Nmother's obsession with the perfection of my body and clothes

[Sallying Forth]

I have shared some of this already in other posts but wanted to elaborate on this here because I can't stop thinking about it. I know why. I'm in the process of changing my body image, both inside and outside. This has brought up many things my Nmother has said or done through the years. One of most disturbing, and I don't know why except that it was a violation of my boundaries, was her constant need to adjust my clothing. ANYTHING I wore brought on this behavior. If my shirt rose up in the back after I bent over and stood up, she would pull it down over my bottom. If my hair was out of place, she would put it back into place. She cut off most of my hair when I was 6 because she didn't like it long.

My Nmother's nitpicking, clothes tidying, and body primping behavior would step-up around company.

After writing all this I know this has to do with both her N and OCP disorders. The desire for perfection in everything drove her to keep me "perfect." I felt like I was on display for her, her friends and her relatives.

And at the same time she neglected my basic needs. My curled and ugly toes are a result of my Nmother's neglect. When I was growing a lot my shoes became too small. She didn't want to get me new ones because "you're growing so fast and we just bought you those." This happened with clothes too. She purchased my school clothes in August and by the time school began they no longer fit. My Nmother got angry with me for outgrowing my shoes and clothes. Like I could help it?

She nitpicked me. My looks. My clothes. My body. My voice. My mind. My emotions. It was an intrusion into my boundaries. That's exactly what it was. It is no wonder that I sense these are vines I am cutting off rather than strings.

Addendum: I went to the beach this afternoon, listen to the waves, the seagulls, felt the cool air on my face, and spent some time with God. I came away with the strong sense that God made me the way I am. My Nmother tried to redefine that and mold me into her image.   I thought that was supposed to be God's job?

[Plucky]

Oh Sallying, I can really sympathise.
My mom made a career of being pretty.   Of course I had to be quashed so as not to compete.  But my sister got the absolute worst of it.  Even now my mother phones to complain about my sister's hair, clothing, body, choice of scent, etc.  She makes the rudest comments in public!  My sister says nothing but I try to stand up for her, on the rare occasions we are together.   She ven goes on about how other people complained to her about my sister's appearance.  I find this hard to believe.

Once my mother 'explained' that her mother, on one occasion, complained that her (my mom's) hair was too hard to comb.  This was a rare occasion when they were together as my mother was brought up by her divorced father.   This is why she is obsessed with her hair, has to get it done all the time, berates each hairdresser and is never satisfied, and is so critical of me and my sister. 

One thing I instinctively did in the past, was to turn the conversation to her.  Ask about her outfit, her haristyle, etc and just asking about it will make her so self-conscious that she forgets about you.   If there is something to compliment about her, do so, and she can get her supply without putting you down.
If she reaches out to touch you, move away as if you thought you were in her way.  Say 'excuse me'.  Then find something on her that needs adjusting.
 
Good luck.  And remember that the body and everything on it, are just packaging.
Plucky

[Sallying Forth]

Once my mother 'explained' that her mother, on one occasion, complained that her (my mom's) hair was too hard to comb.  This was a rare occasion when they were together as my mother was brought up by her divorced father.   This is why she is obsessed with her hair, has to get it done all the time, berates each hairdresser and is never satisfied, and is so critical of me and my sister. 

Good luck.  And remember that the body and everything on it, are just packaging.
Plucky

Thanks Plucky!

My Nmother wouldn't let anyone cut her hair EVER. She did all herself because "no one else could do it like she wanted it." PERFECT. And she started coloring her hair at a very young age when the first sign of grey showed up. She also permed it herself.

I had my hair colored once by a hairstylist. Never again because of my reaction to the dyes. Plus I decided a long time ago it doesn't matter if I turn grey. Like you said, it's just packaging.

