Struggling with DM - again

[christmaspresentaibu]

I've posted here about my relationship with DM and her behaviour previously. It all blew up around September/October last year and I thought we'd got to a point where DM understood that she couldn't keep putting pressure on me to drive home and see her and DF all the time and texting/calling/messaging constantly - I'm doing a PGCE and live about an hour away from them.

After much crying on the phone and my DF driving up to see me and cry in his car on the first day of my PGCE about how my behaviour (not seeing/talking to them as much as they'd like) was affecting them, I thought I'd finally got through to them that I just don't have the time or the brain capacity to deal with them. Through my PGCE safeguarding training and talking to colleagues, I've come to realise that their behaviour (this year just gone and lots of incidents throughout my childhood) probably constituted emotional abuse. I actually dropped everything one Sunday before Christmas to go to their house and 'have it out' - DM crying on me, asking me to hug her and tell her I loved her, after all which she goes 'I know you hate me.' Just the whole thing was awful.

Despite all this, I went to stay with them for a few days at Christmas and then DP and I drove down to see them again for the evening about three weeks ago.

Since then, I found out that DM and DF have visited the area where I lived but gone home without telling me. I also have to instigate any contact at all now - so it's one extreme to the other. I sent DM a small/token gift I'd thought about and chosen to show her I was thinking of her, but when I messaged her last night to ask whether she liked it, her response was 'it would've been nice to see you last week but never mind' (schools in our area were on half-term but I had PGCE assignments and planning to do, plus wanting to spend time with DP and my friends).

Am I doing something wrong here? I'm trying really hard to weigh all this up in my head (I don't really have anyone to talk to who understands, apart from a colleague at work who has similar parents). Am I being a shit daughter? I'm trying to come to terms with their behaviour and still be kind to them, while at the same time do the best I can in my training, look after my mental health and enjoy my relationship with DP. Nothing I do for them is ever enough.

If anyone can advise me on this (again, sorry), I'd be really grateful.

So many of these posts resonate.
Like the time DM asked me not to bring my DH (DP at the time) to family gatherings because his presence was a reminder to her that she was by herself. Of course my DBro could bring his DP - it was just me having a partner that upset her.

Lottapianos, I think you've hit the nail on the head again with 'it put her into the role of rescuer and supporter, but only on her terms.' She really seems to have zero empathy. I remembered recently an incident when we were in the supermarket and a child was crying - DM gave him such a glare, it was terrifying. He was probably tired/hungry etc and just a bit whingy being dragged around a shop, but DM doesn't seem to have any concept of that. If that's how she reacts to a stranger's child crying in a public place, what was she like when we were tiny?!

Right at the start of my uni placement abroad (which I didn't want to do, but was part of the degree DM and DF wanted me to do), I asked to skype them because I was really struggling mentally/emotionally with being on my own in a foreign country for the first time (and for a year!), but DM said 'only if it's a good skype'. So I wasn't allowed to burden her with my feelings, she wouldn't support me.

It makes her recent behaviour all the more strange, because she's effectively taught me over the years that she doesn't care about my feelings but now she wonders why I don't tell her things or want to spend lots of time being close to her.

Anne, it's so sad to think of DF being to blame as well. It actually hurts me more than anything to do with DM because I think he's in so much pain too. He's a sweet and gentle person, but he didn't stand up for us. From what I can tell, his father was incredibly strict when DF was growing up and maybe he struggled with that. I feel so sorry because, if that's the case, DF's been failed by his dad and his wife? I wish I could protect DF, I just want him to be happy. When I dwell on it too much, it just brings me to tears.

During an incident when DM stormed off during a day out and we had to trail around a National Trust place in silence after her and sit in the car in silence on the way home, I remember asking DF why he was still with her and he said he didn't know. That's maybe ten/fifteen years ago?

Narcissistic people really do have no empathy whatsoever.

I would not let your dad at all off the hook here; he has really been your mother's hatchet man throughout and has sacrificed you on her alter of abuse.

