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Old 10-10-2015, 07:20 AM
 
4,096 posts, read 11,434,245 times
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And now is a good time to learn how you can change and deal with it. Far better than trying when you have a new child and are still having problems. Learn your boundaries now and you can apply them when you have a child to save the child from having to deal with a mother and grandmother in a dysfunctional relationship.

We dont want to hear "My Mom does this or that to or with my child and it is bad for my baby. What do I do to make her stop?" AK-Cathy is right on point.

You cannot go back and fix the past, you cannot fix your mother. You can only change how you react to her and how much contact you have with her.
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Old 10-10-2015, 08:33 AM
 
3,111 posts, read 5,010,474 times
Reputation: 7375
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stuckinthepastagain View Post
...We buy her gifts, take her out to dinner, but it's not enough.

...she pretty much demanded a large sum of money for a purchase for my dad's birthday...

...She then calls me a week later and says she is planning a dinner for my dad at a very expensive restaurant on a specific night. We would be responsible for paying her own way...
I think you are on the right track with distancing but try to be aware of how you play into the equation. If you set up the expectation that you buy gifts and pay at meals then don't be surprised when there is the expectation that you buy gifts and pay at meals.

She knows you are much better off and is demanding to be treated. However because you aren't getting the emotional closeness that you thought you would when you started buying gifts and paying for meals in an attempt to prove your worth you now want to discontinue.

Nothing wrong with that but you have to lay your cards on the table. Something like, "Look mom, you've always treated me like crap. When my self esteem was low I tried to buy your love with gifts and meals out because I thought you might approve of me if I showed you how successful I've become. But I'm still not feeling the love so I think it is better off for all involved that we not subsidize this relationship with money in an attempt to fix it. If you want to have a mutual loving relationship let me know. Otherwise this drama/accusations etc. isn't working for me and I need to leave it behind."

Armchair internet psych. $.02.
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Old 10-10-2015, 08:54 AM
 
Location: Greenville, SC
895 posts, read 1,132,642 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mic111 View Post
I think you are on the right track with distancing but try to be aware of how you play into the equation. If you set up the expectation that you buy gifts and pay at meals then don't be surprised when there is the expectation that you buy gifts and pay at meals.

She knows you are much better off and is demanding to be treated. However because you aren't getting the emotional closeness that you thought you would when you started buying gifts and paying for meals in an attempt to prove your worth you now want to discontinue.

Nothing wrong with that but you have to lay your cards on the table. Something like, "Look mom, you've always treated me like crap. When my self esteem was low I tried to buy your love with gifts and meals out because I thought you might approve of me if I showed you how successful I've become. But I'm still not feeling the love so I think it is better off for all involved that we not subsidize this relationship with money in an attempt to fix it. If you want to have a mutual loving relationship let me know. Otherwise this drama/accusations etc. isn't working for me and I need to leave it behind."

Armchair internet psych. $.02.

GREAT POST, and spot on. OP, I am very sorry for what you are going through.
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Old 10-10-2015, 09:02 AM
 
Location: ......SC
2,033 posts, read 1,670,285 times
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I had a bad relationship with my mother also. I just ended up putting as much distance between us as possible. It never got any better.
She just seemed very resentful of the fact that I could have a life, and she felt she didn't. Nor wanted for me to.

Sorry to hear you are going through troubles in the relationship with your mom.
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Old 10-10-2015, 09:17 AM
 
13,640 posts, read 24,440,578 times
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You can keep, maybe even repair some of the damage your mother has created about you to your dad.

Call your dad. Explain to him why you can't attend his dinner party on his birthday. Tell him you would like to take him to dinner or maybe a sporting event he enjoys in honor of his birthday and in thanks for just being your dad. Make plans for just you and him.

Sorry about your mother who must harbor resentment towards your bio father ..He is not around so you are the receiver of her resentment. Just distance yourself from her drama by not arguing or allowing her in your personal life.

Best of luck to you in whatever decision you make because you sound like a very caring person.

