Her demands are overbearing.

[Sunflowersok]

I need a rant about my mother, and how overbearing she is with her demands for me to take responsibility for her life.

She constantly asks for so much off people with a sense of entitlement that you her owe what she needs. She does not work. This was partly due to mental illness years ago but for the past few years she’s been making excuses not to. She will often, often!!! Play the victim. It’s like making up this victim scenario is what gets her by in life. I’ve tried helping her in the past setting her life up, getting a home for her. She has often had solutions to every single one of her issues but it’s like she enjoys playing the ‘poor me’ card.

She asks me a lot for money. Every week maybe. She lives with her son who is a few years younger than me who also is also entitled. He lives like a child in her home and rinses her. Will not cook for himself etc. He’s 25. He’s had so many job losses over his attitude not getting his own way at work I’ve lost count. At the moment he’s managed to keep one for the first 2 years of his life. He earns more than me. But for some reason barely pays anything towards her rent and he blows the rest on himself. If you need an idea of how much money He spends, over the past two years he Must be on to his fourth or fifth sports car. He will buy these, spend thousand on the insurance, pull them apart, kit them up, reckless drive, write them off, buy another outright in cash. Rinse and repeat. My mum is constantly asking for ‘scraps of coffee’ she is that skint. I know the first thought is to blame by brother for his shitty behaviour towards her, but she encourages it from him. I’m here working full time but having to feed my DD and run my home. Before I met my partner I had no savings at the end of the month as my income was stretched. She will not ask him for money because ‘He is only a baby’ and ‘but he works so hard for it’ or ‘but he has just bought another car so he doesn’t have any’ and instead expects me to fund her instead.

If I say no to her, she will make me feel so bad that I either give in, or she will send me nasty passive aggressive messages. I have called her outright once after she had me in tears for going on a night away with my partner to the theatre after refusing her a 100 loan. The night had been planned for 2 months and I wouldn’t have been able to go if I had loaned her.

She’s constantly asking for favours. Constantly. During lockdown it was ‘will you go to the shop for me’ or if you are ‘passing can you drop a scrap of washing powder off...’ (knowing full well i will just buy her a box, and if I say no, she will make me feel bad because it’s “only a scrap” of washing powder). Will you nip here for me. She knows I’m self isolating. She messages me every day with these demands. I live 20 minutes away from her so it’s a 40 minute round trip. I am working from home full time. I am homeschooling. She knows I can not run my daughter around here there and everywhere in the current conditions. Her son is furloughed at the moment but is ‘ Too busy working on his car’. She lives A 2 minute walk from the shop. She has no commitments.

She used to do this when I was working 2 hours away. I would leave the house for 6, get to work for 8, not Return home until 7 most nights. She would ask me to do a full shop for her on the way home from work, maybe twice a week, when I was knackered and all I wanted was to get home, get showered, put the washing on and eat. With the money she borrowed off me. She could have easily been shopping in that time I was working. If I said no she made me Feel bad because I was ‘passing the supermarket anyway’. She has often bitched about me to
her sister making me look like the ungrateful daughter. If I ignore her messages about favours, she will sent passive aggressive messages like ‘oh its fine I’ll just starve then’ or ‘I’ll hide from the bailiffs I’m sure they won’t find me’.

I confronted her after the theatre incident. She denied it all. And then it settled for a bit about the money, she never asked until Christmas came when she ended up getting a loan for a lavish Christmas of food and gifts, knowing she couldn’t afford repayments and would could just ask me to pay it back.

Yesterday she asked me to loan 40 for council tax as she was in trouble. I asked her how much she owed. She said 80 but she planned to pay a bit and then pay more when she could. I told her it might be better to ring them up and ask them to make a payment plan and put a few quid extra on her bill over the year to spread the cost, rather than borrowing off people and wondering where she will scrape the money up to pay people back. She said she will thInk about it. I gave her a perfect solution To her problem but she messaged back and said ‘I’ve thought about it and decided to pay the 40 now instead’. Meaning of my money. She had a solution for her issue and she decided It was my responsibility to pay it.

I don’t mind helping her out here and there but by doing so I am feeding in to my brothers lifestyle and their ridiculous head in the sand attitude to responsibility over their lives. I’m so very fed up. She’s been like this as long as I can remember and I just needed to write it all down.

My mum is the same and the book that @ihatethecold recommended explains it all perfectly and helped me put boundaries in place.

Ranting is the start of the process though.

