How do I get over the guilt of being NC with my mother?

[MrsGorilla]

Up until 18 months ago I was seeing my mum at least once a week. And then I started therapy about her and I snapped and had to ask for space while I worked through our history (she stood by while my stepdad was verbally abusive, bullying, and sometimes violent, and backed him up for 13 years til he left her).

I wrote to her telling her for the first time how the history had affected me (a myriad of MH problems, self harm, self disgust, chronic anxiety). Her reply was all about how MY letter had affected HER and how she’d had to go on strong antidepressants, and have time off work, and how her relationship with my stepdad was hard for her. She said sorry, but three sides of paper was all about her, and excuses.

I felt so guilty about her missing her gc that I let her see dc a bit even though it made me horribly anxious and upset, and everyone here advised me to stop putting myself through it, so I did. I told her I couldn’t bear it and needed to be NC. It was like having faced what she had put me through, the truth was too ugly to ignore anymore.

And then she decided to turn up bold as brass at our school nativity play, upsetting dc and dh and myself.

At first after that I felt entirely correct in my conviction that I should sever things. And I kind of felt proud for being strong. And then over months the doubt started to creep back in- we’ll, not even doubt really, I know things are broken- but the guilt. It is overwhelming at times. It’s like an intrusive thought and at least five times a day I will stage an imaginary conversation in my head where I explain to faceless people why I am not an awful person for not seeing her anymore. And I feel fucking frustrated because I will have been painted as an awful cruel person who has denied her her darling gc but if she’d have been a better mother and not fucked me up this wouldn’t have happened.

How do I get over this crushing guilt? How do I let go of this frustrated dialogue in my head? How do I make peace with this? I mean, it wasn’t all bad, she helped me with DIY shit and doing my garden and looking after dc as babies etc. But before they came along she was just not there for me.

Please help me work this out.

Here it is! awordplease.org/2015/09/12/escaping-your-mother-part-i-an-open-letter-to-daughters-of-narcissists/

The last 6 years of being NC with my mother have been the best six years of my life. I agree with a PP that until recently I had barely thought about her. Only reason I’m not in such a good place at the minute is because she recently wrote me a nasty letter which has upset me.

Rhubarb I have found that with time you stop trying to justify to other people (and yourself) why you are NC. When it comes up, which it does sometimes if strangers/acquaintances ask how often my kids see their grandparents for instance (I have an accent from a different country to the one I live in), I just say I don't see them anymore. I actually can't even be bothered to go into it any further after many years of analysing it all to the nth degree in my own head. I don't owe anyone and explanation.

If people comment, and they do, they often say 'but what if something bad happened to them? Wouldn't you feel awful?'. I usually just say 'well what if something bad happened to me?'. The fact is, for me I no longer feel any guilt about it. I feel sadness I suppose, but I'm sad for them because they have never met my wonderful children.