Who would’ve thought the worst part of my fourth trimester would be dealing with my mother? Since having kids, our relationship has slowly crumbled away. Instead of respecting her more, I’ve found myself angry, wondering why she is the way she is: selfish and narcissistic. Any time I try to talk to her about anything she shuts down and says, “Well, I guess I’m just a terrible mom. I’ve did everything for you.” When she just hasn’t. For lack of a better term, my whole life I’ve been an “emotional support” animal for her. If I had troubles, she didn’t want to hear them. If I was sick, she disappeared and my dad took care of me or I did it myself. Meanwhile, I was always expected to help her with everything. If she wanted to go somewhere, I had to go. I didn’t even officially start college until I was 23 because it would ruin her schedule. In fact, it’s amazing that I even got married at all because we fought the whole time I was dating my now husband. I didn’t actually get freedom until I got married. When I recently asked why, she said “Well, you weren’t our responsibility anymore.” As if I was a piece of property to transfer. My husband and I only dated 6 months before marrying… in part because I just couldn’t take it anymore and we’d already known each other a year before dating.
The final straw came three months ago, when giving birth to my third child. I didn’t really want her at this birth to begin with. After all, she always ate snacks when I was nauseous and complained that she had to leave as soon as baby was out because she didn’t like driving at night. If it involves food though, no problem. I had several complications this time around. 5 failed epidurals in and I wouldn’t let her back in the room. I just didn’t want to deal with her when I was in the worst pain of my life. She took it personally and sent a ton of toxic texts to my phone while I was actively giving birth. My husband tried to hide them from me but couldn’t. So there I was, covered in sweat and blood, holding my newborn baby reading text from my mother about how she “Will never be treated like that again.” Instead of basking in my empowerment for doing labor naturally for the first time and the glorious first golden hour, I was thinking about her. She hasn’t apologized and refuses to talk about it. Though she has said she won’t have the same relationship with this baby as she does the other, you know, because she didn’t see it come out of my vagina. She ignored me for days and wouldn’t bring our kids to the hospital. My dad and grandparents came to visit though and tried to handle her.
I’m having surgery in a few days and I know I won’t have any help after. She refuses to watch the baby on surgery day because she says it’ll stress her out. She’s mad that I keep pulling away, says I’m keeping her grandkids from her but anytime I ask for help she’s not available or makes up an excuse. She also only ever wants my oldest child, because she’s “easy.” My second child is very emotional, so she doesn’t like him as much.
Why haven’t I went NC? I honestly don’t know. I guess I still have some hope it’ll be fixed somehow. Also, I have no one else to watch my kids at all. Plus, my other family isn’t toxic, just her. Should they miss out because she’s a problem? Ha, she also says I’m the problem and that everyone has noticed that I’ve “changed.” As Morgan Wallen would say, “If I’m the problem, you might be the reason.” I just spent an hour crying on my bed because of her and I’m done with it. I’m done with her trying to control my life, I’m done with her choosing favorites with my kids. I’m just…DONE. My in-laws also hate me…so who knows. Maybe I am a problem.
All I know is that I’m 30 years old and only just now learning to remove her from certain aspects of my life. No longer will I allow her an opinion. My daughter asked if she could go over to her house tonight. I said no. She asked if she could go tomorrow or the day after, I said no. She asked why. I don’t know how to respond. She loves her grandmother. I don’t like her grandmothers influence. Am I wrong? I don’t think so. I feel empowered to take control of my own life. To be a wife and mom, not just a daughter. How will my kids remember me? As the mom who took orders, or the mom who loved deeply, helping them become who they want and need to be? It’s not about me. It’s about them and I hope it stays that way forever. God help me, it will.
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Shame on her, making the birth of your child all about her! You’ve been dealt a crappy hand not once, but twice: your mother and your in-laws. It’s NOT YOU! You need to keep these people a safe distance away from you if they can’t be loving and supportive of you.
Give daughter an age appropriate response: Grandma is in time out for a little while. She has been disrespectful to our family. Mom is working on it, and will let you know when we will see her again.
Then take the time you need to care for yourself and your family. Maybe find a neighbor/ teenager to babysit in a pinch. And consider finding a therapist that you can talk to in a few months when life settles with the newborn and siblings. Congratulations on the newest family member!
