My mom is 72 years old. She is divorced and lives alone in a senior apartment. She has a myriad of issues but one of them is that she calls me crying, saying she is going to run out of money. She says she needs to make my dad give her more. She'll say things like "I really don't want to have to live with you" (she can't and I have told her that). She lives in a 2 bedroom and has a storage room. I have tried repeatedly to talk her into a one bedroom and no storage. It would save her $300 a month in rent. She lies and says it won't. I spoke with the building manager; it will.
She refuses to let me see her finances. She just keeps crying. Twice now she has told me she needs my dad to just die so she can have all their retirement. This feels cruel. I'm not sure exactly what she gets monthly, but I know it's at least $4,600. I know she has to pay taxes but is this enough? She lives in a small city in Ohio. Her rent in $1900 and includes all utilities.
I don't know what to say to her when she cries that she is going to be homeless. When I ask to see her finances so I can help, she insists she has cut everything she can cut.
She's the kind of mom who does things like text me on my anniversary with "Happy Anniversary. You are old. Now you have to take care of me." And constantly says "Now, take care of your mother" which means wait on her hand and foot when I am anywhere near her vicinity. I was cleaning her house on Saturday and she barked at me 4 times to get her some water. I kept telling her to give me a moment. She could have walked over to the kitchen and gotten it herself. But when I am around, she suddenly loses the ability to do anything.
I'm getting off topic here. She doesn't ask me for money. She doesn't even hint at it. But she drives me berserk with this crying because I always feel so awful for her. I know she hates being divorced. I know she HATES being alone. But...what can I do?
I am afraid I have come up confused.
I would recommend you contact authorities in your area such as APS and then step away from this situation and get on with your own life.
There is little you can do for these two. I suspect things have never been terribly different from the sounds of the free flowing medications in your other note to us. Leave them to it. You are helpless in this.
So are we.
She has the possibility of a good life if she wanted it. She has enough money and good enough surroundings to do that. But, evidently she is one of those people who would rather complain and fault find than have a decent life. She is using you as an emotional crutch. This is not healthy for you or her and is enabling her to continue her dysfunctional ways.
Be clear that you are not looking after her - you have to work to support yourself and provide for your own old age. She can hire someone to clean her house. If you give people like her an inch they take a mile.
My mother was somewhat like this. She had her health, a decent income, a good place to live and so on, and yet found fault and complained about so many things. I didn't feel bad for her. It was her choice. I changed the subject when she started complaining. I let her know very clearly that she was never moving into my home. I limited my contact with her for my own mental health.
You need to focus on you and your needs for a decent life. Back off from your mother. She sounds narcissistic and is using you as her narcissistic supply (of attention). Stop giving it to her - she will find someone else. The suggestions below about groups that could help you are good. You can check them out online, and also books about codependency (Melody Beatty) and children of dysfunctional, narcissistic parents. Draw boundaries as to what you will and will not tolerate in your relationship with her (book -Boundaries by Cloud and Townsend). Personally I would not even discuss the topic of wanting your dad to die so she can have more money. I would change the subject every time she brings it up. Likely it will go to his current wife anyway.
As far as her crying about money and homelessness this is a hook she is using to get your attention. It's a manipulation. Don't fall for it. She wants your attention/sympathy and to get you worked up. Reduce your contact with her.
You have been raised by an emotionally unhealthy person. It will take work on your part for you to get healthier. A therapist might be helpful in you gaining more independence. I have gone to therapy off and on all my life and it has helped me a lot. Your mum wants to you jump to her bidding and ask "How high?' on the way up. You need to learn how to protect yourself from her. Wishing you the best. It isn't easy, but it is doable.
Earlier today I recommended that you consider reading Silently Seduced. I do believe that book may really help you.
In response to me, you stated that when your parents divorced, your aunt noted that your mother should NOT be leaning on you for emotional support. And yet she did and continues to do this to you. And you are very clearly absorbing every bit of this pain. It’s almost as if she’s never seen any separation between her and you. She sees you as an extension of herself, and holds you directly responsible for every feeling she has. You are NOT responsible for ANY of her feelings.
