Horrible relationship with controlling DM

[MeridasMum]

I had a long and very helpful thread on here a couple of years ago called (something like) AIBU to devastate my DM?

DM has always been very controlling and, when DH and I suggested she take a break from looking after our DCs while she was recovering from cancer (she wasn’t thinking about their safety and a couple of extremely dangerous situations had occurred because she wasn’t paying attention), she absolutely FREAKED OUT.
In short, she punished and terrorised me (it sounds so exaggerated and dramatic but it’s honestly how it felt) for approx 7 months. Screaming down the phone at me, using all her old controlling tricks, sending flying monkeys, ridiculing me, emotionally manipulating my DCs….).

Advice here was to stick to my guns, don’t attend every argument I’m invited to (I loved that one), go grey rock, etc. Many of you shared similar stories about how their DMs did this but all came round in the end.

It’s been 3 years and our relationship is horrible!

She barely looks me in the eye, never calls or texts unless she absolutely has to, turns on the guilt triggers (she knows me so well), ignores me when I speak (not always, but enough to make her point). I am expected to ‘fix’ our relationship single handedly when, to be honest, I don’t really want to. If she met me half way, I’d feel better about being a dutiful daughter but I massively resent the fact that I do all the running, make all the phone calls, do all the inviting for visits, keep pleasant conversation going despite her rudeness, etc.

Not only that but her behaviour has actually brought up ‘old wounds’ that I hadn’t thought about for a long time:
⁃ She was often an absent mum when I was a young child, she never went without her ‘me time’ or her friendships and socialising, often to my detriment (I wore a house key around my neck from the age of 8)
⁃ She constantly checked my food intake, regularly told me I looked pregnant, she was (and still is) a competitive under-eater
⁃ Nothing I’ve done is ever ‘quite right’. It’s always ‘almost right’ and she praises me for that but if it’s not how she does it, there’s disapproval. If she feels strongly about something and I don’t change, she goes nuclear (screaming etc that I mentioned earlier)
⁃ Some of her rage became physical when I was a teen/young adult. For example, she’d grab me by the hair and pull me about (this only stopped when I did it back to her, twice. I still feel horrible about that, not necessarily guilty; it’s just a terrible memory). This has never been discussed as I know she would deny it (trust me, she would)
⁃ A memorable phrase when I wouldn’t do what she wanted was “no problem, I always get you to do what I want eventually”
⁃ My dad wasn’t any better (I’ve been groomed by DM to believe his was the only abuse I suffered). At 19 years old, he pulled up my dressing gown, exposing my nakedness, to smack my bare bottom because I was going on holiday with my boyfriend (now husband), he tried to push me down stairs when I told him I was pregnant with our first daughter, and so much more. He is now dead so I’m free of that to a certain extent.
To be very fair and balanced, my DM was very loving for much of the time. I got lots of ‘I love yous’. In fact, she said (and seems to believe) that she loves me more than any mother could ever love their child. She absolutely believes that.

So to now.

She still refuses to call me and when I do, she has this voice that says “I’m depressed and it’s your fault, ask me what’s wrong, fix this”. I don’t. I’m breezy and pretend I don’t notice. The thing is, she’s so good at making me feel guilty and I do, very much.

There has never been an apology for any of this.

I am looking for a private therapist to help me but everyone local to me has such a long waitlist. In the meantime, I’m a wreck - anxiety is killing me, my amazing husband and kids can feel the angst coming from me, I’m a chatty person but no longer want to talk, I feel awful; it actually feels physical. It’s affecting me at work, it’s affecting my sleep, my life is falling apart, I overeat, I drink too much, the list goes on.

I know about the stately homes thread and I do pop onto it from time to time.

Give me a kick up the arse, give me a pep talk, anything. I don’t know what I need but I need something from you lovely wise people, please.

One more thing - I can’t go NC. I know some will advise me to. I honestly don’t think I could live with the guilt. I was NC with DF on and off (DM always insisted we got ‘back together’ - she’d divorced him so he became my problem to deal with) and I still live with awful guilt about him dying alone, his alcoholism and his loneliness towards the end of his life.

