You were a guest, and reached out for food that was provided for guests. Your mother was not (or should not have been) in control of your decisions at that point. There was absolutely nothing wrong with you deciding to try some food that your hosts had provided. I think it very unlikely that the hostess would call you a "little girl" when you were fifteen... my son is fifteen, and there's no doubt that he's a man. Perhaps what happened around this time in your life was that you were obviously an adult, and this caused your mother anxiety. Because, to be honest, sometimes my son will say or do something that is still somewhat childlike, and it throws me, because he looks and sounds like a man. However, I expect that discomfort, because I'm a Mum, and I don't expect my child to remain a child forever. We all have to traverse that difficult bridge between child and adult, and as parents between being in control of our kids well being, and trusting them to look after themselves. It's meant to be uncomfortable... but the adult response is to accept and overcome that discomfort. Paradoxically, it seems that the person behaving like a little girl, at least in this situation, was your mother. It seems that your mother was completely unable to let go.

You know, the fact that this woke you shows that it was an important incident. It occured at a pivotal moment in your life, when you were really and truly becoming a woman, and you were talked down, to almost nothing. Although it wasn't exactly abuse, it was still deeply wounding. Perhaps it's only now that you're able to confront such things.

Funnily enough today I've had some reminiscences of painful things from when I was a child... My mother never believed me when I was ill. I had broken fingers and toes, pneumonia three times, bronchitis several times, chicken pox, measles, mumps, whooping cough, and even scarlet fever... and she never believed I was ill, unless the doctor happened by to see my brother (who often had the same ailments as I did at a similar time). So, for example, the doctor turned up on a few occasions and asked why I wasn't in bed... My Mum would say there was nothing wrong with me. On one occasion I had actually been dragooned into serving my brother, bringing him food and drink etc on the tray, sitting by him to distract him from his ichiness etc, and the doctor came in to see him and his first comment was, "why is this child out of bed? Can't you see she's sick?" My mother said there was nothing wrong with me, and he said, "she's white as a sheet, and sweating, and if you touch her forhead you'll see she has a temperature. Your son is on the mend." I remember feeling so sad when I was put in bed... for a start, I wasn't playing Mammy anymore, I'd lost my function in the family, for a second, why didn't Mum notice when I was sick, when a stranger noticed the minute he walked in the room?

When I needed glasses the same thing happened, she insisted I was making it up, though I was so short sighted I couldn't see the lines on my palm from a distance of two foot. When I was sixteen I took my first overdose, she didn't think anything was wrong, even though I vomited myself empty, hallucinated for maybe two days, and couldn't walk in a straight line for a week.

Invalidation, while not outright abuse, is very damaging. Things that appear trivial are usually symptomatic of a deeper problem. I'm sorry your Mom made you feel like that.

I've wondered my whole life why she never seemed to care if I was ill or not. But do you know the worst thing I remember? It was being awake while they were having a party, and overhearing her say, after praising my brother to the hilt, "Oh. M... *real name* is stolid." I suppose, though I know she loved me, she just loved my brother more.