What is your relationship with your mother like?

[NameChange17269]

I know this is a very odd question but I am just wondering. I love my mother but I don’t know if I actually like her as a person ? Just some times the way she acts, little bit selfish, not the best up bringing but I think she tried her best, she is just constantly negative and it really gets on my nerves. She is in her mid 50’s and has no real friends. She isn’t in a relationship either so she is on her own. She moans so much about general life and how she is unhappy and lonely, yet she won’t do anything about it?! I offer suggestions and it’s as if she doesn’t want to be helped. I do not know what I’m asking for really - I guess I’m just wondering what others relationships are like ?

Quite difficult. When she's around she is very practically supportive, she cared for me as a child very well, she did everything while my dad worked.

However emotionally there's not a lot there. I know she loves me, but she doesn't tell me so. We don't have much of a connection in that way. It's almost like there's something missing.

I'm no contact with my mum and have been for five years after very low contact for nearly ten years. I'm the family scapegoat and in the family hierarchy there's my dad (abusive alcoholic) me, the dog, and then my siblings.

My mum is an emotionally and physically abusive piece of crap and hounded me into a breakdown 15 years ago. She's a bully and beat the crap out of me as a child. She doesn't treat me like a human being, just something she has to tolerate or put up with.

I put up with it because I was traumatised and wanted her to love me. I wanted her to be kind and I thought that if I tried really, really hard, then she would see me for who I was and not this picture she seemed to have of me where I was a terrible person.

I eventually had therapy and realised that my mum was killing me and I would kill myself if I continued my relationship with her. I still have her voice in my head telling me what a piece of shit I am and how I can't do anything right. How ashamed she is of me. She was always telling me how ashamed she was of me and took everyone's side over mine, even if they were strangers.

My siblings are the same and they all treat me like I'm scum. I'm estranged from them all but not before my health gave out and I have several long term illnesses because of abuse and trauma.

I'm judged because of my relationship with my family. People don't believe me or tell me that she's my mum and I should try to sort it out with her.

To those who have a good relationship with their mum, you're very lucky so treasure it. I've never had a maternal figure in my life, no one to support me or ask life's questions and have no idea what it's like to be loved for myself.

I'm sure she thinks it's absolutely fine, for me it's one of tolerance.

I've never really had a relationship with her, she severely neglected and and abused me my whole life. I've struggled to pretend there's a relationship since becoming an adult just to keep the peace.

I don't like her as a person, she is horrible and incredibly fake.

I'll call her out on things when I know she's telling lies (90%) of what she says is lies but I don't go out of my way to tell her what I really think.

I don't actively involve her in my life as she puts on an act eg she will invite us over for lunch, hold my baby long enough to take selfies and then hands her straight back before uploading images saying 'best afternoon cuddling my grandchildren all arvo' when it was a pure photo op and no other words or acknowledgment to my kids.

My DM is dead thank god. That sounds awful but she was useless, self absorbed and thought the world and everything in it owed her. She was deliberately cruel to me most of my life and made me feel less than all the time. She hated me achieving anything and gloated on my failures. Not a mother at all certainly not the kind of mother I am

I love this thread in that it has made me realise at the end of the day most of our (now older) mums are at times a bit bonkers in their own different ways.

No doubt we will also be a bit naggy, a bit demanding, a bit distant or whatever else when our itme comes to be a mum to an adult DC.

I am so close to mine. She is a big emotional support, encouragement and in her own way (not overly emotional) shows when she is genuinely happy for me. She is a sounding board for practical issues. She is a hard worker and gave up a lot to be there for me as a child. But yes also at times she doesn't show the overflowing emotion I would like her to show, she can randomly be very over sensitive, she can be negative and I sometimes wish she did more to move her own life on and open her eyes to more. But overall, she is my brilliant mum.

Thank you for everyone’s responses on this thread x x

I haven't spoken to mine in over a year. As pish as 2020 has been, it would have been a whole lot worse had I had the stress of putting up with her crap.
Disclaimer: yes I know you only get one mum.
Yes she is that bad.
Yes I know some have lost their mum and would give anything to see her again.

Mine drives me insane. She’s absolutely infuriating and drives me mad. She’s also the most wonderful woman I know and I will be utterly lost without her. She got very ill when I was about 15, so I pretty much took over as ‘mum’ for my siblings and she’s never really got better, so I do everything that needs doing, from shopping to making phone calls. Despite that, she’s incredibly strong, she’s clever, and has the best instincts. If she tells me not to do something because she’s got a bad feeling about it, I always regret it if I ignore her. She’s got the same sense of humour and we make each other laugh.

