To those who are NC with their mothers?

[LondonLady1980]

How have you made peace with it?

I have had a very dysfunctional relationship with my mother all my life and 11 months ago (at the age of 42) it all came to a head and it's pretty much been NC ever since. The odd message here and there (which always ends up with me feeling bad) but I haven't seen or spoke to her since last April.

I had counselling last Summer which really helped but things have really started to get to me again over the last few months (mum related) and so I re-commenced counselling again a few weeks ago.

I just need to know how to stop feeling guilty and how to stop going over and over and over everything in my mind - constantly questioning everything about my childhood, questioning why she treated me the way she did, questioning why even as an adult she still manipulated me and treated me bad, trying to make sense of her behaviour and her ways of thinking etc. It's like I just can't move on from it and it's driving me insane. I don't want to spend the rest of my life in therapy.

I'm hoping my confusion and upset is partly because going no contact is still relatively new (is 11 months classed as recent?) and that I'm still trying to make sense of it?

I'm just hoping to find strength and support from others who have been here and survived it because I'm really struggling 😥

I have no desire to "change the dynamic".

My mother does not deserve me to have me in her life.
I have spent over 40 years sacrificing my own mental health and my own emotional well-being for her in order to pander to her warped view of what it means to be a parent, and I'm not doing it anymore.

You will be fine !
Trust me I know !! U get over that guilt and ask yourself not why she does it u won't never know but how would u treat your children and if u answer never like my mother your doing alright !! Turn that guilt into a little but of anger at your mother !
Then just concentrate on your own little family x

It's when I think about my own children and the relationship that I have with them that I feel the most angry, and the most bewildered and confused about how my mother could have treated me (and my sister) in the way that she did.

(And how she continued to treat us through our teenage years, and still does through our adult years too).

That's the part that used to get me as well !
My beautiful lovely children how could anyone do this is beyond me !
I think it was an era of bad parents so many woman of our age I'm nearly 50 go thrrou this!
Just remember your breaking a cycle and your being a good mum !
That's how I have got throu it u just gotta keep going x

It is truely bizarre and unhelpful and the fact that you are trying to justify this makes it even more so.

@LondonLady1980
The ppl she is using to relay questions to you, tell them you do not want to know and to not tell you anything from her. Gifts returned via said ppl. Please do not listen to these ppl saying don’t go NC etc, she sounds very manipulative.
You're correct in saying why should we tolerate shitty behaviour because they’re our parent ? you wouldn’t accept it from a man or a friend.

I've been very low contact for over half of my life. (Maybe once a year if my Dad is unwell)

Honestly, I probably think about her once a month.

I was mid-20's when I suddenly thought- that's it. I can't keep shedding tears over this woman- she simply isn't worth it.

2 things really. Maybe 3.

Cut her off. When those people mention her, just say 'ok thank you' and change the subject. It means nothing to you now- otherwise you keep handing her power. Send the gifts back or give them to charity.

This is a period of grieving. Grief for yourself- why didn't you have a 'nice' mum? Grief for what will never be. Grief for the end of a relationship. That's ok.

Society, as a whole, finds it difficult when you say your Mother is a horrible person. If they have a halfway decent relationship with their own Mother, they find it hard to understand that a Mum can be a dreadful person. But she can and is. And that's ok for you to say and acknowledge. It's a bumpy road, OP and I hope you find peace.

It is almost 3 years for me now. At the age of 48 when I was very sick with sepsis. Supposed to be helping but didn’t. My father went NC with me too.
They have a good relationship with my adult DD. But it is very much she is golden child like my brother and I am just the scapegoat.
I finally got a degree at the age of 45, working full time as well. All she could say was “oh good, all of my children have degrees now”.
I have reached out to my father as they were visiting my DD but he said he would not meet me without my mother.
I am more at peace with it now. I do feel guilty that they are getting older but I wasn’t even told about my father’s 80th birthday party and I will miss a family wedding in October.

How have you made peace with it?

Easily.

