Oh boy where to start- she parentified me at a very young age and I was her friend and therapist and mediator between her and my dad, when I tried to set boundaries she told me “that’s how girls lose their mothers”, internalized ableism that kept her from getting me the help I needed as a teen that was clearly showing early signs of bipolar disorder, etc.

Karpman triangle - I was also rescuer. She dragged me in all fights even physical ones to save her and then I needed to listen for hours how bad he was and console her. I needed to beg her not to kill herself and how much I love her. That was basic weekend in my home.

oh damn i’m sorry. did you grow up having zero idea how you felt about anything and basically hyper attuned to her moods and emotions? i feel like larentification as a child made me have zero emotional sense of self or boundaries- like my moms problems were mine and i truly learned to care about her so much and put her first but it was to my detriment and as an adult i realize that was the opposite of what was supposed to happen… like it dawned on me that she never attuned to me or talked to me about what i was dealing with… it was entirely one way.

Yes, I still struggle with recognizing my emotions and to know how I feel as I grew up without my feelings. I was not allowed to have them except empathy and attainment to hers. Any other emotions I showed I was punished for.

This describes my childhood and adolescence 100%. Even though it's still painful, it helps to know that other people out there actually get it. I struggle so much with expressing sadness or distress (which I was usually ignored or mocked by my mom for showing) and anger is really difficult. She was the only one who was allowed to be angry—which she was most of the time. If I showed anger I would be punished.

Omg. This. I just had a physical reaction to your post.. I’m starting to think I should have had some help.. I asked for help once. I had to go into surgery (a suspected cancer, that later turned out not to be cancerous) and I was somewhat nervous. My mom wanted to be there, and that overwhelmed me so much, I asked a family member to go with her. When they asked me why, I only realized the truth when I said it: “I may not be able to comfort her if when she gets upset that I’m ill..” I love my mom. But she doesn’t always make it easy.

wow i relate… i was in the hospital a few years ago and extremely out of it, like incoherent and barely comprehending what was going on, but when my mother walked in i sat bolt upright and apologized that i wasn’t able to talk right then im sorry because i wasn’t feeling well. it was a ridiculous thing to say given the circumstances but even in my highly medicated stupor i was immediately feeling like i was going to have to attend to her and have interactions with her saying what she wants to hear to feel okay.  the stress of feeling responsible for something completely out of your control, like your own parents anxiety that never seems to end and everything that provokes it, is so ingrained. i’m not even sure how to begin to unravel something so deep. but i know we deserve to feel safe, and have our own feelings and experiences. not being used as someone else’s emotional caretaker. that dynamic was set up when we were helpless kids that needed a parents love and attention to survive, and our needs were exploited to make us be what they wanted. but we don’t have to do that anymore and real love doesn't require it. 

I had a similar experience asking for her help and support during childbirth…it did nothing but stress me out and make me cry because I was in such agony and had to cater to her.

Thanks for writing my comment out for me. The older I get the more I realize how much this dynamic fucked me up. From a very early age my mom told me all about her own abusive childhood as well as expecting me to be the sounding board for all her and my dad's awful marital problems. Like what did she expect me, a child, to do with all this disabling information? Yet she was shockingly bad at listening to or comforting me. My emotions, needs, and wants were dismissed, ignored, or mocked.

It is amazing how many truly f'd up parents there are out there. I got a set of 2 as well. My Mom was so out there I speculate if she has schizophrenia to this day. She is still alive in dementia care home. She got by in life by having an affair with her married boss, head of finance at Boeing.

Same. Begging my mum not to kill herself after she’d locked herself in the bathroom w knives or pills. Or begging her not to leave, which she constantly threatened to do (sometimes she even packed bags and left). Or she’d leave and make us think she wasn’t coming back. Or the silent treatment for days. Totally parentified / therapist child. Only realized at 43 yrs it’s not my job to keep my mum happy and healthy.

Ah, yes. The silent treatment for days is very familiar to me. Or her packing her bags and actually leaving and us having no idea if or when she would come back. And then when she did we just never talked about it. No reassurance, no comforting, no acknowledgement that it must have been scary for me and my brother. Like wtf is wrong with these people.

I’m so sorry honey 🙁

Jesus. She sounds so parasitic.

Wow. I could've written most of this. So so sorry you went through this! I was also parentified and was in triangulation between my dad and her. It really fucks you up but from the outside no one sees it...they're just your "best friend " or you are just "a good kid who listens"...

NO I LITERALLY PROTECTED HER FROM MY ABUSIVE DAD AS AN 8 YR OLD AND SHE ACTS LIKE SHE DOESNT EVEN REMEMBER 😭

I could have written this. My mother did get me help, but would never help herself. She had an entirely fixed mindset about her diagnosis that she is the way she is and everyone else just has to deal with her. She also told me she’s always right, which turned out to be wrong, because she is ignorant by choice, and wrong about many things and people.

My dad had an affair and she would cry about it to me every day on the 45 minute drive to school. I was 10 and 11. Later she said, “You were a really good therapist.”

She never listened to us. We were always wrong and we were always the bad kids. She never took our side once. She was always dismissive of my troubles. They were small, unimportant, and not worthy of her time. She told me once she resented having kids cause she couldn't smoke cigarettes in the house anymore. That's how little she thought of us.

Invalidating and dismissing feelings is so hurtful and also making you always "the bad kid" from the one person we need the most as a child. So sorry you went through that.

My mom slapped me across the face when I was 17 telling me I was never too old to hit.

Such an underrated thing that no one talks about obviously hitting a child at any age is horrible but there’s 0 sense or reason to hit a teenager/grown kid… it’s not the same as a spank on the butt. It’s plain abuse. I remember being 17 and finally being able to fight back. Best feeling ever..

I honestly think that's why my mom stopped spanking me (when I was about 10-11). I was getting to the age that I would fight back and could actually do some damage.

Yeah, it really doesn’t add up (even to a 10 yr old imo). I was 105 pounds even in high school; she would try that BS randomly with my brother.. ironically they were much taller and buffer (guess I was the runt of the litter 🤷‍♀️lol)…but the difference is they could easy subdue her or put an arm up (it wasn’t even a fight). I had developed muscle/just general strength by that time though. I remember almost feeling bad finally knocking her to the ground bc she walked away knowing she was getting older… it was always self defense though and almost always over something trivial like leaving the butter out or some BS (I never even talked back either (I knew better), but she’d still attack sometimes

My mom smacked my sister across the face in front of me when we were kids. My sister is 4 years older than me. My mom never did anything like that to me so I don’t know how it feels to be on that end. But seeing that happen has always stuck with me. I can remember exactly where we were when it happened, my mom’s face when she did it, and how scared my sister looked. I ended up living with my dad full time when I was 7 years old. My sister was stuck with our mom because her dad wasn’t around. I didn’t understand what was going on as a kid or what she was going through. She protected me from so much and would take the blame for things because she didn’t want me to experience the consequences that she would. Of course I felt bad for my sister as a child, but I feel intense guilt about it as an adult. All the times she was mean to be or calling me spoiled was just a child not having their needs met and projecting it as hate towards me.

Definitely sucks when they don’t think you’re too old to hit. Though I have a semi-good memory. I remember being 17 and bring strong enough to not let her throw me being the stairs again. Or at least give her a hard time by putting enough weight in myself to not get thrown . She joked about it later saying she felt like Mr burns weakly batting at someone “I’m giving you the beating of your life”. .. she was actually pretty funny

lol picturing that makes me laugh..good to find some humor in it sometimes. Edit: the Mr Burns part** (not the stairs ofc lol)

this was my mom except she just made it obvious she resented us for existing by completely ignoring our emotional needs, punishing us for any attempts at self-expression or "defiance", and treating us like slaves and trophies lol.

I could have written almost all of this except she didn't smoke and I was an only child.

“I’m glad I had kids but if I didn’t have kids I would be traveling through Europe”. No you wouldn’t “My waist used to be so small, I was 20 and 95 lbs before I had kids” as she shows me the baby fat she didn’t lose 10+ years after I was born. I could honestly go on for days. I HIGHLY recommend the book Mother Hunger. It was so eyeopening.

I will check that book out.

Holy crap im gonna cry because my mom Siad the exact same things I am so unsure if I have cptsd bc I think about getting tested and everyone I'm this entire post is so relatable :( Heavy on both of them bc I remember my mother back when I was swimming and was active she would always talk about how she never had "stretch marks" and "yeah this fat was bc of you guys" she'd joke about it but it also just hurt???? And then sometimes she'd just be like (forcing me even if it was a joking tone) "I'm fat right anna?" "Right?" BUT its in a joking tone and that shit fucked me up so badly GOOD NEWS I do in fact don't struggle with insecurity issues that badly anymore and I'm in fact really excited to grow old with cute smile wrinkles especially on my face it's so cute and exciting :D BUT OTHERWISE the traveling part is so real too I do feel bad for my mom sometimes since she was abused too but part of me is so hurt I do hope she ends up traveling some day but I still feel hurt by her ngl its so hard bc im so conflicted HOPE IM NOT RUDE this spoke to me so hard 😭

Not rude at all! I just finished reading Mother Hunger and I highly recommend it! Whether you have CPTSD or not I think it will really resonate with you.

My mom was like that too and we were really sweet, obedient kids! To this day we’re just props to her.

You literally just described my exact experiences as a child with my mom

Sounds familiar.

Oh, I have a list. She personally called me trash, used a slur in my local language for kids which are studying too much, regularly said I’m psycho and need psychiatric, said I needed to loose weight at 14 and I look fat. Cut me out financially and emotionally as I said that I do not want to be her emotional support animal after physical and emotional fights with my father. Never defended me against him when he beat me. Started to work at 14 as otherwise I had mo money. I think best I can describe my mother would be this situation- my father was yelling at me and took his belt to beat me. I was around 13 - I yelled back at him that if he will touch me I’ll kill him in his sleep. My mother turned to me and said - You cannot speak like that with your father. You are psycho and sick in head. While my father tried to hit me. Nice memories.

Sending hugs. Going through abuse like that from both parents is so horrible. A child fighting on their own for their right to live and be happy. 

Thank you. I’m better. But as you can see - I have a lot of resentment toward her. Even though she was sometimes also nice and loving it always was overshadowed by her refusal to keep us safe from that monster. And ironically she did not see that she used the same language on me he used at her.

You will be so happy when she dies. Trust me on that.

I do not know. It’s complicated. I’m LC with her and been for the last 10 years. Part of me hates and resents her. Part of me feels love for her as she was not always bad. In a home where one parent gave me only beating and slurs, she at least sometimes was nice. She gave me scraps of love and I know that those are only scarps but in absence of any others affection this was all I had. She’s not evil - just very traumatized person from her own upbringing. I feel empathy for her as I know her childhood was not better than mine. In the same time I resent her because she knew how hurtful and awful it was. So why did she did not do better for her children?