Its not your fault your dad is the ways he is either; he has chosen to stay with his wife for his own reasons and threw you under the bus in the process. He gets what he wants out of their dysfunctional and codependent relationship.

Attila, that's hard to hear but I think you're right. When he drove over and cried in the car, I said again that their marriage wasn't really any of my business but if he wasn't happy, then... but he said he wanted to leave but couldn't because of the cats, because where would he go, etc. So he stayed with DM because practically it was easier, he didn't have to think about things like the house?

It was really hard seeing him get so emotional about the possibility of leaving the cats behind and thinking that that might have been a reason they never split up years ago. Is that mad? Or maybe he applied the same logic to us as his DC, he couldn't leave because he thought he wouldn't see us?

Families are bloody hard work. I told DP tonight that unfortunately it's my fault he won't have a birthday card from my parents this week because I was meant to know telepathically that I had to visit them over half term to collect it. He was a bit but generally keeps quiet about them. I think it's really hard for people with more normal parents to comprehend situations like this. He does try but quite often I feel like I'm being a knob or being unfair to complain about my parents.

So despite the constant pressure to visit and be in contact with them and 'celebrate' (a word which stung a bit around birthday season in the autumn when it was all going tits up and celebrating was the last thing I felt like doing), there's been radio silence from DM about DP's birthday. In happier times, she would've texted to say happy birthday and, if you had a card for somebody and weren't sure if you were going to see them, you'd post it, wouldn't you? He had a lovely birthday in any case, because of course his partner's mum isn't really a central character in it, but why does she have to inflict her petty games on him too?

I'm not pissed off about him not having a card, although I'm embarrassed that it's my fault and now they're taking things out on him too. I'm annoyed about the double standards! Why do they get to drive to within 5 miles of where we live without saying anything and not text on birthdays, but if I did that to them, there'd be WW3?

Every weekend I don't see them, I can feel this pressure on me. But I need a life too!

They've got so much worse since I've been with DP. As I mentioned, DM seemed to be in her element when I split up with my previous boyfriend. We met at school and I wonder if that relationship was tolerated because it was just us being kids? Me moving away to live with DP is another sign that I'm an adult and she doesn't have any control any more?

Feeling a bit shit today.

I'm not pissed off about him not having a card, although I'm embarrassed that it's my fault

It's not your fault, though. It was their choice to not send him a card.

Stop blaming yourself: that's what they want. They want you confused and feeling guilty and on the back foot. They want to be in your head all the time.

They're toxic, awful people. No amount of thinking things through will lead you to a place where you can reason with them: reasons are for reasonable people. Ignore them as much as you can, and only see them when you absolutely have to.

I would reiterate what OntheRise wrote. Its not your fault at all re the card. The fault lies with your mother who chose not to send a card to your partner as a further means of scapegoating you.

It is really not possible to have a relationship with someone like this.
Your mother has trained you from soon after birth to serve her. You in her eyes are not supposed to have a life of your own nor any opinions that differ from hers; she sees you purely as an extension of her. Such people also do not change.

People like your mother cannot do relationships at all but always but always need a willing enabler to help them. In your case that role has been played out here to perfection by your dad who is really also a weak bystander of a man. He has consistently failed you as a parent by failing to protect you from the excesses of his wife's behaviours. He has also acted in his best interests throughout, it was about him as well. Fact is he gets what he wants out of this relationship with his wife and has been more than happy to throw you under the bus.

People from dysfunctional families end up playing roles, your role here seems to be the scapegoat. As a result your man here is also scapegoated. Would suggest you read the website entitled Daughters of Narcissistic mothers if you have not already done that.

Neither were good parents to you when you were growing up and they have not fundamentally changed since those times. They will also be crap as grandparents to any children you go onto have.

Thank you, both! I do feel confused and guilty, but I know that this is part of the FOG cycle that people with parents like mine get stuck in. Completely agree that 'reasons are for reasonable people'! Working in a school at the moment, it's quite shocking the similarities I've noticed between my parents' and some of the poorly behaved students' behaviours!

