Estranged daughter

[Serendip16]

My much loved daughter and her family are estranged from me. I am a widow, living alone. She is a very wealthy young woman and a lifestyle only few could dream of, over the years she distanced herself from me, making comments about my fading looks and dress sense, I answered back at first, I have always looked after myself and consider I dress well, but not top designer, when I visited she made herself absent or started to vacuum, I was only there half an hour, perhaps once a month, any invite to my home had been refused, house too small, but I had bought her up here, had her engagement party for about 40 people here. Whenever I said something she thought I was getting at her, so
Last Christmas I was ill, she said I had bought it on myself and has not made contact. I did not see her or her family and felt alone and like giving up. I waited to see if she would get in contact but she never has, she moved home and didn't tell me. I am asking you for advice, knowing she doesn't want me, have any of you just outgrown your mom? I love her and her family so much and each day hurts. If I got in touch you would just shout at me again. I made a new will and until I got to solicitors I was going to cut her out and leave my home and everything to grandchildren, but once there I couldn't, I love her, she is my daughter, doesn't need the money but I felt mean considering it. I cry everyday for her and lost confidence, other friends have their families. She once said to me, don't expect me to care for you when
you are old, I don't know why she SA id it, it was me caring for her and looking after her home and family whilst she was always away.
From a young persons point of view, can you imagine that baby who means the world to you, turning on you. What would you do? Am I just being selfish. I loved my mom, couldn't have hurt her, but know it's not the same now. She has a new life, should I just face facts that I don't fit in. If you thing I am out of order in my expectations, tell me, I want the truth.

I have friends and other family, whom I love, but I love my daughter too. The will was never mentioned, just some thing that needed updating as my circumstances changed. I know you haven't the whole picture, that would take too long. Can see that several of you have cut off mothers that you consider as draining. I hope your children are not so judgemental, perfection is something easily attained, we all make mistakes, but most of us do care. Doesn't every mother love their child whatever age they are? How do you switch off feelings, but it appears that some daughters cannot be happy with a mother that falls short in some way, which I obviously have. You have me as some controlling, self pitying lonely old woman, but I asked for the truth and I got it, thank you it has helped. Thank you to those kind replies, it takes all sorts. The message seems to be, let it go if I want her happy, which I guess I knew anyway, didn't like to admit it.

Sadly, although I never cut her off completely, my alcoholic mother would have written something very similar.

I think what people are saying is there's obviously a reason for your dd going nc maybe threads on here about families struggling with family behaviours and going either low contact or nc. I think you need to look objectively in your role in here and how you may have affected this relationship aswell as your dd.

Mrs Knightly. How is that the ramblings of an alcholic woman. It makes me wonder if you ever knew an alcholic, because the one that I knew couldn't string two sentences together, he was usually rambling and full of the joys of Spring if he had a drink in him, then verbally abusive and being sick when he hadn't, so you got off lucky by the sounds of it.

are you sure she was alcholic? Very puzzling.

Daughters do not cut off their mothers for not being perfect or for falling short in some way. We do it as a last resort after a lifetime of hurt and not being heard. In my case the one thing needed to re-establish contact is a genuine acknowledgement that she has caused me pain. That's all it would take. But it'll never happen.

so you got off lucky by the sounds of it.

And there's your issue.

A complete lack of empathy and no filter.

And there it is.

What you've done you will probably know deep down inside.
If she's not ready to have contact then let it go. Seems like you've done all you can and let her make the next step.

Wow. Your last update has revealed a lot OP.

Sometimes you have to accept that your adult children aren't nice people. It's hard to accept when your own child or parent turns against you.

I think her inability to name one thing (that irritates her) is telling.

I'll be honest here.... I love my mum dearly, there are irritations, but I think that's down to old age.

She takes ages to tell a story...sge repeats stuff...she closes her eyes when she's taking...which I think is to help her recall things .... and she always wants to know what's going on.

However I would never let those things affect our relationship. I love her no matter what ...she's left her business to stay a month with me when I had my children.