[spyralle]

My mum is always perfectly coiffeured....    She also cut off all my hair when I was 6.  Must be an N thing.  I don't remember having very many clothes, but if I did have something that she liked (Like a pair of wedge sandals when I was 15, she wore them out until they were messed up..  If she likes something of mine,  she goes on about it until I feel guilty and give it too her...  I remember having this shirt once that she really wanted.  I did not offer it too her so she very carefully washed and ironed and hung it up ready to pack when she left.  Of course I gave it to her!!  My mum is also a 'nitpicker'  She lives in Spain and even now I panic about what I am weraing when I get off the plane..  It has never been right yet.  My hair is wrong, my makeup is rubbish, I look too fat etc....  If I have ever worn a dress, she has always said I shouldn't because I do not suit them.  As a result of all this, I never wear dresses,  use anything but foundation (and I only use this to hide), Tie my hair up, or ever buy anything girlie.

I can't do girl stuff.  I look ridiculous in lipstick and haven't got a clue what suits me and what doesn't.  She once didn't speak to me for a year because I refused to put on a wonderbra to go out with her in.  She said she did not want to be seen with a flat chested daughter...

Sallying forth...  My mother also intruded into every essence of my being.  She wanted to have a say over my body shape, the way I looked, my mind, my emotions, my thoughts.  No secrets are tolerable to her.  She would always seek out my diary (and I never learned) and read it and then have a breakdown...  BLAME BLAME BLAME  all the time.  She once (when I was 16) caught me kissing a boy.  She went off the richter scale on that one, and yet she used to flirt with everyone imaginable.  I was so confused. 

I could go on about this all day so I apologise....  She also, when I am speaking to others, mouths the words alongside me.... just in case I let her down.  When I learned to speak Spanish.  She used to laugh everytime I tried it out...  Then on day I was practicing in the little village near her house.  I said to one of the Spanish women that if I had the money I would buy a house and live in her village.  My mother marched me back to the house and went mad.  What would people think of her she said that her daughter wanted to live with peasants.....

I want to be a woman.  I want to know what it feels like to look after myself properly and to feel comfortable carrying a handbag.  God I'm beginning to sound ridiculous now....

Apologies

Spyralle xxxxxxxxxxxx

[Plucky]

Marta, and others with the same behavior from N mom,
My mom always takes anything I like too much as well.  She hints around until she gets it.  Then she doesn't use it and basically I never see it again.  I started askign about anything she has taken "are you enjoying that new shower curtain?"  "Are you still using the small tv?"  and I even asked for some things back.  She finally gave me back one thing in a huff and since then the 'borrowing' has slacked off.  I only even noticed that this was odd because of my husband, who pointed otu that she didn't even need the item and why couldn't she get her own? 

When I was a child and teen, my mom started to shame me for becoming a woman.  She threw away my favorite article of clothing when I was 12 because it made me look 'trashy'.  I was a very late bloomer and had a little girl body until I was 16.  So I don't believe it.  I was very attached to this little thing and was very angry she had thrown it out when I was away after I had resisted her attempts to get rid of it before.

I want to be a woman.  I want to know what it feels like to look after myself properly and to feel comfortable carrying a handbag.  God I'm beginning to sound ridiculous now..

Spyralle, don't apologize for mouthing your truth.  And it is the truth for many, including me.  My mom never taught me how to do anything to make myself attractive.  All she does is criticise the little I manage to do.   You can become what you call a 'woman'. (BTW you are a woman, by definition.  If you want to change your style ok, but you do not have to do anything more to qualify as a woman.  You have made it.)  But you have to learn from others.  I found that looking at what men in drag do is instructive.  They have a long way to go but they manage to look very feminine!     
Pluciky

[October]

I can identify with a lot of the neglect others have suffered from their mothers, and the damage that does to them.  I am not sure who I am as a result.  I am female, but the word 'woman' makes me very nervous.     Girl is ok, except I am too old to be a girl.  But what comes after that?  Adult girl is the closest I can find to who I am.  And always have been.   

When I was small I had the exact same hairstyle every day of my life until I was 14.  Two plaits; one each side.  I had long hair, because 'dad' wouldn't let it be cut.  (Since when was he in charge, though??)  This was a 1950s child style in the 60s and 70s.  My mum made me into her youngest sister, who also had this style all her childhood.