I am expected to ‘fix’ our relationship single handedly when, to be honest, I don’t really want to

Bloody hell, I'm not surprise. She sounds AWFUL.

Just stop contact! Use the counselling to work out why you've allowed her to treat you like shit for so long.

Do not subject your children to her emotional abusive. Stop that right now. That's up to you.

@SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius

I see you can’t go no contact with your mother, *@MeridasMum*, but you could gradually lower contact with her - stop don’t contact her as often, don’t issue as many invitations - do things on your terms.

Basically, it sounds as if she is using every contact and visit as opportunities to treat you badly - and you have NO obligation to facilitate that, or to allow your children to see it.

You could also look at how you can put limits on the contact/visits you do allow - if she starts being nasty on the phone, say “oops - someone at the door - I’ll ring you back”, and then don’t ring back - or wait a few days longer than you would usually have waited. Set visits for neutral territory - the park - and have an appointment to go to after an hour, so you have an excuse to leave.

You are a good person, and you deserve to be treated well, not badly. You did nothing to deserve the way you were treated as a child - that is 100% your parents’ fault. You do deserve to heal yourself from the wounds that abuse has left.

I wish I could come and give you a huge, proper-mum hug right now.

Oh thank you. I really appreciate that

You can search the BACP website listings by area but the counsellors also list their areas of expertise, so look for ones who specialise in difficult family relationships or whatever they call it.

Don't think of it as NC, but decide you're going to take a six month complete break from her while you seek therapy. Then revisit.

@MeridasMum

I had a long and very helpful thread on here a couple of years ago called (something like) AIBU to devastate my DM?

DM has always been very controlling and, when DH and I suggested she take a break from looking after our DCs while she was recovering from cancer (she wasn’t thinking about their safety and a couple of extremely dangerous situations had occurred because she wasn’t paying attention), she absolutely FREAKED OUT.
In short, she punished and terrorised me (it sounds so exaggerated and dramatic but it’s honestly how it felt) for approx 7 months. Screaming down the phone at me, using all her old controlling tricks, sending flying monkeys, ridiculing me, emotionally manipulating my DCs….).

Advice here was to stick to my guns, don’t attend every argument I’m invited to (I loved that one), go grey rock, etc. Many of you shared similar stories about how their DMs did this but all came round in the end.

It’s been 3 years and our relationship is horrible!

She barely looks me in the eye, never calls or texts unless she absolutely has to, turns on the guilt triggers (she knows me so well), ignores me when I speak (not always, but enough to make her point). I am expected to ‘fix’ our relationship single handedly when, to be honest, I don’t really want to. If she met me half way, I’d feel better about being a dutiful daughter but I massively resent the fact that I do all the running, make all the phone calls, do all the inviting for visits, keep pleasant conversation going despite her rudeness, etc.

Not only that but her behaviour has actually brought up ‘old wounds’ that I hadn’t thought about for a long time:
⁃ She was often an absent mum when I was a young child, she never went without her ‘me time’ or her friendships and socialising, often to my detriment (I wore a house key around my neck from the age of 8)
⁃ She constantly checked my food intake, regularly told me I looked pregnant, she was (and still is) a competitive under-eater
⁃ Nothing I’ve done is ever ‘quite right’. It’s always ‘almost right’ and she praises me for that but if it’s not how she does it, there’s disapproval. If she feels strongly about something and I don’t change, she goes nuclear (screaming etc that I mentioned earlier)
⁃ Some of her rage became physical when I was a teen/young adult. For example, she’d grab me by the hair and pull me about (this only stopped when I did it back to her, twice. I still feel horrible about that, not necessarily guilty; it’s just a terrible memory). This has never been discussed as I know she would deny it (trust me, she would)
⁃ A memorable phrase when I wouldn’t do what she wanted was “no problem, I always get you to do what I want eventually”
⁃ My dad wasn’t any better (I’ve been groomed by DM to believe his was the only abuse I suffered). At 19 years old, he pulled up my dressing gown, exposing my nakedness, to smack my bare bottom because I was going on holiday with my boyfriend (now husband), he tried to push me down stairs when I told him I was pregnant with our first daughter, and so much more. He is now dead so I’m free of that to a certain extent.
To be very fair and balanced, my DM was very loving for much of the time. I got lots of ‘I love yous’. In fact, she said (and seems to believe) that she loves me more than any mother could ever love their child. She absolutely believes that.