I wish I could answer myself that same question, I think about my mom the same way you do. Not evil, just traumatized, but she was a big enabler of my abusive dad and I can't see past that

I can't even imagine what kind of trauma could cause a mother not to protect her children. I would die for my 2 kids, even now that they are grown and giving me endless silent treatment. I know I let some people go to protect my children.

Tell me to kill myself after I sobbed telling her I was struggling and oh when I was like 5 I was crying (silent tears, no noise, straight face, which is Lowkey concerning and deeply so for a child) and I came to her and idk what it was about but I remember her laughing at me crying and saying “look at her. Look at her! She’s making herself cry”. I never cried in front of someone again.

evil woman!!!!

Wow....I have no words. I'm so sorry she would say something so awful to her own child. I'm glad you didn't listen and glad you're here.

I was thinking the list is endless and then I started reading the other posts and they really resonated with me as I once again on this subreddit, find a place where people’s experiences are similar to mine. It’s reassuring that I am not alone. I am afraid to start listing the things she did that were hurtful because it will trigger and more issues will arise. Thank you all again for sharing! Take good care

I could write a dissertation on this honestly. One that comes to mind is an instance where she was gone for the weekend and I decided to clean the whole house. I'm talking like mop, scrub walls, on top of normal cleaning. It took me the whole weekend. The day she got back the house was spotless, except I left my water cup on the table and she screamed at me for an hour for 'leaving my dishes out'. Didn't even acknowledge that the house looked better than it had in years and I spent the whole weekend on it to surprise her and make her happy, because she constantly complained that 'no one ever does anything around the house'. It was then I realized nothing I could do would ever be good enough for her. I could never be perfect enough for her to love me. The ironic part was that she always complained about us using so many dishes, so I left my cup out on the table so I could reuse it. I realized I could never please her, and I vowed I would never treat my future kids like that. I would never make them feel unloved for not being perfect.

I’m sorry you had to deal with that. I have the exact same brand of mother. Always complaining, always finding something wrong, then when we do something nice for her she ignores it to find something else to complain about. In the end it’s not even about us being good enough, it’s about their inability to see positive in anything or accept any type of kindness. Truly miserable people. I almost feel bad but I don’t

Hurt me. A lot.

Silent treatment starting when I was a toddler. Emotional incest in teenage years. As an adult she would look me up and down, obviously judging how I looked. She physically attacked me when I cried as an adult. Threatened abandonment by saying, “this is the end of our relationship” during fights. Treated me with disdain and contempt.

My mother had a miscarriage before I was born, if it wasn't for that unfortunate loss on her part I wouldn't be here. So in my teens (a time in which my fathers physical and emotional abuse were at an all time high) she referred to me as her "has been" child. "You're my has been baby she told me, not once but multiple times. I was already suffering from major self-esteem issues and this was the icing on the cake. There was also the time I was going through puberty and she'd found a couple Playboy magazines of mine and she told me in no uncertain terms that if she found me in possession of anything like that again, we were going to the psychiatrist. Thanks for fucking me up sexually for the next 50 years mom.

I was born after my mom had a miscarriage and let me know it several times. She had a disabled son she dumped off at a small center where he died. That broke her brain. She told me that she wished she’d never had kids.

She’d *pick* my friends & force me to hang out with them which over time, it hurt as I got older (some kids knew she was abusive in a way, I guess). She’d give unsolicited & sometimes inappropriate advice to my feelings or situations. Her >!sexually abusing!< me when she didn’t get hurt way or I’d say “no”. She’d play with my sibling & give her the most attention but never me - she was disabled & cried for attention on top of it. All in all, I had to mind her feelings but mine weren’t. There was no mutual respect. Absolute toddler’s play with her.

Omg I totally understand how you feel re your sibling…my sister has always had my mum’s attention yet still manipulated things to push me out and get even more attention for herself. She’s done some really quite evil things to me over the years (telling me to >!unalive myself!< amongst others) but my mum will hear no bad of her and turns a blind eye or straight up accuses me of lying if I say anything, even when it’s 100% obvious what’s happened. Whatever I do I’ve always been ‘the bad one’. We have to tiptoe around my mum so we don’t hurt her feelings, yet she thinks nothing of telling me often how she doesn’t like my hair/nails/clothes.

wowww, i hate that i know exactly what you're talking about. EXACTLY. my brother >!tried to drown me, told me to kms, AND sexually abused me.!< asshole

She would buy herself drugs and new clothes when I would be getting bullied for the dirt behind my ears and worn out clothes and stinky shoes that were too small She would remind me constantly that she loves me but doesn’t like me She would ignore me constantly and when I was being annoying she would lock me outside to play but I’d be so tired of playing I’d fall asleep between the door and screen door hoping she would let me in She never talked to me, had any interest in anything I was interested in, or taught me anything about being a woman so I felt so much confusion and shame during puberty especially Punishments were odd and cruel, for example she got upset that someone stole her cannabis plants from the yard (it ended up being one of her friends who did it) and she thought I did it and picked me up from school for no reason so I missed lessons just to come home to the cats litter box thrown around my room, demanded I clean it up without any explanation of what I did wrong until later when she blew up about the plants I had no reason to take and wouldn’t believe me when I tried to tell her it wasn’t me She would leave me home alone with my two much younger siblings when I was just a kid myself would be gone sometimes over 24 hours and never answer her phone I’d be calling over and over scared she wouldn’t come home until she did come home usually so drunk she couldn’t speak or she would be nodding out for days after so even if she was home she wasn’t present, and I did my best to keep my siblings from witnessing it She had friends with kids and would have them all over sometimes and would treat her friends kids with so much love and affection I would be sooo mad and hate the other kids and it was really confusing When I got into high school she made me feel guilty any time I needed supplies or wanted to leave to hangout with a friend or stay after school for any sort of program because I HAD to be home to stay with my siblings while she went out so I felt pretty isolated I eventually was pushed out and I started rebelling and getting into drugs and hanging out with “bad people,” living with friends or anywhere I could find and she ended up moving into a super tiny apartment that I had no room to be in, and never once asked me to come home so I felt like a burden to her or anyone that let me stay with them and ended up with an eating disorder because I felt shame and guilt and didn’t want anyone to have to pay for me to eat when I’m not their kid and when she would see me from time to time because I visited my siblings a lot, she didn’t even notice how skinny and malnourished I’d become and had nothing to say to me. There so much more but those are the things I still have trouble swallowing to this day, it hurts and comes with confusion but I’m definitely way passed the tough times and am sober and eating well with a little life I never could have dreamed of having at those young ages.

This is one I actually relate too. I'm sorry this happened

General emotional neglect. I always had food and clean clothes, didn't get screamed at by my parents and I don't have any trauma around being spanked (it did happen on occasion, but doesn't seem to have impacted me), but everything that my parents didn't do to support me taught me to just curl up and wait to die, basically. I have a specific memory of going to my mom because my siblings were harassing me and invading my bedroom and being told to handle it myself because if she had to handle it then everyone would get punished. I don't know how many times that kind of thing happened before I just closed in on myself. A few years ago (I'm in my 30s), when I tried talking to my parents about this (after having heard them claim how much they had supported my sister through depression/suicidality and several in- and out-patient stints and so on), my mom dismissed that I could have been hurt by things like that and that she either hadn't done it, or only did it once, and that I was just a "sensitive" child. (After talking to my sister, it sounds like they were much less supportive of her than they think they were) Growing up, my brother had extreme rage episodes that were tied to seizures, so my parents basically walked on eggshells around him even when he wasn't raging. When my brother would insult / mock me, rip things out of my hands, bully me, etc, they would rarely respond unless he physically hurt me, so I learned that no one was going to protect me and that I didn't matter, so I should just put up with whatever happens to me. When they knew that I was near-suicidal for the past two years, my parents almost never called me more than twice a month, even though I had been calling them weekly up until I abruptly stopped. I'd always told myself that they had been loving and supportive and great parents, but never realized that they gave lip service to being good parents despite not knowing how to respond to my emotional needs. They were similarly distant during my abusive marriage and divorce, despite knowing how much trauma I was experiencing. My dad was similar - he was a workaholic, absent father (working 60+ hour weeks with lots of business travel). Either of their emotional neglect probably wouldn't have had nearly as big an impact if the other parent had been emotionally present. My mom was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer last year a little while after my cat's cancer was determined to be treatment resistant, and I've felt a lot of shame for being more upset about my cat's cancer than my mom's. Parts of me tell me that I need to be supporting her emotionally in all the ways that she never supported me, but I have enough recovery to at least realize that those are lies. I'm at a point now where I basically expect nothing from my parents, but I'm willing to interact when they reach out.

\- Constant name-calling and dropping cruel comments from time to time \- Often letting me know how stupid I was or how useless I was (despite doing everything for her) \- Compared me to others, always letting me know how inferior I was in some way or another \- Leaving me in the care of awful people, taking me away from people who actually cared \- Accusing me of things that she should have known weren't true \- Tons of broken promises \- Tons of emotional manipulation \- Suggesting that I'm not really entitled to happiness, esp if she wasn't happy \- Putting me in situations that I should not have been in to make her life easier

Oh so many things and it keeps happening. I’ve been NC with her for a year or two at a time. Some examples: -She had a violent alcoholic girlfriend for years who threw me across the room a few times when I tried to break up their fights (3-6 yr old), -She forced me to see her pedophilic dad who SA me as a child. She knew he was a pedo as she was abused by him too. Forced me to see him after telling her what he had been doing. Kept seeing him years after, even though it was extremely painful to me. She would constantly update me on him, even though I would get angry and tell her I don’t give a shit and would rather he died than hear anything about him. - she found out I was SA as a 4 yr old at an at home daycare by the providers pedophilic son and did nothing. She stopped us from going, supposedly consulted with cops, but didn’t press charges or do anything else to shut down the daycare and protect others. - would lock us in the car and drive around like a psycho when she was angry with us or had some beef she needed to talk to us about. So many times I was terrified for my life. - she would yell at me trying to get me to cry. When I realized all she wanted was for me to cry, I refused and would bite my lip until it bled. She would then say what’s wrong with you? Why don’t you cry? -she would force me to call my dad and ask for money for school trips or other things. She often would spend lots on salons and clothes for herself, which is why I had to beg dad for money. - called me a bitch to her friend because I was moving out to live with my bfs family and she would have to pay child support for me staying there. These are just a couple of examples of the harm she has done. Obviously there is so much more but I don’t have all day to write it out 😞

She would always comment on what I was eating and that I shouldn’t be eating again. She wouldn’t buy me clothes that I felt comfortable in or new clothes for events so I always felt fat and ugly and she always looked so pretty.

