Hi OP. I was in a similar position with my mum. I went no contact with her about ten years before her death.
I won't go into the details of all of the abuse, as it's very long, complicated and traumatic. But I had clung on to the fantasy for most of my life up until then that she was a good mum, that she loved me, and that I just kept disappointing her.
During the time that we were no contact, I did undertake some therapy. I'd also been told by one of my cousins, and I'm very low contact with all of that side of the family (don't have anyone on my dad's side) that my mum was in a specialist dementia care home. She'd gone in there around four years before she died.
About eighteen months before she died, I made the decision to go and see her as part of my continued mental health recovery and emotional and spiritual development. I had to be sure that I was in a solid and robust enough place to be able to deal with whatever I was going to experience at that meeting.
I didn't know whether she was going to recognise me and know who I was, whether she would berate me for not going to see her before, or whether she would try to pull me back in with emotional manipulation and crocodile tears. I really had no idea what her reaction was going to be.
So I went into the meeting knowing that I had a clear escape route. I'd driven there, and I said to myself that I could get up and leave at any time if my mum became verbally abusive. That was my backup. But it was really important that I went into that meeting with no expectations, completely open-minded and open-hearted, and ready to respond rather than react to whatever I encountered.
On that first meeting, she did recognise me initially, but she was very confused about how long it was since she'd seen me. She didn't remember that I lived four hours away. I think in her mind she'd gone back to when I was much younger, and so was she. At various points in the conversation, she clearly lost track of who I was.
I did know that she was hardly having any visitors. The only person who visited on a semi-regular basis was one of my cousins who lived nearby. The rest of the family hadn't been to see her for a long time.
I'm glad that I did go, because it was actually a really transformative experience for me personally. I was able to let go of the remaining fear and resentment that I had been carrying towards her, and I was able to see her for the first time as just another human being.
From that day forward, I began to think of her not as a bad person or an evil person, but as a suffering human being who had chosen to pass on the pain and fear that she lived with to her children. That didn't excuse any of the abuse, but for the first time I truly understood that I was not responsible for any of it.
There was never going to be a version of me who was feminine enough, pretty enough, ordinary enough, straight enough or conventional enough to have been worthy of her love, because she simply wasn't able to give that. The fault didn't lie in me. It lay within her and in her choices not to address her own trauma, and instead to pass it on to me and to my sister as well.
After that first meeting, I did continue to go and see her when I was in that area of the country. I was also able to be there the weekend before she died, as the care home staff had told me that it looked as if she was very soon going to pass away.
She wasn't able to talk on that occasion (I'm not actually sure whether she was conscious or not) but I sat by her bed and read some poetry to her, which I knew she loved. It was something that I was able to do as a human being for a fellow human being who was suffering and soon going to die. It wasn't something I did because I felt that it was my duty as her daughter, because she had given up any right to that kind of consideration through her actions during my life.
I'm glad that I did see her before she died, because it has brought me a huge amount of peace and self-acceptance.
My sister chose not to visit her, and I don't know whether that's something she regrets now or will come to regret, because unfortunately we're no longer in contact either.
Whether or not you choose to do this with your mum is entirely your decision, and only you can make that judgement call as to whether you are strong enough to go into that meeting and take whatever is thrown at you. There is no obligation to do it simply because she is your mum, and my experience doesn't mean that yours would be the same.
But whatever you decide, I do wish you all the best. 💐