My mum is an abuser

[Nesbit]

I’m afraid that Im going to say too much about this and it will seem like I’m on some sort of vendetta against my mum, so I just want to make it clear that if comes across that way its not my intention. I love my mum but I have a very difficult relationship with her and something I found out recently.. Im not sure I can ever have any relationship again. She is bipolar.. and I’m not trying to use that to explain everything, but of course it does have a huge affect on how she behaves and why she behaves as she does.

 

Anyway, theres a lot of stuff in the past that has made our relationship rocky so we weren’t as close as we used to be to begin with, but last week I found out she’s been abusing her new boyfriend. I’m at fault too for some of what I said and I know that.. we’d got in to an argument this particular day because she was in an angry mood and complaining about everything, particularly her relationship.. talking very negatively and just plain mean about the guy shes dating. Telling me she doesn’t really like him and that he smells and annoys her (which I’ve never noticed him smelling), so trying to be helpful I said that everyone goes through days where people irritate them and .. well basically I was trying to support her but also say that she shouldn’t make any rash decisions, which she is very impulsive and I know she’ll probably change her mind about him next week for example last week she was complaining he was not paying her enough attention or coming around to see her often and this day he’d come over to take our dog for a walk (well my mums) and stayed until sh came home from work, obviously wanting to see her .. anyway, she then went on to say shes not really attracted to him or connecting to him so I simply said that maybe she’d be happier being single for a little while (she just got out of a horrible relationship a few weeks before meeting the guy shes with now) but she replied that she needs to keep him around so that when we go away (I was planning to take her abroad in the summer) she’ll have someone to keep an eye on the pets.. to me that’s wrong and maybe I shouldn’t have been blunt about it but I told her I wasn’t happy to use someone like that. I was used in my previous relationship for money, so I know how awful it is and I’d never do that to someone. Anyway this caused a huge argument which ending in me calling her a bitch (not about her and the guy, but in regards to how she acted with me).. which is awful, I instantly regretted it and I know its not right to talk to my mum in that way but it was a complete slip of the tongue and I apologised.. she then threatens to throw me out, which I should mention.. I have selective mutism and anxiety so Im living with her for now (Im 21) but I have been working hard to move out anyway.. of course I understand that she’d say that after I called her a bitch, but that always seems really unfair of her to do when she knows Im pretty much stuck relying on her for now (which I hate) and she uses it knowing that I can’t do all that much about it. I said back I can’t wait to get out of here which was childish.. but she then throws a remote control at me telling me I’ll regret it and never see her again and then disappears out the house, with no mobile phone on her or anything.. which might not seem a big deal to anyone else, but she has self harmed before.. and ever since I was 8 when my dad left she’s done this thing where she’ll tell me shes going to kill herself and then disappear and I have to go looking for her.

 

But the main thing is.. 3 hours went by and I found her phone, so I thought maybe if I look and see if shes texted her friend or boyfriend to say shes coming round then I’ll at least know shes safe (she didn’t go out in her car, which she usually does so that made me even more worried). I didn’t intend to read her messages and no it wasn’t the smartest or nicest thing to do.. but I only wanted to see if she was safe, but when I went on to her inbox Isaw something about the police.. and I read it, very wrong of me I know.. I didn’t read more than he one text and basically I found out from it that a week ago she’d gotten drunk while out with her boyfriend, punched him in the face 5 times.. someone called the police, to which he refused to give a statement and she also lead him to believe that he’d killed our cat.. that probably doesn’t make sense but what happened is our cat went missing the other day after the boyfriend accidently let him out.. so Im guessing shes told him she found it dead and .. I don’t know, but it wasn’t true the cat was fine and came back pretty quickly and I remember the day after it did her boyfriend messaged me saying he think he saw the cat..to which I was confused.. because it’d already been home and when asking my mum she said she’d told him it was home.. but now I know that’s a lie.. she told him was dead and more to the point she abused him.. she punched him and cut his lip open and the guy she is dating is a lovely guy, hes very soft and his ex wife was abusive apparently.. so he’s begging for my mum all the time while shes abusing him.. which my mum has hit me a few times and hit my brother too when he was a teenager, so she does have a history of violence, but I didn’t think she’d ever be a bully and be the abuser in a relationship.. I tried to talk to her about it but it didn’t go down well and shes now disowned me.. I wasn’t acusing when I did, I tried to come from a place of concern for her and told her I cared about her and if shes doing this kind of thing then she needs to talk to someone about it and stop.. now I don’t know what to do, I live with her so that makes things hard and I don’t want to lose my mum.. but at the same time she doesn’t feel like my mum anymore, shes like a completely different person to me now.

