Feeling extremely bamboozled!

[Deborah_]

Lots of good advice so far. It does rather sound as if your mother would find a reason to object to any and every name you might choose.

I would add: drop the subject of your baby's name until he/she has been born and the name has been officially registered. Then tell your mother, because it can't be changed whatever she thinks or says.

[Thewhitedove]

She just wants names that she likes, names that were popular when I was a child. She doesn't seem to understand that I am a different person to her and have different tastes. My name is horrible by the way and I have actually spent my adult life explaining how it is pronounced to people as its so obscure! But I'm going to go ahead and register the name and she will just have to get used to it. 

[Who me]

1 hour ago, Thewhitedove said:

Ironically phonecalls trigger her as my grandparents used to call her to verbally abuse her far worse than how she speaks to me. I remember her coming off the phone in tears throughout my childhood and teens. 

 

This is an example of how bad parrenting affects the children.

 

Knowing how she was treated by her parrents and knowing that your Father does not share her views should help you to disregard her caustic comments, or even enable you to reply pointing out that she is here repeating what her parrents did to her.

 

I suspect that you will not be able to change her, but you can change how you respond to her comments.

 

May I suggest that you don't deal with them alone, share what she says with your husband and with your Father.

Listen and pay attention to what they say.

Do you have a positive relationship with your mother in law? If you do use her for positive comments on how you care for her son and her grandchildren.

[BK1110]

Although you are still her daughter, your primary worldly relationship is now with your husband and your children. You are an adult, you have left your parents and have cleaved to your husband. You are not obligated to follow your parents advice and leadership as you were when you were a child living under their roof. Things like naming your baby and where you live are only her business so far as you make them her business.

I would consider writing her a letter explaining the ways that how she treats you affects you. Tell her that after your phone call you were physically ill and wept and felt very hurt. Things cannot get better if there is no effort to confront the problem in a healthy and respectful and loving way. Your other choices are to do nothing and continue being abused, or cut off the relationship without trying to improve things. Neither of those are very good options.

[Thewhitedove]

1 hour ago, Who me said:

 

This is an example of how bad parrenting affects the children.

 

Knowing how she was treated by her parrents and knowing that your Father does not share her views should help you to disregard her caustic comments, or even enable you to reply pointing out that she is here repeating what her parrents did to her.

 

I suspect that you will not be able to change her, but you can change how you respond to her comments.

 

May I suggest that you don't deal with them alone, share what she says with your husband and with your Father.

Listen and pay attention to what they say.

Do you have a positive relationship with your mother in law? If you do use her for positive comments on how you care for her son and her grandchildren.

Who me, I do get on well with my Mother in Law which my own mother resents, but I never elevate my MIL to being a substitute mother even though I do enjoy her motherly nature. She has her own flaws (don't we all) but she is a good mother to my husband and his siblings.

[Thewhitedove]

7 minutes ago, BK1110 said:

Although you are still her daughter, your primary worldly relationship is now with your husband and your children. You are an adult, you have left your parents and have cleaved to your husband. You are not obligated to follow your parents advice and leadership as you were when you were a child living under their roof. Things like naming your baby and where you live are only her business so far as you make them her business.

I would consider writing her a letter explaining the ways that how she treats you affects you. Tell her that after your phone call you were physically ill and wept and felt very hurt. Things cannot get better if there is no effort to confront the problem in a healthy and respectful and loving way. Your other choices are to do nothing and continue being abused, or cut off the relationship without trying to improve things. Neither of those are very good options.

About 9 years ago I told her my feelings. I did it in the spirit of us coming closer together and in as loving a way as I could. I wanted to sort it out and move forwards in reconciliation, not dredge up the past for the sake of making her feel awful. That was the last thing I wanted. I just wanted some communication and to clear the air.

Worst decision ever. She wouldn't speak to me for 6 months except to make horrible guilt inducing comments such as 'she should be used to people disappointing her by now'. She invented things I had said and misreported the conversation to my father. She took to her bed and basically lost her mind. I had to beg and grovel for her forgiveness. It wasn't long after that that I decided to move abroad which she has always resented. 

The stress which that experience caused me was immense. My dad orchestrated our feeble reconciliation as it was making him ill too. I feel like my entire body shut down. I turned to alcohol and cigarettes and became a total shell of myself. I've never felt so abandoned, so unjustly dumped. She emotionally threw me out with the trash when I dared have an opinion of her that wasn't flattering.

