A safe place for people with crap mothers, in the run up to mothers day

[pocketsaviour]

Last year I remember feeling very conflicted on mumsnet around the whole mothers day deal.

Lots of threads inviting "Share the best lesson your mum has taught you!" and when I replied "how to take a punch from your dad" it was a bit of a mood killer :(

So this is a safe place for all of us with damaging mothers to freak the fuck out make plans for M-Day which will keep ourselves sane and healthy.

I've recently gone NC with my mum. It was the straw that broke the camels back and i feel so much better now, like free and as if the weight of the world isn't on my shoulders any more.

Always makes me a bit sad.

I heard a guy on the radio today talking about how he chronicled his mother's life when she was 80 (him 60 ish I guess) and he said it brought them closer together, and he also said "if you can imagine getting closer to your mother" (or similar).

Well, I can't, no. But for the opposite reason to his!

My MD gift to myself is to not spend the day with my mother. She has already told me today that she will kill herself & then I will be sorry. It's all water off a ducks back now as she says it quite regularly.

Another one here. Like V.Day (used to be my wedding anniversary), it is a non-day for me.

No doubt I'll get an email at some point telling me how awful a daughter I am.

I've been an awful daughter since I was born. Might as well fulfill her expectations of me.

I know this is a Father's Day card, but it would have done for either of my parents (I wasn't quite passive-aggressive enough to send it)

WellWhoKnew I'm also waiting for the dreaded email. I expect it to inform me that I'm making her ill and sick to her stomach as she constantly wracks her brains as to what she might have done to deserve the coldness I have towards her, why I won't make time to phone her etc etc. Last time I got one of these emails she apparently had had a cancer scare and her doctor told her it was probably the stress she'd been under due to my treatment of her that had brought it on

She has honestly had such far reaching consequences on my self esteem that I'm going to seek counselling. I have no idea what I might have been/achieved if I hadn't grown up feeling like absolute worthless crap every day. I'm only 31 but I am exhausted by years of worry and self-loathing.

I did find a generic card in Scribbler today- blank inside and just 'Happy Mother's Day' on an inoffensive floral front. She can have that- the fallout from me not marking the 'occasion' at all isn't worth it for me at the moment, but I'm hoping to be a bit stronger one day.

I send the token christmas, birthday and MD cards but other than that i try and get it very low contact.

Just the other day i was told i was a horrible mum and that when my children grow up they will realise what a horrible mum I am. Honestly, my DM has selective amnesia! Myself and my sibling endured an horrendous childhood with her; abusive alcoholic and possible narcissist. I think she definitely views her children as an extension of herself.

She even had the absolute audacity just after my DD was born to make a malicious allegation against me to SS! I honestly don't know how a mother could act the way she did and still does.

Constant abuse, snide comments, threats etc. Physical and emotional abuse when younger. I'll send a card but it be purely perfunctory. I can't stand the bitch

My relationship with my mother is fine, but my relationship with my father on the other hand... I feel very lucky that there isn't as much emphasis on fathers day, which allows me to plead forgetfulness most years - other years I do send a "happy fathers' day" card - but like other people have said, I always avoid the "World's Best".

Op this thread was a good idea! Those adverts on tv have really been grating on me as they do each year.

However this year is different - I'm pregnant, it gives me real hope in that I can change the cycle. I don't have to be like her as a previous post said - she taught me how NOT to be a Mother.

I am looking forward to spending Mother's Day with my little girl when she is here.
Does having your own child make Mother's day easier in general posters? I really hope so.

DanyellasD: I often look at people I know and wish they could have been my mother.

I do this too! I also try to be the mother that I wanted to my son.

Personally, I've found having a child makes Mother's Day and every other day harder as I see the love and attention I give her and wonder what I did so wrong to not have that love myself.

This will be my first NC mothers day
Until now I've made minimal effort, sent a none gushy card and some flowers
This year I'm focussing on my DC
I feel a sense of relief that I don't have to put myself through the pleasantries

glue I think some people just aren't cut out to be parents unfortunately. I like to use her shitness to encourage me to be the best mother I can

Brilliant thread pocket

I'm a mum, so Mother's Day is now mine as I'm nc with M.

My son is making a fuss of me this year and excited to do so, it's the best thing ever.

But yes, it hurts. Olly I can only imagine how conflicted you must be. Hoping it passes soon.

A huge hissy hug for everyone who needs one!

glue often it's when we see normal love that it shines a massive spotlight on the discrepancies in our understanding of what love is when it comes from people who are supposed to love us, but fall short.

User, you are exactly the reason I don't have a great relationship with my mum. All this 'entitled to adoration' just because you're their parent is bullshit. You earn it. No wonder they don't spend a lot of time with you, probably can't hack all your passive aggressive comments

I'm in. My Mum is appalling. Simply no idea about love, support or even kindness. Like many on here her lack of feeling has been thrown into sharp relief by having children of my own. I sometimes get quite teary when lovely moments remind me of all I never had.