 

I know I was wrong and I take the blame for that, but how do I have a relationship with her now? I know the guy will stick by her but that makes me feel sick.. to know shes doing that to him and now Im confused and I resent her because when I was 8 and she split from my dad she told me he cheated on her and was horrible so I hated my dad and for years I refused to speak to him.. but now I’ve found this out, it makes me wonder if what she said about my dad was even true and did she abuse him? So now I have no relationship with my father either.

 

Im sorry this is so long and rambly, if anyone reads it all and has some advice I’d be so grateful, I just don’t know how to act around her now..

Edited May 8, 2014 by Nesbit

[SpiralOut]

I don't know what advice to give you about your mother, but is there a way for you to reach out to your father? It's not too late to try and start a relationship with him now, if you want to.

[love1336x]

Spray some holy water on her, and watch how she will react & burn.

[darkmoon]

You want to know how to get on with her? Just stop telling her what to do

 

 

She confided in you, a mom-and-daughter thing and you pull all the joy out of the occasion that every mother wants.

 

 

You should be on her side. Not some boyf of hers. You are her family, not him.

 

 

Just because you are guilt-ridden over a rich guy, it does not mean you can dictate to others. Candidly, do better as a daughter. Your mother pushed you out into the world etc. Just say nothing much in future. Just be affectionate, srsly. xx. And say sorry.

Edited May 8, 2014 by darkmoon

[pteromom]

I just don’t know how to act around her now..

 

You should NOT EVEN TALK about her relationship with this guy. If she talks to you about it, just say" Ummmhmmm", "yep", "I get what you are saying", and don't offer any opinions about their relationship.

 

Because what happens between him and her is between him and her. The guy can leave at any time if he wants to.

 

You should focus on your own life and not so much on hers.

[Nesbit]

You should NOT EVEN TALK about her relationship with this guy. If she talks to you about it, just say" Ummmhmmm", "yep", "I get what you are saying", and don't offer any opinions about their relationship.

 

Because what happens between him and her is between him and her. The guy can leave at any time if he wants to.

 

You should focus on your own life and not so much on hers.

 

I'd agree with that, but honestly I've tried to not talk to her about it.. or if she talks about it I try to just nod and agree, but then if I do that she gets angry, takes it as me not being interested and then goes in to a fit of hysterics telling me Im a bad daughter.

 

Maybe I'm completely misreading your tone.. but I find it a little judgemental.. as though you think I'm some nosy parker who wants to know her business, I don't.. the opposite in fact, if anything she wants me to be more involved than I am. And the one time I had a boyfriend she'd constantly text me making me feel guilty, telling me i'd abandoned her.

[Nesbit]

If she badgers me for advice, not liking when I keep my mouth shut.. but then gets angry if I do say something.. then what am I supposed to do exactly? And I mean, honestly tell me.. because Im really confused about it all.

[Nesbit]

You want to know how to get on with her? Just stop telling her what to do

 

 

She confided in you, a mom-and-daughter thing and you pull all the joy out of the occasion that every mother wants.

 

 

You should be on her side. Not some boyf of hers. You are her family, not him.

 

 

Just because you are guilt-ridden over a rich guy, it does not mean you can dictate to others. Candidly, do better as a daughter. Your mother pushed you out into the world etc. Just say nothing much in future. Just be affectionate, srsly. xx. And say sorry.

 

Im not on his side.. its not about me picking sides, yes sorry for the guy but its more me being worried about her and the fact that she's lashing out like that, and I did apologise.. many times. Again, it goes much further than what I've wrote about that guy.. she abused me a lot growing up and I accepted it as normal.. that its ok for parents to hit their children and verbally abuse them, but now I see her being violent to others its made me realise that its wrong. So I'm not trying to be mean to her or anything like that, I'm confused about my relationship with her. Also, I'm very affectionate actually, I always try to hug her.. I did after this argument happened, but she doesn't reciprocate that.. not once has she hugged me or told me she loves me. I know shes my mum and I'll always love her but she's hurt me in a lot of ways.

