[Alibongo]

Hello everyone

I have had terrible problems with my relationship with my mother since I got married 15 years ago now and things have gotten a lot worse since my father died, aged 57, 7 years ago. I have had a lot of counselling over the years to try and get things right in my head about my mother and it has helped to some degree.

Since January I have decided to cut all ties with her, this was after a row I had with my eldest brother and she took his side (long story) but very distressing. She is manipulative, controlling and all those things I have been reading on this board that an emotionally abusive mother is. She has nearly wrecked my marriage several times, tried to take control of my children - one of whom is autistic aged 9. So life for us is quite difficult anyway without all the added problems of my mother.

This woman has made me severly ill and depressed in the past and I feel I am finally climbing out of it. But I feel I need time to 'heal' and get strong without her on my back. She lies and is nasty to her own children but to complete strangers she is as nice as pie. AND she is extremely jealous of my life!

She rang me today out of the blue and I felt my heart flutter but didnt answer the phone and left it on answer machine. I played it back and she sounds her usual down trodden, stern self. Its a pattern - she creates problems, pulls the family into them and throws us out and doesnt take the blame for ANYTHING. She has never said sorry to me, not once in her life.

Sometimes I want to tell her how I really feel and I have tried this in the past, but she goes on a crying rant and starts getting panic attacks and says things like "oh I didnt say that, I never said that etc." Its all emotional blackmail, always has been. She stifled me as a child, never got hugs and tried to make me jealous by hugging my youngest brother in front of me.........you know all that stuff of emotional crap.

So..........basically I don't want to ever have to tell her what I feel about her I just havent got the emotional energy in my life, a lot of that is taken up with my own children, especially my son with autism.

But........I want her off my back forever. If I never saw her again I would be happy I have had enough basically. I have nothing more to say to her.

Any advise or experience with difficult mothers I would like to hear from you. Thanks in advance.

I feel better for letting this out now.

Alison

[wi_fighter]

Hi Alison. Welcome to Psych Central.

I don't have a controlling mother, but I'm still dealing with a controlling ex-husband. I can point you in the direction of two books that have given me some insight into the situation.

One is The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner, Ph.D. It explains that, as you probably already realize, we can't change the person we're in conflict with, so we have to change our own behavior. If we have a new response for the same old arguments, it's ultimately going to alter the other person's response, and then some changes should be able to be made. There's a chapter specifically for daughters and controlling mothers.

The other is The Verbally Abusive Relationship by Patricia Evans. One of the latter chapters gives instructions on how to respond when they start in with the abuse, and it explains how to respond to each of the different kinds of verbal abuse. There are actually 15 categories.

I can't give you any sound feedback on either of these yet, since I'm still new to them myself, but it has given me some food for thought and has helped me keep my cool when I want to explode at him.

Hopefully someone will come along who's further along in the recovery process with some more advice for you. I'm actually four years past my divorce and I'm just now trying to stand up for myself.

[wi_fighter]

I just wanted to add that they're both pretty short books, each around 200 pages paperback. They both get right down to business without a lot of fluff that makes you want to say "get to what I need already."

My only advice is to deal with the pain and talk to someone. Best of luck!

Gee, this is so weird!! I think your mother is my mother's clone!!

My father has also passed away- 11 years ago. Since his passing my mom has gotten even worse with her manipulation and playing us siblings against each other. Her "dramas" are so much more exagerrated, they were bad enough before!

You wrote: " She lies and is nasty to her own children but to complete strangers she is as nice as pie. AND she is extremely jealous of my life!"--- This is EXACTLY my mom!!

I have so many experiences with these situations! Finally spiraled in a depression 5 years ago-- still trying to get back on my feet! Been in therapy off and on for these past 5 years.

Sorry I have to run now, would love to share experiences and perhaps help each other. My PM is always open- write anytime! I'll try to write somemore on here later!

Good luck with things!!

Mandy

[Alibongo]

Thankyou to everyone for your kind replies and book recommendations, I will look into these. Mandy - wow! its so nice to know I am not the only one out there with these problems. Would love to chat to you sometime.

Anger.........well I phoned my mother this afternoon and told her that she was being unfair to me (understatement) but she wouldnt listen. I ended up putting the phone down on her, my anger is over boiling point. Then I emailed and said I didnt want her to contact me and that I don't want to see her again.

I am going to have to go back to therapy to get some healing done. Have to go now, feeling a headache coming on.

Thanks again x

[CJR520]

Your Mom and mine must be twins!!! My Mom is constantly talking about us, her three kids, one at a time with the others behind our backs. Talks about us to our kids, picks on certain people, like my 18 year old grandson at Christmas time. She can make life very miserable, but does like your Mom, strangers and people in businesses are her friends. There is one key, though. My Mom has no friends her own age at all to do things with because of her problem. Try getting the book Toxic Parents by Susan Forward. I think you will get a lot out of it. I surely did!! Good luck!

[growingflower]

I broke off the relationship with my mother over 5 years ago and it was the best thing I have ever done. Now in my situation there was phycical, emotional, and neglect abuse from her when I was a child. Even my therapist said it was the best decision I have ever made. The only thing is others responses especailly relatives. They don't understand how a MOTHER can be abusive. Don't pay attention to those people that try to make you feel guilty. You will never regret doing what is best for yourself even if nobody else understands it. Good luck, and keep in touch.

i wish you the best in this. my mother was similiar. hell to me, but nice as pie to friends and neighbors.

[growingflower]

This is so true! My mother was abusive to me and my brother, but she seemed so nice to everyone! Some people or relatives couldn't really see it, and you know its the fathers that are abusive, not mothers, people just can't wrap their minds around that concept. I wish I could come up with another name for my abusive mother, because she wasn't a mother at all.

[wisewoman]

wow, what a topic! My mother was/is evil and loved/loves to inflict pain. She has no more power in my life. However, here is the twist. I work mostly with people who are over 60 and this one woman was really abusive to her daughter and yet, I still choose to find a way and a reason to connect with her.

As for others. I have 8 siblings and they are mostly messed up more then me and in denial. One asked me when the parents die if I would attend the funeral. I asked him if he would like me to? He said yes and I said I would do it for him. They have no meaning. They are poor excuses for humans. SHE< THE MOTHER IS A POOR EXCUSE FOR A HUMAN! The best thing I did was walk away. She tortured, neglected, exploited, humiliated, verbally,Physically, emotionally abused me. We can nuture ourselves and there are people out there who will also nuture us and love our cores. Sorry, if this is intense, touched a soft spot.

to one who spent half of her adult life, doing cartwheels and over-achieving, it isn't "too much"... xoxox pat

[growingflower]

I know this sounds really mean, but if my mom called and she was on her death bed and wanted to see me, I would send her congradulations ballons. She was a terrible abusive mother who I am so glad she is out of my life. I will only truely have peace when she is dead, because she will stop threatening me. Sorry if this sounds bad but it is nothing compared to what she had done to her kids.