Does nothing when her adopted 6 yr old child is sexually abused by a close relative? Instead she buries it because she wants to project to the outside world that she has the ‘perfect’ family. No love, hugs, care, reassurance or support were shown at all to the child. The ‘Mother’ then spends years putting the child down and making the child’s life a misery and hell, because the child ruined her projection - the child, is then made to pay.
References the child’s actual birth mother as a ‘Slag’ to the child when the child is 12 yrs old
What kind of a mother waits until the grown child is aged 50 yrs old before asking whether the sexual abuse by the close relative involved penetration, even though the 6 yr old child had clearly told her the facts as and when they happened each time. It was bad, but did not involve penetration - why did the ‘Mother’ not listen the first time around?
A few years ago, the 'Mother' causes physical damage to her adult child, then aged 54 yrs, through an ‘accident’ of the mother's making, and again dismisses the damage that she’s done, denies responsibility and does absolutely nothing to try and put things right, or redeem herself - two major instances impacting and damaging in the child's life, but yet again, it’s all buried and never acknowledged by the ‘Mother’. Strangely, the child is always expected to show respect and support towards the ‘Mother’, as the ‘Mother’ always commands it.
Last year, the 'Mother' decides to bring up the topic of the abuse again when the grown child is 58 yrs old and then feigns that she wasn’t aware of the extent of the abuse and only then becomes upset when she finds out that psychologists over the years were very alarmed at how she’d dealt with it. The ‘Mother’ again, is only concerned as to how this looks on her.
What kind of a Mother is prepared to tell lies and paint a false distorted picture of her child to anyone that will listen 'her supporters', so that she herself, and only she, comes out of it looking good, or twists reality and pretends to actually be the victim of any wrongdoing. Even worse, makes out that there’s something not quite right with the child/adult child (Fact: throughout the years, professional diagnosis has confirmed that there is nothing wrong with the adult child, it's a case of what's happened to them that is the problem, and as a result of this, the adult child had developed very strong tolerance levels for bad and inappropriate behaviour)
I am that adult child, aged 58 yrs, and I am still suffering. Reaching out to anyone who can give any help or advice please as I am at a total loss as to how to deal with that kind of a mother. I feel very broken and can no longer keep fixing the damage she’s done and continues to do. Low contact has helped over many years (I've lived away from her since I was 18 yrs old, 20 miles away thank goodness and I work full time), but it’s reached the point where I can no longer keep putting on a false brave face and pretend to keep playing the role of dutiful daughter, as her whole persona just sickens me. If I'm honest, I feel I am at a crossroads and frozen, as I'm concerned as to what serious damage she's next got lined up for me if I don't toe the line, her line.
Move away and start a better life. No good will come from you spending more time with this person.
On a much lesser scale, my own mother "didn't think it was important" to tell me my father (who she made sure I never met while he was alive) was married before her and had 2 kids. I, as an only child, found out in my late 50s about this marriage and that I had half siblings through an Ancestry.com search done by my friend. My half sister invited me to a family reunion and I went and it was amazing. Upon my return my mother had absolutely no curiosity about the meeting, didn't ask about my feelings, didn't apologize,...nothing. I didn't volunteer any info, either. None of her behavior really surprised me. Saddened me, yes. Surprised me, no. She is who she is and she'll never be anyone else at 92. Still a denier and making it about herself. So, I have boundaries with her and it's do-able. She once said she didn't understand why we don't have a mother/daughter relationship like others do. I just shake my head when I think about the irony of her saying this. She's not a monster, but someone I've been cosmically assigned to and I have to decide how I manage the relationship. I have power in my choices. You do, too.
May you receive hope, healing and wholeness, clarity, wisdom, courage, love and peace in your heart as you work through it.