So to now.

She still refuses to call me and when I do, she has this voice that says “I’m depressed and it’s your fault, ask me what’s wrong, fix this”. I don’t. I’m breezy and pretend I don’t notice. The thing is, she’s so good at making me feel guilty and I do, very much.

There has never been an apology for any of this.

I am looking for a private therapist to help me but everyone local to me has such a long waitlist. In the meantime, I’m a wreck - anxiety is killing me, my amazing husband and kids can feel the angst coming from me, I’m a chatty person but no longer want to talk, I feel awful; it actually feels physical. It’s affecting me at work, it’s affecting my sleep, my life is falling apart, I overeat, I drink too much, the list goes on.

I know about the stately homes thread and I do pop onto it from time to time.

Give me a kick up the arse, give me a pep talk, anything. I don’t know what I need but I need something from you lovely wise people, please.

One more thing - I can’t go NC. I know some will advise me to. I honestly don’t think I could live with the guilt. I was NC with DF on and off (DM always insisted we got ‘back together’ - she’d divorced him so he became my problem to deal with) and I still live with awful guilt about him dying alone, his alcoholism and his loneliness towards the end of his life.

These ideas/phrases in your OP - of you getting "back together" with your DF, or "splitting up" with your DM ... and the fact that she loves you more than a mother could ever love a child ...

... they all gave me a strong sense that bottom line is your mother doesn't truly VIEW you as her child, with all that entails. Instead the relationships between you and each of your parents are, deep down, as if you are their partner, rather than their child.

Your mother needs you emotionally - to fight with, to vent on, to lean on. Whereas in the proper order of things you should be leaning on her, and she should be getting her support from someone of her own generation, not her child.

Where there should be some separation and boundaries, there is merging and confusion about who is what to whom.

@Bumpsadaisie

I don’t believe I used the phrase ‘splitting up’ with DM, in fact, I did say at the end of my OP that I can’t go NC (that’s the phrase we use, is it not?)

The ‘getting back together’ with my father was a phrase I used for ease. It saved a longer word count in an already long thread.

I don’t think either of them saw me as a partner in any traditional sense and there was certainly no sexual element to any emotional or physical abuse (I have often thought long and hard about the smacking my bare bottom and I genuine believe it was a power play/controlling technique to remind me I was only a child - although as a 19 year old it felt disgusting and sexual at the time).

However, I did ask for input and I thank you for yours. I am certainly going to consider what you have said and can perhaps relate: both of them used me as a replacement for each other, I suppose, but isn’t that what many divorced couples do inadvertently to their kids? I definitely knew too much at too young an age about their relationship for sure.

That said, I have definitely extracted myself from that element of both relationships (my father has died and my mother is desperate to get things back to ‘normal’. She knows she has lost the puppet that did everything she wanted)

Yes, I didn't mean that you were literally in a sexual reln with them or that you were literally splitting up or literally getting back together.

I'm talking figuratively and more loosely than that, that there is a nuance of that sort of feeling about it how you relate to one another.

Like you're merged in a couple instead of being separate people with space between you. Your mother expects to control you because she feels that the right feeling is to feel merged with you. If something happens to establish your separateness she is very distressed as it feels all wrong.

That's the kind of thing I meant. Separateness feels uncomfortable and hard to tolerate.

Your parents sound unbelievably toxic. I know you said you don't want to but I'd really consider going NC. I'm not the best for advice on this but I just wanted to comment and say you are incredibly strong, you've gone through so much and seem like an absolutely lovely woman.

@Bumpsadaisie

Yes, I didn't mean that you were literally in a sexual reln with them or that you were literally splitting up or literally getting back together.