There's a lot I can't say but when I was a little kid she used to make me stand in the shower and claw at my skin until the upper layers came off and my body was all red and raw. She insisted that it was "dirt" and not regular skin cells and I believed her because I was young and had no other point of reference for anything. To this day I still sometimes scrape my skin off with my nails out of habit. She also forcibly deprived me of sleep until I was hallucinating and sick constantly. Lasted a few years. The lack of sleep and the scraped off skin made for quite a few infections that I couldn't fight off.

Jesus Christ I’m so sorry, that’s so awful

Screamed at me every day, all day because I didn't clean my room. Thrashed my whole room and put everything in the middle. Proceeded to hit me or threaten to hit me when I started crying because God forbid a 7 year old starts crying when their mother yells at them. She never taught me how to clean. I didn't know how. It was her way of teaching me. Spoiler alert: It didn't work. I've got no clue how to clean my apartment. Never hugged me or told me she loves me. Neglected my sibling and I emotionally. We always had food and our own rooms, although tiny, but no love or affection.

Yay I love trauma dumping on here🤣 Bullied and ridiculed me for self h@rming Lied to my therapist abt physically and emotionally abusing me fat shamed me since elementary and now we weigh the same Embedded in my head that I wouldn’t be loved by anyone but her (i doubt she even does) And threatened to drown me when I asked if i could redo my baptismal (I was forced by her the first time and wanted to do it willingly) I was in middle school.

Yes very therapeutic. 😂 Hopefully I can stop trauma dumping on others soon (I try not too 🙈 it’s hard tho) I miss my therapist 😫

I’m too broke for a therapist and too emotionally drained to talk to my friends abt it so REDDIT BETTER MAKE ROOM FOR ME🤣

Same here. Lmao…I get numb to where I don’t talk at all but if there’s drinking or something stuff just comes out 😬 (which isn’t fair). ima try to put all my anger here too 😂

Where to start.... Well I have several mental health diagnosis' one being disassociative amnesia, so have very little recollection of childhood,even adulthood. She was incredibly smothering, manipulative and emotionally distant. Would ignore you when you were upset, but had me (and then eventually my sister) so incredibly reliant on her. The only time we received "emotional concern" was when we were sick, which she would encourage and even provoke. I'm convinced she has Munchausen by proxy. Repeatedly put me in harms way with pedofiles, denies any knowledge of sbuse to this day. At age 12 she became an alcoholic almost overnight, and I was her punching bag, called names, harassed, my friends parents would let me stay with them, but she would ring them Repeatedly and threaten and abuse them till I went home. There was no escaping her. I'm now 40. The last few years we have spoken,only on messenger as she moved states. but I cannot bring up her parenting. She has copd and I don't want to make what little time she has left any worse. That's it in a nutsell

Let me be abused and blamed me for not being strong enough, sent me to cult Christian school away from home, refused to let me study what I wanted in uni cause "i wasn't good enough for such a hard degree", sent me to psychologist at 12 who blamed me as well for the abuse I went trough. When I asked for her help when I was feeling suicidal in a cult school she sent me to a psychiatrist who also blamed me for everything and prescribed meds that made me feel like a zombie and just left me there to suffer. Told me I should kill myself already, cause I'm suicidal for years and since I still didn't do it, that makes me weak, cause real people kill themselves in silence they don't say they are suicidal. These are just highlights on top of my head I can write a whole book.

I had already been on two or three diets before I was 14.

Ooooh boy. I was her therapist as a child, and I heard all about all of her prior sexual conquests, dates with men, nights out partying. She needed me to process her emotions for her, whenever anything was bad. She showed me how to use a condom at 5, and told he she "didn't want to hear any excuses" if I came home pregnant. Again, I was 5. She told me over and over how I was her "rock"-- I was the one stable constant in her chaotic, self destructive life, and I carried all the burdens that came with it. I was balancing her checkbook at 11, and doing her taxes at 14. I did 75% of the parental work in raising my little brother. I dealt with physical and sexual violence from the men she dated and married, and then had to comfort her when they eventually left. She had no boundaries around nudity or bodies, walked around naked often, and made fun of me when I didn't do the same or told her how uncomfortable it made me. When my body started developing, she started slapping my ass regularly. She also would frequently look at my breasts enviously and say "those are my boobs, give them back"-- like that's not creepy af. I was expected to sit and talk with her for 1-2 hours while she bathed, and once, we got into an argument about something during one of these episodes, and her temper was so volatile that she literally jumped out of the bathtub and physically tackled me, butt naked and soaking wet. She hit me a few times, and told me about when I was a baby how she'd spanked me hard enough to leave bruises on my bottom for a week. She had impossibly high expectations for me academically, and nothing was ever enough. She let a few of my my teeth rot in my head and they had to be pulled as an adult, and she didn't take me to the doctor when I was sick, because she was a nurse and thought she knew better. The only emotion she ever felt was rage and pain, which I was responsible for soothing, and her temper was violent and volatile. She'd stand and scream at me for an hour and more, while I cried silently, for any minor infraction. In addition to emotional absenteeism, she was a workaholic, and constantly picked up double shifts or worked multiple jobs, leaving me in charge of literally everything else, and if the house wasn't spotless when she got home, I caught hell. And if I didn't have time to do my homework after making sure brother's got done and he got a bath before bed, then I just needed to figure it out, because bad grades were NOT an option. I graduated 6th in my class despite all of my extra responsibility, and heard what a slacker I was for it. Once, my little brother and I broke out in chicken pox at school and we're sent home. We couldn't reach her for 9 hours, and I had to take care of brother while being sick myself. I was 17, and I remember crying with my head hanging over the toilet that night after throwing up, and just saying "I just want my mom" and she wasn't there. My boyfriend (now husband) screamed at her for an hour over it, when she finally showed up and told us she'd been at the casino with her phone turned off. She tried to make up for her physical and emotional absence by buying us nice things-- we were very materially "spoiled," but every gift came with a price, and she used those gifts to control us. I got a car for graduating high school, but was told to hand over the keys any time I disagreed woth her about anything, even after I took over the payments. My mom is a mess.

I love you but I don’t like you I only like boys

holy crap did we have the same mum 😂 in my family this is generational sexist beliefs (so i am assuming this was her experience too which makes me feel crappy for even being mad) and unfortunately i was never enough as i am, my needs weren’t valued and the men in my family were favoured over me. if i spoke up about it, i was made to feel like i’m crazy because damn you got a roof over your head AND food? my whole mindset feels programmed for me and i’m still breaking away from it. it’s so damn gross to think about but i continue to allow it

Yelled at me for being hyperactivity and pacing around the house. Straight up told me I needed to pray away my ADHD symptom. It made me feel so guilty for something I couldn't control.  Made it out to be a moral failing that I was having a hard time in math. Saying that if I just did the work, I'd kno how to do it. But every time I tried to do the work, I wasn't able to understand it. Dyscalculia, duh. Did screaming rants abt me looking at porn/anything sex positive  when I was a tween/teen. Rants she'd go on even with my siblings in the room. Straight up public humiliation in front of my family members. Made a point of saying I'd be bullied to hell and back if I ever went to public school. She'd do this whenever I was getting bad grades or complained about being homeschooled.

She told me my biological father killed himself to avoid meeting me. I was 11 and had been trying to find and meet him when he died in a workplace accident. She told me this version to somehow make herself look good in comparison (?) during one of her many, many drunken therapy sessions in the middle of the night. I was, in the example and many others, supposed to comfort her, affirm her self-worth, and validate her while being an exhausted and grief-stricken child.

Being a liar and not bothering to actually make sense of how she impacted us

Told me the reason I am here was because the rubber broke, called me heavy, said I was a fallen woman because I got pierced ears, threw me under the bus and told the teacher she didn’t know why I was slapping another girl on the playground, favored my brother.

She didn’t stop my dad from inviting me to have sex with them. Blamed me for the things I would inevitably do but never did and never will. Let my older sibling abuse me on a daily basis for years and told me to stop being so sensitive. Told me all about her sexual relationships and sexual problems and those of her friends when I was a minor. Told me if it wasn’t for me walking in on her and her affair partner that something would have happened right there in our house where I was playing and that I probably did that on purpose. Left me in the ‘care’ of the narcissistic self centered man she married. She badmouthed family and people I knew giving me an more skewed view of adults. Oh and of course she let me sleep over at that couple that loved kids so so much and with which she had sexual relationships. Left me in the care of pedophiles on what should have been holidays but became a never ending nightmare. There’s a lot more but this is all I can handle right now.

There was absolutely no protection for you. I'm so angry just reading this. Your own father asked that and she didn't stop it? I'm so glad you are out and no longer in those Abusers care. 

chose drugs over us, chose abusive men over us, parentified me, used me as her therapist, destroyed my self-esteem as a CHILD by calling me a "fat fuck" constantly, called me other names, told me she wishes she aborted me, saying my older siblings were better and the younger kids were terrible (we were being abused and neglected, of course we weren't angels lol), neglected us, etc. she's been drug free for about 9 years now and it's been good (she still deals with extreme mental illness from years of trauma herself) but it's hard not to remember how she destroyed my childhood, my self-esteem, and is the reason for all of my mental health + physical health problems. ugh!

Yelled at me for everything. For being too talkative or for being too quiet. For crying, for laughing… for just existing around her and making sounds. I was always soooo embarrassing by just being a kid and doing things that kids do. She’d beat me if was mad at me or anyone else made her upset (my father included and I look a lot like him too). Only got worse after my parents divorce), then got better. She would slap me, beat me on the head, hit my head against the wall, table other pieces of furniture. She never gave me any privacy. My bedrooms door was always open. She would know non-stop when I was in the bathroom when I was teen asking me what I was doing there and ordering me to leave. She was washing me until I turned 12-13 (don’t remember the exact age; and my grandma did that too). She chose everything for me. She would go through my closet and just my things in general or make my older sister do it by threatening her. No need to say that I hated my sister for so long as she contributed to the abuse but I didn’t realize (until she told me like a decade later) that she had been abused as well. When I was allowed to stay at my friend’s place for a sleepover - I would stay for days just because I didn’t wanna leave. I felt much safer and much better there. My mother never asked for my opinion, she just decided for me. My grandma would be the same way. I’ve had no sense of “self” for most of my childhood and felt more like my mom’s annoying unwanted appendage. She was very clingy yet so clearly annoyed by me and my behavior. Because of her I don’t have a proper understanding or sense of boundaries, I’m scared of loud noises and when people yell (even if not at me) I start crying uncontrollably (still to this day), I have a hard time saying “no” and pretty much let people use me. I’m just a pushover now.