[darkmoon]

Im not on his side.. its not about me picking sides, yes sorry for the guy but its more me being worried about her and the fact that she's lashing out like that, and I did apologise.. many times. Again, it goes much further than what I've wrote about that guy.. she abused me a lot growing up and I accepted it as normal.. that its ok for parents to hit their children and verbally abuse them, but now I see her being violent to others its made me realise that its wrong. So I'm not trying to be mean to her or anything like that, I'm confused about my relationship with her. Also, I'm very affectionate actually, I always try to hug her.. I did after this argument happened, but she doesn't reciprocate that.. not once has she hugged me or told me she loves me. I know shes my mum and I'll always love her but she's hurt me in a lot of ways.

 

from what you have told me, well, you move out sometime, we all do, it is an exit most all people take, it is considered odd not to

 

try to - take out to eat or shop or walk in the park, see if you can just enjoy each others' company, not to sort out issues, you can not, impossible to create drama (her not you) in public, then decide if you secretly want to just give up and now have a goal, that of planning an exit strategy, maybe in a few years' time, do not tell her, of course, she sounds like she causes scenes, in quite a no holds barred way, a bully

 

 

and look at how she deftly handles her boyf, a nicer version of her comes out, or he would be exasperated like you are, and dump her

 

 

 

yes, she will say you are abandoning her, but you are doing nothing odd in moving out (she would have driven you away, fact)

 

 

hang onto your sanity

 

you can not win if she is difficult

 

 

I wish you the best of luck. Have fun sometime.

Edited May 9, 2014 by darkmoon

[mrs rubble]

Im not on his side.. its not about me picking sides, yes sorry for the guy but its more me being worried about her and the fact that she's lashing out like that, and I did apologise.. many times. Again, it goes much further than what I've wrote about that guy.. she abused me a lot growing up and I accepted it as normal.. that its ok for parents to hit their children and verbally abuse them, but now I see her being violent to others its made me realise that its wrong. So I'm not trying to be mean to her or anything like that, I'm confused about my relationship with her. Also, I'm very affectionate actually, I always try to hug her.. I did after this argument happened, but she doesn't reciprocate that.. not once has she hugged me or told me she loves me. I know shes my mum and I'll always love her but she's hurt me in a lot of ways.

It is so great that you've noticed and realized this. (in bolded)

It is most important that the cycle stops, as abuse is usually passed/learned through the generations. Did her parents abuse her too??

I'd recommend going to an anger managment class and learning about anger, abuse, triggers and stopping the abuse.(You can tell mum you're doing it for any number of reasons eg; thinking of volunterring at a womans refuge etc.)

Your mum may be encouraged by your example to do the same.

[SpiritualAlchemy]

You want to know how to get on with her? Just stop telling her what to do

 

 

She confided in you, a mom-and-daughter thing and you pull all the joy out of the occasion that every mother wants.

 

 

You should be on her side. Not some boyf of hers. You are her family, not him.

 

 

Just because you are guilt-ridden over a rich guy, it does not mean you can dictate to others. Candidly, do better as a daughter. Your mother pushed you out into the world etc. Just say nothing much in future. Just be affectionate, srsly. xx. And say sorry.

 

No, sorry, I don't agree with this at all. I think the OP is being a responsible human being, and a loving daughter. She has tried to address her mother's violent behavior - any one who cares about a loved one would do the same. The OP has also admitted her mother was abusive to her as a child - see the pattern here? The mother has an anger management problem and she needs to deal with it, until she does, she's just going to be an abusive person that nobody will want in their lives! For you to tell her to suck it up and do better as a daughter and ignore what's going on - her mother is being violent to her boyfriend, get it, physically punching the dude - is like the worst advice ever!