Unless your daughter has mental issues ...irritations alone will not cause her to do this.

BTW ... leave your money to your grandchild.

Not to be all doom and gloom but, I'd also make some funeral arrangements for yourself, because she doesn't care and may not even attend.

Confide in a close friend to do this. If you have nieces, nephews, or cousins then make them aware. They may be the ones who have to bury you.

I am in the middle of a situation where my cousin has gone nc with her mum.

I am not suggesting it is the same in your own case OP but it has certainly brought dynamics to the fore.
At the start i was confused as to why she would go nc with my aunt who has always been a sweetheart to me and i had only ever seen her as a kind soul. My cousin was very respectful about her mum and didnt go into any real detail etc.

My aunt was really upset and down over this do i took my mum and her away as a treat for a city break. I saw a completely different controlling, spiteful, selfish side to her.

My cousin has shown me the texts and letters her mum sent her before and after she went nc. I was shocked, certainly not what my aunt had said happened.

When i tried to gently suggest to my aunt that she may have a part to play and may have things to suggest, she was horrible. Vicious and nasty. She has told people that i was horrible to her, despite witnesses to our whole conversation correcting her. Her version is drastically different and she sticks by that.

It has been enlightening to see how people cannot see any responsibility for how things end up.

I am not saying that is the case for you OP.

OP,

I do sympathise and I believe there's so much projection here.

If mother's can be awful, surely daughters can too right?

I'd invest in other relationships.

Ha.
Sorry, I'm another one that can smell a constantly trotted out victim narrative at a hundred paces.
My extremely close friend does this to her daughter. Oh woes is me, she treats me so badly, I just love her so much, how can she treat me like this? Etc etc etc. She is an extremely intelligent alcoholic with borderline personality disorder and her daughter has had to go NC after years of emotional blackmail and emotional abuse, in order to protect her own mental health from the danger posed by her own mother. If your idea of an alcoholic is based on incoherence and an inability to frame an argument, then you may wish to examine your either your drinking or your world experience, as your either extremely naive or in denial.
Your rhetoric is extremely dangerous, op.
I'm also projecting based on the similarity of your victim narrative to that of my lovely, but extremely damaged friend. Her daughter is right to be NC. . Sometimes our children have tried for years to maintain contact out of guilt and obligation, but sometimes it is to the detriment of their own mental health. I support the rights of daughters to look after their own mental health.
Reading your posts, I am very wary. I suspect your dd's version would be very different.

Mm hmm

There are so many damaged young women on here, no mother should make their daughter feel like that. Not all mothers are cruel manipulators and to say that most are estranged because of that is not right. It is easy putting a general label on people without knowing the facts. It is always better to be a little kinder than necessary, what I said to Mrs Knightly was true, an alcholic changes personality when they have a drink, can become physically and verbally very abusive., anyone coping with life with one dreads the key in the lock, you cannot judge them it's like an illness, but hard on their loved ones that tests love to
the limits as all addiction does. Going no contact is control and the ultimate weapon like sending people to Coventry or Ghosting, but says more about the one doing it. Sorry for all of you genuinely hurting, you are coping as best you can.

It's hard not to project when you have been on the receiving end of these types of parental missives written from the "victim" parent to the "ungrateful bratty" child when you know it's a manipulative load of crap.

I think if you don't know why your daughter is behaving like this to you then there are major issues you are not facing up to. You need to have an open discussion. And perhaps longer term counselling between you both. I bet your daughter has a strong side to this story as well.

Unfortunately, if a 'child' wants to break contact with its mother, there has to be something very very wrong in the relationship. Nobody cuts off from a normal loving relationship with their mother, even a somewhat annoying or trying relationship. The mother came first and is parent to the child, so what went wrong cannot be a total mystery to you, and has to be a lot to do with you. Sorry to be blunt. As others have pointed out, it is likely you have been told many times by your daughter what the problem is for her, but were you listening?