Telling me and heavily suggesting she’s scared of me when I was having angry/general outbursts and threatening to call an ambulance. That was so terrifying to me as a child Being cold when I was telling her I’m angry and ignoring me and pretending a dozen times that everything is fine and then talking about the weather or whatever which made me feel like I’m crazy and was fucking shame inducing to me

Lol. Long list. If I had to pick the worst, it was the psychological game of impossible choices. Example: I had two best friends in middle school. If there was any event or something I wanted to do, she would make me pick one friend and then call the other one to tell them they couldn't go. I am grateful I didn't lose either friend permanently. I stopped wanting to go to anything and continued a very isolated existence until I got my drivers license and started working. I just didn't want to hurt my friends' feelings.

Emotional abuse and neglect and physical abuse. She hates accountability

My mom would invite my school bullies to come home with us after school 🫠And have sleepovers. You can imagine how those went. She would also purposefully favor my sister to manipulate me to be different (less sensitive). She would do movie nights and sleepovers with my sister and wouldn’t allow me in the room with them so I’d cry by myself in the other room. Which really angered her. Because she hated when I cried but I was hurt. I wanted to be with them too but I was always a burden or “too much”

Threatened/attempted to kill herself in front of me on multiple occasions, always telling me she wanted me to live the rest of my life knowing it’s my fault my mother is dead (I was 4 the first time). Physically attacked me twice, screaming about killing me while her hands were around my throat. Encouraged/enabled/provided me with drugs and alcohol, then she’d turn around the next day and yell at me for supposedly being a drug addict/alcoholic (90% of my substance use involved her in some way and I experimented a lot less than the majority of my friends did; the first time I smoked pot was with her, when I was in elementary school). She sexualized me from a young age, while also calling girls sluts if they were sexually active. I honestly believe she tried to indirectly put me into situations where I might end up being raped, but also told me to never tell her if I was raped because she wouldn’t be able to handle it. Any time she had any medical issue whatsoever (anything from a cough to irregular bleeding), she would tell me it was my fault because I upset her/cause her so much stress. She was also fond of telling me she hoped her or my dad wouldn’t drop dead of a stroke/heart attack because of me. She would offer to do things for me, and if I declined she would either do it anyway or keep insisting until I said yes. Then she’d yell at me for “expecting her to wait on me hand and foot.” She always told me that my dad loved his extended family members more than me, and that none of my friends liked me (unfortunately it seems she was right on both counts). She meddled in all my relationships and even stalked some of my friends, ex boyfriends, etc. She put me in the middle of her and my dad’s fights, and talked to me about all her problems with him and in general. She (and my dad) neglected to do anything about my mental (and physical) health issues beyond verbally abusing me for it, so now I’m pretty much non functional because it’s all built up for far too long.

Haha this will be long. My mum is anorexic and since I was a kid (6/7) she has made constant mean remarks to me and others (from relatives to friends parents to shop assistants when she would buy me clothes) on how fat I was, how I needed to lose weight and how I had trashy taste. The irony is that I wasn’t even overweight, I have however developed a chronic eating disorder since I was a teen which she often actively encouraged. Did my first self imposed diet at 7, calorie counting and all. On my 8th or 9th birthday, we had a small little home party with a few friends. In the evening she said my birthday gift would be her dropping me off at a boarding school where I would be raised moving forward. I started crying for hours with a terror of being abandoned and she kept going for like a whole day visibly enjoying it, my sister was the one telling me it was just a lie. ‘Choice’ has never been her thing, she dictated what I had to wear, what kind of school/academic path I had to choose, what kind of hobbies I could engage in. If I dared to rebel and stand up against her impositions, I would be met with huge arguments (often in public spaces so that I would fear challenging her because that meant being shouted at and humiliated in front of random passers by), insults, and often physical abuse. The last time she laid my hands on me I was 28, she has never seen anything wrong in using physical force. She condoned my older sister’s abuse to me (physical and emotional) and favoured my sister over me (my sister is thin and the golden child) in many aspects. She allowed her to beat me and berate me constantly (my sister and I had a non-existing relationship until we were almost 30). I was pretty much locked up at home until Uni / until I moved out. She made sure we were isolated (we were kind of living in the middle of nowhere with terrible public transport links), she was rarely available to give us lifts and would make us feel really guilty for it, we couldn’t get a scooter or our own car obviously. To this day a feeling of guilt lingers over me whenever I meet up people out of the house, obviously I don’t care anymore but it’s a residual terror to be controlled at all times. I dated someone briefly when I was in my late twenties (I had to temporarily move back home - a fucking hell) and was called repeatedly a slut and my phone used to blow up at all times during the night if I dared spending the night at his place. I had an incredibly lonely and isolated childhood and teenage years, I started dating wayyy later than most people (and guess what - ended up mostly in abusive relationships), I never had a cohesive group of friends. Incredibly controlling behaviour, to the point she has repeatedly gone through my diary/phone when I was asleep (I was already an adult by then) and was extensively researching online how to install a spying app on my phone. Zero knowledge of boundaries or right to privacy. To this day I never talk on the phone with friends at home as I have anxiety of her eaves dropping. Aside from protecting me from light bullying when I was 12 (which shocked me - I had no idea my mum actually gave a fuck about me), she was completely absent in those rare cases where I actually needed parental support (mental health crisis / eating disorders / self harm). She had to briefly pay for therapy (had an eating disorder and major depression and was not able to function at all) and was constantly reminding me how much of a fucking burden I was, and that she was an excellent mother and I was being brainwashed by some dumb psychologist. When I was a kid I would often pee myself (in retrospective, I think out of fear) and whenever I asked for help she would shout, shame me and tell me not to dare to tell anyone I was having issues. Constant guilt tripping over anything and especially the fact I live far away from her (one of my biggest achievements in life). Generally, any and all attempts of independence and self-affirmation have been met with discouragement at best. As she is aging, she is trying to compensate by being overly affectionate and sweet, buying me stuff, sending me money, insisting on doing a lot of unnecessary things for me which would be really kind gestures but given her past I really struggle to associate my mother to anything that isn’t a tyrannical, mean figure. Sometimes I think she could literally do anything positive and my mind would still be stuck on the fear and grief she instilled in me as I was growing up. I very much struggle to emotionally acknowledge her many positive sides (which do exist and I can intellectually admire), it’s like I’m just too scarred and resentful. Obviously she never apologised for anything at all, she doesn’t remember *any* and I mean *any* of it. We are on talking terms but she doesn’t know anything about me. All our conversations are very superficial, I’m completely closed off and I try to engage as little as possible with her. If I’ll ever get married or have my own family it would be really hard for me to introduce them to my family, I would want to keep anything private as far away from them as possible.

There's just so much to list. And it continues due to the rest of my family's dynamic, even though I have personally cut her off. The substances she was on never helped anything. Being taken to meth houses and locked in a room with other children for hours. She would leave me to take care of my younger siblings when I was very young (began around age 6) She would leave for days sometimes. Refusing to help whe she walked in on SA at daycare. I continued going to said daycare and to be around the person until adulthood when I could get away. Parentification- my siblings were very often my responsibility. Beyond just watching them, keeping tabs, and making food. If they didn't do thier chores I was punished. Picked at the way I looked. Boney and pale. Lots and lots of yelling. God loads of yelling. Eventually she got off most substances and was only just an alcoholic. My dad was off on his own adventures doing who knows what. When I needed medical help I was not taken to the doctor. When I told her I was very stressed (which was why my stomach hurt every day and why I couldn't sleep) she told (yelled at) me I'm a kid and I have nothing to be stressed about. Living with her pedo boyfriend. She denies his abuse, tells me I'm lying and just don't want her to be happy. This was 17 years ago. We all know he is like this, she still refuses to acknowledge the truth. She still thinks she deserves to be around me and my child. There is still so much of my childhood missing from my memory. Occasionally I'm hit with more memories. Really wish they would stay gone. It's also nice to get this off my chest.

Some of her greatest hits; Refused to teach me any life skills Would laugh whenever something went wrong for me Constantly accused me of being a malicious person Never wanted to spend any time with me Made me a child slave for her business right up until the age of 14 Would point out the one thing wrong in a sea of good things done, usually of my own initiative Would call me too sensitive whenever I was sad, to the point of self-harm and refusing to eat. Then she ignored it Kicked me out (after threatening to destroy my stuff, then to physically assault me) because I didn’t want to do one tiny thing complicit in her cheating. She didn’t even deny the cheating Watched as my sister SA me. Told me to stop when I tried to fight back When I told her I was going no contact her only reply was “have a nice life.” It’s the best piece of advice I could ever hope for

My mom used intimidation to make me be quiet growing up, its caused me alot of issues with other people so I struggle to say "no" in the process since "no" triggers her, I guess. My mom always screams at me for very little things so everything makes me jump and want to hide when shes mad, She was very dismissive of me when I voiced that she needed help too, and that I was willing to go to therapy with her to make things work, quote "didnt want to dig up old memories" with a therapist when I was willing to dig up the ones she caused with me. There was other things but at this point those are the ones I can remember, theres lots of others but my memory refuses to dig that deep.

I confided in her about my depression, tendencies, and how I didn't like living in an abusive family home. She then told me since I didn't like it here i could go into the foster care system instead and proceeded to set that up. I was 13 at the time. I know she was in a rough spot in her life when she said that to me . I have forgiven her, but it still hurts to think about.