Last edited by Miss Blue; 10-11-2015 at 08:24 AM..
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Old 10-10-2015, 10:10 AM
 
Location: Midwest
21 posts, read 24,331 times
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To the OP, Reddit has some very helpful pages on NPD or other personality disorders. Your mother sounds textbook Narcissist. I know because mine is too, and so is my father. I can't believe sometimes that I am here to tell about it since I was the "scapegoat" in the family dynamics, and we know what happens to us. My brother was the Golden Child and at age 55 he is just now realizing there is a down side to that role as well.

Seek out help for adult children of Narcisissts. You will be glad you did. I hope things turn around for you soon, but remember, things won't feel better until you inform yourself and change your own behaviors, responses to her behaviors.

I wish you all the best.
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Old 10-10-2015, 10:13 AM
 
Location: Midwest
21 posts, read 24,331 times
Reputation: 68
[quote=sweetana3;41509361

"................you cannot go back and fix the past, you cannot fix your mother. You can only change how you react to her and how much contact you have with her.[/quote]"

nailed it

Last edited by ThePerfectHologram; 10-10-2015 at 10:14 AM.. Reason: Edited for clarity
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Old 10-10-2015, 11:26 AM
 
10,226 posts, read 7,510,431 times
Reputation: 23155
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stuckinthepastagain View Post
I'm 35 years old, have an amazing husband, a nice house and a new job I enjoy, but I have little to no relationships with my immediate family members. Over the years my mother has picked on me, has got in the way of family relationships, played people against me, and excluded me from family get togethers. Nothing I do is good enough. We buy her gifts, take her out to dinner, but it's not enough. So after 35 years I have decided to stop trying. My husband is tired of the dysfunction and all the fighting with my mother, was starting to affect our marriage.

My mother was pregnant with me at the age of 21 and my birth father wasn't interested in having a part in my life. He signed away his rights and my mom married when she was 22, the man she married became my father. He raised me. They then had 2 more children. Since I was a kid, she treated me unfairly and picked on me for any reason. I was not perfect but I was not a "bad" child. I always chased this feeling of "acceptance" which I never really got from her. My sister is her favorite and is definitely the "golden" child. My sister and I aren't close at all, because of the damage my mother has caused and is still causing. She is always a victim and she thinks she can say whatever she wants to me, no matter how awful and if I defend myself, I'm "disrespectful"..

I have been my mothers dumping ground for so long, and I'm just done. The latest example of her mistreatment was my fathers birthday dinner. It's his 65th. Three weeks ago, she pretty much demanded a large sum of money for a purchase for my dad's birthday. My mother doesn't "ask" if we can contribute to a gift, she "tells" me. I explained to her that money was a little tight this month, (due to our new home purchase) and she didn't like that answer. She got loud and yells " are you telling me with your husbands salary you can't give money for this gift!" She is just impossible. I got up and left her home and haven't been back since. My father would never ask for a gift - he never wants anything.

She then calls me a week later and says she is planning a dinner for my dad at a very expensive restaurant on a specific night. We would be responsible for paying her own way and I again reminded her that money was tight this month. I told her that we could figure something out but that particular night my husband had a client dinner and I had to work until 630 and this restaurant was an hour away. She said the dinner was at 7. We wouldn't get there in time. So I suggested how about a Saturday night..and she said "Your sister is working that night", So I suggested Sunday and she got agitated and said " oh well, too bad if you can't come, this dinner isn't about you." I told her to "expletive" off and hung up the phone. I never said that to her before but I just lost it and broke down in tears.

I called my father the next day and of course she had already gotten to him, so he wasn't receptive. She picks and chooses what she tells him to make herself look innocent. I love my dad but he enables her bad behavior. My mother has excluded me from other events or made it very hard for me to attend, my sisters high school and college graduation I was not invited to. My sisters bridal shower and wedding I hardly made it to, and only knew about because of my father. I got married (after my sister) a few years ago and made attempts to include my them in my wedding planning. And they did a nice job on flowers and a few other things, but that kindness was short lived.

