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.

My son has cut me, his father and his sister out of his life, he's a drug addict with many issues, he doesn't "do" families.

So many people tell me how terrible it is to never see my son, it isn't, he's living his life and so am I. He's a stranger I gave birth to, he prefers his life with no family commitments, I honour his decision.

Acceptance is the way to go OP, acceptance without blame.

Every one of us who's had to make the choice to go NC with our mother knows that this discussion with the Op is completely pointless. I didn't go NC for shits and giggles, I did it after a lifetime of emotional abuse. When she turned her sights on my children there was nowhere left to go. She'd tell you the same victim story as the Op and absolutely believe it to. She's high functioning BPD with a sprinkling of alcoholic for a nice garnish. She made my life miserable. Like Ellisandra I'd love to be lucky enough to have a proper mum. But I don't, and I'm better off motherless than living at the mercy of the black hole who derives so much joy from ruining me. Nobody's a winner here.

Thanks to all those who understand as well.

My mother was bitter and sarcastic (and occasionally lovely and supportive) when sober - mornings. By lunchtime she became bitter, sarcastic, nasty and aggressive. Her problem with alcohol has had severe repercussions for her children (2 divorced, 2 alcoholics, 1 eating disorder, all depressive). My own children were kept the hell away from her and distance meant contact was very, very limited and she wouldn't travel anyway.

So, my decision to limit contact was driven by a desire to protect myself and my children.

OP, can you see how this might be the case for others?

Ellisander what is wrong with loving you sil? You say you wish you had a mother, you have, just not the one you want, she sounds as if she has mental health issues, perhaps that's why she drinks I know how hard it is living with an alcholic, I couldn't.

I have reread my initial post and yes I sure feel hard done by. Seeing your comments I realise what I am dealing with, the feeling seems to be I deserve it and can do nothing to help the situation, just let her be. Most of you estranged prefer it that way. I am glad I posted.

Do you actually read anyone's posts Serendip16?
She (my mother) sounds as if she has mental health issues? Well - yes. That's why I said in my post that she had.
And no, it's not why she drinks... unless you mean tea? She doesn't drink alcohol.

But no, she's not the mother I would like. My preferred mother would be one that didn't send me poison pen letters. And before you conclude I deserved them, I've only had one, and 2 other siblings have had several each - so I don't think it's my fault.

Would you go no or low contact in my place?

OP The thing I found most difficult about the estrangement from my mother, which I had initiated, was that she made no effort to put things right, presumably because it would have been too uncomfortable for her! She put her feelings above mine, in other words.
I have not picked up on this thread what you have apparently discerned - that you should not approach your daughter. I think you interpret it this way as it suits you better. Why don't you put yourself out to try and improve things with her?

As to what's wrong with loving your son in law.
Of course there's nothing wrong with it.
I told you - it's the pushing every up a notch in terms of drama that caught my eye.

It's very much how my mother would phrase it "I love him like a son". She would never say she liked him, or loved him - it has to be big over blown declarations - LIKE A SON!!!! That's how much I love him. Aren't I wonderful and loving?

Could just be a throwaway comment from you - but in the context of the rest of your posts, it stood out to me.

You really don't get it at all. Most of you estranged prefer it that way?

No, we don't. It's necessary. Most of us are sad about it and would much prefer that we weren't estranged. But we have to make sensible decisions.

OP, you are getting a very hard time from women whose mothers were horrible to them and who therefore assume that that is the reason your daughter is cutting contact.

Hard not to argue back against that - but no winning there as that just comes across as either "rude and dismissive" or you not listening.

Admittedly you confused the details between the posts - Ellisandra's mother didn't drink - that was another poster.

Overall though you got what you asked for. You wanted the views of estranged daughters - and you got them. Most believe that they did it to protect themselves or their families, that their mothers were toxic or generally deserved it. Maybe they did. That does not mean you did/do or that anyone else does.

People move on. In nature offspring grow up and leave. In the old days in many communities offspring left and din't come back. The obsession with the way families are supposed to work now is relatively modern. My own family scattered as we all made our own lives.

You did a good job OP. You raised an independent woman who works, has made money and had a family. Your companionship however should come from your friends. They are of your generation.

Accept it and focus on your own life.