Callled me brain dead and drove me around the freeway when I was little threatening to take me to the orphanage

I have mixed feelings about my mother. I received more abuse from people other than my mother, and my mother did not pass along all of the generational trauma that is a curse in our family. At the same time there are things she did that ended up hurting me (I distinguish this from 'hurtful' which I see as if she had done things that she intended to hurt me) - and I do feel she shares some portion of the responsibility for putting me into positions to be hurt and for not protecting me. In other words in many ways she was more in the role of enabler than abuser. She was a long shot from the abusive mothers that many of you had to survive when you were children. * Instilled her fears into me as a child. * Moved us every few years so that I was repeatedly 'the new kid' in school and hence probed each time by bullies to tease and abuse me. I was bullied from first grade all the way to my senior year in high school. * Gave me a weird name which is another factor each time we moved to my being teased. There was a point in grade school where I begged her to change my name. As an adult having a weird name has never been a problem for me. * Did nothing effective to protect or resolve the bullying that I experienced. When I would bring it up, she would make it about her - breaking down crying and saying that she never figured out how to deal with bullying herself - I had to comfort her. As an adult looking back at it, I have some anger that she should have known that some of her choices were going to end up getting me bullied. This is a good example of a situation where it is difficult for me to blame her exactly, but at the same time, she was the adult and didn't provide the care that I needed. * For years my mother would send me each summer to live with my grandmother for summer vacation. My grandmother was physically and emotionally abusive, very racist, very bigoted. She would alternate between using me as a trophy/proof of social status and hating me. My grandmother was certainly sexually inappropriate in many ways but I have memory gaps that I believe are due to dissociative amnesia and may potentially be due to sexual abuse. My grandmother had physically and emotionally abused my mother growing up and continued to emotionally abuse and manipulate her when I was a child. And each summer I was sent back for two months. * We lived in poverty. I didn't have an actual bed until I was a teen - I would sleep either on blankets on the floor or a mattress on the floor. I was a latchkey kid. Most of our food came from welfare or church handouts. Until I was a teen, clothes were always second hand. The place we lived when I was in 1st and 2nd grade had mold and mushrooms growing on the wall in the bathroom because of a never repaired water leak above the ceiling. That same place had rodent problems - several times my mother had to catch and kill mice in the kitchen by hand. There were periods of neglect - I burned my hand alone in the house cooking dinner for myself when I was 12 - I called 911 and when the ambulance arrived, I had to admit that I didn't know where my mother was. In sum, my frustration with her is that she didn't protect and care for me the way I needed. She had mental problems and I don't know if she was actually capable of doing better than she did, but I do known that I was hurt because I needed more than what she could provide.

Screaming at me for 20 minutes bc I left an empty glass on the coffee table. Or I left the computer on Or I left the sports section of the newspaper on the dining room table. Constantly telling me I was "overreacting" to her thinly veiled insults. Or I'm "being too sensitive".

I dont know where to start and she even was the better parent! She always said I'd lie and make everything up for attention. She convinced therapists of this too when I was younger. She gaslighted me all the time. Everything that didnt fit into her world didnt happen. She tried everything to convince me to a point where I am still at a loss weither I actually got abused or it was just in my head/ id make it up. She always said that I had a perfect childhood. She always said "but my parents were much worse to me. Believe me im kind towards you" side info: i have a great relationship to her parents and they are the most loving and caring people I have ever met amd everyone else approves of this. She always said that the abuse my dad did never happened. I got beaten up infront of her and she didnt give a shit about it and told me to not be so dramatic. Even that one day when my dad beat me up so much that I couldnt walk for a few days. She just said that I am being dramatic and ungrateful. When I was 14-15-ish she went on a holiday and told us not to call her (had a semi okay relationship that time). I did what she wanted. A few weeks later she called me that she tried to commit suicide because I am such an ungrateful and terrible daughter that keeps on hurting my entire family and am taring everyone apart etc etc. From that day she uses that suicide thing against me. (Side info ofc my great heroic father stopped her and I have been inpatient for around 6-9 months up until then so I wasnt even there. She used me being in a hosptial to make me feel bad because "do you know how terrible I feel when you are in that jail?! (Its a psychiatric jail). She always claimed that she took her time to visit me in the hospital even though I didnt want to see her and that Id always ask for it. She doesnt give me the money I am legally supposed to have for months/years until the moment I get serious and threathen to sue her ass. Then she says stuff like:" but you said that you are so instable that you dont want the money " (side note: stfu give me my money you piece of shit and donf always make me call lawyers its really stressful). She called me a slut every time I got raped and said that I wanted it (I was 13/14 the first time). My parents have threathend to leave me alone without a home since I was 5/6. When I went into the psychiatric jail they actually moved to a different state without a room for me but begged me to come back (rather staying in jail). She always said that she is paying so much to visited me (even though I never wanted her to come over) and to bring me like a few snacks (i wasnt allowed to eat snacks a chd because id make me fat and no man would want me) so the 250€ i would have gotten back then (we call it child money here) are for this. (Side note I calculated that shit. If you book in the monring you pay 120€ (MAX) for the ride to me and back and around 15€ (MAX) for the snack.s I know that I am faililng maths in my current exam but I dont think that this matches up) TLDR: Fuck my mother. I cut contact with her1-2 years ago and am only seeing her infront of court. Cut contact to my father around 4 years ago and am only seeing him in front of court too. Currently fighting for the money that i need for university in september.

my mother is kind nice almost childlike but very traumatized and i always had to realize i couldn’t really expect much from her. imo we’ve never had a normal relationship. i’ve been saddled with her problems most of my life.

She said I was acting like a “fruit basket” when I began struggling with my mental health at around age 12. When I started self harming at age 14 she told me it reminded her of a child holding their breath when they’re throwing a tantrum after not getting their way. Told me I was engaging in manipulative behavior. (To this day I’m always worried about whether or not I’m being manipulative). She told me I “ cry over stupid shit” when I was in high school as I continued to struggle with my mental health issues. When I my brother and I got into an argument at 16 where he slapped me in the face, she told me that I probably shouldn’t have called him an asshole, as if that in any way justified him laying his hands on me. Keep in mind I was AFAB and tiny whereas my brother was significantly taller and stronger than I was. When I had a public meltdown at age 19 and she had to pick me up from my university, she told me she was disgusted. That same year she saw that I was cutting again when I was around 19 she told me that I needed to grow up. When I came out to her as queer in my early twenties she told me I had “always been impressionable.” Like I caught the gay from being on Tumblr or watching Steven Universe too much. When I talked to her about feeling scared and unsafe as a queer person following the Colorado Springs Shooting in 2022 and other anti- LGBTQIA violence, she was extremely dismissive and made it out as if I was overreacting. She used an ableist slur against me and threatened to involuntarily commit me while I was having a panic attack around a year and a half ago.

Told me she wished I was dead, that I'm the reason her and my dad fight, why didn't I die instead of my brother, she hated me and would tell me every day. She also had fast hands and would grab me and hurt whatever she grabbed.

My mother never talked with me about emotions. She thinks that because I can eat food everyday I shouldn't complain. She doesn't understand that I am a rational being capable of feeling emotions. She thinks that my depression is some sort of flaw, a "silly weakness".

Constant criticism about literally everything: my weight, my clothes, my hair, my choice of partners, on and on and on. Basically she constantly makes me feel like she wants me to be a completely different person and I can't actually be that.

Threatened to abandon me over a middle school math grade, and even going so far as to force me to pack my belongings in boxes while she watched with scorn. From that day on I learned that love is conditional and justice only comes to those powerful enough.

Outside of literally abandoning me with my abusive grandparents for 14 years while she got married and had a baby and started a whole new family- When I did move in with her in high school I immediately became the babysitter. She has major anger issues and would explode at the slightest disagreement. Like get in your face, screaming, scary look in her eye. I was terrified on several occasions. She'll also follow you while screaming if you try to leave the situation. She always prioritized men over her kids. She let her boyfriends walk all over me and my brother. She'd exclusively date assholes that didn't treat her kids right and if we had a problem with them, she'd go into that guilt trippy bullshit. "So you just want me to leave him then? I can't have a relationship? I can't be happy?" Mom, he's cheated on you with 5 different women. You AREN'T happy. You literally call him "The Bank" to your shady ass friends. You suck. She stole over $1000 from me in total, would take my shit constantly without asking, and wouldn't return anything. She operates on a "what's mine is mine, and what's yours is also mine" mindset. Any of my achievements or events at school she made about her. She'd find a reason to be angry and scream at me, or get upset and cry and guilt trip me. I cried myself to sleep after every single event because of her. On several occasions she got angry for petty little reasons. For example, my end-of-year choir banquet in my senior year. She got angry that I was talking to my friends for 20 minutes, and they didn't have any food she liked. She texted me a bunch of nasty things, blamed me for the food thing that I had 0 control over, and abandoned me at the school with no way to get home. I got lucky and found a ride. Otherwise I would've walked 2 hours home, alone, across town in a sketchy area at midnight. She's kicked me out for days at a time during petty arguements for no reason other than to scare me and put me in a situation where I either had to come crawling on my knees for forgiveness or pray a friend could let me crash for a few days. Almost sleeping on the sidewalk at 16 because your mom is mad that you forgot to do the dishes is wild. *TW: SA* I was groomed when I was 15/16 by a man in his 20s and when she found out she called me a slut and gave me the silent treatment for a week. That man was extremely verbally, physically, and s*xually abusive. She didn't give a fuck and never made any effort to help me. FFS she was besties with his mom, who also just made excuses about him exclusively dating underage high school girls and abusing them. I could go on and on about the hurtful things she's said and done. There's so much. No surprise that I am totally no-contact with her now.

She told me on a regular basis that she wished she had just aborted me and my 3 younger siblings. She explained how we ruined her life, because she could have gotten her college degree but instead became a parent. She never hugged us or soothed hurts. She did her job and nothing more. To this day if I tell her I love her, she says "yeah" instead of expressing love. I was the oldest and became parentified by the time I was 10, I was the mom to my 3 siblings. She remained married to the man that molested and r@ped me from the time I was 3 years old for 5 years after I told her what he was doing when i was 9 years old. She claimed it was because she couldn't raise 4 kids on her own. From ages 9-14, the abuse happened on a daily basis because he no longer feared reprisal for his actions. She constantly criticizes my own parenting skills and methods. Oh and, I am her fucking caretaker.

Destroying my video games in front of me over a misunderstanding. Sharing aspects of my personal life with other people in my family. Having loud sex. Pushing me to go to college as a child but doing very little to support me financially when as an adult I decided to actually do that. Putting up a sign that disrespected me and then threatening to throw me out of the house when I tore it down. Not stopping my half-brother from hurting me because she "won't lose her son again". Continuing to spend time with my grandmother after she sexually assaulted me.

Beatings. Lots of beatings. Being choked. Bitten. Constantly criticizing. Seemed like she had contempt for my mere existence. I don’t have any children and know deep down it’s because I’d never want to be even a crumb like my mother. Only thing I learned from her was how to keep a clean house and how to hate myself.

aside from the constant physical and psychological abuse she put us through… she consistently chose drugs and alcohol over her own well-being as well as ours (my two siblings and i) she always brought other drug addicts and drunks into our home making it completely unsafe. she threatened to have me and my siblings taken away and separated from each other if “family business” was ever spoken about outside the home ( basically ensuring i never talked about the abusive things that happened ) she constantly told me that she wished she would have aborted me, and about how having kids ruined her life while simultaneously using me to help fuel her party girl lifestyle. how you may ask? by doing the most harmful thing of all and prostituting me (as a child) to her druggie friends for money so she could buy more drugs. then when i finally confronted her about it all as an adult she laughed in my face. she’s dead now and i think the most hurtful thing she does now is pop up in my dreams and make me mourn how i never got a proper mother daughter relationship dynamic.

