My mother is a vile bitch who hates my husband and can't stop having a crack at me

[mslucy]

Just interested to hear from other posters what sort of relationships they have with their mothers.

Mine is quite frankly appalling.

My mother last night phoned for a chat - it was not a row (for once) and I managed not to lose my temper, though I was quite short with her.

She loathes dh with a passion and is constantly carping on about how useless he is, how awful he looks, how he's ginger (ffs!), how he's a weirdo etc etc etc.

He is a bit eccentric but I love him and I am also not one of life's conformists so we get on just fine.

I was also told:

a) I "used" to be pretty
b) How I had so much potential
c) How my flat is "grungy"
d) How when I miscarried a few years ago, I made "too much fuss" about it. This is from someone who always goes on about how she never forgave her own mother for being unsympathetic about miscarriage.
e) How I lead an alternative lifestyle - I have always worked, paid my bills, don't do drugs (ok I used to but not now), I am a home owner, I'm married and don't indulge in bizarre sex practices or keep a salve in the airing cupboard.
f) How my son would hate a sibling and how my obsessive love for him is subconsciously preventing me from conceiving.
Basically I'm not some kind of sloaney cow who spends her city wanker husband's bonus on colonic irrigation.

Should I just cut her out of my life forever or how would you suggest managing her?

Sorry. x-posts

surfer, nqc, please know this. i do not think she should take this liying down. however i think it wrong, even evil to cut off all relationships with your mother.

excpet in very very rare cases,(sexual abuse, rape, drugs etc)

i think you should have a break from your mum for a bit so u have time to think what to say to your mum without being angry and go from there. What wud your mum say if you tell her about how you feel about her being like this? Will she listen?

I've told her a 1000 times how much she's upset me with her comments. It doesn't seem to make any difference. My brother gets it too. I really don't think she'll change - people don't change at the age of 67.

She'll say something like "I know I can't influence anything you do and it's your life" and then go on to attack pretty much everything I do.

The only thing she doesn't call me is a bad mother!

Someone with a borderline personality disorder (which even if treatable I cannot see this lady asking for help anyway) is well worth staying away from completely in my view. You do not need such toxic people in your life even though they are family.

This is a generational problem and the damage has gone down the line to your Mother. Mslucy the best thing you can do is learn from their past mistakes and do your utmost not to repeat them.

I would also have to disagree with CB.
We would not surely let friends treat us in such a manner so why on earth should family members have any such exemption?.

Cutting off a family relation is often done by the person after much soul searching and heartache on their part. It is certainly not a snap decision.

MsLucy - I would recommend that you read "Toxic Parents" written by Susan Forward.

yes, I was thinking of checking that out.
She's been a lot worse than this, believe you me.
I think she is definitely an anti role model for me. Eg, I have always been quite career minded because she didn't have a career, always been careful to stay sane about food issues because she is so weight obsessed - she's a 6 and I'm a 10/12.

I often think she looks at me and just thinks "yuk".

"Basically I'm not some kind of sloaney cow who spends her city wanker husband's bonus on colonic irrigation"

Do you honestly think this is what she wants you to be? I'd be very surprised, especially as it's something you so clearly despise. Is that how you see your mother?

FWIW I'd cut her out of your life. She's poison and poison has a habit of spreading. I have a poisonous mil (she's vicious to and about everyone) and we have cut her out of our lives. Best thing we ever did.

she more or less admitted to me last night that she'd find it easier to accept me if I was a sahm, married to a more "conventional Man"
she isn't a full blown sloane (not posh enough/not enough £££s) but that is what she aspires to be. she is drawn to people like that, even though she married my dad who is an academic.
She sees me as a hippy, which I find insane, as apart from a rather flamboyant taste in clothes (my mother has always loathed the way I dress) I am quite the opposite.

I'm horrified at her saying that she would find it "easier to accept me if I was a sahm...."