I never had any affection for her in any case because she utterly ruined our relationship when I was a teen. I spent decades being civil with her for the sake of maintaining a relationship with my Father, but at no point did she acknowledge any of the things she said and did, so there was never any interest on my part in attempting to repair the relationship. Then my Father passed, my Mother immediately reminded me that she was indeed the self-absorbed, toxic, tactless horror I'd always believed, so I immediately stopped contact there and then, considered her dead and gone from that moment, and accepted I was never going to resume contact for any reason whatsoever. I was comfortable with that decision in the immediate aftermath, and never waivered.

She passed about five years on, I was aware she was ill but still felt no inclination at all to resume contact. I don't miss her at all and have no regrets in ridding myself of someone who was never anything but a negative presence in my life.

It's not my fault my "DM" was a useless, actively harmful parent and a horrible person to boot, so I don't feel any need to question myself or query why I feel no guilt at all. She wasn't worth bothering with. It's no more complicated than that.

what helped me was knowing that if my parent had had some 5 minute spiritual moment where they could see it all clearly and with empathy they would tell me to run, not walk, away from them. And once I thought that I clung to it.

Stuff left on the doorstep goes straight into the bin.

Flying Monkeys need to be told that you don’t want messages from her, and will not discuss her. If they can’t abide by that, off they fuck too.

Honestly, I never did feel guilty. I was grateful she gave birth to me but that's about it As an adult you're in charge of your own actions and relationships. Own them.

I’ve been No contact with my mum for 15 years. She’s an alcoholic narcissist. She changed when I was 13 and my sister was 5 into a completely different person. I moved in with my dad when I was 16 but maintained contact with her. It was only when I had dd1 that I realised I didn’t want this for her. To be on tenterhooks all the time, to not know when my phone rang whether this was a normal phone call or a hateful one. She would threaten to smash my car or house windows because 6 months ago I said something in a tone she didn’t like. I could never relax. She turned up drunk to my one year olds party. I’d asked her not to come if she didn’t feel that she could stay sober. She then started on a load of people. I told her she needed to get help or I couldn’t have her in my life. And that was that. Family didn’t understand, friends with good relationships with their mums couldn’t understand. You’ll find that a lot. It was hard at the school gates seeing doting grandparents and thinking that we were missing out on that support. But I never left my child with her, it was too unpredictable. I moved house not long after I stopped talking to her and asked family not to share my address or new phone number. I also asked them not to tell me things about her or pass on ‘messages’ from
her. It was tough but now it’s just normal. I had ptsd after I had my second child as I developed flash backs of DV events I witnessed growing up. My sister then stopped talking to her so both her kids are nc. My great uncle died a few weeks ago and I’ve had to say I won’t go to the funeral as not only could she start on me, but she would start on anyone who she thinks still speaks to me. This isn’t the first family event I’ve had to turn down. Again it’s hard for people to understand but that’s the cost of protecting your peace. NC is the best thing I could’ve done. You can’t change a person who doesn’t want to change. I’ve got a few friends now who are also nc. You don’t have to put up with it. I still get told stories about the horrible stuff she’s done to my nan or uncle but they put their rose tinted glasses on and speak to her as normal. She hasn’t changed and I’m glad that me and my family have peace. I can’t see this ever changing.

Support to all of you.
❤️❤️❤️
I'm not fully NC, but she lives in another country and it also hit at 42, as a PP said.
No therapy, but healing.

My favourite author, a minister of the Church who was writing in the 1890's, was very much a family man. But he wrote:

"It is the parents who demand most who have done the least to deserve it".

That stuck with me. Maybe it can help you. Another time he wrote that it's a step into adulthood when you can get to the point of no longer letting your parents rule your life, and that step is a good and right one to take.

For me the most life changing moment in managing all the feeling around my mother was realising that it isn't her that I want/ was sad about. What I wanted, craved ect was a Mum like most people have.

It's when I think about my own children and the relationship that I have with them that I feel the most angry, and the most bewildered and confused about how my mother could have treated me (and my sister) in the way that she did.

Yup.

OP, I'm 14 years in now. Going nc was a long time coming and whenever I've explained any of it to anyone, their only question has been why I left it so long.

In the end, the decision was taken out of my hands by SS and the police but, due to the final reason for going nc, I'm not allowed to tell anyone. 14 years on of not being able to share it with friends, of people thinking I'm hiding something (I am). It's been hard

But I never feel guilty. I understand it was her and not me (but it doesn't change how I see myself and it doesn't stop me from pushing people away so that they can't see me as she did).