As for co-dependency, that has never been diagnosed of me by a therapist. I don't rely on my 'Mother' for anything. What has been diagnosed is very high tolerance levels to bad and inappropriate behaviour, which unfortunately led to me making some very bad life choices in relation to husband/partners etc. and people that I let into my life in my earlier years. I learned how to correct my behaviour many years ago - I no longer tolerate that type of behaviour from anyone. The frustration for me is that although I was able to remove almost everyone from my life that fit under that category, I am still left many years later with one person that fits well and truly into that category. It's the keep having to tolerate it that does me, and the wrath that that would follow from relatives and her friends, her 'supporters' if I didn't keep doing the dutiful daughter thing. Hope this makes sense?
Think in terms of starting a new life for yourself. An adult woman does NOT need to "toe the line" for a dominating parent.
So what?
Walk away. Life is too short to have folks like this in it.
"It's the keep having to tolerate it that does me, and the wrath that that would follow from relatives and her friends, her 'supporters' if I didn't keep doing the dutiful daughter thing. Hope this makes sense?"
I think I can see your viewpoint, but the basic question is WHY do you have to keep tolerating the behavior? Just as importantly, why are you concerned about the "wrath" that would ensue from relatives and friends, supporters, etc.? I can understand that family can be upsetting, but friends and supporters?
Where are these people in providing support to your mother? If they're not contributing, ignore them. Their "contributions" aren't healthy if they're encouraging her behavior.
"Dutiful daughter thing" does NOT include self degradation or putting yourself in a position of abuse.
In no way do you have to tolerate continuing abuse. I strongly encourage you to contact RAINN (Rape, Abuse, Incest National Network) at 800-656-4673, rainn.org , for help and guidance. It's never too late to get help, Nomore1.
I hope you find the strength to contact the AND to cut all ties with your mother. You deserve better. You matter.
Best wishes to you, Nomore1.
I'm now the same age as you. Before going up for Thanksgiving, I was reflecting on the fact that the sisters wouldn't know, not after 44 years. It was that ingrained for that long.
But that's the night I told my sister about it. Lo and behold, it also turned out that my mom told my sister about it some months beforehand. My mom, 85, feels bad about how she handled it. I no longer need or even want to converse with her about how badly she handled it. Frankly, it was better for me that she did talk to my sister about it as she feels bad. I certainly wouldn't be able to handle that convo.
It wasn't OK, but it's been the way it is.
Which is what your mom might be doing now, trying to be the mom she wasn't then. Trying to make it better in some way. I suggest that if she brings this up you just tell her that you forgive her and all that, but you're not up to talking about the details with her.
You are not going to change her now. Even if there is no Dementia, there is mental decline. When she brings up the subject, tell her its a mute point. That it should have been handled at the time. Since she refused to do that, no point in hashing it up now. From that point on, ignore her. At this point, you will never find out why she said what she did. For yourself, you forgive her because its probably is a mental illness. But, that does not mean you forget. You keep your distance and keep those boundries. You never become this woman's caregiver. She is an abuser and no child should care for their abuser. You need to realize you will never get what you emotionally need from this woman. She is not able to give it. You need to find good friends. When I worked, one of my co-workers got close to a woman who became like a Mom to her. I had a older friend like this too. If I had not had a loving Mom, my friend would have been a good replacement.
Why do people do to others what they do? They themselves probably don't know. It would be so nice if our world was perfect but its not. You can have 4 children and each one will see there growing up years completely different from the other 3. My Dad was a likeable curmudgeon. My sister and one brother just ignored some of his quirks but my other brother and I took his quirks to heart and they effected us differently.
You need a therapist to help you except "this is Mom" and give you the tools to step away without guilt. You have to realize its not you who was the problem it was Mom. I know that may not be any consolation for the child within you wanting to know "what did I do wrong" but it wasn't you that wasn't enough, it was your Mom that was not enough.
This question of yours really belongs in the realm of professional therapy. I doubt there is much help in answers on a Forum of any kind; here you will likely get the sympathy of others, but that will, in the end, do you very little good and in fact can help you to stay stuck where you are. Sympathy isn't adequate compensation for all you are going through, and never can be.
It may take some time in professional therapy to help you find your path away from an abuser.
I am so sorry for the grief and pain you have suffered, but the choice to move forward into another life of your own, once grown, is/has always been yours alone; no one can do it for you.