 

OP, if I were in your shoes, I'd look for somewhere else to live. I'd attempt to get my mother into counselling...talk to the boyfriend, tell him you know what happened, get the boyfriend to agree to get her put in jail if she touches him like that again. Talk to the rest of your family, her close friends, and ask them all if they'd be interested in doing an intervention. This means that you all confront her, in a loving and caring way, of course, and persuade her to go to anger management. You need to be upfront about the hurt she caused you as a child. She needs to understand the great damage caused by her actions, and she needs to address them! You possibly need therapy too. At the very least, I think family therapy may be useful here.

 

Your relationship as mother and daughter can be repaired. But once you lose respect for a parent and their actions, it's tough to regain. Take it from me, both my parents were violent, abusive, in every way possible, to their own children. At the age of 43, I am now taking my father through the legal system for historical abuse. Allowing abuse to happen to anyone is wrong, and should NEVER be ignored or excused.

[mrs rubble]

Spiritual Alchemy - well said. Kia Ora Welcome to LS. Best wishes for your own battle.

[pteromom]

Maybe I'm completely misreading your tone.. but I find it a little judgemental.. as though you think I'm some nosy parker who wants to know her business, I don't.. the opposite in fact, if anything she wants me to be more involved than I am. And the one time I had a boyfriend she'd constantly text me making me feel guilty, telling me i'd abandoned her.

 

No, not at all. I just think you are very emotionally invested in her choices, which adds drama to your life since you have no control over what she does.

 

I don't think you are nosy. I just think you CARE. Which is a good thing, to a point.

[Baller25]

I’m afraid that Im going to say too much about this and it will seem like I’m on some sort of vendetta against my mum, so I just want to make it clear that if comes across that way its not my intention. I love my mum but I have a very difficult relationship with her and something I found out recently.. Im not sure I can ever have any relationship again. She is bipolar.. and I’m not trying to use that to explain everything, but of course it does have a huge affect on how she behaves and why she behaves as she does.

 

Anyway, theres a lot of stuff in the past that has made our relationship rocky so we weren’t as close as we used to be to begin with, but last week I found out she’s been abusing her new boyfriend. I’m at fault too for some of what I said and I know that.. we’d got in to an argument this particular day because she was in an angry mood and complaining about everything, particularly her relationship.. talking very negatively and just plain mean about the guy shes dating. Telling me she doesn’t really like him and that he smells and annoys her (which I’ve never noticed him smelling), so trying to be helpful I said that everyone goes through days where people irritate them and .. well basically I was trying to support her but also say that she shouldn’t make any rash decisions, which she is very impulsive and I know she’ll probably change her mind about him next week for example last week she was complaining he was not paying her enough attention or coming around to see her often and this day he’d come over to take our dog for a walk (well my mums) and stayed until sh came home from work, obviously wanting to see her .. anyway, she then went on to say shes not really attracted to him or connecting to him so I simply said that maybe she’d be happier being single for a little while (she just got out of a horrible relationship a few weeks before meeting the guy shes with now) but she replied that she needs to keep him around so that when we go away (I was planning to take her abroad in the summer) she’ll have someone to keep an eye on the pets.. to me that’s wrong and maybe I shouldn’t have been blunt about it but I told her I wasn’t happy to use someone like that. I was used in my previous relationship for money, so I know how awful it is and I’d never do that to someone. Anyway this caused a huge argument which ending in me calling her a bitch (not about her and the guy, but in regards to how she acted with me).. which is awful, I instantly regretted it and I know its not right to talk to my mum in that way but it was a complete slip of the tongue and I apologised.. she then threatens to throw me out, which I should mention.. I have selective mutism and anxiety so Im living with her for now (Im 21) but I have been working hard to move out anyway.. of course I understand that she’d say that after I called her a bitch, but that always seems really unfair of her to do when she knows Im pretty much stuck relying on her for now (which I hate) and she uses it knowing that I can’t do all that much about it. I said back I can’t wait to get out of here which was childish.. but she then throws a remote control at me telling me I’ll regret it and never see her again and then disappears out the house, with no mobile phone on her or anything.. which might not seem a big deal to anyone else, but she has self harmed before.. and ever since I was 8 when my dad left she’s done this thing where she’ll tell me shes going to kill herself and then disappear and I have to go looking for her.

