Did/does anyone else’s mom put on an act when there is other people around?

[YouAreNotBatman]

I was remembering when I was a kid, she was (and is even today) miserable, judgemental, critical, very selfish and rude person.
Wouldn’t really talk to me or my dad.
Neutral or grumpy face on most of the time.

But if we had guests over she was talkative, energetic and seemed interested in other people.
Once they or we left, boom, the facade would drop.

I’ve forgotten what she is like, I’m used to her being a death eater, but recently when I was spending time with her, we pump into some people she knows and my goodness the change in her demeanor!
And was we continued our way it all dropped and she started to criticize them.

It’s so weird!

Does anyone else know people like this?

@stealthninjamum My mother (81 today) is like that. Very, very misogynistic ... my father left her for OW 33 years ago and to this day she blames the woman more than my father. She lives abroad and when I last rang her we were talking about the Queen's funeral...Prince Andrew got mentioned and OMG, I then had to listen to a 5 minute rant completely victim blaming Virginia Giuffre...she basically called her a whore! Lovely.

She was also a 'performative parent' ...mainly for her family. The minute we moved away and she no longer had her 'audience' it stopped. She took no interest in our lives...she (along with my father) is a raging narcissist. I'm now very low contact with her, been no contact with my father for 33 years.

My mum sounds similar. Miserable, cold, negative about everything and bitchy but to people outside or at work, she’s always smiling, nothings too much trouble, happy go lucky. Everyone would tell me how lucky I was to have such a lovely, happy, bubbly mum.

She’d offer to help people if they said they needed something from a certain shop and then bitch about having to go and get it, call them dreadful names. If I said, you did offer, I’d get told to fuck off and that I was jealous of her spending time with other people. She’d be lovely to me in front of other people and pretend we were really close, then it was like a dark cloud in the room as soon as they were gone.

She hated when I met my partner as he was/is such a positive person and thought I was amazing and was very open about that. She’d visibly cringe at him showing me affection, doing nice things for me and telling me how nice I looked. She tried to cause trouble in my relationship, planting negative thoughts about him in my head when the reality was he’s a really good man. It’s really hard to describe her.

Lots of other issues which took years of therapy to go through. I had a horrible childhood, my dad was abusive, but for some reason these people had some sort of control of me for years. Totally relate to the person that said she was burdened with adult issues as a child, my mum would tell me about their marriage issues and very personal things I was too young to cope with. I was a ball of anxiety growing up.

I finally had enough of it all about 10 years ago, in my early 30s, when I could see my parents were starting to negatively affect my children. I cut all contact with both parents and after a few months adjusting to being free of it all, life has been really good. I don’t think it will ever not affect me, being put down for years by the person that should build you up the most takes it’s toll, but I can see it was my fault now.

but I can see it was NOT my fault now.

My mum did this. Hateful to me , abusive. I’m front of others happy and lovely to me. I realised that she did this so that if I ever spoke out I would not be believed

Yes, I call her the “ street angel, house devil”

I recognise the misogyny too, although she claimed to be a feminist.

And she had a hierarchy too. But she liked being around people she saw as lesser than her. For example, if someone dared to be dressed in a business suit and was working on their laptop on the train, she’d say things like ‘look at him/her, thinking they’re important and everyone’s looking at them.’ 😬 But then if they spoke to her, it was like she looked up to them. A real chip on her shoulder I think. She liked to be around people that were poorer than her and she could feel superior to. She’d be over friendly with people that she felt looked poor or less worthy than her on her made up hierarchy, like someone buying cheaper brand food in the supermarket or someone stacking shelves.

Sounds absolutely crazy and is so hard to explain. It’s always strangely comforting to read others with similar experience although I’m sad that others have had to navigate it too.

My parents were both a bit like this. Not feeling superior over people but being over friendly to people they perceived as lower status to them. I think it came from a place of deep insecurity as they had both risen from humble beginnings and so felt intimidated by people they perceived as equal status if that makes sense. It didn’t come from a bad place.

For future reference, I found the phrase "That is very kind of you to say, thank you" very useful at my mum's funeral when dealing with well wishers. It wasn't the place to tell them she'd been awful to me, and acknowledged the good intent in their condolences while not agreeing with the content. It worked well 😁

It's the Catherine Tate 'nan' character!!

I think a lot (not all by any means) of older people suffer from low grade depression and are often quite unhappy for various reasons and this can be one of the manifestations.

My father in law is reasonably chipper At 83 on the surface but I know gets down due to various ailments , he's now lost his partner who dies 3 years ago and 17 years ago lost his wife of 40 years.

He's always making comments about being 'yesterdays man' and any good things being 'behind him'

I try and cut older people acting like this some slack because I realise many are unhappy but don't like to say it - especially to their kids.

Yes, though to be fair, I think most of us put on a different persona with 'outsiders' than we do with those in our closest inner circle who we are more ourselves with.

My mum is definitely like this and I've come to understand it as being almost 'performative'. It's gotten worse due to social media. She is very 'going to the beach with my best friend!' posting photos and then would slag her off to me, how her friend has gained weight (or even worse, when she lost it!), what she was eating, what house she just bought that my mum didn't like, who she's friends with, etc.

