My mother wants us to be closer... (holidays, brother, sister)
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It is odd to me that you don't mention trust issues with your father, just your mom, and your father misled you your whole life, and likely would be continuing had your mom not told you he isn't your bio dad.
Seems to me that you are blaming your mom for telling you. Yes it was likely a hard time for you to hear this, but no time would be easy when you've already become an adult, to find out you've been lied to your whole childhood.
I think seeking professional help for your obvious resentment and anger towards your mom, and your anger that you hide towards your dad would help you sort this out.
There are too many issues that aggravate this relationship with your mom, those color every interaction with her imo. Those need to be addressed going forward while she is still here.....So that you can try to have a mutual respectful relationship.
Beera your mom sounds exactly like mine, the story about what happened in front of your son definitely confirmed to me that I was right to cut off my own mother.
JanND, no amount of professional help for the OP will change the mom's behavior, if anything, a professional is likely to give her the same advice that those of us who have been there did. The mom is not behaving the way she is because the OP is not respectful enough towards her. I know it's probably hard to wrap your head around if you haven't seen it first hand, but there are parents out there who genuinely do behave this way.
My mom is not quite as unhealthy as yours but they are definitely cut from the same cloth!
Are you SURE about your father? Because if you've no proof, or never discussed it with him, how do you know it's really true?
Having an open honest conversation with your mom about your conflict is not the same thing as setting and maintaining boundaries. Maintaining boundaries very often requires that you accept that your mom will never accept or understand or even listen to your point of view and you alone have to set the parameters for your relationship. Which it sounds like you have done.
Discussing this with your mom like a rational person will have no impact because she is not a rational person. She's not 'kind of a narcissist'. She's a TOTAL narcissist. Or has Borderline Personality Disorder. I'm surprised she has any friends at all.
Speaking as a mom who would like a closer relationship with her daughter ...... my daughter recently accused me of being manipulative. I was taken a little aback by it. I was always accused of being too permissive as a parent so to be seen as controlling was a bit puzzling.
I think a lot of the problems between mothers and daughters stems from incompatible personalities. My daughter and I have very different values and they seem to get further apart as time goes by.
I would tell my daughter that if she really does not want a close relationship with me and she really does not value me very much, then she should not have a close relationship with me. Yes .... it's painful, but that's life.
It is odd to me that you don't mention trust issues with your father, just your mom, and your father misled you your whole life, and likely would be continuing had your mom not told you he isn't your bio dad.
Seems to me that you are blaming your mom for telling you. Yes it was likely a hard time for you to hear this, but no time would be easy when you've already become an adult, to find out you've been lied to your whole childhood.
I think seeking professional help for your obvious resentment and anger towards your mom, and your anger that you hide towards your dad would help you sort this out.
There are too many issues that aggravate this relationship with your mom, those color every interaction with her imo. Those need to be addressed going forward while she is still here.....So that you can try to have a mutual respectful relationship.
My dad and I have already hashed through the issues with him keeping the truth from me, but it's not like I was adopted or there was an affair. My parents used a sperm donor. When I was a kid I never had a clue that I wasn't his biological child (though I often hoped my mother wasn't my bio mom). We were always very close. Finding out was a shock, but I shrugged it off eventually. I'm trying to find out my genetic history now via DNA testing to see what my health risks are.
I had a lot of anger toward my father over a lot of crazy incidents during my childhood, but I'm at peace with it. My father, despite being a narcissist, has always had my back and we talked things out a long time ago. I'm not blaming my mother for telling me - I needed to know. But she decided to do it when I had lost two key emotional supports and was clearly in a deep depression, and she made sure to tell me my father would disown me if he knew I'd learned the truth, so that secret could fester for a few years. I've never been so close to suicide as I was in the period following losing my friend and her mother. At the same time, I was leaning on my dad for support that was desperately needed. She needed to get back her power, and it took me years to realize that. I'm not still brooding over it - I just gave it as an example of when she did something super manipulative and, given my emotional at the same time, breathtakingly reckless.
She never hesitates to remind me that my father's a narcissist, but somehow the therapist that told her my father was a textbook case (and confirmed it to my face) neglected to figure out that she was too.