When I was 14 I was due to go to Holland on a school trip and finally got them to agree that I needed shorter hair.  They arranged for me to go to a hairdresser, which was fine, and I told them exactly what I wanted; the bottom of the hair to be shaped into a gentle curve.  Except that it was a customer of my dad's, and we went to her house on a Saturday, and she cut a straight line across my hair, with no shaping whatever.  My parents didn't tell her what I wanted, and she didn't speak to me at all.  It took about a minute, and she charged 50p for it.  This was 30 years ago, but 50p was still stingy for a haircut even then.

I came home and cried my eyes out because of the straight line cut, and my mum said that was that; she would never ever take me to a hairdresser ever again, because I was ungrateful and didn't know what I wanted etc etc.  She pretended to believe that I was sorry that my hair was short, but I wasn't.  I was just sorry it was not done properly. 

It took me another 10 years to go into a hairdressers again, and I think in my life I have done so less than 6 times altogether.  Even when I married, I did my own hair rather than face a hairdresser.

Like Marta's mum, my mother also bought me my first bra far too late.  I was 14, and well developed, and embarrased at school.  She went shopping one day and came home with a blue padded bra.  Then she made me put it on in front of her, to make sure it fit.  I was so ashamed.  I took it off straight afterwards and hid it at the bottom of a drawer.  It took me ages to dare to wear it.  The last thing a developing young girl wants is a blue padded bra, that will make her even bigger, and show through her school clothes.   

[bliz]

I can relate to this and even think we talked about it in a different thread.  It took me years, and really only now, in my 50's, do I feel comfortable with my femininity.  I have very unusual hair for a white girl..(joke intended..it is thick, kinky, coarse.)  It was the bain of my existence and totally unmanageable by my beautiful, blond haired mother.  SHe also liked it about an inch from my scalp and still today tries to entice me to cut it boy short. She still picks on me about my hair, clothes, makeup, actions, words, thoughts, I suppose, but I mostly can ignore it. It is terrible what they have done to us as children for the sake of their illness.  It takes years to replace the negative tapes with positive ones.

[Sallying Forth]

I can identify with a lot of the neglect others have suffered from their mothers, and the damage that does to them.  I am not sure who I am as a result.  I am female, but the word 'woman' makes me very nervous.     Girl is ok, except I am too old to be a girl.  But what comes after that?  Adult girl is the closest I can find to who I am.  And always have been.   

Hmmm ... this is very interesting. I'm dealing with a lot of this right now as I lose weight. Also I was purposely treated like a boy to cause gender confusion as part of an experiment. So this on top of what you wrote and my mother's strange obsession with my body ... it all brings a new light to my gender identity problems.

I've never felt female, always IT, like my first name I used on this forum. I think I'm beginning to get the picture now. It was a many different factors which caused me to feel this way. I know it began with my Nmother when I was quite young. Then my bioNfather and Nfather became part of the picture. I do remember having gender confusion as early as 4 years old.

[vunil]

Boy can I relate to everything people are saying!  I would just love to be in one of those movies where you go back in time to college days or something but you know what you know now.  Because I was really cute!  Young people are really cute.  But I had no earthly idea-- I found myself hideous.  It was important to my mother's self-concept that I be worse (especially fatter) than she was.  I am naturally a little closer to societal ideas of pretty than she is, or I was, and I think this bugged her. On the other hand, she wanted me to be beautiful so she could live through me.  Back and forth between these two opposites-- it can make you crazy.  Success let her down, failure let her down.  I would love to go back there and just strut my stuff!  Really just be in the moment.  Sigh.

today was my birthday and she sent me a card with a dancing pig on it.  She said I would appreciate it because I keep talking about how funny my new big (pregnant) body feels to me.  I am torn-- on the one hand it's kind of an offensive thing to send me, a dancing pig meant to be me. On the other hand, I am sort of the same shape as the little guy   But I guess it hits a button that she is paying attention to what I look like, especially that I actually hardly ever talk about it-- it isn't that I "keep talking about it."  I think she just keeps thinking about it...  She sent me an e-mail with exactly how much weight she gained in each pregnancy, and when.  I have no idea why.