I'm talking figuratively and more loosely than that, that there is a nuance of that sort of feeling about it how you relate to one another.

Like you're merged in a couple instead of being separate people with space between you. Your mother expects to control you because she feels that the right feeling is to feel merged with you. If something happens to establish your separateness she is very distressed as it feels all wrong.

That's the kind of thing I meant. Separateness feels uncomfortable and hard to tolerate.

Thanks for your further explanation. My response to your first post was just to add clarity. I think I understand what you mean though - like a co-dependency thing I think

@ParistoLondon

Your parents sound unbelievably toxic. I know you said you don't want to but I'd really consider going NC. I'm not the best for advice on this but I just wanted to comment and say you are incredibly strong, you've gone through so much and seem like an absolutely lovely woman.

Thank you for this.

I have done everything I can to avoid replicating their behaviours but I admit that some have crept in from time to time.

When controlling tendencies with my own DC have crept in (I refer specifically to my young adult children, not the little ones), I immediately a pop Louise and stop. I have also asked them to ensure they speak to me about anything I don't notice straight away.

They see their gran's behaviour and what it does to me and, quite rightly, will never let me away with that!

ok OP you want a kick up the arse heres one....why are you destroying your marriage and your childrens life? Why are you not putting the very people who love you unconditionally first? Why are they all suffering too? Tell you why its cos you place more importance on appeasing your mother than you do your husband and children, Have a think about this.Why should they suffer too for your inability to do the right thing not only for you but for them too. Its not all about you. They have to live with you and watch you being abused watch you been taken from them with depression and fear...its not fair OP.You are not being fair to you your husband or your children. You have not found a solution to this problem over all these years that works despite everything you have tried...I think you need to learn when to bow out and admit defeat...in doing this you get a chance of living.And I want you to live a happy successful life with warmth joy and no fear in it but while ever you are on this roundabout refusing to get off you are cripling every and any chance of happiness. I am sorry lovely lady you dont deserve this but neither do your own children or husband they need you all of you not a shell of who you are or who you could be.

Hi OP,

I totally understand what you mean about not being able to go NC. My mother was physically and emotionally abusive growing up and continues to be emotionally abusive. It’s very easy for strangers on the internet to advise to go NC and often criticise people in a similar situation for not going NC, especially when there are children involved, but they tend to forget they are at a safe remove from the situation at hand with no emotion attached to it.

Like a PP mentioned, I recently learned that the reason people like you and I struggle with NC is due to FOG (fear obligation and guilt) that’s been drilled into us from a young age and that made a lot of sense to me. Maybe objectively NC might seem like the ‘right’ thing to do but unless you’re at total peace with the decision, and it doesn’t sound like you are, it might not be the right time for that.

That being said, your mum (like mine) sounds like a bit of a narcissist, insofar as she has to get her way and resorts to emotional blackmail to ensure she does, denial of any wrong doing etc. Unfortunately people like that don’t change and can’t be reasoned with, so if you do wish to have a relationship with her (you get to decide what type of relationship you have, how often she sees your children etc) you need to accept that this is her and she can’t/ won’t change. Then maybe start with some boundaries, you don’t necessarily have to communicate these with her, but there are certain things you can do if she starts being provocative, in order to protect yourself and your well-being and that of your children.

I’m sorry for all the abuse you endured. I’ve heard a few people on MN mention the ‘toxic parents’ book. I’ve ordered one myself.

Lastly, might be a long shot but if you are working do you get any sort of health benefits through work? I recently learned that where I work there are 6/8 bupa counselling sessions that we can take free of charge. Maybe you might have something similar?

There is a phrase that has helped me with various difficult people.

"Detach with love".

Whether or not you go NC, detaching with love means that you want the best for them, you still love them, but that you emotionally distance yourself. As STDG said, keep visits short and have a list of pre-prepared escapes planned.

When you're actually dealing with her, imagine you're on a complaints desk and dealing with an awkward customer. And/or that you are standing on a rock with the sea (of little meanneses) trying to drown you, but even when the waves come over your feet, you can still feel the solid rock under you and you aren't going to get swept away by it.