First- uts totally fine to tell your daughter that grandma hurt your feelings and you are taking a break from seeing her so she can think about what she said.
Kids understand consequences and you can keep it simple.
Grandma should be held accountable for her shitty behavior- and if that means a time out then so be it. She clearly only worries about her own feelings and has no positive influence in your adult life.
Maybe think about the things you want your kids to see and learn versus letting them see her bad examples all the time. You dont owe her anything.
I really feel for you, OP. I’ve been where you are and it’s so painful to finally come to terms with an unreliable, disrespectful, and selfish mother. If you do anything moving forward, please may it be therapy for yourself to heal what is called the “mother wound”. You can learn how to give yourself the love you deserve and need from your mom. It takes time. My therapist reminds me that as I earnestly break the cycles of abuse and neglect as a parent in my own right, my wound will hurt because I am seeing more clearly what I was missing. This is what I am sensing from your post and I encourage you to do some work for yourself.
There’s plenty of reasons here to take a break from your mom. Maybe you’ll be NC forever, maybe you won’t. Just make the best decision you need for yourself and kids for now; you can revisit it at any time. As for an explanation for your kids, you can tell them that when someone doesn’t treat you with kindness, they aren’t welcome in your life until they can make it right. Even family. You are teaching your kids this valuable lesson as you role model it for them, especially your eldest who has a strong relationship with grandma and may need some help with that in her own right. All the anger you’re feeling is from being hurt without repair over and over again, and I hope you let it lead you to a more peaceful day tomorrow.
My MIL caused an incident during the birth of our eldest. Apparently she had learned that my mother spent the night in the hospital with my sister at her request, and being the jealous and competitive hag she is, apparently expected she would do the same with my wife and I. Never discussed this expectation with us though, and we would have said no. That is an intimate experience between husband and wife, and it is weird that she expected to intrude upon that. Also, there was nowhere for her to stay. There was only a bed for my wife and a chair for myself.
The next day we were moved to the birthing suite. I stepped away to get some ice chips for my wife. She was already extremely stressed and vulnerable, given that her epidural didn’t fully take, and this was her first time giving birth. When I got back to the room she was crying. I asked her what was wrong and she said she had just gotten off the phone with her mom. Said her mom told her that she wasn’t coming to be there for the birth because she felt disrespected due to not staying in the room with us the night before. I stepped out into the hallway and called my MIL. When she answered I immediately asked her if she told my wife she wasn’t coming. She said yes and started in on how she wasn’t being respected as a first time grandmother or whatever. I told her to shut her fucking mouth and support her daughter. She hung up on me.
She showed up an hour later to be there for the birth so either my verbal lashing shamed her back into compliance or, as I suspect, she always planned on coming and just wanted to emotionally abuse her daughter when she was A, at her most vulnerable, and B, the center of attention. She has always been jealous of my wife as she is bitter and alone. She wants my wife to fail in life like she did and wind up just like her so she can feel superior. My wife now looks back and realizes that her mother’s goal has always been to push her to divorce so she can live in our home and help to raise our kids. She has no retirement savings since she has zero financial intelligence. Retirement is coming up and she hasn’t said a word about her plans or expectations. She is in for a rude awakening when she finds out that not only will she not be living with us (our marriage would not survive), but that also we are not willing to sacrifice our children’s futures to fund her retirement. Government assisted housing is what’s in store for her, and she will make everyone around her miserable as a result. We no longer care, this is what she has earned. If she wanted our support she could have treated us with respect. She chose not to.
Shit, go nc with her. Doesn’t mean you can’t be civil when around her and nice to the good family members. Legit just block her number and move on. Life is way too short to have to deal with this.
She won’t change; cut her off now. Everyone will be happier. My kids were sadder about our dog that passed away 3 months before my Mama when she died.
Cut her off.
Dear OP you say maybe you are the problem and maybe you are…maybe you are seeing all that isn’t fair or right and wanting to be done with all the bull…and if that makes you the “problem” embrace it. There is a saying “I’m ok being the villain in someone’s story as long as I am the hero in mine.” Be the hero in your story and the story of your little family with husband and the kids. Be the story your kids look at when they are grown and go wow how lucky are we that mum broke those generational curses so we could have a great life. Embrace your villain origin story cause it is also your hero story.