Can we have a thread for those of us who are daughters with difficult mothers?

[PinkyofPie]

Been thinking about starting this thread for a while.

My mother is a difficult and sometimes toxic woman and we have a strained relationship.

I think IRL there's not enough people around like me, all my friends are best friends with their mums. My mum recently moved back to the area and all I get is "oh I bet you're so happy". Actually, no, her being closer is awful if I'm honest.

There's so much to my relationship with her, too much for an OP.

A huge bone of contention is that she knows about a family member sexually harassing me quite badly through my teens (I've posted details in another name). I'm talking flashing, suggestive language and grabbing me now and again when no one was looking. I have told her the details. This person is still very much in her life, she bigs him up to anyone who listens and can't understand why I despise him and won't be near him. She minimised his behaviour massively and We Don't Talk About It.

She also made comments along the lines of "well did you lead him on?" yes mum, I was 16 and he was 55, I was gagging for it with a relative.

being in her presence is very tiring. She has no friends so I feel pressured to see her now she's back near me. I met her today, and I am drained. I always feel like I've done something wrong, she's in a constant mood. Everything is crap, she hates any food we eat, complains about people nearby and won't look for the good in anything. Where she lived before was so much better apparently. Spending just a few hours round that negativity is exhausting.

The funny thing is she makes out to others like we extremely close. A daughter of her friend - who I had just met that night - once said to me "I'm so jealous about the bond you and your mum have"

Anyway I know MN has lots of people who feel the same so thought I would start by having a place for us long suffering daughters to share, moan, vent and generally get everything out into the open!

I agree that it's making me a better mother ( I hope!!) dd is 20 and I think we have a really good relationship, far better than the one I have with my mother, but maybe dd would say differently? I'd hope not tho, and we talk, and she knows about the difficult relationship I have with my mother, so I believe I'm learning from her mistakes....
My mother only had me, so when I had dd everything was wonderful, she's the best thing ever ( always has been the favourite), when I had ds (14) she couldn't understand it, who'd want more than 1 child? And a boy??? Good grief, was I mad? She told me to abort.
And now she wonders why ds doesn't particular spend any time with her, she has no idea how to communicate with him at all, and thinks he's lazy ( what 14 yr old boy isn't?!!).
I'm sick of hearing it now,

Name changed - but I'm in.

I've only just started going NC as it has took this long to realise how manipulative and narcissistic she is.

In my teen years the stuff I witnessed I'd never put my children through.

• different men running past me on the stairs/landing entering my mums room or leaving
• going down in the middle night for a drink and seeing strange men in the kitchen
• men washing their cocks in the sink before/after fucking my mum
• walking in on her fucking (Kitchen, Living Room , Dining room table)
• men sorting out drugs while she'd sit there half naked laughing and helping

I have a memory when she split from another husband and she was threatening an over dose and got me the youngest child to ring my dad and tell him " to see his reaction" my dad told me to phone an ambulance and he's not getting involved. My mum wailed how he was a failure and nobody wanted her. Bare in mind my mum and dad hadn't been together for over ten years at this point.

She bangs on how she was a single mum raised X amount of children by herself... Thing was once we all hit 11/12 we fended for ourselves.

She has a mob mentality, like if we had a dispute it wouldn't just be me vs her it would be me vs her and the siblings. She also has this " us against the world " mentality aswell which was depressing when younger.

The amount of our friends that would stay once and never come back because they heard my mum having sex or seen her having sex was mortifying
(The sex sounds where something else very porn like, she'd enter the bedroom and within 10 seconds would be screaming the place down with how their " an amazing fuck " " she's gonna cum " "fuck her harder with that big cock" )

The amount of times we moved house because of failed relationships ( 15 houses in 17 years!)

She thinks she can say whatever she wants without no repercussions
In the past month

• I'm a cold hearted bitch
• ive never been there for her
• I'm a let down

My own wedding she dressed like a slapper, and when people pointed out her in appropriate wedding attire she told them all Theyre jealous they havent got a body like hers
The "speech" for my wedding didn't mention me just how she was a single mum and mentioned my siblings!

and I'm now two weeks into NC and I can't tell you the relief I am experiencing. My DH couldn't understand how it took me so long to run for the hills.

I believed I was a good daughter I did everything j could, I'd ring up companies to sort out her debt and get a payment plan going only too find out weeks later she'd taken another credit card out to go and get Botox, lip fillers , eyebrows tattooed and an outfit.
I'd be on the end of the phone when she sobbed and sobbed how the worlds Against her.

Yet never once was she there for me. I remember telling her I was pregnant and her words were " stupid girl. He won't stick around"
I miscarried a few days later her words of wisdom
" good job. He wouldn't of stuck around"

I tried so hard, but she just failed as a mum.

