Awful email from my DM

[Toastandstrawberryjam]

I have posted on here a bit before about my marriage and DH moving out. (Can't link on phone - sorry). But basically after 20 years of EA I asked him to leave, divorce is now under way.

From the start my DM was incredibly unsupportive, her first reaction being that it would mess up the seating plan at a family party! Over the last few months she has gone from ignoring me, to telling me I'm overreacting and should have tried to make it work. I told her a few home truths about it all and we settled into a somewhat normal pattern of occasional emails where she just ignored the situation.

She hasn't seen or spoken with my DDs since this all happened.

Anyhow this morning she sends me an email. A long email. It tells me exactly what life on my own will be like. A full detailed awful explanation. The rundown house with no nice furniture. Awful neighbours. DDs going without everything. Never a hope of doing better for myself. Saying goodbye to all the nice things I have.

But not to worry! She has a solution. I need to let DH move back in. We should spend more time together. Have lots more sex. I should stop putting the children first and concentrate on him. It goes on and on and about how great that will be.

She knows that his behaviour was so bad my DDs don't even miss him. In fact they say to me regularly "please don't let daddy come back".

I don't know how to reply to her. I'm utterly broken by this. I never expected support from her, but this is absolutely vile.

The background is one of the reasons I didn't leave DH years ago. She told me if I did I would meet somebody else and I would have to accept if he wasn't nice to my DDs because that was all I could expect.

The terror that somebody else would hit them or worse kept me with DH. Better the devil you know.

I think that what is going on is she cannot allow herself to accept the evilness of what she chose to do to you and put you through and you leaving your husband for being abusive is too challenging to her. she must see you are wrong, failing and suffering in order to justify to herself what she chose to do to you by not leaving her husband.

How she feels though is not your problem. She deserves no free pass because of it.

Just goes to show how unceediably fucked up she is and that you're not!

What sort of mother would want their daughter to be an abusive relationship.

She's just pissed because you've proven yourself to be the woman she never could be and she's trying to appease her own inability to break free.

Bloody hell she sounds just awful. So sorry for what you have been through.

I would agree with not replying to her at all. The nonsense she is spouting doesn't warrant anything except contempt.

Are you ready to type ex or stbex instead of dh?

I am not telling you how to post, I hope it doesn't come across like that, but it might help you to transition him from 'dh' (well, he was never the d but you know what I mean) to ex. gone. out. past.

Toast

It is indeed a wonderful thing to be loved. Sometimes though we have to learn to love ourselves before we can truly show love to others. For your mother to continue to live with a man who abused her daughter show that she had no self-respect or love for herself and therefore none to give anyone else. Don't go looking for love from an empty vessel. Look within yourself and you will find plenty. Give it all to yourself and your children. Accept your mother for who she is and expect nothing from her. You are strong and courageous. Keep going forward.

Momb, PERFECT

I can think of all sorts of things you could say to her (in your position they would be going around my head at 100 mph) but I think you should ignore it.

I also think you should stop seeing her and should cut her out of your life.

You have accepted this awful abusive relationship because it's what you were used to with her and your vile step father. I think you should detach completely from her, get some counselling now to help you with your future relationships and focus completely on your children. Do you have good friends or do you find that after an initial good start, they treat you badly?

She sounds awful and has a very warped sense of what is right.

Personally, I would go NC as whatever you do will not be good enough.

You and your children deserve happiness and all she has done throughout your life is to try and suck it out of you.

IF you do decide to go NC, then you could either quietly slip away not anwser emails, texts etc or you could send her an email and tell her to fuck off and to never contact you again.

She's telling you how she was able to keep her marriage to a child abuser and would-be rapist going. As if you didn't already know that she put him before you when you were a child. When it was her job and responsibility to put you first and keep you safe.

Fortunately you are breaking the cycle of abuse and there is a good chance your girls will never go through what you have. Even if that means no nice furniture (WTF) or even them going without certain things, they are being given far greater gifts than this. Self-respect. Courage. Loyalty.

How she can sleep at night I don't know, but at least you need feel no guilt ignoring her - and that email - to whatever extent you feel is necessary. There is, of course, no point in replying to her - that's what she wants. To suck you back in to the fear and recrimination. You don't acknowledge the truth of anything she has written and she will never see your point of view. There's nothing to be gained from prolonging the 'discussion'.

On some level she hates that you are doing what she was too afraid to. You could do a lot worse than make your mantra in life 'do the opposite of whatever my mother would do'.

Watch out, she may make him her buddy!

It was when my family did this - buddied up to my abusive ex - that I finally went into therapy. And that's when found out what a fucked family I came from - no wonder I'd chosen a hideously abusive husband, it was all i knew.

My family's betrayal was a very painful time for me tho. Acutely painful. Does your mother drink btw? Could be a rambly pissed email. Not excusing her though. She believes women are powerless in the face of abusive men.

Take care

It's not often on here that I really feel like going round to someone's house and implementing The Hemlock Solution but this is one of those rare occasions. What a piece of work.

You've done so well in freeing yourself from her it. Now is the time to keep yourself going forward.