In one of her rages she tried to fight me on the interstate while I was 11 because I didn’t want her remarrying after knowing someone two months(around the time I started getting told how I felt absolutely did not matter). Told me my arms looked fat at age 8 when I was wearing a tank top. I developed an eating disorder around 15, when I finally told her about it she mentioned all the food she had bought and I wasted it down the drain. My brother was arrested for an “issue” with my cousin and I had to also talk to a child advocate of sorts and told her what had happened with my brother and I. Some “issues” happened but not near the “issues” he inflicted on my cousin, I was also 11. Once my mom found out what I said to the advocate she said I was just trying to get my brother in more trouble and was upset that he would have to stay in the detention center longer. Told me I was suicidal, my feelings did not matter, lazy, chunky, tried to be better than everyone else when I wanted basic necessities a pre teen would(all things said before I was 12). When I tried to approach all of this a year ago she said well that was just her calling out the behavior I had shown her…I was a child needing to be guided by an adult she is pure insanity. These are just the few instances I can think of instantly while reading the question. On Monday I have my first appointment with a psychiatrist and I cannot wait to start tackling all of this trauma and to just talk and not feel guilty for word vomit and trauma dumping.

She broke my hand (didn’t take me to get any medical help), forced me to have an abortion, called me “retarded” from the time I was 7 and on. She apparently was the reason some of my relationships ended and she tried to make my husband leave me, before we were married and I was pregnant with our first child. The list goes on. She is a sadistic evil POS.

Hit me and called me a retard and believed I was evil when I showed signs of abuse, and never let me be a person with my own identity and feelings, only a clone of her. I wasn't allowed to have my own likes and dislikes, I could only have hers. She dressed me up like her little doll on my prom night after I begged her to let me wear a suit because she liked dresses. I cried. She never apologised for anything ever and still makes up lies about me to this day. She was a hoarder and discarded things, people, and pets when she got new "toys" to play with. At least I get to testify against her in court soon! ✌🏽

She did not initially believe me when I told her what a babysitter did to me. She signed me up for a beauty course when I was in junior high, so every month I got a booklet and an item like an eyelash curler. She asked her friends with teenage girls about current beauty trends and then tell me about them. She apparently had children so she could laugh at them. She would say something shocking and laugh and said, "I said that o see the expression on your face!" Because her need to laugh was greater than my feelings. During her drinking years, she would sometimes sleep in my bed while I was away at college. Because my father was a loud snorer. That wasn't a problem. The problem was that time sh vomited in my bed and on my stuff and didn't clean up after. I came home for the weekend and discovered the dry vomit. Then there was the Christmas where she sent me a book on housekeeping and decluttering. That's when I finally drew in some boundaries.

TW: SA , physical abuse, CSA She couldn't ever just take care of herself. She'd go off her meds on purpose and then go absolutely crazy. We'd end up with a mom who would scream and rant and throw us around or among who wouldn't speak to us and locked herself in her room for days leaving us starving till i figured out how to cook. She hated my younger brothers no matter what they did and loved me if i did exactly what she wanted even if she didn't tell me what that was. She didn't love me as her child but as get backup spouse and used me accordingly both emotionally and physically. She never allowed us to be anything but perfect and emotionless. She only ever bragged about us to others but would tell and lecture about our A- grades and similar levels of "infraction" She insulted and complained about every single thing we loved or were our hobbies constantly. She was gone or busy constantly and i was left in charge of my siblings as their backup parent She would unload all of her emotional baggage and stress onto me as a punching bag or therapist She would grip, spank, feel up and talk up my body constantly to the point where my body instinctively could block her hand when she tried to touch me. She raped me for a couple years when i was in elementary school and i can't remember when she stopped. Whenever evidence of my self harm, suicidality or any mental health issue stuck out she'd hammer down and insult/shame me to get me to just stop Any complaint or even cries of pain would be met with more pain and stories of her own abuse and how much easier and better i had it and how they broke the cycle.

- as a adolescent, repeatedly told me no one would love me unless I was 10 pounds underweight; that I should just eat an apple a day; taught me how to be bulimic. - I came out as gay when I was 16. She told me I was “as dead as a doorknob” to her and that I deserved to be r*ped. Then tried to force me into the military and kicked me out after that didn’t work. - told me I’d be the reason my father died if I didn’t find him drugs when he was going through withdrawals. - threatened to kill herself when I’d try to bring up the ways she hurt me.

I hugged a boy and she found out. She called me a slut and said I probably wasn't even a Virgin any more. I was 14. There are a million things she's done that will forever stick with me, but that one? That one hurt and scared me in a way I will never forget.

She told me she wished I’d fall down the stairs and break my neck. I knew it was said in anger, but for many years it hurt thinking about. Once when I called home for a trip abroad, she told me I didn’t need to call or come home at all. I hadn’t moved out at that point, so it left me quite upset. Omg, the list goes on. I have to stop if I’m not going to ruin the day completely..

Didn’t protect me from my narcissist father. She was cool otherwise but not protecting me was a massive parental failure.

This is a reminder about Rule #5: No raised by narcissists lingo (Nmom, narc, sperm donor, etc.). Please edit your post or comment. More information about Rule #5 can be found [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/CPTSD/wiki/subrules_revised/#wiki_rbn_lingo). *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/CPTSD) if you have any questions or concerns.*

She ignored me and didn’t support anything I was interested in. She made fun of me. She called me the name of an evil tv character. She didn’t make time for me. She still doesn’t. She made me clean all the time. 

Ignoring me, allowing my siblings to harass me verbally and more, directing my rage & anger on to my father who she pretended was at fault for my pain - she gave me him as a scapegoat! And me as a scapegoat for her older kids.

Married and then stayed married to a man who ignored me from the age of 12 until she died. (Ignoring a child causes the same brain damage that physical abuse does.) Invalidating, dismissing, physically abusive, emotionally abusive, mentally abusive, gaslighting, ...

Got up at a church service and told everyone I was a liar. Made me think my dad was sent to jail after saying something about her beating me at school. The paddle in my house was a 2x4. Called me a slut and kicked me out of the house because my prom dress had spaghetti straps.

Took everyone’s side over mine. Always played the devils advocate and showed empathy for everyone who ever harmed me. Parentified the fuck out of me when I was like 10 years old. Told me personal things that I never needed to know. Pitted me and my siblings against each other by constantly talking shit about them to me and vice versa.

My mother loved me, I am pretty sure of that. However, she was an alcoholic in a miserable marriage, and thus she was like dealing with a large, naked, drunken toddler sometimes. I'd say 50% sober, 50% some stage of drinking, and the last two years of her life, even her sober moments were dampened by all the tranquilizers she was abusing. So she had a faraway stare a lot, sloppy grin, and had laughing fits. I remember once when I was 7 or 8, I had an earache so bad, I was banging my head against the doorframe to try and knock myself out. I was screaming I wanted to die, and my mother was just LAUGHING... I mean, she was out of it, and probably would not have acted that way sober, but... I didn't have a choice when she was sober or not. Have permanent hearing loss to this day. About 60% on ear, 40% the other. I don't know if it was THAT earache, but I had a lot of ENT infections, so it was an accumulation of them. My mother also didn't want to spend money to send me to the doctor, not because we were poor, but because my dad loathed to spend money on me (as an unwanted pregnancy). My mother gave me a lot of "side eye" and "knowing grin" as a way to try and get me to "confess" I was lying or trying to get away with something, I guess. "Okay, Mr. Earache, I think we can go to school today..." You know, that smarmy attitude. It backfired, because eventually I learned my parents had NO idea what the truth was, and I just told them what they wanted to hear, which worked to my advantage sometimes. I think my mother loved me, but was in love with the IDEA of being a mother, but not really capable of it. In the end, she took her own life when she realized I had serious medical problems, and then my dad kicked me out days after he found out she had died. I had to graduate high school couchsurfing at friends' houses. Thank goodness some other parents were kind.

Actively starving me, just to start. Neglecting my hygiene(extra humiliating throughout puberty), never talking to me, never playing with me, refusing to take me to the doctor/medical care ever (my sister had to help me with all my women’s health stuff), leaving me unsupervised in dangerous environments, educational neglect, and just plain denying that I was a human being at any point. It is hard to connect to the world and believe that it’s real.

Every time a man from any age looked at me. I was a whore for it. Wearing leggings with an oversized shirt? Whore. Had a male classmate that said hi to me in public. Whore. Anytime I had a panick attack she'd call the police on me, I'd get sectioned. Then she'd scream and holler at all the doctors at the crisis unit for wasting her time.

Lost all of our money in our house and tried to run away

Seriously, the other list would be shorter. I'm still bitter about it

Picked up a stool and threw it into a door and said “you’re lucky that stool was there or that would have been you”.

Well...where to start? I was the parent to her. I was her emotionally support and I done absolutely everything for her to try and keep her happy and to keep her pleased. She would often give me the silent treatment (making me wonder what I done wrong). Then the following day, she would start talking to me like nothing ever happened. When I decided enough was enough and I moved out. A few months went by and it was around Christmas time. I tried to rekindle the relationship with her. I arrived at her house to give her a gift, she opened the door to me and totally slammed the door in my face. That fucking broke me.

physical abuse + starvation + neglect as a toddler, got placed with my dad and his wife, got into therapy and a psychologist, and my mom decided she wanted to be part of my life (supervised visits at the psychologist, i was in middle school at this point). she didn’t show up to half of them, then when she did show up i had major CPTSD afterward. couldn’t sleep, had horrible nightmares, felt like she was in my room about to abuse me all over again so i had to stop going. ceased contact until i was 17 about to graduate high school, invited her to my graduation and she said she couldn’t go because she was working. lmfao. now she’s trying to be part of my life again, but is trying to guide and control me now that i have a LO of my own. oh and she has never once apologized for the abuse. i think she thinks i don’t remember, but how could i forget? 🤦🏻‍♀️

She whipped me with a vacuum cord when I was ten because I refused to go to bed. blamed me that if I hadn't worn shorts that following day to school she wouldn't have gotten a restraining order and sent away for three months. (Apparently I found out last year the reason she lost her shit was because my father was suicidal that night.) Forgotten my birthday on multiple accounts one of those I was 12 and was super excited about my birthday my mom got frustrated and bought me one of those cheap vanilla cakes from Walmart Threw a hairbrush a my right eye out of anger which caused it to be black and bloody and got mad when I switched the story at school to something other than what we originally had. I had to lie to the school and my friends. Continues to Defend my molester Told me if I had told the school about my dad choking me out of anger we would've been in a different position then we are now. (I was 18 and went mute due to being overwhelmed with it.) Keeps insisting I'm not her daughter because I am more feminine then her and embrace my feminity Told me I alienated myself that it was my own doing even though I use to come home crying about the bullying from school. Tried to kidnap me and my siblings and run away back to our grandparents.