Anyway, rock on, ladies!  We know we are beautiful now! 

cheers,
dancing pig

[spyralle]

It's my birthday today too Vunil.  My mother sent me a card saying 'Bestest Mates'.  Bearing in mind I haven't seen her for two years and we haven't spoken for months I find this a little hard to swallow.  There was a letter in the card.  This is what it said......

Spyralle,

I'm sending this card in the sincere hope that you are in good health and happy with your daughter, your relationship and in your work situation.  I looked at this card and thought 'Yes that typifies the stage we had achieved and I was satisfied, consideringour convoluted lives and living circumstances.  Unfortunately even that was terminated.  Ah Well!
I've tried so hard to help in major matters but now I'm resorting to card sending- much easier but not my style.
However it acts as a necessary contact because of 'family' reasons - but never doubt that my sentiments are wholly sincere.

As ever
God Bless you.  I think of you many times a day and you can be assured of allmy love.
Mum

I'm really not sure what all that is about.  Where I to tell her what has happened with the ex she would be angry and then blame me.....  Still you can't help wishing....

Happy Birthday Vunil

Spyralle xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[vunil]

Happy birthday to you, Spyralle!  It's funny-- we have a birthday a day apart and I think we have the same real first name (I don't want to say it, for anonymity reasons-- my whole family lives on the internet). 

Your mother sounds very similar to my mother.  When mom gets stressed out, she becomes "official" and "logical."  She actually just sounds "constipated" and "haughty" but I think she thinks she is not letting emotion get in the way and being "bigger than the situation."  Your mom appears to be doing the same.  The same abstract language, everything.  It's impossible to tell what in the world she is really saying, it's all so abstracted. It's pretty clear that she is trying for a loving tone, while still making clear that the truth of the matter is she is superior to you and you are vaguely disappointing to her in some vague way. But!  She loves you anyway!  How funny.

Ah, well.  There is love in that message along with the ridiculousness. I would just take the love and run with it.  I have been doing that with my mom and it makes things better.  You know, dancing pigs are cute.  She is of course saying I am fat (she hasn't seen me pregnant yet; she is just imagining) but she is also reaching out. 

Happy birthday!  Eat some cake.  It is a law of physics that one must eat cake on one's birthday.  With ice cream.  It's a new year for you!!!

[spyralle]

That is funny Vunil...  The world is full of strange coincidences isn't it.  It's funny isn't it this love thing.  My mum believes that giving love is giving money and then after she has given the money she thinks that the person that she has given it too should do what she says...  I think you are right and she is trying for a loving tone but is it all in the course of manipulation.

i would love to be able to run to my mum with my current problem.  I would love to have her stroke my hair and tell me that it doesn't matter and that i will always be beautiful and special and that money is not the be all and end all.  this would most certainly not happen so I keep quiet.... and feel ashamed and that I have let her down.  after everything she has done for me financially I let some man come along and just take it all off me etc etc etc.......

I too thought i was hideous when I was young and totally neglected myself.  what was the point of trying to look pretty when I just wasn't...  So I never washed my hair, wore the same socks for a week and all sorts of other things that my mother should perhaps have noticed and encouraged me with.  When I look now at photos of myself I was pretty...  It's very bizzare...

i sent my mum a photo at Christmas and she said to me.  I looked at your eyes in the photo and thought that yes you were a good person.  I am 43 years old and she is trying to convince herself that I am a good person.  I once asked her why she was not proud of me.  i said after all I have trained to be a psychiatric nurse and she said "psychiatric nurses are the lowest of the low!!!" so that put paid to that...  She said that I have chosen to work with Schizophrenia because it is demonic!!!  Actually I work with addiction but hey I'm sure she'd find a few demons in their if I was involved.  i was once being bullied by this girl at my school.  My mum sided with the bully!!!!

And still I am torn and want to write her a letter asking for her to stop it hurting but I have accepted that she can't.  Maybe she thinks that she really loves me and I just have to be satisfied with that....  Sorry I am a bit down today...x

Spyralle xxxxxxxxxx

[vunil]

N's and their absolute bullshit!  "psychiatric nurses are the lowest of the low!!!"  --!  What in the heck is she talking about?

