Is this normal behaviour for a mother?

[Barbaro]

Ok let me know if I am just crazy and should just accept my mums demands.

I've recently started seeing a guy, done this before although not to her knowledge as I don't like sharing my private life with her as she then just gossips about it to her friends and lies. I know i cant trust her with secrets hence why I never share any with her either. She doesn't even know that my ex raped me because I know she will tell everyone she knows as its 'good gossip'. I sadly have to live at home as can't afford a flat and am 27.

Any time I go out to see him, she demands to know where I am going and when I will be back home if I miss a text I get calls and voicemails with frankly quite rude messages from her asking where I am yet again. She says its just normal motherly behaviour and that mothers never stop worrying about their kids. I get that, its natural instinct, but to want an update every time I drive my car or go somewhere else? I've never come close to crashing.

Quite obviously I don't have a great relationship with her. The most we bond over now is my horse as she helps me with him a lot but that's about it. She has never been that proud of me, usually comments on how I need to wear make up more like her friends daughter does and she's never said I am pretty. She either clearly doesn't trust me to be allowed out (dunno how since I've never done anything bad in my life?) and I can't be trusted to drive home at night (yet she's the one who nearly crashes all the time in daylight).

I get it too I live under her roof, but this just seems abnormal and does to anyone else I know, but none of them are parents. What do you think?

OP that's awful. I used to check the DC remembered their key before they went out and asked them to text if they decided to stay out/sleep at friends just so I knew but otherwise I'd feel I was suffocating them.

From mum experience, it's not normal behaviour.

I lived at home until I was 24 and came and went as I pleased. If mum ever asked where I was going, it was rare and only out of interest or in case she needed something picked up and I might have been going nearby.

Generally, I'd let her know out of courtesy if I was staying out so she could double lock the door, but if I forgot, she'd just text saying "home or away?" And that was it. No questions. Not because she doesn't care about me, but because she knows I was sensible and didn't need babysitting.

Have a look at the website 'daughter's of narcissist mothers' to see if any of it rings true for you

That's not normal at 27, you are an adult and free to come and go as you please. The abuse about your appearance shows a callous disregard and disrespect for your feelings. The fact you don't trust her tells me you are in an emotionally abusive relationship and your mother sounds like a narcissist. It is toxic behaviour to use her own child's plight as gossip and that is not normal parental loving compassionate behaviour.

Get the book toxic parents by Susan forward - you will find your mother in that book.

You are unhealthily enmeshed with her and she does not want to let you individuate away as a separate independent adult and she will continue treating you like an infant until you learn to put healthy boundaries in, very difficult to do while living there.

You should make plans to move out and become independent ASAP.

As a mother with an adult dd living at home, I must say why do you live at home if you don't like your mother? It is all very well people saying that your mother is not normal, whatever that means, but she isn't getting any choice about having you in her house, is she? And now she is being called toxic and abnormal. Just move out. If you can afford a car and a horse, you can afford to pay rent and give your mother a bit of space.

I agree Atenco, my children are older teens and so my expectations of them are very different right now, but I'd be pretty pissed off if they expected to live in our family home, come and go as they please and complain about me.

OP fundamentally if you want your mum to treat you as an adult you need to behave like an adult and find your own home. Do you not have friends living in shared houses? That's what everyone I know did/is doing after graduation (none of them have cars or horses though).

Totally agree too Attenco

The OP is 27 and still choosing to have her independently unachievable lifestyle financially and practically subsidised by her mother for the foreseeable future. Her plans in how to support herself are merely vague hopes of gaining a promotion that pays enough.

I see that a lot in the horse world, people valuing horse ownership above being an independent adult. They buy a horse before they can afford to fund it and support themselves and then justify their continued lifestyle choice as being because they have a quirky horse that nobody else in the horse world could cope with so they can't possibly sell or get in a sharer!

As someone now 20 years or so older, I get comments about how lucky I am and obvious envy at being able to comfortably buy what I want when actually they've had riding lessons since they were a foetus paid for by mummy and daddy, then bought their first horse when decades younger than me because I made sacrifices to be financially sound whilst they chose to be subsidised by their parents yes this has hit a nerve and it pisses me off

I think I can understand the OP a bit better. Yes, buying the horse was no doubt a mistake and arguably irresponsible if she had to rely on her mother's funding. But now the horse is here and she does not believe its wellbeing could be guaranteed if she were to sell it. She feels responsible for it. Seems pretty understandable to me.

If I were the OP, I would do everything I could to save in all other areas of life: not go out, drive as little as possible, anything I could think of to get away from home. But I probably would feel responsible for the horse.