The OP has absorbed, internalised, tolerated and accepted this abusive experience her whole life - because she has been conditioned to that “normal” from birth - even her friends and family are complicit in this normalisation.

Her own father cleared off as soon as he could leaving his child to manage “the most selfish person he has ever met.”

The OP wasn’t cared for, nurtured, loved, protected, encouraged, considered - ie not parented from birth. She left at 13 when this got too much and was emotionally battered and blackmailed for this survival decision.

Probably becoming a parent herself had her revisiting and questioning the maternal bond and as a normal, sentient, compassionate mother now herself, capable of love she reconnected in the best intentions of hope with her own mother.

But what a surprise her DM is exactly the same disordered, abusive, controlling, malicious, exploitative person she always was - but now worse - with bells on. These disordered types always get more unhinged and worse with age - especially if they are drinking and their daily lives are ever decreasing circles of bitterness - lost friendships, jobs, alienating family etc.

So spew it all out OP. We have heard it all before and can tell you exactly what she will do next. You have decades of abuse to declutter from your head and heart. There are lots of resources on here and on line which will help you through.

An important insight I had recently is that when you have been in a toxic relationship as a child - you keep going back to it despite knowing intellectually it is wrong - it is an emotional urge and impulse - you are drawn back in, always in the real and naive hope that this time will be different, they will love you, be kind to you, respect you.

The reason is because when we were small we had to trust this abusive person because they at least provided food and shelter and we needed those things to survive. So as young children we are biologically programmed to have “hope” and keep going back to the “caregiver”. We still have this neurological reaction/compulsion and drive as an adult with these parents. And each time we get hurt. But we don’t need them anymore to survive (food and shelter) and in fact remaining enmeshed threatens our own survival - MH, relationships, career, finances etc.

I think you have to block her during the work day, unblock for relevant time periods if she has your daughter. I’d be honest, if she asked why say I need to be able to use my phone for work and it is so distracting you calling all day when I’m working, it’s the only solution since you won’t stop. I need my job.

Have you heard of the Karpman drama triangle? This is a basic description of the communication between the players. There is lots of information out there on how people communicate in this way and how the roles are varied. Eg one minute your mother is the victim and you the rescuer (when she does the oh poor me act, and if is an act), next she is the perpetrator and toy the victim when she doesn’t get what she wants. Meanwhile she’s pushing pulling you everywhere until you are completely confused and worn down. www.lawsociety.org.uk/practice-areas/family-children/emotional-resilience-stepping-outside-drama-triangle/

I also agree you need to escape her clutches for your dd as much as for yourself. When you can finally reconcile with not being who/ what she needs and her not being who/ what you need, you will be able to break free little by little.

Someone way upthread described her behaviour as parentification. This is a very insidious way to bring up a child, slowly grooming them to be what you want them to be instead of being who they want. It took me a long time to break the strings between my mother and me and a lot of very good therapy. Don’t beat yourself up for not getting it right all the time.

@yesterdaystotalsteps123 that's 3 months tuition not 6 but I get your point

OP, what happened between 13 and 20? Who did you live with? Did she just hand over guardianship and not keep in touch?

I think the email that someone suggested earlier is good. In it you are setting out what will happen in the future, it won't come as a shock to her if you then refuse to give her any money and also will save you making excuses if you are at any time in contact, just refer her back to the email. Good luck.

She’s definitely got narcissistic qualities. Most people think that narcissistic people are horrible but often they are not and it’s very very covert. They are probably very unaware they are doing it.

Have a look at F.O.G ( Fear, obligation, guilt) this is what your feeling now.

The thing with narcissistic behaviours they are the offenders personality so they can never ever change. If they are aware they can control it for a short time but it can’t last forever. So you need to think - can you battle this passive aggressive manipulation forever or do you go NC? What steps can you put in place to protect your finances and mental health and how would you feel if she started this with your dd - because she will, she won’t be able to help herself. She is probably already training her to be unable to say no to her when she’s older.

You got back to square one because she broke your boundaries down again So prepare for that.

BUT - you’ve got to stop the cleaning and child care. That links you two tightly together, your inviting her in.

@ExShield

Between the ages of 13 and 20. Hmmmm...