My bad experiences with my mother do indeed color every interaction. I have an almost visceral feeling of uneasiness whenever I'm alone with her. But it's taken me until the last couple of years to figure out that she was just as dysfunctional as my dad, and spent the past 20 years using his narcissism as a smokescreen for her own. My anger with my father has been dealt with - I always knew who he was and I've had 40 years to process it. My feelings for my mother are more complex and the damage she did has been more insidious, and I'm only just now beginning to figure out how deep it goes, even as she presses for more of a relationship.
My mom is not quite as unhealthy as yours but they are definitely cut from the same cloth!
Are you SURE about your father? Because if you've no proof, or never discussed it with him, how do you know it's really true?
Having an open honest conversation with your mom about your conflict is not the same thing as setting and maintaining boundaries. Maintaining boundaries very often requires that you accept that your mom will never accept or understand or even listen to your point of view and you alone have to set the parameters for your relationship. Which it sounds like you have done.
Discussing this with your mom like a rational person will have no impact because she is not a rational person. She's not 'kind of a narcissist'. She's a TOTAL narcissist. Or has Borderline Personality Disorder. I'm surprised she has any friends at all.
Certain about my dad - he admitted it to me. It was all very dramatic.
She has a ton of friends who are very close to her. For that reason I'm never been sure that she is a narcissist rather than someone who just has narcissistic tendencies. But then I consider any number of little behaviors in addition to those scattered big examples from my life, and I just don't know. I go back and forth, but I suppose it doesn't matter because it amounts to the same thing.
Beera your mom sounds exactly like mine, the story about what happened in front of your son definitely confirmed to me that I was right to cut off my own mother.
JanND, no amount of professional help for the OP will change the mom's behavior, if anything, a professional is likely to give her the same advice that those of us who have been there did. The mom is not behaving the way she is because the OP is not respectful enough towards her. I know it's probably hard to wrap your head around if you haven't seen it first hand, but there are parents out there who genuinely do behave this way.
^^^^this. The narcissist's behavior is intentional. Neither you nor a therapist are going to get them to change.
A narcissist could be standing over a dead body with the smoking gun in their hand and they will deny they did it.
Logic, presentation of facts, trying to reason....does not work.
Speaking as a mom who would like a closer relationship with her daughter ...... my daughter recently accused me of being manipulative. I was taken a little aback by it. I was always accused of being too permissive as a parent so to be seen as controlling was a bit puzzling.
I think a lot of the problems between mothers and daughters stems from incompatible personalities. My daughter and I have very different values and they seem to get further apart as time goes by.
I would tell my daughter that if she really does not want a close relationship with me and she really does not value me very much, then she should not have a close relationship with me. Yes .... it's painful, but that's life.
You really don't see how you are manipulative? YOU JUST did it in your post! That part I bolded RIGHT THERE is manipulation.
You can have value for your mother and realize that you can't be close with her. Being a mother doesn't entitle me to have more with my children than they want, specially when they become adults with lives and families of their own.
Speaking as a mom who would like a closer relationship with her daughter ...... my daughter recently accused me of being manipulative. I was taken a little aback by it. I was always accused of being too permissive as a parent so to be seen as controlling was a bit puzzling.
I think a lot of the problems between mothers and daughters stems from incompatible personalities. My daughter and I have very different values and they seem to get further apart as time goes by.
I would tell my daughter that if she really does not want a close relationship with me and she really does not value me very much, then she should not have a close relationship with me.Yes .... it's painful, but that's life.
This right here is where you are manipulative! You have decided that she must not value you if she doesn't want to be close. Perhaps it is exactly because she does value you that she keeps her distance.
You really don't see how you are manipulative? YOU JUST did it in your post! That part I bolded RIGHT THERE is manipulation.
You can have value for your mother and realize that you can't be close with her. Being a mother doesn't entitle me to have more with my children than they want, specially when they become adults with lives and families of their own.
If you think THAT is manipulation, all I can say is, you must be very very very lucky to be unable to recognize true manipulation, presumably because you've not been subjected to it.
What the poster stated is the exact OPPOSITE of manipulation. It is capitulation and letting go.
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