Everyone is jealous of me.

[JugglesFuggles]

According to my mother, everyone is jealous of me. Some examples:

My mum bumped into an old school friend's mum in Tesco. They chatted about about their daughters. This school friend's mum wasn't as enthusiastic as my mum had expected. Clearly jealous of my brilliant life.

My mum told her friend, who's roughly the same age as me, about my visiting her and helping with some clearing out. Her friend said to my mum that she's always happy to help my mum whenever she needs it to save me making a 200-mile trip. Clearly jealous of our relationship.

Me and my mum were out shopping and a woman we were passing clocked my insane multi-coloured trainers and had a good look. Clearly jealous of my trainers.

My mum told her sister that I've won on the premium bonds every month this year barring February. Her sister said 'Oh right'. Clearly jealous of my fortune.

It's a running joke between me and DP now - if one of us does/gets/has something that the other one doesn't we say "You're jealous of me". But because we've made it a joke, I kind of forget how absolutely unhinged and insane it is.

The irony is that my mum doesn't put me on a pedestal at all. She has very little actual interest in my life - rarely any questions about me and isn't particularly interested if I do give her some news.

Has anyone come across this kind of weird projection before? Or this type of assumption of rampant jealousy? It's so strange.

Sorry - Edited to add that I don't think my life is anything to be jealous of. While I've done well for where I was born, I'm pretty ordinary and boring.

is your mum like this when it comes to her own relationships too?

some people treat their children as possessions / extensions of themselves - so they assume everyone is jealous of their children in the same way they would be jealous of their car

Not generally but weirdly around clothes 😂

She loves the fact she has quite a young, trendy style in her late-60s, and does tend to assume a lot of people are jealous of her clothes.

there you go - so its just a pattern of her thinking, she just assumes people are jealous even when it makes no sense

do you ever call her out on it? or is it generally harmless quirk?

She sounds very childlike.

OP - sorry I did just laugh out loud at you and your DPs in joke! Brilliant! Best to make light of it - nowt as queer as folk!

Wow that's pretty tedious.
Says a lot about what's going on in her mind. Not something you come across very often tbh, but so long as you understand it's all hot air and she doesn't do any harm with it.
A shame for the kind person who offered to help whose motive was then debased to something unkind... I bet she'd be upset if she realised it wasn't taken as the kind helpful offer it actually was!

And just to add my Aunty would always tell one of her DDs how jealous everyone was of her when we were growing up - as well as every boy who didn’t like her was apparently gay… Very odd.

could she be projecting do you think, ie she is a jealous person of others so assumes any good thing in anyones life is something to be jealous about?

Have a read about narcissistic mothers

She sounds vain and is projecting that vanity onto you. Love that you can laugh about it with your DP so at least you have an outlet for her odd behaviour

This.

Narcissists need other people to be jealous of them. It's their life's blood to think they are.

Maybe she is the one who is jealous of you?

it’s an odd fixation. Very unhealthy. Do you challenge her at all it, or suggest a different , less negative interpretation?

This is exactly what she was like with me growing up - everyone was jealous of me, and all the boys fancied me.
Actually, you reminded me of when I was telling her an exercise class I went to recently which turned out to be mostly 18-20 year old men <Long and ridiculous story> She said "I bet they all fancied you". I'm 38. I think they thought "What's that old biddie doing here?" 😅

I really don't think she's jealous of others. And she's definitely not vain.
It's just fucking weird.

We've definitely learned to joke about it. Me and DP regularly WhatsApp each other pictures of our lunches - the shitter looking, the better - captioned "You're a jealous fat pig" 😆

I've given up challenging her. I used to but it totally falls on deaf ears. She just assumes that I'm too naive or oblivious or trusting to be able to tell that people are jealous. I just say "Right, ok" whenever she tells me someone is jealous of me.

I think she needs to believe that people envy her for what she has (which includes you), because what would be the point having anything (including a daughter) if other people weren't wishing it were theirs. You see it in children - they only want the toy their sibling wants, and if the sibling stops wanting it then they also lose interest.

You see it more commonly in women who pretend to themselves that their husband is attractive to other women because that makes them "the winner" for having him. It seems fairly harmless.

My moms response to anything negative that is said or happens to me is because they're jealous of me, funny thing is, I've recently started therapy and it turns out she's the one that is jealous of me. Not everyone else.

Weird how similar they are! What’s interesting is I wouldn’t say my Aunty was a jealous person either, or at least hides it very well. She likes a lot of attention for all the ‘nice’ things she does and is the first to offer assistance but done in an almost controlling way.

She does tick a lot boxes for narcissism if I’m honest - enjoys to play people off against one another and be the best person to everyone

My mum bumped into an old school friend's mum in Tesco. And the school friend's mum wasn't quite as enthusiastic about you as your mum would have liked? How enthusiastic was your mum when talking to the other mum about your school friend's achievements?

Well, exactly.

But I will say that my mum is actually quite good at feigning enthusiasm to people's faces and then running them down later.
The trouble is that she sets the rules of the game, so she's/I'm guaranteed to win.