I wasn’t well. Felt suicidal. Started drinking at a very early age. Had ‘blackouts’ in memory every time I had any sort of painful emotion (as a result of repressing them and staying silent as a child). Started self harming to a scary extent. Started wanting to help myself and then stopped self harming and got addicted to painkillers instead. A string of going from person to person trying to find Some self worth in someone who loved me - to no avail. Fell in to a relationship with a man who offered some sort of a stable life, but was very needy and scared of abandonment. Emotionally abusive, the man had anger issues and blamed me for a lot of things. Ruined my self esteem further. Went from councillor to councillor to therapist to psychiatrist. Finally got diagnosed with bipolar and ptsd from childhood before I ruined my life.

Then I had my Dd and everything changed. All of a sudden I was important in the world. I planned to leave EA relationship with her at 18 months after I realised I wasn’t stupid as he called me all the time. Left and started a life from scratch and found Strength. Started the treatment I needed. Build back the relationship with my mother and started to face the reality of my situation.

Now that years have passed, I’ve obviously become too relaxed enough to let her start using me again .

I lived with my dad (I turned up one day with my clothes in bin bags) and build the relationship I had lost with him Since when he left my mum (she had an affair). He wasn’t around too much though, he has a problem with drink so I pretty much raised myself, washing my clothes and learning to cook. He just was around a few hours a week. He’d leave money for me and be at the pub and I just got on with it. I enjoyed the peace and the quiet. I had Been there a week and there was a knock on the door, my mums mum was kicking off and screaming calling me a selfish bitch and that I’d put my mum in hospital because after she realised I’d gone she tried to kill herself. That’s the last thing I remember before things went very wrong for me.

No she never got in contact with me. I escaped out of the house the day I left as one day when I had gotten home from school to find the house was boarded up because She was hiding from the landlord and was not paying rent. She locked me in the house. I wanted to die that night, something Pushed me to say no and I fled.

Sunflowers you’ve done fucking amazing. You are strong. Incredibly strong. After what you have said you need to get this toxicity out of your life. Either go NC or very very low contact. You will never get that mother daughter relationship your seeking. This will never be the cherry on the top.

You can absolutely do this with out her

Crikey op, you absolutely rock. You owe it to yourself, dd and dp to cut these leeches out of your life. You will never have the proper mother/daughter relationship that you want, and tbh a lot of us don't anyway. Do you have a good relationship with mil? If so I would concentrate on that.

I would sit her down and explain your finances are affected by the Coronavirus (even if it's not). Tell her you don't mind helping her out but you just can't and so you're going to help her organise her finances so she can manage better, etc. Then, in your mind set a firm amount about how much she can borrow a month, say 20 quid and only give her that if she's desperate and make it clear there's no more.

I know you love her but she sounds like a handful

Sunflowers you’ve done fucking amazing. You are strong. Incredibly strong. After what you have said you need to get this toxicity out of your life. Either go NC or very very low contact. You will never get that mother daughter relationship your seeking. This will never be the cherry on the top.

You can absolutely do this with out her

^^
EXACTLY THIS!!

Here's a thought: what would happen if you died? She'd manage, that's what. People like her will always expand their needs to your limit. Cut the cord.

Bloody hell. You’re made of iron just to be here. And you don’t owe her, or anyone, a single thing.

I’m in awe of you.

What is the tie to her from your DD? Is it genetic? As that means nothing as any adoptive parent will tell you.

Oh I am so sad for you. I grew up without much love too and had to be very independent as my mum has always favoured my brother as he is more like her. I am a people pleaser, I don't like saying no and have enabled people in the past.

She will never love you, she isn't capable of it. All you are doing is enabling her treatment of you. With my experience of narcissists be very very careful with your daughter. They will often drip drip drip poison into children's ears to turn them into an enabler and try to make themselves the focus of everything. Someone I know doesn't see her child anymore as when she finally turned on her narcissistic mother, her child moved in with their grandmother and cut off my friend.

I think first step is get yourself into some proper counselling and cut down contact with your daughter and your mother by organising children's clubs instead. The money is just the tip of the iceberg, you need to recognise that this is an abusive, toxic relationship

That’s some journey Sunflowersok - that took formidable strength - how did you tap into that? Do you need another delve to find another boost to launch you clearly into the next fabulous chapter of your life?

Could you get a new phone? Don't give the number to your mother or brother - keep your current phone for them. Check it once a day.

Stop accepting any help from your mother - no school pick-ups or cleaning. So you won't feel indebted to her in any way.

You could also consider opening a savings account for your DC, and every time your mother asks you for money, say 'no' and put the money into your DC's savings instead.

Respect, sunflowersok, respect to you.