We sometimes become stuck in habitual ways of living because it is more terrifying to move out the comfort of the known; of being the same, of acting and reacting in the same ways rather than going through the terror and pain of the unknown in order to move into another way of life.
It takes hard hard work, and we sometimes try instead to find compensation in our habitual ways.
I wish you the very best, and I hope that you will seek another way with the help of trained professionals. You still have some years that you can make quality time. Only you can make the choice. Only you can do the hard, hard work.
I know this b/c I am the AC and my AM is as I described above. The relationship we've had over the past nearly 65 years is VERY complicated, to say the least, and somewhat co-dependent too, as I was an only child (to further complicate matters) and trained from toddlerhood to worship the ground she walked on. "Your mother can do no wrong. She is perfect." That's what I was trained to believe! Now, I did not suffer sexual abuse, thankfully, which I am so sorry to hear that you endured and that your AM ignored. That sort of 'ugly detail' just didn't fit into her Perfect Family Notion so it had to be dismissed, I guess. I'm sure such a thing would have been dismissed by my AM as well.
She loved to overfeed me (as a baby) until I vomited, then feed me again. So I grew into a chubby kid. She then harped on me being Too Fat and put me in Weight Watchers at 9 years old (the only kid there) to be given a pig mask to wear if I gained weight! On and on the dysfunctional dynamic went, until I moved out at 17 just to STOP dealing with her crap once and for all.
Now she's 95 and in a Memory Care AL with advanced dementia and I'm in charge of her entire life. She came thundering back into my life once again in 2011 and I cried when I told my new husband of 2 years that my folks were moving 4 miles away. He was flabbergasted that I would be crying!! Once they moved back here, he realized in short order WHY I cried at the prospect.
I had to immediately establish very strict boundaries with my mother. VERY strict. To save MY sanity. The calls would be on X days at X times. The visit would be on X day from X time to X time. And so on. They would NOT live with me, PERIOD, so they were living in Independent senior living until they moved into Assisted Living and now Memory Care for mom. Dad was a sweetheart and passed in 2015. To this day, with advanced dementia, mom carries on and can still push my buttons & manipulate (to a degree), so I still wear a protective shield around MY body and heart.
This is YOUR life. Your AM is a toxic influence over it. Learn how to set boundaries for YOUR sake. Find and install YOUR shield to protect YOURSELF or mother will run riot over you until you wind up dying before she does. It's how these women operate. Oh, and the whole world will think THEY are the Good Guy and you are the Bad Guy. It's how they've set things up; it's part of the game they play. You can't change that, but you can change how YOU play HER game.
Good luck.
I have a dear friend whose grandfather abused all of his granddaughters (5 in my friend's family alone). One of her cousins committed suicide because of the abuse, my friend went a little crazy and got pregnant at 19 but went on to become a doctor who has never had a relationship, and one of her sisters had a nervous breakdown and wouldn't even live in the U.S. because she was so traumatized. Her other sisters have all had failed marriages.
Turned out he had done the same thing to his own daughter, and if she'd just had the strength to report him or at least deny him access to her own children, that family wouldn't be completely messed up today. This woman was a college professor for 50 years, but is the weakest person I know. Her daughters have forgiven her, but they could just have easily seen her as complicit in their grandfather's abuse and cut all ties. I often wonder how their lives would have turned out if they had.
[[Narcissists try to destroy your life with lies,
Because their life can be destroyed by the truth.]]
This dynamic will not change if you try to tow the line, play at being the dutiful daughter, or by false bravado.
The human body and mind was gifted with a fight or flight response.
As a child, you were frozen and could not run, could not fight back. Over the years of confusion, you have trained yourself to be frozen.
Never argue with a narcissist who believes their own lies. That leaves RUN.
Far away, so you cannot be reached or harmed.
Use this to think your way out of the very real danger you find yourself in:
💔
Narcissists try to destroy your life with lies,
Because their life can be destroyed by the truth. 💔
Now put your hand over your heart. Is it still beating?
Run.
Ask your employer to transfer you to a far away place, if that is possible.