It’s up to you to make that separation because your mother didn’t seem to foster you becoming an individual. At all.
You also cited that you are considering reading a book titled “Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents”. I’m not familiar with that book, however the title leads me to some other thoughts, and maybe others have mentioned these things to you.
MrsL - you’ve been dragged through a LOT by your mother. And possibly your grandfather. And maybe your father as well. And your experiences have been denied by your mother - to the point where you have questioned yourself and your own reality. That’s wrong to do to a child who KNOWS what she has experienced.
It’s pretty clear Your mother has no reason or interest in change. Disordered people rarely see anything wrong with themselves. It is pretty much ALWAYS the rest of the world that has wronged them.
Maybe I’m way off base, but I believe that The REAL person deserving of help is YOU. And you have to truly want to help yourself. Do you?
Please bear with me here… Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families Could maybe be of help to you. ACA is NOT just for people who grew up in alcoholic homes. They have online and in-person meetings. Maybe this could be a start?
I understand that Beginning any change (or real healing) is so hard. But if we don’t go in, we can’t find out.
For whatever reasons, your mother has placed you in situations over and over where you have been and continue to be emotionally abused. Those are difficult and painful things to admit to ourselves. And it doesn’t matter the “reasons” or excuses why the adults who were supposed to love and protect us did or do the things they did or do. You have every right to protect yourself from further harm.
Please care enough for yourself. My beloved late dad used to say to me, “JB, You don’t have to feel like this…”. And he was so right. My dad knew me better than anyone in this world. He’s been gone for 33 years and I still feel his words embrace me.
And so I embrace you with these words. You don’t have to feel like this…
warmly,
JB
Your mother sounds like a first class manipulator and unless you cut her off, she will continue making more demands from you.
You do not have to wait on her hand and foot.
You are not responsible for her money management.
You do not have to take her into your home, unless that is something you want. And if you do, she will see that as a weakness she can exploit further to get even more from you.
I know, this is your mother I am talking about. This world doesn't guarantee that we have a healthy relationship with our parents, free from any dysfunction.
You need to set some boundaries. Decide just what you need for your emotional well-being, and limit her contact when it makes you feel uncomfortable or you feel she is making unreasonable demands. You can start by not answering her phone calls. Call her. On your timeline. And when she starts with the crying and trying to guilt you into doing more for her, you hang up. You walk away from the conversation. Look up on YouTube videos about how to deal with narcissists. Learn how to go Gray Rock. If you have the time and money to invest in yourself and your own health, seek a therapist to help you learn to set your own boundaries.
Parents are particularly effective in manipulating their children, because they have groomed them their whole life. You have learned to respond to her in a way that she wants - at least part of the time. If she sees an in, she will keep pushing to get more from you.
Your mother is a grown woman. And, you don't mention any mental incapacity, or any other disability keeping her from managing her own life. She may not be very successful at managing her life, but that is not your problem to fix.
BTW, does your mom know that your father has remarried?
All the advice here is excellent and I would only suggest the following.
The next time she says something like she "needs my dad to just die so she can have all their retirement"
Ask her to give you specifics on how your dad should die with statements like:
"Are you suggesting killing my father to get money, and if so, how do you plan to get away with it, I'd like to hear your plan"
You've heard the saying, 'Misery loves company'? Your mother is the living proof of those words. What she wants is pity and sympathy from you first. Then she'll want a bit of 'babying' from you. Then she'll start with the "companicking" (working herself into hysterics so she can lead into complaining) and last she wants to make you just as miserable as she is. When you talk to her or visit, she wants that conversation or visit to end with you being just as miserable as she is.
Your mother sounds a lot like mine who is an emotional vampire. She too hates being divorced even though her marriage ended almost 50 years ago. People like this will suck the life and the light right out of a person. You can't let her do it to you.
Bring a third party with you to talk to her about downsizing to a one-bedroom apartment. Sometimes it helps if there's another person in the conversation. If you go over there to help her clean, it has to be to HELP her clean. Not you clean the place while she sits around barking orders and demands on you. When that starts up, you leave.