She moans so much about general life and how she is unhappy and lonely, yet she won’t do anything about it?! I offer suggestions and it’s as if she doesn’t want to be helped I think, for your own sake, you need to take a step back. Stop offering her suggestions. If she’s moaning, say ‘I’m sorry to hear that mum, let me know if there’s anything I can do to help’. And then change the subject. It’s ok not to want to listen to someone constantly moaning. And if that tack doesn’t work and you feel like you need to distance yourself, it’s ok to do that too.

Just a bit odd really. She’s not a terrible person, we’re just very very different and I can only tolerate about 2 hours with her. She was a bit of a rubbish mum but is a fantastic grandparent so makes up for it that way.

My relationship with my Mother will be much improved by her death.

Love her
Like her

and she is my best friend.

My mother was abusive emotionally and physically she has a personality disorder she used to beat us with objects.
One time when she was beating me she ripped my hair out so I kicked her in the stomach she then beat me again saying "how dare you I'm on my period and that hurts" I was 10 years old.

I'm a mum to my 7 year old and the thought of physically hurting my daughter makes me feel sick. I think I can sometimes be emotionally distant but that's the trauma I've been through
, I will try to explain to DD when she's a bit older

We got back into contact 3 years ago after she said she was getting help she ghosted me earlier this year again so it's permanent NC.

As a child I had a recurring thought that if the house caught fire my parents wouldn't rescue me as they would be too busy rescuing my sisters, grew up feeling like a 2nd class member of the family, always in trouble, sisters always found it easy to blame me and were always believed.
Fast forward, now in my 50s my mother relies on me for practically everything whilst her favourites sit back and do nothing but my mum still prefers them to me, sometimes I just want to shout at her and ask why doesn't she love me, pathetic really

My mum is amazing and I know I'm blessed to have her. I feel like she taught me how to be a good mum in turn and I couldn't love her more.

My relationship with my DM is complicated. I do love her and I know that she loves me, and my siblings. But I also feel a lot of resentment towards her, because she failed to protect my DSis and me from being sexually abused by my F and others and my DB from being badly damaged as well.

I can't express that resentment to her, because when's I bring up the past, she bursts into tears. I know it was a shock to her when we told her about it a few years ago, but she makes it all about her.

I'm also angry with her for not being the kind of mum we could talk to. She was distant emotionally and doesn't seem to realise it. But I know why this is so. She was orphaned at 10 and then sexually abused by the uncle who was her guardian. She was also in an abusive marriage; my F was paranoid, accusing her of cheating (oh the irony) and emotionally abusive and controlling.

I cope by thinking of her as Granny to my DDs (11 and 8). She doesn't see much of them now (because of Covid of course), and they haven't asked about when they'll be seeing her, so she isn't as close to them as she thinks she is.

She's 81 now, and we rub along okay, but without really being close.

As a mum to 3 teenage daughters some of the responses on this thread make me sad, i hope i can be a good mum to them for the rest of their lives ( and don't get in their nerves too much!)
My mum has dementia so now she is like an empty shell and isnt really herself anymore.
I have always loved her and got on well with her and i know she loves me but she was never openly affectionate and when I had dc she never helped or was involved as much as my friends mums were , she could be a bit emotionally distant but my grandparents were the same, I am trying to break the pattern with my own DC.

@AccidentallyOnSanta

I love her but I don't like her.

She loves me but she doesn't like me , I'm not good enough for her, I'm not what she thought I'd be.

So that makes for a fun dynamic.

This sums up my mother too. I have never done anything right, I have been a big disappointment to her all her life despite having had a great career and two wonderful children. She couldn’t even be bothered to get what my job was right, despite being told many times. She’s never told me she loves me, neither did my father so I guess that sums it up. FOG big time has driven the relationship on my side. Very sad and thankfully nothing like the relationship I have with my DCs.

When she's happy, she's really lovely to be around. Sadly more often than not she's negative, angry and woe is me.
I swear I will NEVER dump my emotional shit on my child the way my mother does on me. It's exhausting and upsetting because ultimately there's fuck all you can do to influence their happiness. I've done so much for my mum in an attempt to improve her life and make her happier. None of it has worked, she lives to be negative. I've accepted it now, I can't feel sorry for her any more.

@Runnerduck34

I understand where you're coming from. My DDs are 11 and 8 and are adopted, which adds another layer to work through to build relationships with them. They are well bonded to me, but I know the teen years will be tough.

my mother left my father for my friends dad in my early teens. it changed the course of my life. i didnt speak to her until i was 22 hen i went looking for her. we get on great now and have done since then really.
i dont judge anyone at all and hold no grudges whatsoever. my four siblings do not have a good relationship with her. it’s very sad for her as she was forced into a marriage when pregnant at sixteen. i feel she would have killed herself or gone mad had she stayed. she has paid a huge price i think.

i would describe it using the song ‘class of 2013- audiotree live version’ by Mitski