 

But the main thing is.. 3 hours went by and I found her phone, so I thought maybe if I look and see if shes texted her friend or boyfriend to say shes coming round then I’ll at least know shes safe (she didn’t go out in her car, which she usually does so that made me even more worried). I didn’t intend to read her messages and no it wasn’t the smartest or nicest thing to do.. but I only wanted to see if she was safe, but when I went on to her inbox Isaw something about the police.. and I read it, very wrong of me I know.. I didn’t read more than he one text and basically I found out from it that a week ago she’d gotten drunk while out with her boyfriend, punched him in the face 5 times.. someone called the police, to which he refused to give a statement and she also lead him to believe that he’d killed our cat.. that probably doesn’t make sense but what happened is our cat went missing the other day after the boyfriend accidently let him out.. so Im guessing shes told him she found it dead and .. I don’t know, but it wasn’t true the cat was fine and came back pretty quickly and I remember the day after it did her boyfriend messaged me saying he think he saw the cat..to which I was confused.. because it’d already been home and when asking my mum she said she’d told him it was home.. but now I know that’s a lie.. she told him was dead and more to the point she abused him.. she punched him and cut his lip open and the guy she is dating is a lovely guy, hes very soft and his ex wife was abusive apparently.. so he’s begging for my mum all the time while shes abusing him.. which my mum has hit me a few times and hit my brother too when he was a teenager, so she does have a history of violence, but I didn’t think she’d ever be a bully and be the abuser in a relationship.. I tried to talk to her about it but it didn’t go down well and shes now disowned me.. I wasn’t acusing when I did, I tried to come from a place of concern for her and told her I cared about her and if shes doing this kind of thing then she needs to talk to someone about it and stop.. now I don’t know what to do, I live with her so that makes things hard and I don’t want to lose my mum.. but at the same time she doesn’t feel like my mum anymore, shes like a completely different person to me now.

 

I know I was wrong and I take the blame for that, but how do I have a relationship with her now? I know the guy will stick by her but that makes me feel sick.. to know shes doing that to him and now Im confused and I resent her because when I was 8 and she split from my dad she told me he cheated on her and was horrible so I hated my dad and for years I refused to speak to him.. but now I’ve found this out, it makes me wonder if what she said about my dad was even true and did she abuse him? So now I have no relationship with my father either.

 

Im sorry this is so long and rambly, if anyone reads it all and has some advice I’d be so grateful, I just don’t know how to act around her now..

 

Longest post ever, but it sound's like things are ****ed up brah.

[littleplanet]

No, sorry, I don't agree with this at all. I think the OP is being a responsible human being, and a loving daughter. She has tried to address her mother's violent behavior - any one who cares about a loved one would do the same. The OP has also admitted her mother was abusive to her as a child - see the pattern here? The mother has an anger management problem and she needs to deal with it, until she does, she's just going to be an abusive person that nobody will want in their lives! For you to tell her to suck it up and do better as a daughter and ignore what's going on - her mother is being violent to her boyfriend, get it, physically punching the dude - is like the worst advice ever!

 

OP, if I were in your shoes, I'd look for somewhere else to live. I'd attempt to get my mother into counselling...talk to the boyfriend, tell him you know what happened, get the boyfriend to agree to get her put in jail if she touches him like that again. Talk to the rest of your family, her close friends, and ask them all if they'd be interested in doing an intervention. This means that you all confront her, in a loving and caring way, of course, and persuade her to go to anger management. You need to be upfront about the hurt she caused you as a child. She needs to understand the great damage caused by her actions, and she needs to address them! You possibly need therapy too. At the very least, I think family therapy may be useful here.

 

Your relationship as mother and daughter can be repaired. But once you lose respect for a parent and their actions, it's tough to regain. Take it from me, both my parents were violent, abusive, in every way possible, to their own children. At the age of 43, I am now taking my father through the legal system for historical abuse. Allowing abuse to happen to anyone is wrong, and should NEVER be ignored or excused.

 

 

I totally agree with all of this. Well said!

It is the tougher route to go. But otherwise, you end up aiding and abetting your mom's behavior, wind up going around in circles.

Confusion helps no-one.

Calling abuse for what it is......is the first step.

You need some of the support from people in your life who can think and act clearly, who are not afraid, and who know how and what to do that is the right thing.