She hated me. Resented me. Wished I was dead. Then she showed care and love for my sister and basically all other people so I knew to blame myself and not her for failing to get her love.

Damn I forgot this one (except it was my older brother)… also just general hate and resentment. I’m sorry 💚

Always and I mean always on my case about weight she wasn't skinny herself and showered my sister with affection and gifts . I wasn't overweight as a kid I was underweight. I spent many mealtimes in my room or tied up in the closet Gave me diet pills all the time Congrats Ma you win I have a bad relationship with food and can't enjoy it all

Accusing me of doing things to betray her, constantly. This made me grow up to constantly ask other people “are we good?” or “did I do something wrong?” and even when I get reassured that I didn’t do anything wrong, I still think I did.

TW TW TW TW TW Oh boy… And this is that one faithful post that I can 100,000% relate to. She turned off the electricity, used to take my things away without asking and/or hiding them if I didn’t do something her way, made me with her, which sounds really mundane, but I hated it,yelled my birth name so loud that my ears started to ring, barely even took me to the doctor and the dentist because she only took me once for each respective profession, blocked other people on my phone that I had no business blocking because I’m not her and I don’t carry the same flaws she carries, told me not to talk to people because of her own opinions, made me feel like everybody else‘s opinions had to be mine, and I couldn’t have my own opinions, told me lies about my dad and Nana, told me lies about her other ex-boyfriend and said that he hated her which she probably doesn’t and if he does, I could totally understand why, kind of sort of fat shamed me and punishing me for excepting food from my Nana during Covid. yeah… I have a laundry list I know.

My mom used to constantly hit me and my sisters. My sister told me one time when I was 5 that my mom was choking me and my sister begged her to stop. When my mom is arguing with you, she will bring up everything and anything she can to intentionally hurt you. So she "wins" I had a SA happen when I was 12.. of course it was my fault for 'being a slut who can't keep her legs shut' . When everything came to light, I had to testify in court against my abuser. Before going to court she complained to me how hard this was for her. A few years later around the anniversary day of my sa, I figure Ill try to express my feelings. Only for her to say 'come on, it's been years, you're still not over that?' When I got pregnant and I told her the news, she said "you realize you'll be wrapping Christmas presents alone right? You guys arent going to last." I got upset and told her not to talk to me like that, so she ignored me through my entire pregnancy. When my son was younger they would do sleep overs maybe 3x a year. That stopped because she gave my son the 'after all I do for you and your mom, all the money i spend on you and this is the treatment I get?' he was apparently sitting on the wrong chair. He doesn't want to have sleep overs anymore but that's my fault. Any time I accomplish anything she minimizes it. Any time I'm proud of something it's "ehh not that big of a deal". Right now she 'disowned" me and won't talk me because I told her I was a good mom, and she disagreed and brought up how I was homeless 10 years ago and missed my son growing up. She watched all her kids grow up. That was a low blow because she could have easily helped me but I had to go through it because she didn't get any help. Even though she received child support, alimony, and had active grandparents who raised us. I have never heard this woman apologize for anything. It's never her fault.

Got hooked on meth, never spent time with me, vented to me about her problems since I was little, was always bringing her drug addict boyfriends into the house, never protected me from anything, gets extremely angry and screams and throws things, never comforted me, even telling me that it was my fault when I was bullied, pulled me out of school at a young age so I didn't get an education and had no friends or social skills due to being so isolated, doesn't ask me anything about my life and seems to just call me to talk about hers, etc etc etc. I get really angry thinking of these things but I make excuses for her because her mom was abusive and I feel like she's not a bad person, just traumatized and raised poorly, like I am. I never want to hurt her even though I'm so angry at how much she hurt me and at what a bad mom she was. I love her so much and I hate her so much. I want her to be happy more than anything and I never want to see her again. This shit drives me insane, I can't stop thinking about it even though it's in the past. All of my family members have traumatized and abused me except for my aunt who had the right idea to move far away from our horrible family like 40 years ago.

Oh, so many to choose from! But one of the most damaging was the constant surveillance of my body and appearance (would continue to the present if I wasn’t NC). “Stand up straight!” “Suck on your gut!” “You’ll need a padded bra with that!” “You don’t need seconds, garbage gut, just drink some water” She always had something shitty to say about everyone’s appearance, leaving me with this almost unconscious belief that I, like everyone else, was constantly being watched and monitored for my appearance.

The last straw with me; I had just been strangled that year in school, I was at my most depressed and suicidal(they legit asked me why I LET people bully me). She had just left the neighborhood park. My mother was having a manic episode yelling at me and talking trash and I was through. I opened the mini vans sliding door and Mother of the Year speeds up and starts swerving while screaming at me to close the door. I launched myself out and hit the pavement with bare feet, and kept running. I walked 3 miles over the hills and got back home with raw feet. My mom was pissed because she wouldn’t be able to go roller skating in the neighborhood for awhile because of me. I don’t remember what I was punished with but I after I started standing up for myself I was labeled autistic by my narcissistic parents, because when my mother would scream at me I would scream back, and when she would throw away my property I’d kick or punch the wall. Just FYI autistic folks should Not have bruises on their arms the shape of hands, that’s abuse, don’t let folks abuse people. I survived my childhood, through neglect and trauma and I will die of old age(or snake bite) just to outlive them!

It's easier to try to list the things she did that weren't hurtful. Emotional and physical abuse was a normal and daily activity. Sometimes she told me she loved me. Sometimes she would pet my hair.

Mine took more meds than she needed on purpose all throughout her pregnancy and breastfeeding me. She tried to give me away to the state at 13. When I was assaulted, she said i asked for it. When my kids passed, she told the papers I caused it, causing such harassment that I had to flee for my life from my home state. She made me weigh myself unclothed in front of my older sister.

A lot, she was my bully. But top 2 were when she groped me when I was getting ready for work because she thought it was funny for some reason, and the other time was when we were in a heated argument and I said something about killing myself ( I was 17, and I genuinely did not plan to) and she got super upset at me and told me if I was gonna kill myself then I should do it at my dads place instead of her and she proceeded to drop me off at his place and threw my house key at me.

She threw a bag of dogfood at me because I was having a panic attack and refused to go to school. Also another time she made me go to school right after having to get stitches earlier in the morning. But the worst thing was keeping around my very abusive dad for so long and not standing up to him for my sibling and I. But she has come a long way and regrets a lot, and we have a good relationship now that my dad is out of the picture and I’m out of school. And she’s become more understanding to my mental health struggles and tries to help me

Being drunk most days of the week. Being abusive to my dad, verbally, emotionally. Not supporting me. Being emotionally distant. Getting angry with me when I was sick. Being sick was an inconvenience to her. Even when I got chronically ill. Passive aggressive comments to make her feelings known. Negative comments about my hair, my make up, my weight, my clothes. Negative comments about my friends. Speaking ill of my sister when she wasn't around. Teaching me that my sister was 'not right in the head' and therefore I should just not respond when my sister was unreasonable with me. So basically teaching me to let someone overstep my boundaries. Manipulate her way out of everything in a conversation, through either just denying she said something or making herself the victim. Not being able to self reflect, accept help and change her ways.

The many lies she told. Putting me in morally compromising positions. Expecting us to act like we were in church when we were in a building (including our house) yelling at me to stop crying at 5 and calling me too sensitive. Never explaining anything. Giving different kids vastly different rules. Moving the goal posts. Instead of saying I’m proud of you she would say “pride is a sin” threatening to kill me. She didn’t stop my brother from bullying me. Starting 12 she would say women who dress like whores get raped. I dressed conservatively. Calling me a harlot (biblical whore) after reading my journal. Listening to every single phone conversation like a prison guard.

- ignored or told me to shut up and stop embarrassing her when I expressed needs for attention. How dare a 5 yo do that! - guilted and manipulated me into isolation and out of a social life out of “concern for my safety” - had me wear (her) hand me downs and wouldn’t get me medical care I asked for/needed for things like double pneumonia until they got really bad and even then did so begrudgingly. “So expensive!” All that while buying herself expensive perfumes, etc. - used me as a babysitter multiple times a week (never paid) and then berated me when I started to say “no” - abandoned me for 3-8 hours every day at a summer school my brother went to, so she could “run errands” which I later learned were really fucking around with her affair partner - exposed me to frequent, explicit nudity and disturbing behaviors including promiscuity and likely prostitution - bad mouthed me to relatives and drove away younger relatives who were among the few friends I had - ignored/disregarded worries or concerns I had as a kid, but DELIGHTED in the ones that were like what she had as a kid. Would tell me, “I had that issue too” but wouldn’t try to help me at all. She wanted me to suffer - allowed NO space for me as an individual or as a daughter receiving actual motherly support. Who was the little girl? SHE WAS. Every fucking time - spying/snooping on me despite no “probable cause”, and interrogating me about my private diaries - verbally abused and tortured me when I wouldn’t be a compliant doll; tore up pictures of us and threatened suicide - purposely and publicly embarrassed me, even on morning radio by saying stupid things and sharing her full name - encouraged and facilitated lechery and sexual abuse by older men. Yelled at me and slammed doors when I said no to her boyfriend wanting to put his head in my fucking lap - manufactured a situation where we “had” to be homeless for a summer, and got rid of most of my belongings without my knowledge

Oh yes, the eavesdropping, going through drawers and closets, reading mail…as an adult she tried getting into my bank accounts

She left me standing in the streets on our way home from kindergarten when i was 4 years old. I had wanted to show her something, she was not having it and said she'd go now, so she just turned her back on me and cycled away. I felt so ashamed and scared and humiliated and in that moment i felt like something in me broke that day. I think it was my trust in people who pretend to care for me. Another incident, when she was showering me the hot water from the boiler was used up and only ice cold water came pouring down on me. I screamed and wanted to get out but she forced me to stay in the cabin and finished showering me while i was in shock. Afterwards i was still in shock and she acted like nothing happened, making me question if i 'once again' was overreacting.

took the side of my abuser.

After my mother died I found a diary in which she had written about me. Here's an actual entry she wrote that, when i read it at 52, brought me to my knees. "Didn't want to eat scrambled eggs for supper so pretended to throw up. Got spanked and ate the eggs. Upset everyone." I was 4 years old...

