How to go no/LC with abusive mother - trigger warning

[MerLOWnomore]

Hi there,

I’m 30 years old and have come to the realisation that my mother is an abuser. It’s not really a realisation as I’ve known it since childhood. I think she knows I know. But it all came crashing through lately.

I had a mental breakdown just before Christmas, was kept in hospital for several days. Similar things have happened to me before, but never quite this extreme.

Examples of her abusive behaviour

• Screamed names at me in public
• Telling me I deserve to be rap**d as a child as I’m not racist.
• Saying me and my sister were ill in childhood -I’m not sure we were, though I do have some joint pain as an adult. We were taken to a load of struck-off doctors as kids and I, in particular, was given drugs that resulted in things like hair falling out, high heart rate, sudden weight gain.
• Following recent break down have recently reconnected with Family who she has tried to turn me against and who have been nothing but supportive, loving and kind. Everything my mother has never been.

This is just scratching the surface of her abusive behaviour, which I believe was also sexual at times. She’s also ruined relationships that cannot be repaired as the relatives are now dead. I feel tremendous guilt for this.

My questions are as follows:

My Dad and sister still live with her, though my sister may be moving out soon thank god. I worry endlessly about them. My Dad will not fully commit to leaving her despite several discussions expressing a wish to. Do I continue to encourage this or leave well alone?
How do I go low/nc with her? I am currently just texting her and have no plans to speak to her on the phone.
However, I am meant to be seeing her and my Dad in Edinburgh soon. My Dad has already booked a room and paid for it all. Obviously I’m in a separate bed but I do not want to share a room with her under any circumstances. I don’t ever really want to see her again tbh, but am in an awkward situation.

I’m currently under the care of the crisis team, who are supporting me, but planning to discharge me soon.

Any advice from people who have been in a similar situation?

I think she is not good for your mental health OP. You need to focus on yourself and recovery .
Keep away and that includes those who live with her and enable her.

Your dad is a grown adult and is making his own choices. Even though you are concerned about him, you need to let him make his own choices and stay well out of it for your own sake.

Cancel the trip. You are unwell and need to put yourself first. If you have to, lie and say you've been advised to put your health first and stay home.

You need to treat her like she is radioactive. Sadly: everyone around her and all places near her need to be avoided as her toxic qualities will permeate them. So draw a circle around her at least a quarter mile in diameter snd don’t allow yourself to get sny closer to her than that. No to the hotel room. No to seeing father or sister if she is in the same building.

Have you discussed going nc with your crisis team?

I would cancel your trip to Edinburgh, I would not accept future trips unless you can fund them directly. If you receive any other financial assistance from family, I would review this and decline this going forward.

Do not get involved in the relationships between your father/ sister and your mother. This is not your concern and is likely to cause you harm.

Finally going NC is hard emotionally, on your family but also on yourself. I would focus on rebuilding a life independent of your family.

I second what @pikkumyy77 says, stay well away. From experience, our bodies have reactions so things that they are frightened of without our conscious mind ever getting a look in. It’s like they have become a predator and there is nothing you can do to stop your body and mind from responding. I’m only speaking from experience but I don’t think this will help with your recovery at all. I have a similar family member and even the thought gets be going, meeting causes me days of distress and I’m much further along in the realisation journey. It may set you back.

What happened to you was not your fault; this is all on your parents and they will never apologise nor accept any responsibility for their actions.

You owe your parents nothing least of all a relationship. Rebuild your life without them in it. Continue to reduce the amount of times you text them down over time to zero sum.

Having no further contact with your parents now is also saying no more to being abused by them. Be tired of being the last person who matters here.

You will need to grieve for the relationship you should have had with them rather than the one you actually got as a part of your recovery.

Have a read too of the Out of the FOG website.

Do not go to Edinburgh to meet with your abusive mother and her all too willing enabler in the shape of your father. He made his choice a long time ago and has chosen to remain with his wife for his own reasons; he really is her secondary abuser as well as her enabler. He has thrown you under the bus more than enough times to save his own skin and want of a quiet life.

Hi all,

Thanks for all the fantastic advice. I suppose with the trip I keep thinking I could offer to pay to stay in a different room or somewhere else.

I do feel my Dad has enabled and that makes me bitter towards him. But I don’t have the same bodily reaction to him. She met him when she was in her 30s and he was hardly out of his teens. So I do think there may have been some manipulation going on there. He’s completely passive though. Telling me she’s just weird doesn’t cut it. In fairness I’m not sure he knows about a lot of it as she is very secretive and used to tell us not to tell him things. But he must know something is off, surely.

Thankfully I have a partner, good friends and now the support of some extended family who are helping me on my health journey. It does help that I live 5 hours away and not around the corner. God knows how it would be if I still lived in the same town as them.