Steady breathing helps, literally keeping your breath steady.

good luck .. when someone has that much of a hold over your soul, even if it's your mum, you need a lot of love and support to keep fighting for right to be yourself and do your own things.

If your hisband made you free so awful you would divorce him. If your friend treated you like this you would be long gone. Why is your mother allowed to behave so badly for decades?

Read Toxic Parents and start online counselling (check out if you have Employee Assistance at work). Get free of this horrible woman

It's not codependent exactly, but your relationship is enmeshed and that's not healthy.
My mother is very similar, I have been no contact now for years. If you feel that you can't do that (you can, but you aren't ready to) then you need to detach emotionally as much as possible.

You two are separate people. Totally separate humans.
There is actual space, empty air, between you and her.

Visualize the umbilical cord being cut. It's time.

I do think this difficulty with feeling separate is at the heart of many troubled relationships.

Narcissism at bottom is not being "egotistical" or "self absorbed" - although these can be part of it.

At bottom it is a denial and a wiping out of separateness, the acceptance that the other person - daughter, partner, friend, whoever it is - is SEPARATE to you. With different feelings, different thoughts, different personalities, different passions etc.

If someone is very narcissistic then this separateness of key other people on who they depend is terrifying. This fear triggers all the "anti-separate" behaviours that you see so commonly being talked about on here.

For example, denying that the other person is a real other person that might be different to them. Putting their own bad mood into the other person so that everyone is feeling the same and having the same experience. Trying to control the other person, so that it can be denied that actually they have their own agency and will and cannot be controlled.

Toddlers are very narcissistic - they try to omnipotently control the ennvironment, they have poor mentalisation and believe everyone is feeling what they are thinking and likes and dislikes what they like and dislike, that everyone is having the same experience that they are.

But toddlers - if in a good enough environment that can help them face the painful reality of their lack of control - will give up this narcissism and start to relate more realistically to the world. This is painful and a loss but does bring benefits - more realistic and ultimately more fulfilling relationships, plus it helps the formation of the child's own unique identity.

Some people for whatever reason - environment not supportive enough maybe? - struggle with this important developmental stage. They go through life still trying to wipe out separateness and difference and desperately try to control everyone around them. When it becomes evident that the other person IS separate is triggers fear and rage.

@Bumpsadaisie that is a great post - makes so much sense

[quote Comtesse]**@Bumpsadaisie that is a great post - makes so much sense[/quote]
I agree, it is a great post. Thank you for the time you've taken, everyone, to add your knowledge that I assume is learned from experience of this type of behaviour.

This helps @Bumpsadaisie and I can absolutely recognise DM in this! I am trying to 'detach with love' as mentioned above but if you have any pearls of wisdom on how to do that, I'd love to read them.

I've just reread your first post on this thread and you really do need to go NC ultimately. You say you can't but that's because you are trapped in the guilt part of Fog, fear obligation and guilt.
You will have no peace in your life while she is in it.
She doesn't ring you, she's rude when you ring her, so stop. It's not your responsibility to fix a relationship she has fucked up with her abusive behavior.
You really need some therapy with someone who understands dysfunction and toxic families. I can recommend someone who does online sessions (qualified psychotherapist). Not cheap but changed my life. And I say that as someone who has a very very similar mother. I tied myself in knots for years trying to make her happy but nothing would ever work.
Your mother is a narcissist and you are her narcissistic supply.
You need to let some anger overcome your misplaced guilt. You wouldn't take this abuse from anyone else in your life. You don't have to take it from her just because she is your mother.

@MeridasMum

I am still wrestling with "the problem of separation" myself so I don't think there are any easy answers.

Your mother sounds like she has significant interpersonal difficulties and they can't really be fixed - I would say not without several years of intense psychotherapy, and she sounds too old and set in her ways to engage with that.

So I guess one thing is the acceptance that probably she can't be fixed and you will have to make the best of the relationship as it is while protecting yourself and your family.