It's interesting that you say DM trained me from soon after birth - DF says that he recognised this in me when I was tiny. He said I used to be so funny to watch but I changed as soon as I was 'aware of outside influences'

Thank you again for your responses,
I'm on my phone right now but I'll have a proper re-read later

Since then, I found out that DM and DF have visited the area where I lived but gone home without telling me

whoah! after all that telling you you had to go and visit them?!

DF has always said she 'doesn't do emotions'

oh she does, doesn't she? all that crying, all that demanding hugs then thinking you her.

But she only does her own emotions. No one else's.

why does DM want to carry on hurting me? It's not like she particularly seems to enjoy seeing or hearing from me when I do meet up with her or talk to her, yet she always wants more

These are -her- issues. There are some very mixed up people who get married and have kids and then all that mixed-upness comes out onto the kids. It actually isn't to do with the kids, it's to do with the damaged person who can't or won't help curbing their behaviour. Sadly, the kids are the closest easy target for -their- issues.

It's not you. Nor your behaviour, nor your personality. It really is her.

It makes her recent behaviour all the more strange, because she's effectively taught me over the years that she doesn't care about my feelings but now she wonders why I don't tell her things or want to spend lots of time being close to her.

Cognitive Dissonance. She probably isn't -able- to see that the way she behaved means that you can't confide in her. Damaged people have a choice: seek help or stay damaged / get worse. Decades ago the help and knowledge simply wasn't there.

It was really hard seeing him get so emotional about the possibility of leaving the cats behind and thinking that that might have been a reason they never split up years ago. Is that mad? Or maybe he applied the same logic to us as his DC, he couldn't leave because he thought he wouldn't see us?

the cats are neither here nor there; on the scale of perspective, living your life in misery because of the cats isn't worth it. He could take them with him! The children is a harder thing. Women still get majority custody a lot of the time and I know at least one marriage where the man stayed because the mother was extraordinarily manipulative and convincing. It was the right decision because things would have been 100 times worse for the kids without him there.

But a lot of the time, it's simply very hard for an abused person to leave. If your father was conditioned by his own parents, then it might have been downright impossible.

People like your mum, who live in their own heavily-controlled world because they can't bear perceived-threats from outside, often struggle very hard indeed with children maturing and growing their own wings. They -have- to control everything around them for their own perceived-safety and you doing your own thing, not being controlled, is literally unbearable.

But as an adult you have to break away from a controlling parent like this, or live forever in her shadow. Her negative influence can last even beyond her death because the patterns of thought and interaction can remain for years after.

You are doing the right thing in breaking away, without any doubt. It comes at a heavy price tho in grief. Stay strong, there are people who understand and will support you

Thanks, SeaEagleFeather. Yep, they drove up and back and then it was mentioned after the event. It seems that it's not that they want to see me, exactly, but that they want me to make the effort to go to them or specifically invite them. I'd love normal parents that might just text saying, you know, 'we're passing through, are you around for a coffee?' or something.

I think it's that because DM was like this when I moved to DP's town. I'm basically a lodger at the moment, so can't have guests round as and when like I might at my own house. When it was all kicking off last autumn and DM was contacting me incessantly, she sent a message saying she wanted to ask me something 'without me getting angry' - 'why don't you want us to see where you now live?'

For the record, I've never got angry with her about her behaviour, but I did explain in a reply to an email that she sent me that, as a result of her behaviour over the years, I haven't felt able to open up to her emotionally. I didn't want to admit this to her because I didn't want to hurt her, but emailing me telling me she might walk under a lorry because I was being so unfair to her - WTF?! I was also accused of having 'no passion in my voice' when I said I loved her and having 'no emotion' when she was breaking down sobbing about me moving to DP's town (on the day I moved and the day after I'd got back from a holiday with DP). The examples are just bloody endless.

Sorry to keep banging on. I'm keeping a list of all the incidents that occur to me to talk over them with a counsellor and I think I'll show them this thread too.