Thanks for your well intentioned advise, I think that I need to let her be, I used to try to speak with her, but she got angry and said she had nothing to talk about, do I don't push it, would be uncomfortable but I would do it, just didn't work for me. Think Mira is right in her general assumptions. Need to focus on what I do have.
Ellisander, I am not like your mother, sorry I said she drank, that was another poster who was very rude, I don't know what I would go in your position, I would want to protect my children foremost. Mental Health has been brushed under the carpet for so long, a shameful thing that no one wanted people to know it happened in their families. Those poisonous letter to you and your siblings would quite rightly cause pain and of co. She is not thinking straight, in some way she became damaged and I don't think there is much help for mental health issues, it used to be just drug them up, keep them quiet. With the right sort of health and counselling I think a lot could be helped, but it doesn't happen. That can't be you with a family to protect. So I think I would think of those times when she did some nice things and think that's the real her, her over dramatisation is part of her problem. At one time people would never admit to Epilepsy in the family, that was a no no, with extra funding and research that has quite rightly changed and no one blinks an eye now. One day that will happen with Mental Health problems, no one chooses to be as they are, a loving family comes before everything and gives you a good foundation for life. Sorry it wasn't like that for you.

women whose mothers were horrible to them and who therefore assume that that is the reason your daughter is cutting contact.

No, those would women whose mothers are in various ways destructive, and who can see the parallels in the way OP posts.

As a 49 year old daughter of a destructive manipulative power hungry fuckwit of a mother, I can see it too. It makes my skin crawl, tbh.

No one expects their mother to be perfect, but a mother who is actively destructive of the psyche of her child is uniquely dangerous and hard to defend against. Most functioning adults have grown a hide against the rest of the world, but a mother is right inside, under the skin, and can pour endless salt into the gaping hole left where her nurturing should have been.

Oh and back she comes.

OP. Why don't you try Gransnet, not the one on here, the real one, where you will get a lot more sympathy, as the demographic is different.

another poster who was very rude Is that me?

Pretty sure I have been open, honest and clear but not rude at all.

OP, this just broke my heart, I had to reply. I’m so sorry your daughter feels like this, I lost both my parents in the space of 11 weeks, very recently (June-August) I can’t imagine ever feeling that way about either of them. Can you think why this may have happened? X

OP, the problem with posting on here is that many have experiences from the other side and naturally find it hard to accept that there wasn't a good reason for your daughter to go NC. I include myself in that number.

I have been NC with my parents for a number of years - my father was and remains abusive, and my mother enables him. I have never regretted it. My sibling who still sees them occasionally is in a much worse place emotionally than me, but I support their decision to deal with our awful childhood and early adulthood in their own way. From my sibling, I have a sense of the 'victim' stories my father (and hence my enabling mother) tell people about me - we fell out over money, I became too posh for them and looked down on them, my husband took me away from them, etc, etc. None of it is true.

Just let your daughter go her own way. She is in control of her own happiness.

Several posters have asked you what you think your daughter would say, if she was asked why she has gone NC with you. But you haven't replied.

What has she said to you ? Even if you think it's nonsense or not true or she's just making it up ?

I disagree Human Race. I think that sending a letter saying " a mothers love is always constant " and the other things that the OP has said on this thread and in the way she has spoken to other posters will make things even worse.

Although you may be right, it might make the OP feel better.

book

Please stop posting! It doesn't matter what you say you will be picked apart and blamed.

try again re the book

OP, have a look at this website, but only if you are open to the idea that you may have contributed to the circumstances that caused the estrangement.
www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement

What a very interesting site WhoPopped.

Erm slightly biased forum, above. Re rabbit hole.

Do take a look at Joshua Coleman who imo is more balanced. He is a psychologist who was estranged from his adult daughter for a time, so he certainly isn't just talking theory.

The tag line to Joshua Coleman's book refers to 'compassionate strategies' for parents who are estranged from their adult children - you will not get compassion on threads like this, op; for now the debate is entirely polarised, parents demonised and blamed. The strategies Joshua Coleman outlines are not for the faint hearted but even Stand Alone's founder, who still shows clear and hostile bias against parents, fully rates and endorses Joshua Coleman. He is an all round good egg, do give him a go.

And stop posting on here