Even though money is a little tight right now my husband does well financially, and over the last 6 years we have traveled around the world and lived very comfortably. My mother always had something negative to say, so I don't really share many "happy" details of my life with her. My parents have always struggled financially. I think she is a little jealous. We are currently trying for a baby and I don't want to bring a child into this dysfunction. I'm at the point where I'm thinking about cutting ties completely, but that means I will also lose communication with my father, and that hurts my heart. But he isn't receptive to what I have to say.. So what choice to I have?
You have reached the age of maturity, where you have recognized things as they are, not how you wish them to be. That is fine. Accepting that your mother is not the one you would want is the first step to freedom. Accept her as she is, or don't accept her at all. Either way is fine, if it works for you.

As for the money, I must say that I see why your mother got angry. It sounds like you are wealthy, compared to most people. "Things are a little tight this month" doesn't mean anything. That's your mother you're speakng to. Be specific about why you can't contribute to your father's gift or dinner. One month of being tight isn't very persuasive. Everyone in the world has a tight month now and then, and then next month things are back to normal. In other words, if it was something you really needed or wanted, you wouldn't let one month's "tightness" stand in the way. Your mother knows this.

I suggest you just tell her that you think that cost for a gift is too much, so you don't want to contribute to it. You'll get your own separate gift for him...or she can choose a lower cost gift. Her choice. But don't try to say "things are tight this month," since that doesn't mean anything, really.

She was being unreasonable about the father's dinner, IMO. So let it go. You couldn't go. You couldn't get off work early, and it's an hour away. That's unreasonable to expect you to travel two hours round trip after working all day. I'm guessing she doesn't work, so she doesn't relate to that.

I wouldn't cut ties completely. If you lessen the contact, the relationship will wither on the vine, but it will still be there for the future, which I think is important for blood relations (unless they're serial killers or drug addicts).

I relate to your situation, since I, too, was the least favored one, as you were. When my mother passed away, we hadn't spoken in several years because she had done something that was hurtful to me, so I cut off the contact. I regret that. So I don't suggest that you do that. Still, it doesn't change the fact that she had been a bad mother to me, and I still harbor bad feelings about it. All the slights, not helping me when she helped the others, the little criticisms over the years (death by a thousand cuts), the physical things she did (like bleaching my hair and putting makeup on me when I was four because she didn't think I was pretty like my sisters - this absolutely traumatized me, and I still have a problem with having anything done to my hair). In the end, though, each of us is responsible for creating a harmonious, happy life for ourselves. If that means lessening the contact with your mother, so be it.
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Old 10-10-2015, 11:31 AM
 
Location: Brentwood, Tennessee
49,932 posts, read 59,649,447 times
Reputation: 98359
Read this:

http://www.amazon.com/Will-Ever-Good.../dp/1439129436
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Old 10-10-2015, 11:44 AM
 
Location: Midwest
21 posts, read 24,331 times
Reputation: 68
Default Understanding the Borderline Mother

If in fact your mom does have a personality disorder, this book is for you. I wish I'd read it as a young girl.

"The first love in our lives is our mother. Recognizing her face, her voice, the meaning of her moods, and her facial expressions is crucial to survival. Dr. Christine Ann Lawson vividly describes how mothers who suffer from borderline personality disorder produce children who may flounder in life even as adults, futilely struggling to reach the safety of a parental harbor, unable to recognize that their borderline parent lacks a pier, or even a discernible shore. Four character profiles describe different symptom clusters that include the waif mother, the hermit mother, the queen mother, and the witch. Children of borderlines are at risk for developing this complex and devastating personality disorder themselves. Dr. Lawson's recommendations for prevention include empathic understanding of the borderline mother and early intervention with her children to ground them in reality and counteract the often dangerous effects of living with a "make-believe" mother. Some readers may recognize their mothers as well as themselves in this book. They will also find specific suggestions for creating healthier relationships. Addressing the adult children of borderlines and the therapists who work with them, Dr. Lawson shows how to care for the waif without rescuing her, to attend to the hermit without feeding her fear, to love the queen without becoming her subject, and to live with the witch without becoming her victim. A Jason Aronson Book


https://books.google.com/books/about...kp_cover&hl=en
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