I am glad she isn't in charge of the hierarchy of the world. 

I would listen to her kind of like I try to listen to my mom, with one ear, not two.  Kind of like you listen to the music in a grocery store.  Listening carefully is just a waste of time.  And she is EXACTLY like the three N's in my family, all of whom cannot give praise when I ask them for it or seem to need it.  They clam up or cannot resist saying something insulting.  I guess it is because they can't resist kicking someone when they are down, and they can't provide a compliment that might mean they are saying someone is better than they are even in the slightest sense.  Even if that isn't what you are asking them to say, that's what they hear you asking.  It is really pathetic and must mean they have a rough time in social interactions with other people and at work-- and I know all three of them do.

I have had similar conversations with my family, and it always goes the same way.  So do not ask for any kind of confirmation from her-- it will lead her to say some nonsensical ridiculousness like above.  (not that I don't still sometimes do it-- it is like charlie brown and lucy and the football.  Every time they take the football away and I fall on my back I think-- argh!  Fell for it again!).

Meanwhile, we will comfort you all you need.  And your other friends, and the universe, and your job.  It is CLEAR that psychiatric nurses are somewhere near the top of all professions in terms of the service they provide-- I can't think of anyone who provides anything more necessary, loving, and important.  Just objectively, that's clear.  And you are doing that important job.  So there.  WE applaud you and admire you and send you birthday greetings.

[Lizzie]

What a cord that struck with me! I was in college, and smoked 3 packs a day, lived on black coffee and cottage cheese. My weight and persona was the "ideal' for my mother, not matter how unhealthy I was. She would take me to the local department store (Filene's) and buy me all kinds of clothes... not for me, but but for her. I was a size 8, sometimes 5 back then. How happy and thrilled she was that the 8 was too big!! We went to different branches, trying to find the 5. It was a hunt for her, and totally obsessive. I can remember how happy she was when we found the skirt in the right size. She absolutely glowed. She would parade me around, beaming to all others that she thought was looking at me. They were all probably thinking, "what is that crazy woman doing?. I was her possession, not her daughter. I remember her saying to me "they think you are a model!" I cringed.  When it came to serious concerns, she could have cared less. I got not an ounce of advice.

Over the years, I quit smoking and gained weight to her horror. I told her that I saw an old friend of hers and they didn't really know me - she snapped back, "do you blame her? you've changed so much". Or, we would be out and some very overweight person would pass by, and she would give that horrible, cold look and say "AND YOU THINK YOU'RE FAT?". It became her favorite anthem.

She always was perfect, going out the door, shoes polished, blouses starched, hair perfect. She broke her arm when I was living at home and going to college (good situation, right?). Of course, there were many instances of Nrage regarding her care - no one ever did enough for her. I was enlisted in doing her hair - EVERY morning. She would plant herself on a vanity seat and wait for me to blow dry her hair. Out of the week I did it, only 1-2 would be to her liking. She would scream at me that it wasn't perfect, this was wrong, that didn't look right. She would go back and wet it and make me do it over, again, and again until she approved. She would get up and make some nasty comment about, "I guess it will have to do, considering you can't do anything right".
I read once about Catherine the Great of Russia. She was obessed with her wigs and hair. She kept her German hairdresser at her disposal, in a cage. She would only let him out when she wanted her hair to do be done. If he didn't please her, he would be beaten and thrown back into his cage. I felt just like that poor hairdresser.

I still think in my head, when I am around contempories that I am much, much less. Not a woman of 51, but a child, a kid, a nobody. She gave me no confidence at all and I am still trying to get into my head that I am a person. I have no importance, no voice, no intelligence sometimes. I have to remind myself that I am who I am and have accomplished many things in my life. It's funny how so many people zero in on this frailty and utilize it to their advantange. Fortunately, I have enough backbone now to know who these types are and to avoid them.

[Plucky as guest]

Nmom:  "psychiatric nurses are the lowest of the low!!"
Spyralle: "yes. that's what the patients think."
an outraged
Plucky