confused about relationship with my mother -- is it me or her?

I am a 26-year-old female, but I live with my mother as an adult, due to screwing up and being immature and lazy. I continue to make so many mistakes and lie and do stupid things. I’m trying to make up for my failure at life by being more responsible. At the same time, I’m also hurt and conflicted and feel miserable living with my mom.

Basically, after taking a "medical leaves of absence” from a prestigious university and failing several classes, and eventually being hospitalized for depression, I was finally kicked out of my college. I moved back in with my mother. We are renting a small house/apartment, well she is, and I pay a share of my (part time) salary toward financing that store front where she keeps stuff -- she used to be a very severe hoarder (I pay only about 500 dollars a month to cover this). I have taken several classes over the past several years since dropping out, trying to finish out my degree, or get enough credits to be accepted back by my university (which they said they would do), but it’s slow and expensive and I’m struggling to stay motivated. I feel like a failure.

Anyway, my relationship with my mom has always been complicated. She has bouts of mean behavior punctuated by being fun, attentive, warm, and loving.

When asked to think of upsetting events in my past in therapy I recently told my therapist about an incident when I was first going through puberty where my mom asked me if I had pubic hair (I didn’t share this specific detail just said “my development”) yet and I was embarrassed so I said “no” and then she said to show her and I said I really didn’t want to and begged her not to have to, but she yelled and yelled and forced me to undress in front of her and then lay on the bed. I actually did have pubic hair and she was furious and screaming. Afterwards, she forced me to get in the shower and washed me while yelling that I was dirty and couldn’t even wash myself, and that I was a liar.

I am worried when I share that that you will have an incorrect perception or overly negative perception of my mom. That was one of her worst moments, but it didn’t happen again and she wasn’t like that most of the time by any means. When I share things to explain how my mom can be, I worry I’m only telling some things and maybe I’m not seeing the whole story and maybe that’s why people sometimes tell me she is not good for me, but they aren’t seeing the full pic or all the irresponsible stupid things I do, including lie, steal, etc.

A few weeks ago, my mom got really mad and started kind of hitting and kicking me and told me I ruined her life and I disgust her and that I was “demonic” and on and on. It happened in between sessions so I told my therapist about it. I honestly did something awful to deserve it though (I lied repeatedly and elaborately about being in school when I wasn’t).

When I was younger, in early high school (i’m embarrassed to admit I was so old), my mother used to make me say things to my dad when they fought. She used to text my dad from my phone pretending to be me and say things like “I hate you! Why are you so cruel to mommy? why can’t you just love her?” But this was during a very stressful time for her.

When I was in college she secretly lived in my dorm room for a semester which was awful and humiliating. She said she was sacrificing for me but really, I think, she was homeless (kicked out of her long term arrangement with her best friend) and wanted to be with me/get free rent/companionship, etc. It wasn’t ideal for either of us, I hated my life so much during it, but what hurts more is her using this time when she is yelling at me nowadays as an example of how much she sacrifices to me and how ungrateful I am. It’s so confusing.

For over ten years until a few months ago she did not work and was living entirely off money from my dad even though they both date other people and have been living apart many years.

My mom is nice to me too and has done so much for me. She cares a lot about me. But she is also very controlling and doesn’t really let me do anything but I can’t complain because I’m living with her and I’ve messed up my life so I can’t complain.

She seems to resent me and be very disappointed in me not reaching milestones she expected of me but also depends on me for a lot (I do her laundry often, grocery shopping, her homework for a college class, stuff for her work). I also used the remainder of my inheritance from my late grandfather to pay for her college class. But I thought it was the least I could do after failing college and messing things up and lying repeatedly about it, etc.

Like I mentioned, she recently got a part-time primarily work- from-home job as an administrative assistant for a local nonprofit. It’s more work and hours than she expected and she hasn’t worked in a long time, so it’s been hard.

I was helping her in the beginning but ended up doing a lot of the big tasks myself and she is busy herself and is also dating this guy who loves doing stuff and she is always very busy with him even though she tells me she doesn’t want to and is exhausted but feels she has to hang out with him.

Truth is, I end up doing hours of work for her a week, making spreadsheets, etc. And helping her do all sorts of things on the computer. I write emails, schedule meetings, run reports and create mass mailings and all sorts of documents and spreadsheets.

The past two days I was off from work and I worked 6-8 hours on mailings/reports/spreadsheets for her job. I’m not getting paid. Id rather be paid but I feel like I can’t just stop or tell her no. And I feel good about myself for helping my mom.