Please remember that you are not the reason why she is divorced, old, or lonely. There are places she can go for socialization. Joining the local senior center for one. They will even provide transportation for her. Or check and see if her doctor will approve her for some homecare. This way her insurance will pay for a homemaker/companion to clean for her and take her out. Or if she's only 72, how about getting a part-time job? Lots of people her age work. This would also help with her money problems.
Does she have any siblings or other family who would be willing to visit her regularly.
Also, she may be on WAY too much psychiatric meds. You can help her by taking her to her doctor and maybe getting some reduced.
Hothouseflower is right. Stop people pleasing. It never leads to anything good for the pleaser.
A job? That's hilarious. She had a spot on her carpet and I told her she could clean it. She looked at me, incredulous, and said "I'm 70 years old!!" She can only stand for a minute or two, so really, maybe she can't work. I don't know. I used to take her places, like museums, but she can't stand or walk anymore so I don't know how to do that. She wants me to push her in a wheelchair but I'm 4'9" and she is over 225lbs. It's doable but if there is any elevation, I might hurt myself or her. So far I have refused. I make her walk.
She has a younger sister. She drives her berserk too. And my mother is extremely jealous of my aunt, because she is still married. She also has a younger brother. Both her siblings still work and have grandchildren (my mom is also jealous about that). She wears a person down. So no, they don't really want to visit. My aunt sold her truck and bought a van so my mom could get in it easier. They go places sometimes. So, there is that. It's more than I would do.
Okay. But, she's told me this 1000 times. She tells me this literally every time I speak to her. She does not let me go week without reminding me. She uses it for an excuse for everything. It's her "get out of jail free card." I can be talking about how I'm struggling to keep my basil alive and she'll go "well you know, I have PTSD from how mean my dad was to me as a child." I KNOW.
The topic today? I told her that the meds she is taking might be causing her stomach distress.
And I'm not sure if she isn't aware or chooses to ignore the fact that her father abused me too. I suspect from things she has said, that I told her when I was very little, and she convinced me I was incorrect. We never spoke of it. But she did have to pull me out of his home (my grandparents were my babysitters) when her brother nearly killed their father after finding out he was abusing my cousin. Just kind of irks me I guess. Her constant complaints about him with no mention that she left me in his home for 5 years.
My dad was mean too. Not that level of mean, but he was. I cried a lot. She tells me now that he wasn't mean. I must be mistaken. I start to doubt myself but I ask my sister (from his first marriage) and she agrees, he was very mean.
Thank you for the book and website suggestions! I am looking at them now. I am seeing some things that make sense.
If she continues or starts again. LEAVE.
If you are on the phone with her and she starts tell her is she continues you will hang up. If she continues again. HANG UP.
If she starts in with her financial woes tell her that since she will not let you review her finances you have no idea what she is talking about and that you can not continue the conversation.
Stop doing the things you are doing for her.
If she is able she can clean her own apartment.
If you are doing other things that she is able to do stop doing those as well.
Real easy for me to say all this sitting her and not having to deal with this but you have to set boundaries and stick by them.
Go to the website Outofthefog.website and read about FOG and personality disorders. I'm certain my mother had Borderline personality disorder with the Waif subset. She was always the victim, the poor me waif who fluctuated between neurosis and psychosis. She made me the focus of her world and groomed me to make her happy, amidst her psychotic breakdowns and neurotic behaviors that traumatized me terribly. I realized early on that she was insane, thankfully, but I was still left with trauma and learned to walk on eggshells to read the room. Know what I mean? I'll bet you do.
I made it clear early on i would not take her into my home in old age or do any hands on caregiving for her either. When she'd call badmouthing dad, I'd tell her I wasn't listening to that garbage and I'd get off the phone. When the histrionics began in person, I'd leave.
Strict and unbreakable boundaries along with limited contact is the ONLY WAY to stay sane yourself while dealing with a person like this. Stop expecting mother to be any different or give YOU what you need. She's incapable of that, its all about HER and always will be (which is what your therapist is saying).