What you say about controlling everything for her own safety really rings true - I admitted to her a few months ago when she was crying on me asking me to hug her etc. that I was struggling mentally because of her behaviour and was going to seek counselling. The look of horror on her face made me realise that she knows she's harmed me. She asked what I was going to tell them about but I said I didn't know yet. DSis has had counselling too but I don't think DM is aware of this.

Re. the effects of her behaviour lasting into the future - how do I stop that manifesting itself in how I treat my own children? We're not anywhere near having DC of our own yet, but when we do - how do I break the cycle? Can I learn about nurturing emotional intelligence, healthy independence etc in my DC by reading about it?

Thank you all so much

Sorry, I missed a bit about DM wanting to be invited to my room/home - went off on one a bit

I didn't know what to reply to 'why don't you want us to see where you now live?' (just the turn of phrase annoys me!), but eventually I responded along the lines of, well, would you like to see it? Because she had expressed no interest in it! And she messaged right back, 'we would love to!' But there's no love in it, it's entitlement - she thinks she's entitled to my space? FWIW, she hasn't been. When I moved and gave her my address, she claimed that I'd moved without telling her where I'd gone, which is blatantly not true as she had a piece of paper with the address on it!

She paints me as such an awful person. When I was at their house at Christmas, I was chatting to DSis and DM was in the room with my grandma. DSis and I were chatting normally, just the two of us, I can't even remember what it was about, and I subconsciously touched my nose. DM suddenly shouted over, 'what's wrong with my nose?!' I was so embarrassed, because it was in front of DGM too - does DM think I'm that awful a person that I'd be taking the mick out of her nose with DSis?!

It just demonstrates how insecure, she is, I suppose.

about your own children - yes. Yes, you can change the pattern and you can bring your children up in a healthy environment. My half sister grew up in a terribly abusive household and she's doing marvels with her child. Many people do come from an abusive background and are very good parents.

But it will take effort. The pattern we grow up with goes deep. Reading up a lot is a good thing and if you can afford it, find a good therapist you click with who will be willing to help you understand how to be a good parent too (some never give advice, some do).

Everything you write makes me think that your mother is projecting all over the place. It's easy to pour out cod-psychology on the net but even so, it does stand out. She asks you for love then says 'you hate me' even though you have acted lovingly? that comment has come out of -somewhere-, and in the context of other incidents I suspect it comes from her own darker emotions buried within that she ascribes to others.

nd I subconsciously touched my nose. DM suddenly shouted over, 'what's wrong with my nose?!^ ditto. Sounds a mix of extreme oversensitivity and self-absorption ... in her mind everything has to do with her, even when it's not.

From all you have written I really think that there is no point trying to communicate with her, explain or genuinely share your experience / pov with her. She's too far gone in her own misery and self-obsession to be able to perceive you.

why don't you want us to see where you now live?

again she's ascribing motivations to you which don't exist, because you are not acting the way she wants you to to prove you adore and love her, no matter how badly she acts. The best way to handle it is to keep a strong awareness that this is HER, and her problem alone. You are your own person and not the person she thinks you are. I wonder if she thinks you are a carbon copy of herself, with the way she is ascribing motives to you.

Rationality is out of the window here. She's almost certainly too damaged to actually think, rather than react on feelings alone.

SeaEagleFeather, that's really reassuring, thank you. I've thought for years that I don't want to be the same sort of parent as DM, but it's only recently that I've been worried about actually how I'm going to make sure I'm different. I'm particularly worried about what I'd be like if we had a DD. Thank you for recommending therapy again - I really do need to see somebody to talk this through and to work on how I deal wth DM and DF. Going NC just isn't an option right now but equally going low-contact with them makes them retaliate when they realise what's going on and things get worse. But then again, I know they won't change their ways. Like you say, there's no point trying to share my POV with her - when I did, by responding to that awful email, she immediately phoned me after she'd read it and said 'let's stop this silliness'. Because my feelings and emotions are silly, but she gets to try and guilt-trip me (which is what I'd pointed out in my reply, that her entire message was to make me feel guilty)

Yes, she's definitely ascribing her motivations/feelings/insecurities to me. I really think she does think I'm a copy of her, like you say, because her boundaries/concept of my boundaries are non-existent: when I lived with them, walking into my bedroom without knocking, making me have the bathroom door wedged open if I was having a bath; then when I went to uni it was texting me every evening to see what I was doing (and calling my then-boyfriend if I didn't reply), requesting my timetable and asking me to have a 'Find My Friends' app on my ipad so she could see where I was. So yes, very much not seeing me as a separate person who needs privacy.

