I'm sixteen and my whole life until last year I never stood up to my mom, disagreed with her, got in fights with her, and tried my hardest not to make her mad. Up until last year I was consistently in toxic friendships, where the other person (always a girl) would try to control me, limit what I said, punish me if I disagreed, and isolate me from other friends or my family. Back then my mom and I were like two peas in a pod, ganging up on my dad and making fun of him relentlessly, me confiding in her and gossiping about my friends and what annoyed me about them, or me giving her advice on her marriage with my dad or dealing with my half- brothers who came from my dad's first marriage. The two half-brothers don't live with us.
My mom and I were very similar, or so I thought, until I ended my last toxic friendship in June of 2019. This friend emotionally and verbally abused me so much that I self-harmed and fell into many depressive episodes and breakdowns. I was so busy trying to keep this girl happy that I completely forgot about caring for myself and realizing that I needed boundaries. After I ended the friendship I was left with mild PTSD, Anxiety, Depression, and trust issues. I didn't realize, however, how much I would change into a much stronger person a result of this friendship.
Instead of being the quiet, submissive child that I always had been, the kid that my mom always described as "easy" or "perfect", I began to find my voice. This meant that whenever I disagreed with someone I spoke up. I never thought that my mom was the person behind my habit of being attracted to manipulative and immature people who expected me to give up my individuality. As I began to stand up to her I realized that she didn't know how to cope. She victimizes herself in situations where I've expressed my pain to the point where my feelings don't seem to matter to her. She humiliates me in front of others and competes with me for attention until I simply get too drained to talk. In group settings she answers questions I'm asked, acting like she knows better about my own life. She'll get defensive if I say "I don't like that anymore" and she'll say "that's new" and refer to how I used to like it when I was 4 years old. She constantly makes cracks about my weight or other things about what I wear. The clothes I wear often are tight and I think it makes her jealous or insecure which as a result makes me feel bad for looking the way I do.
Two days ago my mom and I got in a fight where she wanted me to not say my opinion if she was arguing with my dad, even though they were arguing about college prep classes for ME. She said how if I hadn't butted in the conversation wouldn't have ended. She said how I sucked up to my dad because I agreed with him. She kept on asking why I interrupted her (she always makes this argument) even though she cusses constantly at me and interrupts me. Yesterday I went in to talk to her to ask to get professional help with our relationship and she kept saying how hurt she was and how I was tearing her apart. As I said me too she didn't seem to listen. In contrast to before, she said I am "I lot to handle". I know very well I'm not. It was like she had her own narrative in her head and no matter how loud I screamed or cried I couldn't get her to wake up and realize the amount of pain she caused and is causing me. It was like one of those movies where the character is a ghost and they're talking to a live person but the person can't hear them like the main character is muted. I asked her about 5 times "please can we get help" and even after I gave examples she would say that she doesn't see what's broken or what's wrong. At one point I screamed "you're so selfish" and she said, "get out". I kept on saying "or what" and we went back and forth. She was closing the door on me and I held it open and said "do you want our relationship to be ****** forever?" She said "get out" again and closed the door.
I'm so tired of being forced to be mature and be the stable one. I'm sick of being punished for having emotions. I'm scared to even look at her and the thought of talking to her as if everything's fine makes me sick. I'm past the point where I can forgive her. I've talked to people about this and they said you have to forgive her she's your mom. She's not treating me like her daughter she's treating me like I'm a bully on the opposite side trying to destroy her. I told her all I want is for us to love and appreciate eachother the right way. She doesn't want to wake up and I'm so drained from waiting for her. I never thought I'd have to protect myself from my own mom.