She shouted and raged at me for bringing her a little posy from church on mothering Sunday when I was five. Always told me I was ugly, stupid, would never amount to much. I could go on and on. The cruelty. The emotional neglect. Trampling on all my hopes and dreams.

Recently she came back from (a very flash) holiday with presents for my daughters (8 and 11). They aren't spoiled and don't expect anything much, but really:

shower hats and a teabag from the hotel room?!!!

This will be my 4th Mother's Day since going NC with my mother. It will be my 2nd since becoming a mother though and that makes it very special, I'm 9 months pregnant too so might even have a new baby by Sunday as well. Knowing how much I love my son and my unborn child has really hammered home how little I was cared for by my own parents. They don't love me and I don't love them, my mother especially is horrible. I'm just glad these days that I don't have to make nice by buying cards and things for Mother's Day, which just used to make me anxious and resentful.

Hugs for everyone with crap mothers, especially when there is so much 'your mother is your best friend' bollocks on Facebook and the like at the moment that it's difficult to ignore.

I just want to send all of you xx

I'm supporting my mum through being NC with her mum (am also NC now) She shielded us as children from a lot of psychological / emotional bullshit from my Nan which I only saw as an adult once she decided she didn't have to 'sugarcoat' everything.

Sending strength and love to all of you. being NC is a hard & guilt ridden road to tread, but (imo) is the best way of helping you to deal with what is a shitty situation.

So sorry to all those who've experienced abuse from their mothers.

I'm v low contact with mine. She wasn't directly abusive but favoured my sister and scapegoated me and didn't and still doesn't accept/acknowledge that my father was abusive (to all of us but inc me sexually). Has admitted staying with the abusive arse for lifestyle/financial reasons.

I haven't organised anything yet. Will be a non-gushy card and generic gift. Which she will say thanks for but will then gush over my sisters no doubt ott card & gifts & declarations of how 'amazing' our mother is. Brother will do something in between the 2 as usual, sitting on the fence.

I'm NC with my mother. She is a vile woman who peddles lies about me. She's always the one that's hard done to. Always the one that's in the right. She has a very selective memory regarding the physical and emotional abuse that she put me through. What she does 'remember' she justifies by saying rhat i deserved it. Mothers day only makes me realise how little she cared about me. A part of me will forever be the 15 year old girl who realised she couldn't get into her house because her mum had changed the locks on her. And her mum stood in the window watching with a smile.

Funnily enough she sent me a card for my birthday last December. I should have thrown it away but i didnt. I chucked it in a box and forgot about it. 2 days ago I found it and opened it. It said 'To a Lovely Daughter'. But I don't feel like a lovely daughter. She didn't make me feel like a lovely daughter with all her name calling and abuse and now lies about me.

I know it's part of her game. I know it's one of her tactics. She never contacts me otherwise. She never asks after the grandchildren. I had a baby 4 weeks ago that she hasn't acknowledged.

I won't send a card this mothers day.

I will feel guilty

Lessons my mum taught me:

Nothing I experience is real.

My feelings about this fact don't matter.

Whatever she or my dad do to me or my dcs, I am to blame.

Whatever they do or say, they will find a way to justify it. This means they are not to blame.

Despite the above, despite all appearances to the contrary, they love me and only want the best for me and the dcs. This is true because they say it is and no contradiction of this statement will be tolerated.

I might print this out and put it on the fridge.

gaaah

Sounds exactly like my mother!

mistermagpie congratulations on your impending new arrival! How wonderful if your new baby arrived on Sunday but I'm sure you'll be just as excited whenever it happens!

graphista your situation sounds very similar to mine. In my case I ended up asking a teacher for help when I could see he had started grooming my younger sister. So then it was my fault that the family broke up. My fault that he took her to the cleaners in the divorce settlement. My fault that she then had to get a job to pay the bills. My fault he didn't pay maintenance.

She still won't accept that he was gearing up to abuse my sister. "Don't be silly, he would never have done that. He didn't even like her"

I do have my own DS (in fact her appalling treatment of him was the catalyst for me going NC.) He is an adult and unfortunately not in work at the moment and living away from me, but coincidentally I am driving up to his city on Sunday and we'll probably just go out for a walk to our favourite park. I always tell him not to waste money on a card or present because a) it's a made up holiday to make money for card and gift manufacturers and b) he tells me and shows me all year round that he loves me.

For me this year I am allowing myself to feel sad and to grieve for the mother I wish I had had, but also reminding myself that the fault lies with her and not me. I am not unlovable. I was the victim of my childhood, not the villain. And while I have made mistakes as any parent does, I am the best mum I can be to my DS and he knows that my love for him is not conditional.