I think I am a bad daughter

[Radiatar]

My sibling feels the same way as me. My mum is getting older now is immobile and is retired and lives alone. On paper I feel guilty about that as it probably isn’t nice. She does have some friends but DS and I are her only family left.

My mum stayed married to our awful dad for far too long, he was abusive towards me physically and verbally. DS and I are completely NC with him. My DM acts like she was in the same situation as me when I was a kid, as if she was also trapped with this man. She was to some extent I’m aware, but it wasn’t until I became a parent I got really angry at how she didn’t protect us. She would play these emotional manipulation games with our dad, it was all toxic and I was their pawn in the middle. I protected my sibling from a lot of it and took the main flack.

My DM also picks favourite grandchildren out of our DC and some of them she barely even bothers with. She will say ‘well they don’t seem to like me’ and then make no effort with them, only the favourite one and then wonder why they don’t like her. She also wants to talk to the adults more than the children when they are present so you find yourself torn between giving them all attention. She is also a fussy picky eater, she never helps us out with anything. She can’t babysit, she can’t play with the DC, she can’t help us out with anything, she can’t drive, she just comes and sits in a chair at your house for hours being waited on hand and foot, needing constant entertainment.

We have young families and busy lives and I don’t know where to fit her in. If I call her, it’s always a long chat about her, she just talks at you for hours, doesn’t ask you any questions about you, talks about people I don’t know. We have to do all family activities inside as she is immobile, this is boring for the DC and extra work for us.

I still walk around with a guilt I am not a good daughter. I have tried making more effort but in her company I feel physically irritated, I get itchy all over with stress and my DP and DC say my mood completely changes around her and I am snappy and distant. I only get this reaction with a few people in my life. It is like I am trapped and want to escape.

Can anyone be honest about if I need to just step up and be a better daughter. Is it my duty for her not to be alone when she is old and learn to tolerate her?

Radiatar

re your comments in quote marks:
"Can anyone be honest about if I need to just step up and be a better daughter".

You are good enough as you are. You basically received the Special Training from your parents (both abusive and dysfunctional) to be seen by yourself as not good enough. They taught you to put their needs first with your own dead last. You also have two qualities they both lack; empathy and insight.

Toxic parents like you describe more often than not become toxic as grandparents; you need to all stay well away from her going forward. She had a choice when it came to you and she chose her drunkard husband. She abjectly failed to protect you from him, she further enabled him and chose life with him over you and your sibling. Now she is inflicting similar harm on your children by making them the golden child or scapegoat.

Would you tolerate this from a friend, no and your mother is no different.

You owe her nothing let alone a relationship.

"Is it my duty for her not to be alone when she is old and learn to tolerate her?.
The short answer is no".

Do find a therapist to work with via the BACP website and find someone at that who has no familial bias about keeping families together. Also read Out of the FOG and Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers websites. Have a read too and consider posting on the current "well we took you to Stately Homes" thread on these Relationships pages.

"I have had therapy and the therapist was confused at how angry I am at my DM rather than my DF"

You need to see another therapist if you have not already dropped this person because he/she does not understand the dynamics of abuse at all.

Yes I did stop going. She kept going back to my father like I said, the NC was the closure I needed to move on. It’s worse having low contact as the memories are still always there.

DM has got worse not better so it’s not like I can move on I have to just brush it all under the rug around her and grit my teeth. With my dad he is just gone. I don’t miss what I never had from him but I do remember her being a parent but there has been a switch off at some point. When her dad died I think she never recovered from that. My grandad was an amazing person it’s hard to reconcile how she has turned out with a parent like him. In therapy he was always my safe person. He always stood up to my dad. He was mad at my mum for not leaving my dad. My grandad tried really hard to help.

I resent her for having what I did not have. She had great parents and a great childhood. She had it so good she can’t move on from it, it’s all she ever bloody talks about. Doesn’t she think I miss that man too, the one who did try to keep me safe. She doesn’t have any good memories from our childhood only her own so she doesn’t associate me and sister with love or happiness

@Thommasina I believe this to be true. She is jealous of my relationship with my sister too. I believe she envies the closeness with my Dsis and her kids too.