hi confused,

i can relate to the relationship with your mother.
i eventually found peace of mind after the emotional and mental abuse in my relationship with my mother.

i learned over the years that i had to accept she wasn't the mother i needed, but she was the one i had to cope with.

at times, i had to stay away, and it was difficult for me when i was younger, getting married, starting a family.

at other times, i got close and pretty soon, injured. damaged.
i watched helplessly as she became more and more deluded ... with such grandiosity and paranoia too, and i was considered by her to be a very low person, and way 'beneath' her, it was one crushing blow after another like that from her. my whole family suffered, but we did so differently because our experiences were not the same nor are we carbon copies.

i finally began to look at her for who she was. i had to see why i was getting damaged in the first place as the unhappiness was seeping into everything in my life, so i turned the limelight in her direction instead of it being on me - the sitting duck - and that is when i saw her for who she was - with these paranoid delusions from a mental illness, and possibly the grandiosity was from her alcohol abuse.

i saw a sadistic side to her that seemed to enjoy making women and children especially uncomfortable. a jealous person, stern and demanding on one hand, selfish with much too much alcohol to be healthy or wise on the other, and most importantly, one who could not feel empathy and compassion for others, not her very own children, not anyone elses'.

she was someone i learned i could not trust my emotions to, and realized that her problems were not caused by her children, as she liked to imply, but something she carried inside her for years that went undiagnosed.

i am sure it terrorized her. how she treated her children was similar to the actions of someone suffering in pain, thereby swatting and swiping people away. she took her pain out on others who were vulnerable to her. she was abusive. verbally, emotionally, mentally. because she was ill.

she passed away recently.

she couldn't give me any credit throughout my lifetime.
she did not know how to give.
i believe she did not want to be like she was.
as a teen mother, she was once trapped in a loveless marriage. completely miserable. she became abusive with her children. quite violent towards girls. somewhere in her young first marriage, she lost it. mental breakdown. she did not want anyone to know. she hid it. or so she thought. we loved her so we saw. she did not understand what we saw. we loved her. how could we know what to do. how could we know what game to play?

i cried deep inside at her funeral. i saw frozen adults children. a few friends. some in-laws who just critisized. most of my mothers family stayed away from her children. i wondered if they believed her delusions over the years, or did they dislike us also because we were also beneath them. see, it still kicks up. but really, who cares what they think now. it matters what i think.

i wished i learned to either stay away from her all together as an adult,
or have found a way to be a friend with no expectations - and reserved my expressions of loving feelings and concern for others instead.

she seemed to have handled that superficial stuff much better.

we all have to figure out what is best for us in our relationships.
abusive ones are the hardest to cope with. it did help to talk things out with a therapist years ago. although the grief my mother dished out was overwhelming at times, i forgave her. after all, i needed my heart and soul intact, no matter what other people say or do, i am ultimately responsible for myself and how i respond to the intentions of others.

i gained more from my mother than she would ever know. my strength and courage and convictions are results of a process to become a better person than what i experienced in my family as expectations on her children. i surpassed those. i had to. i needed to survive all the abuse and the way i did was learn to be the best person i could, and take no prisoners - no abuse and brutality from me towards anybody - not ever - and i do respect people and their feelings, and do get into my life with feel lots of love for those who care about me. i rose above the circumstances for the most part. i thank my mother for that. she did make me want to be the best person i could.

you will find a way to deal with the neglect and emotional abuse.
life will teach you.
listen to your history with her in a therapists' office and it might change your perspective and begin the healing process. i hope this helped. i wrote this out because i felt maybe there was something here that might assist you.

i hope this isn't a bringdown to people to read, if so, i apologize. it is a blessing to come out the other end. i have done that. i know what i am like and what i am not. that is always a good thing. to know oneself.

peace and love,
nightbird