On Moms and Marriage

[valfatale]

I don't know how to explain my relationship with my mother. It seems like, no matter how awful your upbringing was, she's still your mom, and speaking poorly of her earns you looks of disgust. Or skeptical smirks. There's really not a way to say anything without feeling judged. Unless you have physical scars, it really "wasn't that bad

Comments

[joegoda]

Honey lamb, congratulations on the engagement, I hope is it a long and happy one, after which you call off the marriage and become best friends for the rest of your lives. Secondly, have your mom arrested. Drop a hint that she uses to the cops and have them search her place. That will preclude having to put her on any guest list that doesn't include wearing of orange.

I get you, completely. My mom was an alcoholic with two personalities. She was the cause of the saying "When she's good, she's very, very good. When she's bad, she's hell on wheels". My father would take us kids out of the house when she was drunk to make sure we lived through the experience.

[valfatale]

I did actually call the police on her when this all went down. They went to her hotel room (because she hasn't lived in anything other than a hotel in many, many years) and she hid from them, didn't answer the door, so they left and nothing more was done. She is close to 2000 miles away from me, which makes it easier to ignore these things for the most part, but when I heard she was using again (or still, I don't know how oblivious I've been to this, truly) that was the first call I made. For all the good it did.

I feel for you for the situation with your mother. At least with mine, it was something I could distance myself from. She was more negligent than anything, so cliche "had to grow up too fast" or whatever, I was still able to deal with it as best I could. Even now, this wouldn't be as big of a deal if it weren't for the impending protocol decisions. But the swirling mess of this family follows me even when I put as much distance between us as possible.

[scarykarrey]

One of the most oddly relieving days of my life was coming to the realization that my mom has Borderline Personality Disorder, and finding out that there are coping mechanisms that make it easier to deal with people like her. So, while our situations aren't the same, I GET IT. *hug*

[valfatale]

Thank you. It's a damn mess, and thankfully it doesn't impact the majority of my life. But when it does, it's devastating. After all this time, after coming to the realization that she's never going to care for me in the way I had hoped, it's disheartening to realize how much power she can still wield over my peace of mind, just from the fact that she's my mother. I can't imagine what it would be like if she had BPD on top of everything else, that just sounds awful!

[musicpsych]

Well, I certainly don't fault you for feeling that way about her. Sounds like a tough situation. I hope you find a good solution. Maybe there's a short sentence/phrase you can come up with to avoid that laundry list of justification. Or if she is invited to the wedding, you can try to limit the amount of time she is there, pay for a hotel room so she doesn't steal your stuff, establish some rules/guidelines for her. Just some thoughts, though you know better than I do what would be reasonable.

Congratulations on the engagement!

[valfatale]

Thank you! We're super excited, and having fun plotting things out so far! :)

My thinking is, if we end up having to invite her, I'm going to make it plain that her fiance (that she was engaged to after knowing for two months and is a "former" user as well) is not welcome, and that she has to fund her own travel costs and hotel room. If we have to help out, it'll be for the return portion of the ticket. Even then, I'm salty about the fact that she'll get to "beam with pride" about her first-born marrying such a wonderful man, like she had anything to do with any of it

[musicpsych]

I can understand your concern. It kind of sucks that it's your big day, and you have to put up with that. If she is out of your life, it may be best not to invite her. Though if she hears about it from other family members, that could cause some drama. The one good thing about her "beaming with pride" is that she'll likely be on her best behavior, at least during the wedding and reception. I don't know... Hope you find something that works out. Good luck.

[scarykarrey]

I got a popup that we're not FB friends anymore! Did you deactivate, or did you block me? No judgment either way, just wondering!

[valfatale]

Wow, a popup? Like, they preemptively told you, or did you try to go to my page? They really won't just let me slink away.

Deactivated. I just can't right now.

[scarykarrey]

I have one of those Firefox widget things (Facebook Purity) that does a lot of cool things, including letting me know when I've been unfriended. I totally understand about wanting to shut the shit out. Staring into the abyss here, man.