I never fully appreciated it until it turned on me too. Our relationship has completely broken down (due to some quite serious things in relation to my dc and my need to keep them safe). She's unfriended me on Facebook now, but years ago, before she did, all she posted was bs about how she loved her daughter more than anything in the world, how being a grandmother was the best thing, blah, blah, blah, photos of my kids from previous visits saying how much she loved them. You get the picture. While literally in the same hour sending me all sorts of hateful messages and telling me what a terrible person I am. She would be telling everyone about how much she missed her grandchildren and her grandchildren were her greatest gift...but literally hasn't made an effort to see them in several years. I suspect she must slag me off to all her friends (who she used to slag off to me).

I think in extreme cases, like this, it's all about insecurity and shame. Some people have to present a certain face to the world, because how life really is for them is something they can't show. They have to save face and tell everyone what they want to hear publicly, even if they are awful behind closed doors.

The lack of reality, the performances, the virtue signaling, the contrived female social effervescence.......a lot of it is due to the patriarchal umbrella that we all live under.

There is pressure on women to be chirpy, bubbly, playful and to create that happy social space, to carry other people into a happy mood. A lot of the false social behavior is pre-empting any criticism of being a whingebag, miserable old cow.

Only the valuable people will get the false niceness from the social climber. People are bonkers.

Same... just had my boyfriend over for dinner and my mum's behaviour was so fake. It pissed me off. And she won't let him go.
She'd constantly speak some random stuff to him that she usually doesn't bother thinking about. I felt like she was trying to get too close to him in another way. Maybe it was just in my head but my gut feeling wasn't good. I just deeply felt something wrong with her whole change of behaviour and mannerisms.

Yes, yes, and yes to all of you. It’s really hard explaining this type of parent to others. And honestly, I assumed everyone’s mum was like this until I worked in a family home, and realised - oh, when the front door is closed, the mum is just the same nice person, rather than a raging banshee…

honestly, it’s tough on us, but I sense everyone on this thread has broken the cycle. And any with kids are NOT being like this. I try really hard to ensure my kids feel secure and loved.

There was always an unpleasant bitching session after every single friendly party etc. Catherine Tate’s Nan, as a PP said!

Oh, and another thing: she’d brag about me (all of us) to her mates/other mums, eg in playground, so cringe I recall, but to my face she’d call me stupid. She had me assessed for learning issues. Constantly called me thick. I have a bleeding PhD from Oxford, but I still feel utterly stupid.

anyone else on here end up with an eating disorder? That was the other thing. Her whole focus was on looks. It was hideous being her daughter. But of course, she believed herself to be parent of the year.

oh yes, and she lied about almost everything, and she thieved too. She did endure childhood trauma (2nd WW related), and while she doesn’t acknowledge that, I do think a lot of issues come from that… it’s tough.

This was my dad.

Oh yes. My brother would only visit if someone was with him because she behaved better. She did notice and it frustrated her.

when my dad died, she made me go to school the day after because ‘what would people think?’ I was in yr 9

Oh yes. People think she's lovely.

As soon as they're out of earshot (or just if she feels like a rant) she starts about their weight, hair, accent (including putting their accent on and copying what they've just said to illustrate how thick she thinks they are) skin colour, job, clothes, background and parenting. Mostly it's about women but working class men get it too.

If someone is ill, she's had it and 100x worse. If someone does well in anything, they're obviously sleeping with someone to get ahead or it's fixed.

It was awful to grow up with.

@Deata anorexic in my teens and early 20s. Now I'm fat she likes to ask my dress size ("I've seen something I might get you for your birthday") and then does a big tight lipped sigh and says she won't bother when I tell her!
Doesn't bother me any more but my god it used to hurt the hell out of me.

Ug, @BouleDeSuif sympathy and glad you have got past letting it bother you. Madness isn’t it! I now have teenage kids & do everything to TRY and make them feel secure. I used to think the way ats behaved was normal (not helped by the way she claimed she was so much nicer etc than other parents… or that everyone was like that behind closed doors, and that I mustn’t speak up but be loyal to her). Btw she seemed to enjoy giving me a horrible dress that didn’t fit after I gave birth. I can just imagine the “I won’t bother then” type comment of your mum. Like you’re ungrateful, rather than she’s a nasty cow…

hah rant over. that felt better! :-)

Both my parents were like this.

It’s just another form of performative parenting. One way in public, another way behind closed doors.

Yes. My mum and my ex. My brain assumes overly nice people are secretly dicks at home now. I can’t undo it.

Yes I agree. I have learnt that the more effort a person puts in to seem like a nice person to the outside world, the more horrible they are underneath. I've seen this time and time again.

Many people are like that. It's expected of women to put on a happy face for company and the general public.

Maybe she had depression, anxiety, bad marriage?

Yes my mum behaves differently also in front of others

but she is not mean or behave badly at home. Just being different, care about how she is being perceived.

for example buy nice and thoughtful gifts for others (colleagues, my in-laws , her niece n nephews ) but to me as daughter will be a happy birthday , ask me to deduct some money from her bank acct myself as gift. Sometimes my dad said buy me a card and she is the one say no need. When my dad saw me receive many cards from in-laws , he felt bad and my mum just made up with extra more happy birthday throughout the day.

she also likes to make every effort to make jokes (but we heard the same joke million times)

and yes in everyone’s eyes ppl think my mum is very funny and lovely person.

but as my mum, she likes to throw honest opinion about everything. If she see a photo I share , she maybe I don’t stand nicely. Completely missed the point that I was happy about sth and want to share with her.