My mother, my enemy

[Carrie Anne]

I just don't know how this happened.  My mother makes me feel physically ill.  When I was younger, I was so open and willing to be in her life.  And so stupid.  We went from what I perceived as "best friends" to being totally disconnected.  So many millions of hurts and slights.  My withdrawing from her has made her crazed with anger and hurt(?).  Just talking to her on the phone causes me to have a sleepless night.  It's unthinkable in my family to be able to escape from duty and obligation to my widowed mom in her final years of need. How dare I be so evil? Yet, I go months not seeing her and when I'm forced to be back in my hometown, I still can't bare to see her.  She tracks me down and is incensed. My husband and I talk almost exclusively about this draining situation.  Speaking to her brings me nothing but shame and guilt.  She's forever pushing buttons and saying "I know my children".  Yes, she does, all of our buttons. I'm co-dependent and cannot get a handle on my feelings.  I've always felt like I had to be responsible for my mother, even when my dad was alive.  I seem to be the only kid she can get to like this.  I'm the scapegoat now.  My brother(the first scapegoat) killed himself when he went home to try to get his life together at the age of 21.  He was looking for a soft place to fall.  I'm 51 years old and keep continuosly processing my family of origin and feeling stuck.  I can't afford therapy at this time.  Can anyone recommend a definitive book or article that helped you in this situation?  Thanks for letting me vent.

[miss piggy]

Dear Carrie Anne,

Welcome to the board. 

You have a real dilemma on your hands.  If you survive on your own, you are a "bad" person.  If you stay to be "good", you die emotionally.  Your mother is asking you to jump into her volcano of anger and you don't want to.  And you probably cannot understand why your own mother would require this of her own child. 

There are many books available and you can find a list here on this board.  If you click on the Voicelessness and Emotional Survival line (the one without "message board") it will list all the message boards.  One is the reading list.

Hope this helps.  Also I think if you look for threads by Daylily that might help you know that you are not alone.  Ns get worse in their old age.  There are no "death bed revelations" to look forward to and you need to mourn the fact that Ns cannot acknowledge you the way you need her to, the way you were hoping for.  I know, this little hope of mine died last spring when I realized my Ndad is still sucking all the emotional energy out of any situation.  I didn't know why I was so angry until my T pointed this out to me.  Also, I didn't read this book, but just the title alone helped me understand: "Ambiguous Loss".  She's not dead physically, but your relationship is.

I hope I am not upsetting you further by writing this.  Again, you are not alone and you have options and choices for how to deal with this.  You are not selfish for wanting and needing to survive.  Ns can make us feel this way and we need to hold those feelings and definitions at bay very vigilantly.  Do not describe this to someone who cares for older people (unles they work the psych ward) since they see themselves as advocates for voiceless seniors, not realizing that you have been voiceless all your life, thanks to said senior person in their care.  Do find a therapist who understands narcissism. 

Good luck.  Please write more if it is helping.  Miss Piggy

[menashe]

Helo Carrie: you describe a feeling of being trapped in your mother mental/emotional prison. I suggest, by empathy, that you may try to imagine how you life could or can be, if you out of the prison? what feelings arise in you? how your life will change, etcetera..this may be a kind of exercise in inner freedom to feel and to be. Try to write it and see and reflect on it again and again..you may than share [voice]  it little by little, with great detail with accepting friend. He or she may listen. Just listen. Try! with empathy... menashe.  

[Sela]

Hello Carrie Anne and welcome:

....Speaking to her brings me nothing but shame and guilt.

Could this be the key to your troubles?  What are you so ashamed of?  Trying to survive and thrive as an individual?  Setting boundaries?  Not being able to be a puppet forever?

What have you done wrong?  Please make a list and if you feel like putting it here, I'm sure others will be along to help you make sense of it, but if you don't feel like putting that list here.....that's ok too...just make that list and see exactly what you've done that is sooooooooo shameful and that causes you to feel guilty???

There is a book......."Healing the Shame That Binds You", by John Bradshaw, and although I haven't read it, I've heard it's very good (I really should read it too)!.

It sounds to me like your mother is a master at pushing your shame buttons.  No wonder you feel ill after interacting with her.  Can you think of her as toxic?    Can you imagine that engaging with her is like drinking polluted water?

Would you knowingly drink polluted water?  Think how silly that would be?

It's ok to protect yourself from toxins.  Your family may expect you to be the scapegoat but you don't have to be one forever.  You can choose to avoid their poison and feel good about yourself for having the sense and strength to do so.  It will take time and effort, for sure, but hey.......it takes time to reset all those buttons regularly too, right?  Better to remove them from the fingers of polluters.  What do you think?

Sela

[Sallying Forth]

I just don't know how this happened.  My mother makes me feel physically ill.

I'm the scapegoat now.  My brother(the first scapegoat) killed himself when he went home to try to get his life together at the age of 21.  He was looking for a soft place to fall.  I'm 51 years old and keep continuosly processing my family of origin and feeling stuck.  I can't afford therapy at this time.  Can anyone recommend a definitive book or article that helped you in this situation?  Thanks for letting me vent.

Hello Carrie Anne,
I can definitely relate to what you said here. Read my post to "How can I cope" about the books to read. I find reading and journaling really help. I go to therapy AND most of my healing has been done indepedent of my therapist.

I was always the scapegoat from about age 4 onward until I essentially divorced my family of origin. I am 52. If you are being scapegoated there is no way you can be in touch with your feelings. Feelings and scapegoating do not go together. I know I didn't begin to really have my own feelings until last year in October. I finally began to feel. And the feelings no longer came from outside of me. They came from within me.