My therapist seems to think she is not good for me but I am worried he is overreacting or over sensitive due to his line of work or the way I’m portraying her because she often hurts/bothers me. But there are two sides to every story and I am very irresponsible. When I’m independent enough and responsible enough I do plan to move out. She would never let me move out now.

What complicates things is that I have a really distant and uncomfortable relationship with my father. He has always been kind and supportive and tried to protect me from my mother but for some reason I have always felt a million times more attached to my mother.

I feel tremendous guilt about what I did to him and that I refuse to see him despite him being kind to me. I feel very awkward around my father and uncomfortable. Just talking to him is so hard and uncomfortable. Part of it is that I remember when I was very little he used to french kiss me though he denies it and I believe my memory might be distorted so I’m not sure.

Please help me.

Hi, saltedmagnolias!
I could be wrong but the picture I made in my mind through the worrds you wrote, makes me take part for you.
You seem to excuse your mum for every fault she makes. It’s not right to say to your kid things like you ruined my life. No excuse for that.
No excuse for how your dad behaved either. I understand you want to be as far as possible from him.

You seem as a very competent person who screw up at times just like guided for a force of self-destruction and I’m not shocked by this due to how you were raised or what you went through.
It’s very important you don’t blame yourself for everything.
Getting a better self-esteem working with your therapist is key so you will be able to see more clearly how you want and need to be treat by others. Including your mum. I see this is as the first step. And sure you’re gonna be able to do less self-sabotage.
You deserve better and you are gonna to provide it by yourself.
Are you currently seeing a therapist? If so, how is it going?

Take care and have faith in things changing. Because you’re gonna do them change. You can, only need some kind of support by those who knows how to help you.
Anyway, we are here, too.

Don't scourge yourself... you must live with your own problems, your mother's, your illness, plus all your self-criticism? It must be indeed exhausting. I know it's easy for me to say and much harder to implement, but you must start by getting a blank sheet of paper describing where you are now and what you'd like to accomplish. Once it's much clearer in your mind, use your T as a resource and make the most of it, be concise, don't lose so much time doubting or stepping into other people's shoes thinking what they might think... everybody is a grown-up here, if they have a problem with you they'll tell you... just make sure your mother understands (your therapist might tell her) that you're struggling, but making the upmost effort to improve (and you do seem to care about improving and doing the right thing in your post).

Living with other people is difficult. Take responsibility for your part of the bargain but remember that maybe you're not 100% to blame: do you think your mother listens to you? Is she aware of your inner struggle? Is she supportive or rather absolute and smothering? Mine was/is some sort of dysfunctional family as well (so common these days), but if you believe that your father might be some sort of good/alternative influence you might try interacting with him to see how things go... Only if you feel right about it, but having supportive family members and some friends is a life-saver for us, I tell you, I wish I had more of those.

Lastly, pls, don't be your worst enemy and stop saying you're a failure... you're still young (take advantage of it) and a work in progress, just don't desist or surrender before better times come. Have faith and persevere.

(((Hugs))).

I’ve read both your posts and I think it would be a good plan to move out. Keep posting! Hugs!

Having come from a home that gave hot and cold messaging, its very easy to become apologetic when you're on the receiving end of the bad acts, because you want to believe they shouldn't exist when that person has done these good things. In allot of cases you end up making yourself believe that in some way its just your fault for those bad things and perhaps you deserved them. Well... you don't. A bad action is a bad action. The consideration given to that is just as deliberate as the one considered good. Translation: You need to call it out and make any person in your life, regardless of label, accountable when they do something wrong. No one should be able to have their way with you and transpose all of their dissatisfactions in life upon you, simply because they think displaying descent behavior occasionally somehow gives them license to be an inconsiderate jerk when the mood hits them. You are a person, not a punching bag. Stand up for yourself. Believe in yourself. And never take a back seat to another person's opinion or treatment of you. You have the keys to the entrance of your identity. Do not hand them out to anyone.

Yes, I can relate to some of your life too.

Still reminded of my traumatic birth 60+ years ago. She's just turned 88 but still has some horrible personality traits. Everyone she's ever known has let her down.

At least my mother has now stopped goading me (at least for the past few months). However, damage has been done as she's told family members that I'm to blame for how she feels. In a very frank discussion with my aunt more over a year ago, she made a very telling comment "now I know it's not all you".

All I did was tell my mother that I would not try to solve her problems with other people (including my aunt). We're a small family but as long as everything revolves around my mother then life is fine!

If you can get your own place, then do it. It will bring you freedom and peace of mind