Sounds like you are still contemplating going. You really shouldn’t. Yesterday us the best time for a cut iff. But today is also good. Don’t put it off until tomorrow.

You must not meet up with her under any circumstances if you're unwell to have been so recently treated in hospital.

Your dad is not your responsibility. I'm sure he would far rather you got well than worried about him.

Let the relatives who have helped you reach out to your sister. You're not in a position to rescue her.

Please Don’t go to Edinburgh OP
Focus on recovery and the positive relationships in your life .
Your Parents represent too much pain and toxicity, you really don’t need that complication in your life
Go NC focus on you . Just because they are blood doesn’t mean you have to have them in your life.
You have choices , lean on your H if necessary to add another voice who says no to them if needed x

Focus on Being Healthy and finding things that bring joy to your life x

you dont need to go to Edin! Say you are ill nearer the time. No explanation no drama simply cancel and say ‘have a good time’

then deal with each encounter one at a time

Thanks all.

I know it would be a step backwards so I won’t go if she’s there. My Dad has mentioned there is a possibility she may not turn up as she’s said her health hasn’t been the best lately.

Do you think I’d be ok to go if she wasn’t there and maybe bring my partner or a friend as the third person? Or not go at all?

No. This suggestion by your dad is just part of their dance, a bait and switch, to make you show up and take the responsibility if she is there and attacks you.

Do not go to Edinburgh to see them even with someone else. No good will come to you from doing so. pikkumyy77 is on the money here and your parents relationship is a dysfunctional codependent one. She groomed your dad.

Leave your family of origin to it; with you completely out of the picture hopefully they will further turn against each other.

Def don’t go. He’s playing a game too. He might not be so obvious about it but he’s being wet and manipulative to get what he wants - ie you both turn up and he’s the good guy.

Time to step back as calmly as you can op

Agree with other posters that even if your dad tells you that your mum won't be there, it is likely that when you turn up she will be there. The narrative from your dad will be that she changed her mind at the last minute when it was too late to tell you. I wouldn't trust either of them so definitely don't go.

@AttilaTheMeerkat is also right—as usual! In that in a family such as you describe the safest person is absent. The second safest person is the one who stands next to the abuser as helpers and who brings victims in. If you aren’t there those who remain will turn on each other, like crabs in a bucket.

@AttilaTheMeerkat and @pikkumyy77 interesting you both say that as I originally got away to uni. I then came back to my home-town, although I always planned to move away again. My mother started another of her fictitious illnesses once I started getting job interviews in other cities. Things became so bad at home I was regularly having panic attacks and heart palpitations and was told by several people I had to move away to protect myself. I did. Then the pandemic happened.

Apparently my Dad and sis did turn against her during this time and ‘a lot came out during arguments.’ I have no idea what exactly happened but I have my suspicions that the abuse may have been mentioned. Unfortunately they’ve now gone back to defending her despite the fact that both me and Dsis have mental health problems as a result of her/their treatment of us.

I’ve found out through reaching out to other relatives my age for the first time in years (who I was super close to as a child) this seems to be an issue amongst their parents as well. Feck ‘em. At least we have each other.

I will be doing my absolute best to avoid them moving forward. I would like to have some contact with my Dad and Dsis in the future if they can ever see the light.

At the end of the day, my dad has been an enabler as mentioned earlier in this thread. I have no doubt she financially abused him, which hadn’t helped but we’ve had family who would have taken us in. I’d be shocked if he ever officially separates from her. They’ve been together over 45 years, and she is an expert at getting you to like her again. The most friendly, charismatic person in public, but behind closed doors it can be a different story. She also can make you feel extremely loved at times, but it’s not enough.

It’s always been conditional. She makes you feel literally insane, by gaslighting you and lying 24/7. Yet as a child I was supposedly the troublemaker and the one who twisted everything.

As mentioned, my dad has expressed a desire to leave her many times. She’s still abusing him in a psychological way regularly. But when I mentioned wanting to lower contact with her I got the phone call ‘you can’t do that, she’s your mother. She loves you. She’s done so much for you.’ So he’s a hopeless case and an enabler. I don’t blame him as much as her as I think he was too young and probably groomed by her as mentioned. But, how someone can standby and watch that happen to their kids no one knows. He also dropped nuggets like ‘you’re too selfish to have children’ to 11-year-old me and she’s screamed at me and also ‘you don’t know what it’s like to have children, you would feel differently if you did.’ Along with lots of fun insults about how I’d be a terrible mother.

Sorry, it’s a lot. But I’m glad so am on this journey and things will hopefully change soon.

You are very brave! You have already come quite far on this journey. Just don’t look back—don’t go back—you can’t save anyone and you risk turning into a pillar of salt.