It is not doom and gloom though as I do think being able to reflect on what might be going on relationally between your mother and you, is helpful. It doesn't change things, or "fix" her, but the very act of being able to think about it creates a "mental space" between you.

This mirrors what happens when a toddler is brought up by a parent who is sufficiently psychologically/emotionally mature that they can both engage with the immediate behaviour of the toddler which pulls them into high affect engagements, and at the same time keep in touch with their own adult mind, which helps them think about what is going on in the relationship between the adult and the toddler.

So let's say I am this "adult" - if my toddler is screaming at me because I cut his toast up wrong, I both am feeling intensely stressed and irritated by him and feel like shouting back or walking off and leaving him in retaliation ... but I also keep in touch with my thinking mind ... and I think ... he is a little person with big feelings, he is tired, he lives in a world he has little control over ... I can be compassionate to him despite how annoying he is.

That both prevents the adult killing the toddler (!) and creates mental space/separation between them psychically.

That experience of mental space is taken in by the toddler and the process of learning about separateness is reinforced ... in heathy development this happens in a thousand micro encounters. Of course we all lose our tempers with toddlers sometimes, but I am talking about overall, that the experience is one of a parent who can think and remain the adult even though they are under sore provocation.

If the toddler is brought up by someone who can't think in that way, there is just a screaming toddler and a scary raging adult. The encounter escalates, there is no space for thought or a breather ... and the toddler cannot absorb and learn from a positive experience of an older wiser mind who can handle intense feelings while still able to think.

And instead of the separateness feeling containing, and being the thing that can help diffuse and handle the situation, it feels catastrophic to the developing child who does not have a mature mind to help them with their big feelings. There is no containment of the massive affect, so the only option is to cling on (psychologically) to the parent even though they are not really providing what is needed. The child's emotional and psychological development gets stuck and they can't separate very well.

It also crosses my mind that having been brought up by her, this kind of good experience may be one that you have not had too much of, either. If you were to have psychoanalytic or psychodynamic therapy, you would have the benefit of being the small one in the relationship who is thought about by a mature mind. It is a good way to both get in touch with your difficult feelings, be able to express them, and have them contained by a more mature mind. Then one can gradually learn to do that for oneself.

You could think about going no-contact as many have suggested and I don't think anyone would blame you.

An alternative would be to sharpen your skills in how to handle someone like your mother, who I think like a toddler needs compassion but extremely firm boundaries and an experience of someone with a more mature mind who can think about her. Mind you that is a VERY tall order and you may feel you don't have the inclination or the energy for this kind of relationship.

I guess there will also be a lot of grief - about the mother you didn't and don't have and what you have lost (a hope that she could somehow be different).

And also you might have to think carefully about the part of YOU that struggles with separation (I think we all have one!) and think about what role that part of you might play in these difficulties.

Good luck.

[quote Bumpsadaisie]@MeridasMum

I am still wrestling with "the problem of separation" myself so I don't think there are any easy answers.

Your mother sounds like she has significant interpersonal difficulties and they can't really be fixed - I would say not without several years of intense psychotherapy, and she sounds too old and set in her ways to engage with that.

So I guess one thing is the acceptance that probably she can't be fixed and you will have to make the best of the relationship as it is while protecting yourself and your family.

It is not doom and gloom though as I do think being able to reflect on what might be going on relationally between your mother and you, is helpful. It doesn't change things, or "fix" her, but the very act of being able to think about it creates a "mental space" between you.

This mirrors what happens when a toddler is brought up by a parent who is sufficiently psychologically/emotionally mature that they can both engage with the immediate behaviour of the toddler which pulls them into high affect engagements, and at the same time keep in touch with their own adult mind, which helps them think about what is going on in the relationship between the adult and the toddler.

So let's say I am this "adult" - if my toddler is screaming at me because I cut his toast up wrong, I both am feeling intensely stressed and irritated by him and feel like shouting back or walking off and leaving him in retaliation ... but I also keep in touch with my thinking mind ... and I think ... he is a little person with big feelings, he is tired, he lives in a world he has little control over ... I can be compassionate to him despite how annoying he is.