Cut her out of your life. You are getting nothing but abuse and unkindness from this woman. Just because she's your mother doesn't give her the right to be vile. I doubt very much you'd accept behaviour like this from a friend or colleague so why should your mother treat you like this?

a suggestion which might work:

learn to keep a disatnce emotionally from your mother. be polite to her and still see her occasionally, treat her etc, but as soon as she starts to criticise you tell her you won't let her talk to you like that and put the phone down/ask her to leave. that way you can still keep contact but take control of the nasty comments. don't expect her to apologise or change.

rattleskuttle

sort of what I have been trying to do, but it doesn't really work.

I'm used to total honesty with dh, friends and most colleagues. I am quite well respected in the industry I work in and never have to pretend to be something I'm not.

I'm not very good at pussy footing round people and find relationships that aren't genuine very hard work.

i can do this with my mother/father and feel ok about it because i've sort of turned the relationship around. they seem very immature and i expect them to be silly. so the realtionship is genuine but i'm in charge. hope i'm explaining myself well enough. i know it's terribly difficult to know how to handle parents when they are causing you problems and it's not easy to even talk about it.

Believe you me I've talked about it till I'm blue in the face.

I'm just curious to hear the views of others because it's an eternal problem and I know I don't handle her very well.

If you keep her in your life she will always be planting little seeds of self doubt and loathing into you and your family. She will start doing the same to your children.

Is she really the kind of person you want your children to be socialising with? Do you really want her to make them feel bad about themselves the same way you feel about yourself.

CB - "I gave birth to you therefore you must love and accept me forever no matter how horrible and abusive a person I am" is this a line you need to use on your own children when they say they no longer want to see you because of things you do and say to them? I think you might want to practice the line "sorry, please help me change so we can all love and respect eachother". (just trying to be helpful )

You make it out to be so simple. I really do wish life was that simple.

Only mslucy can decide whether she wants to cut out her mother of her life. It ain't going to be an easy decision, and it ain't going to get better over night. It is probably going to take months if not years, before the little moments of self doubt/destruction goes away.

I wish you all the best of luck and offer you a big hug to try and make it easier for you making this decision.

Our relationship has been very bad since I went to university (late 80s). I think I had a lot of bottled up anger towards her as a teen but felt unable to express it - except by dressing in black and listening to the Cure! Once I moved out of the family home it was much easier.

I am not that keen on ds having too much to do with her and would never ever want to leave him with her - my brother happily leaves his baby with her all the time.

Maisemor, I think I have a lot of thinking to do. Thank you for being so supportive.

Maybe rattleskuttle's way of dealing with it sounds like good advice, so you give her every chance to be part of your life but also don't put up with her poor behaviour.

You should talk to your brother about this too, and maybe if whatever you choose to do is a 'two pronged approach' it might help you both.

just read this and it seems that if she would find it easier if you were a sahm etc then she is totally replaying the relationship she had with her father. Perhaps you should (if you haven't already of course) make the precise comparison between what her father wanted for her and what she wants of you and then let her sit on it. Maybe make this observation and tell her that you know her relationship with her father was an issue and until she's prepared to not make the same demands of you you're going to keep your distance. Even if she won't admit it to anyone else, she knows where the root of her problems lie. Sorry, don't know what else to suggest - crap situation

What swung it for us was when my mil started to inflict her poison on my nieces and nephews (age 6 - 10). She told them they were stupid and would never amount to anything (so not true but that's irrelevant anyway), she told my niece that her mother had wanted to get rid of her (a lie) and she told my youngest nephew that he belonged in a freak show when he had a mouthful of stitches after having a fall.

She will move on to your dc. It's what women like this do.

some excellent ideas here. especially rattles.

however, i still think it wrong wrong wrong to cut your mother out of your life. for anyone. she may be toxic, she may be nasty, she maybe smelly. but she is still your mother
however this thread is about lucy asking for help to deal with her mom. which is a very dificult relationshop for her, and i wish her all the best.

you are right, at 67 she wont change her ways.
just tell her firmly that you are what you are, and she needs to accept it. thereafter try and be strong enough to ignore any crap she comes out with. if you dont want to leave your dc alone with her, then dont. it is her loss. but if you don t let them see her ever, then they end up losing out.
its such a tough situation to be in. my dc are in something similar to this with mil, but she isnt at all nasty to them as i had feared she would be.

at the idea of my mother being smelly!