🤗🫂🧸️ {{{{{{ hugs}}}}}
https://lifelessons.co/personal-development/covertpassiveaggressivenarcissist/#3
The SA is something that happened, and of course, it being the 50's and 60's--we DID NOT speak of it. I just lived in terror that my abuser was going to kill me. He said he would.
When I found out that my YB and my YS had also been molested--it was so relieving. Since OB's death we have found that he was a serial pedophile and had been in jail several times for this very thing. This helped me as I worked this out in therapy.
Am I OK now? OB's been dead for 11 years.
I wish I could say yes, I'm great and fine, but the truth is, I struggle still with a high level of anxiety every day. My mother is not loving towards me, only if I am around her does she even act like she knows me. 2 of her 'besties' are literally neighbors of mine for 40+ years and mother never said anything about me in over 20 years, they were both shocked when I told them that "R" was my mother. She'd NEVER mentioned me!
I have cut down on spending time with her by about 90%. I will try to make an in person visit once a month and when I start to feel anxious or upset, I leave. Thank goodness she has never been able to remember my phone number! She NEVER calls me. I have gone as long as 18 months (during cancer TX) with zero contact. And she didn't even notice. That was probably when I FINALLY realized that I have no meaning to her unless I can drive her somewhere or buy her something.
I do pretty much zero CG for her. I don't think watering the dead plants is really considered 'helpful'.
I miss my dad. When I told my folks I had abused by OB, dad was furious and did eventually 'have it out' with OB, but was so weak from the Parkinson's---I don't think it was very 'effective'. Dad held me in his arms and cried and said he'd failed me. He hadn't, he'd never known.
Mother, on the other hand, said 'you are never content unless you're stirring up trouble'.
We can't change these women. In your case, you can really 'enjoy' knowing you're not a biologically related. It would be easier to detach.
GO watch "Mommie Dearest". Crazy moms are everywhere.
As far as everyone in your life is concerned- you are seeing a new therapist with a life changing regime of healthy boundaries and relationships with people who treat you with love and kindness and respect. Only nurturing interactions are allowed.
And then- give yourself all the love and tender loving care you need to heal and grow into the wonderful being you want to be. Love and hugs.
years later I heard a family friend would try to touch my sister. My mother still continues to invite him over the house. Wtf
It is gravely unjust and I am so sorry that you are going through this. I too am 58 and I can't imagine this long period of mental abuse on top of the physical.
I would just say, forgive but remove yourself from the relationship. Toxicity is not required to do what we think is right as far as honoring our parents. Respect is given when it is earned.
You say you have limited contact with this woman. You need to go NCEA (NO CONTACT EVER AGAIN) with her. It's hard to find a good therapist who deals with victims of narcissism but if you can find one it might help you. In the meantime change your phone number if you can. If you can't change your number then block the woman who supposedly raised you, also her blood relatives, her friends and her supporters.
You are 58. It's high time you had a life for yourself because narcissists tend to live a very long time. If she is in her 70s she could easily live another 30 years. By then you will be in your 80s. Do you want to be in your 80s dealing with the care of a 100 and something abusive narcissist who isn't even your blood relative?
Go to counselor (if you haven't already) and discuss how to deal with mom. It's very possible it's time to put the relationship on very, very limited contact to save yourself. A child has no reason to feel guilty for something that happened at such a young age. If the parent was aware, or made aware and did nothing, the child was damaged even further because the one person they were supposed to count on let them down and silenced their voice.
If you feel you must see mom, then do it. However, I would set some ground rules with her: I'm here because your my mother. You failed me when you did nothing to make my 6 year old voice heard, but I'm trying to get past that. Unless you can admit your part in not stopping it or reporting it to the authorities, then you and I will not be talking about it again. Each time you deny what you SHOULD have done to save your child, you hurt me again. It happened on your watch - YOU were the parent. We won't have this conversation again.
You don't have to toe the line where this is concerned. If you can't get along and she wants to keep digging up the buried body, then you may have no choice except to stay away from her. Call and say hello if you want, but when she turns ugly you can hang up the phone. No nasty face to face scenes.