I'd delete the message and ignore it completely. Don't respond because even doing that will suck you back into that sick 'game-playing' and make you think of her. Just imagine that you received a disturbed email from a disturbed stranger because that's all she deserves to be treated as now. Yes it's a sadness but you now have the DDs to raise and try to make happy. That will help.

Huge huge hugs - and kudos - to you, OP, for getting yourself out of an abusive marriage and turning things round for you and the dc.

Your mum is barking. Delete, ignore, don't talk to her about your h again. I'm so sorry.

You and your dc deserve to be happy. You know you've done the right thing - focus on that.

Wow!

Just think about your mother's shit decisions. Think about how you feel about her as a mother, her as a person.

Now think about your own decisions for your dds. Think about how they will know that you always put them first. Always.

You've broken the cycle. You've stood up and protected instead of saying, "it's your job to protect yourself from the people I allow in to abuse you".

I would either not respond at all (ever again)

Or reply with "funnily enough I won't be selling myself to fund a lifestyle the way you did! I'll actually be being a mother to my dds and showing them that they are valued and important. In fact I'm going to be the first person to value me too! Don't ever give me relationship or parenting advice. Your decisions appall me to this day. I will never understand the choices you have made that put me in real physical danger."

You are incredible :) and you deserve lots of these

You are very astute and have perfectly identified that your marriage was just a way to repeat your relationship with your mother growing up: trying desperately to love and to please someone who treats us poorly, and is unpleasable.

You have made the wise decision to chuck your H out. It is time to do the same with your mother.

It will have the same positive results: removing a powerful and toxic person from your life, taking back control, ending a situation in which you feel caught up in trying to please someone who is nasty to you.

Detaching from a parent is done through 2 channels: detaching emotionally, and detaching physically. You will find what combination of things gives you the right kind of distance that feels safe for you.

There are plenty of ways to reduce a toxic parent's impact on our lives and on our emotions: check out the list of resources at the start of the "Stately Homes" threads. There are plenty of books and websites that will make useful reading, and help you change the relationship dynamic.

I don't understand why you want a relationship with this woman, she sounds awful and certainly not someone you'd want around DDs.

Do you think you are strong enough to cut her off? Put her in the same box as ExH. Emotional abusive and not someone who is a positive force in your life. Might as well get rid of them both at the same time and have lots of heartbreak now rather than a lot more in the future.

I would send a brief reply, to close this down. "M, I'm afraid, given your very unhealthy history of relationships and parenting, you are in no position to be giving 'advice' on how to live well. For that reason I will be ignoring it. Please don't send me any more emails like this. They are very unhelpful and I won't be replying to any more.'

I think your reply of "Go fuck yourself" is just about perfect and I can't see any way to improve it.

just read your other posts!

No contact No contact No Contact! Close the door on her as part of the chapter your also closing with your husband.

If you want to send the 'fuck you' email - do so but it will only help her play the victim.

You are a very strong lady - walk away from them both

Agree with Fern. It's your instinctive response for a reason: it states where your boundaries really lie.

You can phrase it differently, of course, if you generally tend not to swear at people and it goes against your values (eg. silence as a response can express the same sentiment, or something PG rated like "Your advice is unwelcome, and I am not taking any of it. Leave me in peace.").

But the general gist of "Go fuck yourself" is sound: it's what you really want to express. Express it your way.

There's no point trying to reason with DM - she's too far gone. Anyway, why should you waste your precious time on that excuse for a person.

I'm staggered by your posts OP. You, on the other hand, are clever, kind and brave. And about to get a much better life.

Massive hugs and congratulations for all you've done.

You are starting a new life, one where you are protecting yourself and your children from emotional and other harm. Your mother is toxic and was not able to do the same for you. I would be concerned about your children having any contact with someone who has demonstrated such appalling judgement. Who knows what damage her words may do to them over the years. You all deserve better. Love your children (and yourself) and ditch the witch, you don't need her in your life.

She doesn't want you to leave your DH because then she has to face up to the fact that you are stronger than her and she doesn't want to feel bad about her crappy choices.
She stayed with your stepdad as she would have lost face if she had left him.

Her attitude may well have contributed to why you put up with EA for so long.

She wants you to feel as bad as she does, for this reason you must marginalise her and ignore all her opinions. She thinks appearances (ie being in a long term relationship no matter how crap is better than being single) are more important than being happy, you have gone the other way.

She is jealous of you and wants you back in your place - don't let her do that, she clearly doesn't see you as a person just something she can talk about and pretend she was a good mother. Her judgement and value system is totally warped and this is why she should be ignored.

Do not reply to your mother's diatribe of hate; if you do it opens up the communication for her to bother you even more. If you reply she knows that she got you. Toxic people like your mother also like nothing more than a) a fight and b) the last word.

Disengage from her totally; emotionally as well as physically. It is no coincidence that you yourself have had an emotional abusive marriage; she groomed you for that.

Radio silence from you must be maintained. I would also delete her e-mail if you have not done so already and block her e-mail address from your account.