I will never broach any subject with her again. I live in a different country to her and for the most part she now behaves herself but it pops up from time to time, like yesterday. 

I feel like a lot of those old wounds are so fresh that yesterday the wound opened without much provocation and all my guts and organs fell on the floor. It doesn't take much.

Sorry for the long rant.

Thanks for listening.

[BK1110]

2 minutes ago, Thewhitedove said:

About 9 years ago I told her my feelings. I did it in the spirit of us coming closer together and in as loving a way as I could. I wanted to sort it out and move forwards in reconciliation, not dredge up the past for the sake of making her feel awful. That was the last thing I wanted. I just wanted some communication and to clear the air.

Worst decision ever. She wouldn't speak to me for 6 months except to make horrible guilt inducing comments such as 'she should be used to people disappointing her by now'. She invented things I had said and misreported the conversation to my father. She took to her bed and basically lost her mind. I had to beg and grovel for her forgiveness. It wasn't long after that that I decided to move abroad which she has always resented. 

The stress which that experience caused me was immense. My dad orchestrated our feeble reconciliation as it was making him ill too. I feel like my entire body shut down. I turned to alcohol and cigarettes and became a total shell of myself. I've never felt so abandoned, so unjustly dumped. She emotionally threw me out with the trash when I dared have an opinion of her that wasn't flattering.

I will never broach any subject with her again. I live in a different country to her and for the most part she now behaves herself but it pops up from time to time, like yesterday. 

I feel like a lot of those old wounds are so fresh that yesterday the wound opened without much provocation and all my guts and organs fell on the floor. It doesn't take much.

Sorry for the long rant.

Thanks for listening.

Then you've done what you can aside from witnessing and praying. Pray for her and leave it to God. But do not think that you need to continue to expose yourself to abuse.

[Who me]

On 1/24/2022 at 11:24 AM, Thewhitedove said:

Who me, I do get on well with my Mother in Law which my own mother resents, but I never elevate my MIL to being a substitute mother even though I do enjoy her motherly nature. She has her own flaws (don't we all) but she is a good mother to my husband and his siblings.

 

It not a case of a subsitute mother, but of getting positive comments to counter the negitive comments.

Again, share with your husband your mothers comments and listen to him.

 

You have to use every tool, help available to you to breaack the chain of learnt bad parrental behaviour.

[HopeInHim]

On 1/23/2022 at 4:37 AM, Thewhitedove said:

My relationship with my mother (non believer) has always been somewhat toxic and I have had problems individuating from her and establishing myself as an autonomous person in my own right. I had some therapy with a Christian counsellor last year which helped me to sort out my feelings and taught me some strategies to cope with any passive aggressive or odd behaviour on her part.

I live in a different country to her but keep in touch and I go home when I can. This has been difficult with Covid but when I was able to, I did, even when it meant costly Covid tests and quarantine etc. She hates that I live abroad even though myself, husband and children absolutely love where we live and have a great quality of life. My father and sibling are all alive and well so she isn't lonely, but she likes to stick the knife in about me abandoning my family when she can.

I am pregnant with my third child and my husband and I were not able to settle on a name even though I'm having the baby in 2 weeks. This has been really stressful especially as I outright rejected a lot of names because I knew my mother would not approve. I asked her opinion on a few that I really liked and when she said 'no', I forgot about the names.

Eventually 2 days ago, we found a name that my husband and I both really liked. I texted my mother and told her we had settled on a name and she said she liked it. I had already decided I was using it one way or another. Its a pretty name, more commonly used in the country we lived in but phonetically pronouncable in both English and the country we live in. Everyone we have told it to have agreed that it is lovely.

 

Today my mother phoned me to say that nobody in my home country us going to be able to say it. She made a big deal of saying the name wrong and getting mixed up. My dad in the background said he could say it fine. My mother kept mispronouncing it and making out that it was just too difficult to say. Then she asked what the middle name would be and I told her: it's another name from the country we live in that is pretty well known and which I told her about before. She pretended to stifle a laugh (as if it was so stupid) and just implied the whole name was a bit of a joke.

When she could see that I wasn't responding to these attempts to manipulate me, she said 'well Its a name from that country you live in and you never come to visit us anyway so it won't matter'. I completely ignored the comment but when I got off the phone I felt so upset.