Basically, what was most healing for me was being the sort of mum to my children that I deserved to have but didn't. You'll never get answers to your many questions. You can just do better yourself.

I look at my children now - their confidence, their capabilities, their opportunities, their capacity to love and be loved and I know I've not only saved them but any future children they have too. That's how I made my peace with it.

This is exactly why I have no guilt about being NC whatsoever. It took me a while to make that decision as I, very wrongly as it turned out, thought that perhaps the love I have for my children diminishes slightly as they get older and that will explain her increasingly awful behaviour towards me. (She has always been difficult but it never seem to get any better despite my efforts at trying to appease her). I then went NC. OP as a result I am the happiest I have ever been. I know she slags me off to anyone who will listen but I have come to realise not one person has ever praised her to me. Being NC has changed my life for the better and is highly recommended. Reading your posts has been so interesting because I could of written them all myself- I have almost had an identical experience to you including the feelings you are having. I will also add that anyone who hasn't had an abusive parent probably does find it difficult to comprehend going NC but if you have, you understand fully and know that the behaviour worsens if you allow it, not improves and NC has been a revelation to me.

Thank you for your understanding.

I was going through my old diaries the other day and there was an entry that I written when I was 17 and I was talking about how me and my sister had been "told off" recently by our mum again (my sister was 18) and that she'd made us cry again because of how nasty she'd been. I had also written how it had been 5 days since she'd last spoken to us and how even in the house she was acting like we didn't exist (i.e cooking meals only for herself, purposefully not including our clothes when putting the washing on, hanging up on our friends if they rang the house looking for us, ignoring us if we passed her on the stairs etc).

She was behaving like that and we were crying.
And this was when we were 17 and 18.

We'd been growing up in that environment with her treating us like that (and FAR worse, including physical abuse up until we were about 14) since we were 5 years old.

How in anyway is that ok?

Me and my sister both moved out when we early 20's but her level of manipulation and control over us continued throughout our entre adult lives. We'd been in fear of her for our entire lives and that just doesn't disappear because we moved out. We had been conditioned to fear her and obey her and that doesn't just go away. We have spent our adult lives on eggshells around her, knowing if we do something or say something that doesn't meet her 'standards' or 'expectations' she will just turn on us.

How on earth can you have any kind of functional relationship with a person like that? Why does she even deserve low-contact?
And why should I just because she gave birth to me?

Like you said, unless people have truly experienced an abusive mother, they can never understand the true and long-lasting damage they do.

Thank you for that,

I have always said that my children will always know how loved they are and they they will never, ever have to experience the kind of childhood I had.

I remember trying to hug my mum once in public when I was 8 years old and she forcibly just pushed me away from her - I will never forget it and how rejected I felt. I can honestly say that I have never once been hugged by my mum and she has never told me that she loves me. She was the same with my sister.

My sister's ability to form close relationships with people has been hugely impacted by how our mother treated us but thankfully she is a great mother. She cannot show any kind of physical affection, or verbally express love or affection to anyone except her children, who she adores. So although she keeps herself very emotionally distant from other people at least she has been able to form a close and loving bond with her children in a way that our mother never did with us.

Please go NC.Your only regret will be that you didn't do it sooner. My only difference between myself and your situation is my Mother has a scapegoat child-me and a golden child-my sister. Unfortunately she has also affected my relationship with my sister although I know since I have been NC, my Mum has not been able to blame me all the time and as a result this has improved the relationship with my sister. It is not your fault how she behaves and is not what you have done. My Mother's behaviour towards me started as a very young child too.

My mum did have a golden child and I was her, and my sister was the scape goat. Even though I was the golden child I was still treated very badly but nowhere near as bad as my sister was. Somehow it didn't really affect my relationship with my sister and we are very close. I think we are trauma bonded (to use a cliche term).

My sister doesn’t really feel anything towards our mother and hasn’t for decades, but I think that’s because their relationship was emotionally severed when my sister was a teenager. My sister doesn't actively ‘hate’ our mum but she doesn’t like her either. It’s complete nonchalance. My sister gives her no head space at all.

Whereas I just feel anger, hurt and confusion all the time.