Itried,
I think your story is by far so upsetting I can't describe disgust I feel for your so called mother. Good on you for cutting her out of your life, she doesn't deserve children.
Don't feel guilty forgoing NC, she doesn't feel guilty for not giving you good childhood

I feel like there's 3 people inside my head since going nc and they won't stop arguing. Ladybird#1 is relieved and happy that there's been no contact, apart from the shouty call, and hopes it continues forever. Ladybird#2 also wants no contact but is very angry and upset and getting it and wants to scream 'I'm your fucking daughter, you know how upset I am, how the fuck can you let me go so easily, why aren't you fighting for me?'

Ladybird#3 is taking bets on if/when there will be an attempt at contact. The odds have an attempt at a sickly sweet Christmas day phone call as most likely, with no regard to how it might upset and spoil the day.

Fucking hell itried, you are well out of that. What a waste of space your mother is.

Bumping for advice.
After not seeing my mum for 5 weeks because of the way she spoke to me, I phoned her tonight. She started going on at me straight away - asked me why I hadn't visited her, I was honest and said because I didn't want to (because of the way she had treated me). End result of the phone call is that I now feel very upset because she is such an unpleasant person, and she's not happy that I won't abide by her rules.
I don't know what to do, I have 2 sisters telling me I am being unreasonable, and that "she won't be here for ever".
Any advice?

Jumping on the band wagon. My mum is an in-denial alcoholic who, although has not been the worlds worst mum, is definitely not great. And is just down right awful after a drink.

Lost this thread. Thought I had it 'watched'... but apparently not (although I do now).

Does anyone else have a mother who thinks that they (as in, us, the daughters) don't actually have their own lives to run... or is it just mine?!

My mother has a puppy. He's... actually he's a pain in my arse, not hers. Don't get me wrong, he's very sweet. But he spends more time in my home, than hers. She informed me this morning that I'm having him for four days this week. Yep: "informed me". Didn't bother to ask, or check if it was okay, just told me. And when I said that I wasn't having him today (which would have made it five days out of seven this week), got told that I had "nothing else to do with [my] time!".

Nope, of course not... I lead the Life of Riley, don't you know?!

Yes, I'm at home all day - but I work from home. Which I can't do with a puppy plaguing the life out of my elderly dog and cats. And today? Today was my first day to myself in almost two and a half months - because my DS went back to school today (I'm a single parent). So it was deep clean the house after the holidays time. When we look after the puppy, it also interupts my dog's schedule of walking - because, even though the pup's had his jabs... he's a breed that apparently can't be walked, due to damaging his joints (although with the amount of racing around and jumping he does, I'm not sure it'd make much difference if he had a short walk, to be brutally honest!). And he chases my son's chickens, which means they can't go out in their run on the lawn - because he does nothing but yap at them. She's refusing to train him, because he "doesn't listen to [her] at all" - and she gets shirty at me when I point out that's because he's here, more than he is there... but she won't let me train him, because he's her dog. And when my dog tries to pull him into line, in front of her - she tells me that my dog (who is trained, mind, and is ridiculously gentle) "needs a good smack to show him who's boss!". Which... no. Just... no. My dog knows I'm in charge, thanks, without violence or threats. Yet when he responds to a hand signal in front of her, she acts like it's the first time he's ever behaved himself.

And why does she expect me to have her pup so often?! Not because she's working... nope. She "voluntarily retired" two years ago. She demands that I have him here, because he interrupts her knitting!!! Oh, and her watching of the soaps and endless antique programmes on Daytime TV...

Did she offer to have my DS for even half an hour over the summer so that I could have some time to myself? Nope. Of course not. But I'm expected to have her 13 week old puppy for days on end, without even being asked what our plans are...

If it wasn't for the fact that I feel ridiculously sorry for the pup, it wouldn't be happening. But this isn't his fault, and I'm planning on talking to the breeder she bought him from about this situation before long. Because whilst I have no problem with animals - I did not plan for a second dog in this house!!!

Sorry. I just needed to get that off my chest before I exploded.

Contrary13
Just refuse to take him in! Stop accommodating her wants.I don't think your situation is as difficult as some others posters(at least from your post)
It might be the case she'll get upset and stop talking to you but you need to develop assertiveness.

I have been trying somewhat successfully to distance M, after getting some great advice and reading other women's experiences here. It is difficult as I hadn't realised how much time and effort I spent dancing around and catering to her moods, whims etc. It was almost 90% of my life was taken up with her which is quite frightening. I have visited her once in the last week and she is feigning illness and I can see she is barely able to talk to me she's so bitter and angry I'm not revolving my life around her.
She has been moaning to my brother about me (regarding my choice of paint for my living room) and I'm re establishing my relationship with him as I realise M was integral in our distance. At least we are talking now, he is still in counselling and I'm awaiting the start of mine.