I always try to honour my mother and father and am now really second guessing myself. This conversation happened an hour ago and I can't tell if I want to cry or vomit. I feel very upset and nauseous too, just thinking about how she tried to manipulate me and male me feel stupid, and when that didn't work she made a adorable passive aggressive comment to imply that I neglect my birth family. I know it probably seems like an innocuous comment but I feel very hurt.

When I was pregnant with my last child, I was actually living near her at the time and she verbally turned on me so viciously that I went into premature labour (no proof of this but I believe it to be true). 

I feel like I can't think straight, that I have gaslit, that I am stupid after all, and all the old wounds from our relationship are opening. I feel so vulnerable.

I need some Godly advice to help me to move forward. My husband has gone out, my kids are looking for my attention and I feel too upset and nauseated to respond. I am worried that this will tip me into some kind of depression as I feel such a disgusting mixture of guilt and the sense of being a bad daughter. I really feel like I'm going to throw up. Sorry for this ranting message; this is what happens when we have these interactions- I lose all sense of perspective and strength.

 

I’m sorry you’re going through that. It’s really hard when you realize that a parent is not a mature and safe person to be around or to share details of your life with. I no longer speak to my own mother - the dysfunction was too much. I wrote a post about some of my struggles.. I think it’s further down the posts in this forum titled “Child of Dysfunction”. It sounds like you need to set some boundaries, and enforce them. Not having a mature, emotionally healthy mother is a gaping hole in my life -yes. But I couldn’t sacrifice my ability to be loved by God, and my husband.. basically the ability to participate in healthy relationships on the sword of her dysfunction. I agree with others who have mentioned writing a letter. For people who are very toxic/manipulating I think it can sometimes be the only way for them to digest what you are saying in their own time, without interrupting you with a guilt trip, etc. How she chooses to respond to that is her decision, and not your fault.

In case it’s helpful, awhile ago as I’ve been working through my own pain, I found some videos by Patrick Doyle on how to deal with relational conflict, forgiveness, boundaries etc. and they have been a blessing to  me.

https://youtu.be/ewrnjpGh2M8

Wishing you the best.

[Thewhitedove]

On 2/11/2022 at 4:45 AM, HopeInHim said:

I’m sorry you’re going through that. It’s really hard when you realize that a parent is not a mature and safe person to be around or to share details of your life with. I no longer speak to my own mother - the dysfunction was too much. I wrote a post about some of my struggles.. I think it’s further down the posts in this forum titled “Child of Dysfunction”. It sounds like you need to set some boundaries, and enforce them. Not having a mature, emotionally healthy mother is a gaping hole in my life -yes. But I couldn’t sacrifice my ability to be loved by God, and my husband.. basically the ability to participate in healthy relationships on the sword of her dysfunction. I agree with others who have mentioned writing a letter. For people who are very toxic/manipulating I think it can sometimes be the only way for them to digest what you are saying in their own time, without interrupting you with a guilt trip, etc. How she chooses to respond to that is her decision, and not your fault.

In case it’s helpful, awhile ago as I’ve been working through my own pain, I found some videos by Patrick Doyle on how to deal with relational conflict, forgiveness, boundaries etc. and they have been a blessing to  me.

https://youtu.be/ewrnjpGh2M8

Wishing you the best.

Thank you for your message. You seem to understand my feelings. Last week I had a C section to delivery the baby. The procedure was horrible and my daughter had some issues at birth and was whisked away to the special care baby unit. I lay in recovery wondering where my baby was surrounded by new mothers with their babies. It was a long day of all of the usual post operative procedures without the baby and I felt so deflated, sad, empty. I texted my mother with some updates of how I was doing and how the baby was. She asked the baby's name and when I told her, her only reply was 'we will get used to it'.

After everything that had happened that day, this seemed to upset me the most. That she wanted to make sure that I knew that she didn't approve of the name despite knowing what I had been through that day. That tough, painful day ended on such an flat empty note and that sense of not having a mother who is a safe space felt so very real at that moment in that hospital room. I remember feeling so low as I read that message. The anaesthesia was wearing off and I missed my baby and then my mother decided to get one last dig in to round the entire day off. I don't know what sort of person she is but this shows that her desire to control me is stronger than her desire to nurture me.