ADad. I've talked to my brother many times about it and he's much better at doing the polite but distant thing. But he's much harder than I am and I do feel my relationship with her is much more conflicted and insidious.

Then there's the fact that she always has to have a favourite - either I'm in her good books or my bro is.

One of us always has to be in the sin bin and the other always has to be the godlen child.

i think you really do have to develop a thick skin for your own sanity. dont play her games.
it's so hard when someone is constantly erroding your confidence, but keep trying withthe emotional distance thing. it does work.

I've heard that "oh she's your Mother" comment before (sign). That comment is often said by people who have fortunately never had to deal with toxic relations. Ignorance of having to deal with such people is bliss for them.

mslucy, it depends how much you can stand. If you can handle her, by all means keep her in your life. If shes having a negative effect on you then please go over to read the other thread my mother has cut me out of her life`.

cylonbabe, tell us about your abusive mother. And about how it ripped your life apart and stopped you from living properly. You must have lots of advice on how to help people like me overcome the terrifying side effects (PTSD, depression, cutting) of an abusive mother without cutting them out of our lives.
Tell me how you managed to do it.
Because the only thing that worked for me, was to cut her out of my life after 25 years of hell. Im happier than Ive ever been in my life. I thought I had bipolar disorder, my mood swings and depression have been so severe all my life. And what do you know? After cutting her out of my life, they more or less dissapeared! I am finally a fully functioning human being.
If you donT have advice on how <span class="italic">you</span> managed this. If you havent been to hell and back with your own mother. Then really, I think you should think very carefully before giving advice on such a sensitive issue.
Custardo, Ive thought about the "what if you get a phone call and shes dead" issue. Id feel relief <span class="italic">for</span> <span class="italic">her</span>. Shell no longer have all the bitterness and rage in her body. She`ll be at peace and at rest for the first time in her life. I shall breathe a sigh of relief that she can never hurt me again.

mslucy, my mother is appalling too. similar in a posionous, insidious, nasty way. throughout my life has occilated between nice and loving and vitriol filled rages. not particularly nice to deal with when one is 5, but equally damaging when one is 30!!!!

i am pregnant (39 +5) and throughout pregnancy she has been a nasty vicious bitch - mainly because DP and i had the temerity to 'disobay' her and not get married before the arrival of the baby (we had been planning wedding when i fell pregnant, we were delighted - she was horrified).
some of her comments and behaviour about me and dp were - and continue to be - unbelievable (i can't go into it as it will set me off and i refuse to let her upset me anymore). Suffice to say, we are now at the stage where DP communicates with her more than me (she is scared to alienate him so behaves herself more when talking to him).

The relationship only continues because a) i am pregnant and don't think now is a good time to make decisions to cut her out and b) i love my dad and want to see him (although he is a total enabler and allows her dreadful rages and vitriol to continue).

anyway, what i wanted to say is that i know exactly how you feel. it is indescribely hurtful to have one's mother purposefully being unpleasent to you. it is also horrible when you realise that you have spent a lifetime making excuses for it.

I particularly empathise with the bit where you say 'she was not a bad parent to us as kids' - neither was mine. She was a loving mother at times...but also, very often a nasty cruel vicious bitch. it meant i grew up not trusting her - i never knew who she would be. i never knew what would cause her rage.

my DP asks me how i would feel if i was told she died...and i would feel immense guilt but also relief. i don't wish her dead but i wish her out of my life.

anyway, long post (and i hardly EVER post, i am shy and more a MN lurker!) - apologies for that. i have no advice, i just thought it might help to know you are not the only one.