I am also opening up to a few friends and being quite open generally about her treatment of me, which initially felt weird as whilst I'd joked about her 'ways' I'd never come out with truths. This has been therapeutic so far.
It such a learning curve and I'm glad I'm on this journey, much preferable to the old guilt laden road I used to shuffle along, but I have a way to go.
I keep remembering some previous advice - that someone who loves you and respects you will not expect you to give up your life to pander to them. They don't respect you and they do not value your time. They see your purpose as primarily to serve them.
Another thing I'm remembering if anyone has the same, my M has always been ridiculously competitive with me, from getting a new bed, clothes, hair etc and I always ignored this thinking I was imagining it, but when I look back it certainly wasn't normal behaviour (and still isn't). It wouldn't occur to me to compete with my DD !
Also thanks to all this, am putting more time and energy into DD, and am determined to be the best mum I can be.

Am reading through these and feel in good company. This is the first time I've vented and this comment really resonates with me: "I have found that society is generous to parents who don't like/struggle with their children but the reverse is not tolerated; and hating your mother is pretty indigestible to most people"

My dad was amazing growing up and was a real dad to my half brother who's dad was shite (my dad arranged all contact for him/drove him to his dad's every school holiday and picked him up etc etc). My mum is life's eternal victim - abusive childhood, cheating ex husband etc etc. Although I'm not sure how much of her crap to believe tbh looking back.

She used to tell me about her terrible life in detail as a kid, including how she was raped/abused etc when I was very young (8/9?). She used to constantly bad mouth my dad and call him controlling etc (yes he is quite controlling because she was out of control and somebody needed to ensure me and my brother had some security). She was a raging alcoholic and everything that went wrong was somebody else's fault (usually mean because, Yano, I was such a horrible kid and all...) and I used to find wine bottles and vodka bottles stashed and hidden everywhere, down sofa cushions/glove box of car etc etc.

I was a very independent kid and could never predict what mood she would be in - nice/nasty. I was constantly told how horrid I was etc which went nuclear when I was a teenager. She used to act as if she was scared of me, as if I was some kind of bully for not allowing her to act as a victim around ,e and accept her behaviour without challenging it. We basically didn't speak for years.

My brother has gone almost entirely non contact with all of us because my poor dad is so loyal, any contact with him means she gets brought along too. I've just had my first child and he hasn't even met her yet :( our relationship is totally destroyed.

I can't even quite write down what she does, basically it is the victimness. Everything is done to her, she is this poor innocent abused woman and it's the horrible daughter, the controlling husband, the hundreds of bosses of the jobs she's lost over the years etc that are the problem. She rewrites history to paint herself as the victim, constantly referring to how horrid I was to her when I was a kid. I wasn't horrible, I was a scared teenager that was angry at my alcoholic mother for abusing my lovely dad, for alienating my dad, for behaving as though I was nasty and treating me as such when I hadn't done anything wrong. She also was jealous at how close me and my dad were and how much effort he put into our relationship so would bad mouth me to him or be nasty to him or me so we were afraid to be happy with each other incase she got angry and started drinking again.

A few years ago I had enough and told her I wouldn't put up with being treated as though I was the problem. That I wasn't the problem she was and she needed to get a grip. Things improved for a while but now my daughter has been born she's ramped it up a notch. Telling me to be careful and that I'll know what it's like for her when my dd grows up hating me, being horrid to me as a teenager etc. I'm resisting the urge to scream NO SHE WONT BECAUSE I WONT BE AN ABUSIVE, ALCOHOLIC BITCH TO HER but it'll make it hard for my dad to see us as she will guilt him into not seeing us if I go NC with her, so I put up with her shit. I can't even force myself to smile around her anymore.

Sorry for the ramble... Have never been able to get it out before

Just resurrecting this thread as had a really shitty text from M and I'm seething. I posted earlier about how it is always about her and how she feels, has no care for my life at all. This is what she just sent, bearing in mind, I last spoke to her on Sunday and we live in the same town,

'If you really care a cheery phone call will make me feel less ignored and depressed. Mum'

I've responded with, 'Sorry. I do work all day. Will call in a bit. Just sorting out dinner'.

The thing is I'm not sorry. She drags me down, and I can't deal with her moods and general sense of my whole world revolving around her. Not sure why I'm posting this. Just wanted to rant really!

I would guess if you then called her, she'd have you dancing around the definition of what a "cheery phone call" should be.

I can't stand the "if you cared" passive aggressive assignment of your emotions, though. I probably would have waited a good bit before responding (if at all).