Stop cleaning her home.
Stop listening to fake crying jags and Poor Me Stories
"No Mother, I will not be caring for you in your old age, it will be Assisted Living which I'll help arrange for you."
Limit time you spend with her and phone calls to x amt per week
Cut contact when the father bashing begins, or talk of wishing him dead
Put your phone on silent at dinner time and let calls go to vm
Take 1 call per day at YOUR convenience
Taxes are not paid on 401k monies or on Social Security income as of 2025. Before 2025, a small amount of Social Security monies may have been taxed OVER and above a certain threshold. These types of women love to victimize themselves and pretend like the Sky is Falling over everything. Arm yourself with facts to counter the B.S. that's slung. So you can separate the bull from the sh*t and know the truth.
We can never make our mother's happy, even if we were to house them at Buckingham palace and give them a bank account of $1 million dollars and our undivided attention 24/7. Happiness is an inside job and there's only misery and insufficiency inside of them. No matter HOW much they have, it's still Not Enough.
But know that YOU are More Than Enough. You always have been and you always will be. The only way to reinforce that feeling is to limit your contact with the person who keeps telling you otherwise.
One call per DAY? OMG. No. I limit them to like once a month. Every call is like 2 hours. Thank goodness for texting.
Are you telling me my mother literally has $4,600 a month? That's crazy. She could be paying for home cleaning, visitors, all kinds of things!! She told me she had to "save up money" for a $20 museum ticket. I've been scrimping on my budget to give her $50 a month to help out. Anywhere we go, I pay for her. I've also offered to pay for her to do activities. I was also going to start paying for a house keeper...and hoped my husband wouldn't freak out.
My aunt built a whole lovely room for my grandma to live with her. I also helped care for her. But to be honest, my grandma was completely different. Very sweet, loving, and rarely complained. I helped take care of her because I loved her. It was brutal because she had dementia and she was suffering. My mom barely helped. It was like pulling teeth to get her to help. She was too depressed from her divorce...4 years prior.
But anyway, I see all these adult children bending over backward for their parents and then think, am I to do that as well? I don't WANT to do that. And then I think that probably just means I am a bad person. A horrible daughter. I was thinking last night that maybe I need to go speak to a rabbi about this. Get his perspective.
i am so sorry for what you’re going through. It feels to me as if you were truly set up to be your mother’s emotional caretaker (her fill-in husband) from a very young age. That’s an incredibly unfair and awful burden to place on a child…and it has continued into your adulthood. It appears you’re in an emotional prison to the demands, manipulation and feelings of your mother.
There are terms for this between parent and child - emotional incest, covert incest, enmeshment. It is NOT sexual.
There is a book called “Silently Seduced” that may help you. Please read it.
If your therapist hasn’t helped you (because she may see herself in you and it’s too difficult for her to actually help you) - then help YOURSELF.
I believe your situation is one of the more difficult that people find themselves in, but there can be hope for you. Please don’t give up on yourself. You deserve happiness.
warmly,
JB
I will check out the book. I also considered reading "Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents" but wasn't sure if it was for me, since my parents are not distancing or rejecting, just really self absorbed with the emotional maturity of fruit flies.
What workup for dementia has been done here. This is the fourth question I have come to with indications that dementia is present, but with little information about that. The other three aren't your fault, but if this is a case of dementia, there are certainly things that must be done. INCLUDING but not limited to downsizing and putting someone in charge of financial concerns.
Do tell us more about where all of that is at.
I WILL say some of her oddities could be overmedication. She is on 5 psychiatric drugs. My aunt said she acted very crazy when her first husband left her. She was about 22 years old. She went right to my dad after that (who was actually married).
And you seem to be enmeshed or codependent with her. If you aren't seeing a therapist to figure out boundaries, then you should start. If you are already in therapy -- find a new therapist.