My privacy to her seen as 'keeping secrets' - which is ironic, because she kept her MS a secret from us for years and then pretended that she was diagnosed in September. I drove down to see her after work because I was under the impression that she was being diagnosed at that specific appointment, but then DF let slip that her diagnosis had been some years ago and DSis told me that she had found a letter at home approx. four years ago regarding treatment for an MS relapse DM was having.

As you say, rationality is out of the window, they are both such damaged people. It's desperately sad, but I want to protect DP and I want to protect my future children from them. Thank you again. Sorry to bang on and on.

Nothing I do for them is ever enough.

This is the nub of it, sadly.

You are not doing anything wrong, or even unreasonable. You are being treated as in the wrong because of some psychological need/drive of your mother's.

This is an important time for you: you are now an independent adult. Set boundaries, manage expectations, as unfortunately your parents will get worse with age/grandchildren.

As for your sister, cut your mother out of the loop and have your own relationship with her. Do your best to agree not even to talk about your parents when you meet up, and never be the bearer of direct or tacit messages from parents to sibling. Plus, read 'The Dance of Anger' by Harriet Somebody or other. Most illuminating!

Sorry to bang on and on.

You aren't.

Parents are our entire world when we are small. They mold us and nurture us (well, they're supposed to nurture us) and they remain important all our lives for better or worse.

You're not banging on at all.

'You're not banging on at all.'

Just wanted to echo this. It's especially difficult to separate from your parents as an adult when they have treated you as nothing more than an extension of them your whole life. It's normal to want to talk about it and try to process it with people who understand. We're listening x

Regina, SeaEagle, Lottapianos, you're all stars, thank you.

Set boundaries, manage expectations - this is really important for me and DP going forward, I think. I spoke to him about DM a little last night and said that, in all probability, her behaviour will get worse as she ages and if we have DC. I'm going to work hard to establish boundaries so that we have our own time and space, but also so that I have headspace away from her. I spend so much time thinking about her and the way she is at the moment that it's really been getting me down, to the point where people IRL have noticed, which isn't great.

Thank you so much for listening to/reading all of my posts. They definitely have moulded me over the years! It's really upsetting to look at all of the insecurities I've had and things that have happened since I was young and realised that ultimately that was because of how I was brought up by DM and DF - things like low self-esteem (contributing to being bullied at secondary school and depression at uni), poor boundaries and paranoia (which I took into my first relationship, where I think I behaved really badly towards my then-boyfriend).

I need to separate myself more from them and I actually think the PGCE is helping with that, in a strange way. I'm becoming responsible for the wellbeing and education of the children in my charge and I think that it's sort of (slowly) helping me to process things that have happened to me, but also to know the signs of emotional abuse and hopefully help me to protect my students.

I think my teachers knew something was going on back when I was at school myself, but tracing it back to DM was too difficult. I was picked on because I was weird and quiet and awkward, but nobody realised that I was weird and quiet and awkward because my self-esteem had been ground down over years by my mother. She's in a position of responsibility in the community herself and it's quite distressing to think of the juxtaposition between what she is like in public and how she can be in private.

Christmas

What the other respondents have written.

You are not banging on at all, absolutely not.

The link below may be helpful to you but I would warn you now that setting boundaries with such people is very difficult because they will rail actively against them. Look also at grey rock techniques if you do speak at all to your mother.

pro.psychcentral.com/exhausted-woman/2016/07/how-to-set-adult-boundaries-with-narcissistic-parents/

I would work on your own FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) with regards to your parents also with a therapist. Choose such a person very carefully and find one who has no familial bias about keeping families together.