I felt physically ill around my entire family. And have felt that way around my h too. See my extremely long post entitled "A time for letting go." I describe in detail everything I ever felt in my h's presence and that's ditto for my family. Abuse does make one physically ill.

Children of the Self-Absorbed and If You Had Controlling Parents are best books out there. MHO.


Sorry to hear about your brother's abuse and death. That is horrid. I can't imagine what that must have been like for you.

((((((((((((((((((((Carrie Anne))))))))))))))))))))

Welcome to the board!

[cat]

Carrie Anne - I am really sorry to hear about your brother and the situation the drove him away.  It must be frightening for you to know what happened to your brother and wonder about how you will handle it.

Something that helped me (and yes, I consider my mother my enemy) was to divorce myself from her (at least in my own mind).  When she calls on the phone, I realize I am a trash can.  She will take the time on the phone to talk about her and all her injustices.  I must remember as a trash can, I have no voice.  My job is to take in (without really listening or processing) any of the trash she throws in - and then toss it out into a big dumping ground.  I don't have to hold on to it.

My sister and I have purposely worked together to decide who is going to be the "good" daughter, and who will be the "bad" daughter.  This way, we give each other a break and strategize.  The "good" daughter has to deal with the phone calls and criticisms of everyone else.  The "bad" daughter realizes she's being trashed to everyone - but at the same time, most people are now aware of Mom's craziness.

When I am the "good" daughter - and wind up on the phone - I turn on the tv, turn on the "Closed Caption"  - and put the phone on mute. 

I would encourage you to find a group that has similar interests to you.  A book club, a church, synagogue, mosque, singing group, orchestra, sewing, knitting - - - and become involved.  Make your mom realize being the scapegoat is fine - you can move on with your life - and by you not being involved in her life, she loses.

[daylily]

Hello Carrie Anne,

I have spent many years in a similar situation.  When I was in college, I acted out to the point of getting myself institutionalized, largely because I couldn't bear my relationship with my mother.  That was 20 years ago, and I've learned a lot since then, but I just wanted to let you know that I may understand how deeply this can cut.

But I think the key is not to let it define you.  Whether you have anything to do with your mother or not, you can go through life letting her win if you keep her in the driver's seat.  How much of your mental energy do you spend on her?  How important is she in your thought processes and your life?  It sounds like she still occupies a lot of your mental space, so talking to her or not talking to her is rather beside the point.

I hope you keep posting and telling us more about yourself.  Who are you, apart from and beyond your mother?  What do you like?  What do you want?  I think the most important thing therapy has taught me is that there's no magic "freedom" bullet, but the important thing is to forgive and cherish yourself just for being yourself.  In that way, you can start to live by your own rules and standards, not your mother's.  You can reclaim your mental space, and learn to feel at home in it.  And if you do that, you will be able to reach a final decision about whether there is room for her in your life or not.

Rather than reading, I hope you keep writing.  There are good books, but in my opinion there is no "essential" book.  The most important thing is not to absorb what a psychologist says but to learn to listen to the voice inside you that whispers, "I know why I am here, and it is not to be my mother's whipping girl."  Eventually, that voice will gain force and volume, but only if you let it speak.  So tell us more about yourself, your history, your desires--anything you want.  But speak it, and keep speaking it until you learn to listen to it.

I wish you peace, and I hope we keep hearing from you.

daylily

[hey_dahl]

Rather than reading, I hope you keep writing.  There are good books, but in my opinion there is no "essential" book.  The most important thing is not to absorb what a psychologist says but to learn to listen to the voice inside you that whispers, "I know why I am here, and it is not to be my mother's whipping girl."  Eventually, that voice will gain force and volume, but only if you let it speak.  So tell us more about yourself, your history, your desires--anything you want.  But speak it, and keep speaking it until you learn to listen to it.

Here, here!! That is beautiful and absolutely true.

If you can't afford therapy, keep writing, write on this board, write letters to your mother that you never send, keep a journal. So much of therapy is just having a safe forum to express yourself without feeling like you'll be attacked. If you can't get a handle on your feelings, try to write it out in a simple list form (tired, confused, fed-up, etc). I found an excellent book called The Woman's Guide to Total Self-Esteem, which has some brilliant exercises to help you assess your feelings on a daily basis.

I, too, had the "mother is my best friend" situation that actually was entirely one-sided with me being responsible for her. I'm currently in a phase of overwhelming resentment about it, but hope to come to some acceptance in the future.

I'm not suggesting you do it, but I moved 10,000 miles away from my mom, and have felt better and better with the distance between us.

And remember: you don't have to talk to her on the phone unless you want to.

[write]

I hate to see that, when parents try to be best friends with their kids- it's almost always a sign of controlling, and the best friend kid always gets dumped once they develop a mind and life of their own...

My mother used to make me feel sick too, she was never my friend, she was a poisonous person, couldn't get on with anyone, spread trouble and ill-feeling wherever she went, always trying to illicit confidences and then breaking them.

She said some very tactless nasty things when I miscarried early in my 20s and it opened my eyes to her, I never had much contact after that.

I'm a parent now and I don't believe my children owe me anything except to try their best to make good happy lives for themselves and grow up so they can be independent.

So don't feel guilty- start working through it and distancing those feelings even distancing yourself physically if you need to.

((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((())))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

[jordanspeeps]

I really needed to read this today soooo much!  Thanks, to all  of you.
In my mind, you are my sisters as we all have the same mother.                     

tif