Stop entertaining your Mom's calls or listening to her obvious manipulations and lies. You aren't responsible for her happiness. You didn't cause her problems and you can't fix them. You should not set yourself on fire to keep her warm, which is what is happening. Don't you have your own life that doesn't center around her? If not, don't you want one?
The next time she calls you up crying, tell her you will call APS and they will help her. Then hang up and do it. If you do this consistently she may eventually stop trying to manipulate you.
"..she hates being divorced. I know she HATES being alone. But...what can I do?"
Her being a manipulator is what caused her to be divorced and alone. Your Dad figured out a strong boundary to get away from her. So should you. You can/should do NOTHING other than this.
My mom is divorced because my dad is a jerk who cheats on his wives and then leaves. He is on his 3rd wife. My dad cheated on my mother numerous times. He was cruel to her. And he is also insane. He just has a wife, so I dont have to take care of him. At least for now. She told me he is pushing her to the edge. He urinates in a container in the garage and makes her dump it out. He steals her benzos and takes them, on top of his own. She has also admitted, several years ago, that he hit her. But he is a frail 125lbs now, so he hasnt got much power in that area. But he will scream at her and makes her life miserable.
The solution is to walk away. Completely. Can't you see how cruel she is, telling you that she wishes your father was dead? Don't enable it any longer. Stop answering her calls, and stop visiting. Reclaim your life in peace. You deserve it.
Through all that guilt, I just want to be left alone. And then I feel guilty about THAT too.
If you spend a little time on this forum you will notice many posts like yours regularly popping up: hardworking and conscientious adult children desperately trying anything and everything to make an abusive, neglectful and/or “difficult” parent happy. Usually this is at the expense of their own family, finances and mental health. To an outsider, it looks like a poignant attempt to *finally* obtain the love and approval they never received as a child. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem possible for most of these difficult parents to provide that. 😞
I know when I was maybe 12-ish, my aunt considered taking me away from my parents for a while. But she never talks about this. My mom says it was menopause making her so mean.
The last 19 years she has been a total mess and has driven me insane. Even when I had my own health crisis and nearly died, my mother would pick fights with me while I was miserable because I wasnt speaking to her enough when she was here. I wasnt speaking to anyone!
I did 2 YEARS of physical therapy to walk, drive, and read again. I still struggle daily but I can take care of myself, thankfully. But the stress she gives me makes it worse.
It's not up to you to fix this, and it's none of your business. She's a grownup. I'd be really curious about what she's spending $2700 a month on, since that's what's left over after she pays $1900 for rent including utilities. With that, she could at least pay someone to clean her house.
What you can do is stop rescuing her, distance yourself by not talking on the phone so often, and insist that she give you POA. Right now she's in charge through intimidation and manipulation, and as her cognitive condition worsens, you'll need to manage her finances and decide where she's going to live as she ages. Don't let it be with you!
Or maybe you leave her to her own devices and wash your hands of her entirely. It is an option, if that's what you wish.
She absolutely is not living with me. Living with my parents was awful. I did it until I was 24 and now, out of their house for 19 years, I realize how insane they made me. Plus I have 4 sets of stairs to use as an excuse. She cant even go up ONE stair without my help. And I am not moving. My husband is not moving.
Born around 1953, your mother 90 percent did watch the original Twilight Zone featuring ‘The masks’ which is all about some rich oligarch who deformed all his heirs before finally kicking off. That was literally a televised example from her childhood encouraging her to sponge off family.
When she starts, get off the phone. Or wash your hands of her completely.
Stop participating in her mental illness.
She tells me the only time she is happy is when she is with me. She says she enjoys nothing except our time together (which isn't much, honestly). Over the summer, while I was taking her out for her birthday, she told me if moved away, she would die. Thanks, mom. No pressure there. She is constantly saying she is lonely. She has no friends. Nobody visits. Nobody calls. She can't believe my brother doesn't call more (she isn't his mother and hasn't been married to his dad for 19 years). On and on. Constant complains about her misery. And so...I feel bad. I feel stress. I feel a gnawing in my stomach and tightness in my chest because my mother is so horribly devastated by her life.