There is no probably about it; your mother's behaviour will worsen as you get older and if you decide to have DC. I would keep any children you do go onto have well away from your mother because she was not a good parent to you when you were growing up. She could well choose a favourite with the other being a scapegoat and use them also as narcissistic supply.

A good rule of thumb generally is that if they are too toxic/difficult for you to deal with, its the same deal for your children also.

but nobody realised that I was weird and quiet and awkward because my self-esteem had been ground down over years by my mother.

the older I get, the more I think that sometimes some adults realise that things aren't right in the child's life. They recognise the signs. But what can they do? it has to be extreme to call SS and often the abuse is so subtle that it can't be pinned down.

All that the perceptive adults can do is be kind to the child and try to bolster them so that somewhere, bits of kindness can stick with the child then and that the grown adult remembers that someone liked them.

That's true, Sea, we couldn't have been removed from DM - protecting us and potentially removing us from her behaviour was DF's responsibility and he decided not to do that.

I had some brilliant teachers at school who picked up on the fact that I was lonely and didn't seem to make friends easily and dealt with instances of bullying, but it was quite pervasive, if that's the right word - it wasn't one particular child or group who made my life a misery but I think it was a general feeling among the other kids that I was a bit odd, and I'm probably still odd as an adult but I like to think that I mask it better in social situations these days!

I also spent a lot of time with my grandparents who absolutely doted on us, so we definitely had positive adult figures in our lives.

Attila, thank you for the link - I'm going to jot those down and keep them as a bit of a mantra when I know I'll have to deal with DM. Grey rock actually sounds quite a lot like how I deal with her already - not telling her anything exciting or emotional, just 'everything's fine, same old' etc.

What will be exciting is if DP and I end up moving abroad next year (which we'd planned to do this August but postponed) - can't imagine that will go down well and there's no way they'd visit. DM and DF don't have passports and they never visited me in Europe an hour away when I studied abroad, so there's no way they're getting on a plane to Malaysia or Vietnam or wherever we end up! But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I'm really excited about having our own space where DM can't meddle and also there'll be no pressure to see her every weekend!

Someone has really acted destructively for a long time when their daughter is so beleagured that they feel deep relief at the prospect of moving half a world away.

SeaEagleFeather sorry, I think I worded my post a bit crassly. Deep relief is true though. I'm excited at the prospect of having an adventure with DP and us moving away wouldn't be forever. But the behaviour of both my parents has really hurt me, especially over the past year, and I can't deny that I'd be relieved to be able to just do what we want to do without the fallout from DM. I can't tell her if we have dinner with DP's parents because even something as minor as that causes ructions and tears, hence the grey rock strategy where I've been keeping details of my life from her.

Although part of me is relieved and excited, I'm sad that I'll be moving away from DSis, my grandparents, DP's family and our brilliant friends. It will be temporary, to give us some breathing space, and we'll probably move back to DP's neck of the woods after a few years.

Interesting that you say your DM has MS.
The link between MS and mental health problems/personality disorder is well documented - not that there is any excuse under the sun for poor treatment of your children - but it may help you, or not, to know this.
Though she may, or may not, have been diagnosed relatively recently, it can be a condition that has been on going for years before it is diagnosed.

That's interesting, Wingedharpy, a poster mentioned behavioural issues relating to MS on one of my previous threads.

Although she's treated me, DF and DSis appallingly at times (and lots of other people in our lives too - DF and I have spoken about the massive implications of her behaviour on many many different people), I do feel really sorry for her. It must be really genuinely distressing to her that I've grown up and moved away, and I know that that must be the case for lots of parents. But lots of parents don't take it out on their children in this way.

As far as I know, she's always been like this since DF has known her (30 years or so). Could the MS have started that long ago? I've not really got any idea about her childhood or upbringing, but my grandparents on her side are remarkably normal, as far as I can tell, so I do struggle a bit to see a correlation between her upbringing and her behaviour now. The MS causing it would make sense.