Are you prepared to hear your daughter's feelings, and really take account of them without justifying yourself? If so, if she would meet you, you could ask her, but you will need to listen and not come back with the usual responses, otherwise nothing will change.
This happened with my mother, we met in a neutral place and tried to resolve our differences with the help of a mutual friend, but she just could not respond beyond her own feelings, leaving me feeling I was very secondary to her needs.
You do sound very unhappy, so I hope you can take some positive steps to resolve this. My gut feeling is that your daughter is also unhappy. Even if you both need to go low contact, it would be better all round if you could work out how together. Good luck.

Going no contact is control and the ultimate weapon like sending people to Coventry or Ghosting, but says more about the one doing it.

No. It isn't and it doesn't. It is the last resort in order to protect oneself from an impossibly toxic relationship. Read these boards - the heartache in making the decision to go NC is terrible.

You see this as something that your daughter is doing to punish you which comes back yet again to the 'poor you' narrative. Until you understand that it is probably the very last thing that your daughter wished and that the correct response is 'my poor, poor daughter, how did I drive her away' then nothing will ever change.

OP, the person I do not wish the person I am no contact with any ill and I don't want to punish them. But any contact leaves me in pieces, and for the sake of my mental well being I can't have them in my life.

Thank you User, of course you are right. I would love to meet up and put right any issues she has with me, but I think it's past that. I just want contact, but deep down I know she is happier now than with me in her life. You all say she must have told me, but despite going over and over again, I can't think what, so can't put it right, I know I have to accept her decision, it seems that the view of most posters on here that it almost constitutes harassment on my part not to take notice of her feelings and leave her alone. I think the people on here that have gone no contact feel better because if it. I just know I couldn't, but there again I loved my parents and though I didn't always think the same way accepted it.,Somewhere along the line I got it wrong with my daughter and I have never come across it before it happened to me, but see there are many in my shoes, which somehow don't feel do alone making a mess of things. I have to concentrate on those that do care for me as I now appreciate that this step is quite common now.

I've been estranged from my daughter for over a year now, I had counselling to get past the hurt and to try to understand the reasons
It started with me calling time on my unhappy relationship with her step father, we were not happy together and spent over 30 years in what seemed like a 'stay together for the sake of the children scenario'

When I found the courage to end it, he had a nervous breakdown and my daughter saw this strong, kind man, broken. They had been like father and daughter for 30 years and I became the horrible woman who made him crumple
She supported him, there was no support for me, once when I was very upset she told me to 'man up' and move on, she said she only had enough in her to support one of us

I tried to understand and slowly over the last couple of years, I have regained my confidence, gone back to work, moved away from the area and bought my own house. I'm busy, I have many friends and really enjoy my life
I had to do this for my self preservation

She is his confidante, friend and step daughter in one, I really miss her because before this we were so close, a very loving funny family unit
Not now, I am the odd one out, my birthday comes and goes, as will Christmas this year, they have it planned already, they holiday together and put the odd photo on social media, she is now good friends with his new partner, all this hurts but I accept it

I'm just so sad that she cut me out, BUT, when she needs a new car, holiday, cash to start up a new business, cash for doing up her home,
I feel know why her loyalties lie where they do
My ex is a very clever man

And no, before anyone shouts me down, I'm not bitter, I accept what's happening, I don't like it and it's certainly not any of my business, but it is what it is now and nothing will change that, it hurts me to the core
Maybe in time to come it could be ok again but it's very sad to know that it ended up like this

Imbroglio,can see where coming from, sorry you have experienced such trauma, you have to protect yourself.

Maybe you could write to her and say what you have written here, and that if at any time she wants to contact you to talk, the door is open.
However the problem with this might be that you go on hoping rather than moving on in your mind. Its really a difficult balance. Wish you well.

OP - if your daughter were to put her side of the story on here, what do you think it would be based on things that she has said to you?
Be honest - no-one here can give you advice unless we have a true picture. Even if you totally deny any truth in her accusations, what are they?