That both prevents the adult killing the toddler (!) and creates mental space/separation between them psychically.

That experience of mental space is taken in by the toddler and the process of learning about separateness is reinforced ... in heathy development this happens in a thousand micro encounters. Of course we all lose our tempers with toddlers sometimes, but I am talking about overall, that the experience is one of a parent who can think and remain the adult even though they are under sore provocation.

If the toddler is brought up by someone who can't think in that way, there is just a screaming toddler and a scary raging adult. The encounter escalates, there is no space for thought or a breather ... and the toddler cannot absorb and learn from a positive experience of an older wiser mind who can handle intense feelings while still able to think.

And instead of the separateness feeling containing, and being the thing that can help diffuse and handle the situation, it feels catastrophic to the developing child who does not have a mature mind to help them with their big feelings. There is no containment of the massive affect, so the only option is to cling on (psychologically) to the parent even though they are not really providing what is needed. The child's emotional and psychological development gets stuck and they can't separate very well.

It also crosses my mind that having been brought up by her, this kind of good experience may be one that you have not had too much of, either. If you were to have psychoanalytic or psychodynamic therapy, you would have the benefit of being the small one in the relationship who is thought about by a mature mind. It is a good way to both get in touch with your difficult feelings, be able to express them, and have them contained by a more mature mind. Then one can gradually learn to do that for oneself.

You could think about going no-contact as many have suggested and I don't think anyone would blame you.

An alternative would be to sharpen your skills in how to handle someone like your mother, who I think like a toddler needs compassion but extremely firm boundaries and an experience of someone with a more mature mind who can think about her. Mind you that is a VERY tall order and you may feel you don't have the inclination or the energy for this kind of relationship.

I guess there will also be a lot of grief - about the mother you didn't and don't have and what you have lost (a hope that she could somehow be different).

And also you might have to think carefully about the part of YOU that struggles with separation (I think we all have one!) and think about what role that part of you might play in these difficulties.

Good luck.[/quote]
Thank you. I appreciate your time.

I'll need to read this a couple of times. And you're right: I'm not sure I have the inclination to manage that kind of relationship. Lots to think about

There's only so much managing you can do of someone like your mother and you may also find that as you pull back and assert boundaries she actually gets worse to draw you back into that dynamic.
I found in the end that I just couldn't deal with her and didn't want to. It's been like ripping off a plaster, painful at first but much better since.

@OrangeBlossomsinthesun

There's only so much managing you can do of someone like your mother and you may also find that as you pull back and assert boundaries she actually gets worse to draw you back into that dynamic. I found in the end that I just couldn't deal with her and didn't want to. It's been like ripping off a plaster, painful at first but much better since.

Yes, I think this is right. Any setting of limits will provoke rage and upset in her and she will go to any lengths to pull you in.

But it is just possible that if you can hold, she might learn to tolerate her distress.

But as @OrangeBlossomsinthesun says it is a massive undertaking to do that and you simply might not want to. No one could blame you either!

@OrangeBlossomsinthesun

I've just reread your first post on this thread and you really do need to go NC ultimately. You say you can't but that's because you are trapped in the guilt part of Fog, fear obligation and guilt. You will have no peace in your life while she is in it. She doesn't ring you, she's rude when you ring her, so stop. It's not your responsibility to fix a relationship she has fucked up with her abusive behavior. You really need some therapy with someone who understands dysfunction and toxic families. I can recommend someone who does online sessions (qualified psychotherapist). Not cheap but changed my life. And I say that as someone who has a very very similar mother. I tied myself in knots for years trying to make her happy but nothing would ever work. Your mother is a narcissist and you are her narcissistic supply. You need to let some anger overcome your misplaced guilt. You wouldn't take this abuse from anyone else in your life. You don't have to take it from her just because she is your mother.

I'd really appreciate any recommendation of a counsellor who is experienced in this area.

If you don't mind, a PM re this would be great. Thank you.

The relief when you achieve NC will be amazing. A whole new way of life.

You will get there. Put your DC first and do it for them.