I accept the point about the horse at least partially.

However, talk about buying a property first I think is a little crass given that for mine and the op's generation ('generation rent') buying a property is not likely to be something we will be able to do. The only person of my generation who I know who owns a house, even in the north where I live and where housing is cheaper, bought the house with his trust fund as he is from an aristocratic family.

My sister who is a psychiatrist and married has to rent, my brother who has a PHD and is married to a teacher had to rent...

The other point I wanted to make is that it can take a while to really realise your mother is toxic and that you need to be away from her, I think most people have a reasonable expectation of support from family when they have been through something as awful as rape and it is horrendous when your family is toxic and you have to deal with them as well as the trauma.

But now the horse is here and she does not believe its wellbeing could be guaranteed if she were to sell it

So you put it on loan or offer an opportunity for a sharer so the cost and chores are shared. This often happens in the horse world. She says it's a talented horse that's a poor doer. Sport horses often are so that's not unusual.

Forget the horse.

Why is this young woman unable to confide in her mother that she has been raped?

It's very sad that you can't trust your own mother.
Poor you.

It's not that uncommon though.

I wouldn't confide in my mother either, and I certainly wouldn't live with her. Sometimes that's how it goes. It's a bit sad but you have to accept how people are, the OP's mother is highly unlikely to change and so she needs to seek support networks elsewhere and not to put herself in a position where she is in too close proximity to someone she finds so difficult. Recognising that is a choice is I think a first step.

I think if you don't enter into an adult independent life then it's not unusual for the dynamics to fall back to teenager/parent disfunctionality.

I also slightly wonder what else is going on in this relationship. Does the OP make an equal contribution to the household, what conversations have been had about both the current set up and the future etc. It's possible that the parents may not be happy that they've not been able to move on either (I know a few resentful parents of boomerang children, I don't think it's easy to get right).

Personally I would get rid of the car before a pet, but those are my priorities.

The OP's mother may be far from perfect, but I don't see why she has to live with someone who doesn't like her.

Atenco I so much agree with you. I would find it very hard to turn a grown up child off the doorstep I have found my DC of similar age to be expecting MUM to provide to orders (from DC) and to stay quiet otherwise. I actually have it in writing that I am not a good mother because I was disappointed by the financial failure and that many people of her age are totally reliant on parental money. I am also told DC is an adult. The pressure on me to provide has cause me so much anquish. DC is adult with school child. I sympathise with OP mum. She is being talked about disparagingly to strangers on here yet it is demanded that Op mum provides for DD and horse!

Not normal at all. Extremely controlling and no boundaries.

My children are all in their late teens and early twenties.

When they go out they tell me who they're going to see, and roughly when they'll be home, because we've decided together that I need to know those things in case there's an emergency. If they're going to be late they'll let me know. But I certainly don't check up on them or send them rude messages if they don't answer my texts. That's not right at all.

Your mother's way out of line here. But you can't change her. All you can do is get out of that house. She's dragging you down.

If you expect your mother to subsidise you to afford a car and horse then her house her rules. Batty as they are.

Of course you can ensure you sell your horse to someone who will treat it well. That's a silly excuse because you don't want to. You want the horse, the car and your own flat. Don't we all! Be realistic. Sell horse. Flatshare. Get a second job. You sound like you think you are entitled to these things. Your not. Time to start acting like an adult. You're 27 ffs. Your mother is barking, so stop using her and get on with your life as an adult!

no it doesn't sound normal.
If I had an adult child at home, I might ask for a text or call to let me know they are not coming in, but I wouldn't be hassling them for it.

If you want to be treated like an adult then stop acting like a child - move out into a house/flat share, you don't need your own flat. If you want to live in a catered hotel then move into one.

Some very harsh comments here along the lines of 'grow up and get over it'. When you have a mother like this, who sees you as a child, who is critical and demanding, who cannot be trusted with intensely personal and painful information, it messes with your head somewhat! You do get stuck in 'child' mode and are often enmeshed with your parent well into adulthood.

OP is clearly becoming aware that all is not 'normal' and is thinking about moving out. Give her a chance! I think this is an excellent plan OP. No it's not ok for your mother to want to know every detail about your life, and to be so cold and critical and unsupportive. It's not uncommon, but it's not 'normal' either and you don't have to accept it. Moving out and putting some physical and emotional distance between you is vital for your wellbeing

I agree with everything joysmum just said.
I would be pissed off if my daughter put horse ownership ahead of moving into her own property (she isccurrently having lessons )
Sort out your living situation before worrying that no one in the horse world is as capable as you at looking after him (plenty are by the way)