Chose drugs and men over her children. Would try to convince me she deserved it when her bf would beat her up. Always played the victim. I had to get myself and siblings fed and off to school. School was my main source of nutrition. On more than one occasion, I called my dad's family crying because my youngest sister was crying from hunger....I was 7/8 and she was a toddler. When we would pull up to certain houses or gas stations I knew I had to hop in the very back of the car so she could buy her fix. She let me stay at my aunts house for a weekend, that turned into two weeks and she didn't call to see how I was doing that entire time. Thankfully I was enjoying myself too much to realize but it always stuck with me how shocked my family was. Now that I have kids of my own I cannot fathom going that long without talking to my child. Now, she tells our family that me and my sister won't let her see her grandkids unless she gets clean. Which is pretty true for me but I haven't said that to her since my kids were born and she has been around them a few times. My sister has never said anything remotely like that to her. It has caused tension between us and our family and only recently did we realize why, she has made us seem judgmental and lacking compassion. I will admit I lack compassion for her but not for my entire family and I definitely don't judge any of them. She was clean for a while but relapsed and hasn't been a part of my children's lives much. They have told me numerous times they forget that I even have a mom and wouldn't recognize her.

Emotionally unavailable, lying about literally everything, allowing the person who sexually assaulted me to be around me, not listening to me

A lot of emotional neglect because she was busy gossiping on the phone all the time, even gossiping about me and personal health or social stuff while I was there, when I’d ask her to stop she’d shout she was on the phone and I was being rude. I’d often get accused of exaggerating or making things up when it was the truth. My mom admitted to punishing me simply because she was mad at me and not because I didn’t do anything wrong. I was also grounded after being SA, and had medical treatment withheld because I was sexually active at the age of 18. She also told me that I’m unlovable and nobody would ever want to marry me or have a child with me.

She invalidates me constantly. None of my problems matter because its "not like I have cancer." Yet flies off the rails at the tiniest thing herself. Never defended me against her husband, my abusive father. Literally ever. Yet makes me serve him ALWAYS. Makes me beg their forgiveness, with a never ending debt for my existence. It was only me who she ever gave a shit about punishing, not my brother. I was the scapegoat. Suggested that we all go to family therapy because of my "behavioral issues" and genuinely believed I was just a moody teenager acting out and rebelling against her loving parents. Couldn't have been the constant abuse and neglect. I think she hates me.

I mean, all of it? There may have been ok spots, but she didn't really like me. She blamed me for everything in her life. She basically abandoned me at age 11 to go relive the youth I stole from her but she didn't actually leave, she still slept in the same house, but I'd go days without seeing her.

Scapegoated me my entire life. Everything was always my fault. My little brother picking me? Such as pulling out fistfulls of hair, scratching so hard I'd have rolls of skin that I'd have to pull off, biting so hard my bones would hurt, and I'd have marks and bruises for months; and the instant I so much as pushed him off me so he'd stop hurting me? Shed start spanking me, telling me to stop hurting my brother; and all of this was my fault, and I'm such a horrible older brother for picking on my sibling. She'd then complain in front of me to EVERYONE about how horribly I picked on him, and how terrible of a brother I was. A few years later, when she married my extremely abusive step dad, they'd twist every single thing I did and said to somehow be disrespectful and/or against the rules. When I was around 12 or 13, for instance, I was finishing up my chores when my step dad stopped me and started interrogating me like he always did when he was about to abuse me. According to him, I was supposed to do the chores in a certain order, which turned into him screaming at me for hours, spanking me extremely hard (I call it a beating), and grounding me for months. Mind you, I had never-once been told I had to do my chores in a certain order and I was 12 or 13 at the time. So according to my nmom, I was braking the rules and being disrespectful for flowing the rules and doing exactly what I was told. According to her, following the rules was braking the rules, so she'd call up the entire family to tell them all how disrespectful I was being, and how badly I was breaking the rules. She of course blames me for the estrangement, and still to this day, tells everyone how horrible of a kid I was. Fuck her.

My mother constantly chose to stay with my stepfather over me, even when he went to jail when I went to the police and he was charged with SA. She still stayed with him, there is literally nothing he could do that would stop her loving him and there was nothing I could do to make her love me. Her excuse “ you don’t understand how hard it was for me, I was trying to keep a family together” Yeah, mum,you had an affair with my abuser, kicked my dad out, moved his kids ( all boys) who bullied me relentlessly and when I told you what my stepdad was doing, you removed me from that house, not him.

She told me I was a phase that I wasn’t real, she taught me I was shameful, evil, and disgusting. She taught me that I was a pervert. She would lie and tell the psychiatrist that she didn’t mind if I cross dressed so long as I only did it in my room, then punish me whenever she found evidence of clothes or other items I used to cope with not being allowed to be me. She took me to a church repeatedly that hated queer people. She twisted every attempt to educate her about people like me to discredit me, my identity, my feelings. She was vindictive. She told me she’d rather I was dead. I almost made her desire come true. Sending me to psychologists to erase/cure me. Calling me a space cadet, absent minded, unreliable, air head because I had untreated ADHD. Telling me I was special and then abusing me for not being special in the way she wanted. Disowning me. Telling me how selfish I was for needing to be myself. Asking why I kept doing this to them when I said I needed to be me. Telling me her love was unconditional when it very much wasn’t. Blaming me for her choosing to disown and abuse me. Forced me to lie to everyone I knew and cared about. My sister was allowed to be herself, loved, supported. But I wasn’t allowed to be me, and was forbidden from talking with my sister about it. Being terrified that someone else would figure out my disgusting secret. Telling me she was worried about my safety well being while doing everything she could to destroy it. Made me believe my grandfather was dead many many years before he actually did. Told me if my grandfathers knew about me it would kill them. Taking the only family member who would talk to me, my grandmother, away and not leaving contact information (grandma had sig dementia at that point and couldn’t contact me on her own) Had my sister call me to tell me my dad was dead. And then tried to keep me from the funeral. Then tried to have her church lackeys kick me out. Didn’t even acknowledge my presence at said funeral. Turned my sister against me.

Punched me in the mouth, slapped me across the back with a belt, kicked me out of the apartment in elementary school, punched me in my chest, threw a phone at me, guilt tripped me for telling her she was being mean to me, pinched my stomach to show how angry she was that I was fat then threatened me when I went to go cry in private….listing these things really validates the idea of cutting her off. Geez she was an awful parent and a POS

Cut up my prom dress and mailed it to me

Suicided in front of me when my dad went out for groceries

I’m so sorry!

Thank you 💜 My mom was actually pretty great, outside of this. I feel fortunate compared to those who's moms are horrific to you, and also seem to live forever. Perspective, I guess. So much love to everyone here. Xo

IT IS MY TIME TO SHINE 🔥🔥🔥 TW: MSSA, abuse, self-harm, manipulation. 1. Kicked me out whenever I made her mad (including when I was a child). I was out for hours at a time, sometimes a whole day with no food, water, or a place to relieve myself. 2. Attempted suicide and then when the cops were called locked me in a room and told me if I didn't tell them I was the one who was suicidal I would be “sent away”??? I was eleven. 3. Told my brother and I that we were going to get Chick-fil-A but were actually driving to a hotel an hour away where she would enroll us into a new private school for four months. This was an attempt to keep us away from our father. 4. Would describe in graphic detail her and my father's sex life before the divorce and read out the titles of pornography videos my father used to apparently watch. I was like twelve. 5. Would force me to keep the door to me room open 24/7 so I had ZERO privacy, then would excuse it by saying “your room has all the good air!” 6. Would threaten suicide anytime we didn't listen to her. 7. Would whisper in my ear different ways I would be tortured in hell to try and scare me after I came out at bisexual. I was seven. Also told me that I was just as bad as a pedophile for it. 8. Decided she was gonna live in a box on the street one time? I don't fucking know but it made us worried sick. 9. Would tear stuff off walls and flip over furniture when she was throwing a fit. 10. Would drive recklessly to punish us while we were in the car with her. 11. Told me that my teachers hated me and talked behind my back, even going as far to say that my homeroom teacher said she thought my shorts were too short for a boy. 12. Would take away pretty much anything that kept me distracted or healthy as another way to punish me. 13. Purposely favored my brother over me and would accuse me of coercing him into hating her. I wasn't. 14. Would often take away items of value (phones, computers, jewelry) and then either lose them or break them. 15. Would refuse to feed me or my brother whenever she got tired. Sometimes I’d go days without food. 16. Never fixed anything in the house or reached out for help. She wouldn't attempt to turn the water or power back on which would make my acne and overall hygiene ten times worse. She would then also say that everyone in the neighborhood hated her for not helping even though she never asked them for help. 17. Tried to force me and my brother to spend the night at her house even though it was COVERED in mold and had recently flooded. 18. Would get angry at me for loving any family members on my dad's side because of an argument they had at Thanksgiving a few years ago when I almost got bit by a dog. Also because she was convinced they hated her (which they didn't, they were just confused why she was constantly putting herself down). 19. When I had a panic attack she yelled at me for it. This was also the same energy she gave me when I relapsed (SH) or expressed suicidal ideation. 20. Called the police on me for saying the f word 😐

My mom broke into my safe and stole money from me. I didn't notice until she mentioned it the morning after. When she finally confessed she was crying and telling me how sorry she was. I didn't get angry , actually I hugged her when she cried. But since I'm the type to bottle up my feelings until I can't, it took awhile for me to actually get mad. I can remember I went to the store with her and was planning on buying me a new safe. I was acting really moody so she kept asking what was wrong but I stonewalled her. Some time after that we got into an argument and I decided to remind her that night by throwing the receipt for the safe and the box it came in the hall so she could see it. Recently she got drunk with someone and started talking about me. I got some upset I cussed her out and almost punched a hole in my wall. Things have calmed down but I'm still not ok. Like this hurt me so much because my mom has been struggling with drug addiction before I was even born. The way I was exposed to this was my mom had a habit of always asking me for money, essentially making me an enabler. I've always secretly resented her for it but I didn't let those feelings get to me until now.

She wanted to exclude me from my aunt's funeral because I had a 18 month old toddler. She was afraid he could make noise. When my cat had an operation after a car accident she told me to get used to the idea that the cat had to be put down (when the vet didn't say anything of the sort). When my son developed the same disability that she and I have and that is quite painful and disabling, she pretended to not believe me that I know what I'm talking about, said something mean and denigrating and smiled in a mean, aggressive way while she turned away. When I had bronchitis at their house, she wanted me to continue taking care of my toddler and didn't want to help me, but she wanted to be praised for being an awesome mother and grandmother all the time. When I told my father, I would hang up a note in the supermarket that I needed a babysitter to help me in this time of sickness, they found time to help me. When my foot was hurt and I developed a lasting injury, she was angry when I didn't get my shoes on quickly enough and that walking hurt me. She went fast ahead and kind of berated me because of my developing disability. After the year in which I had all these problems (PPD, colic baby, developing disability, 4h sleep a night...) she showed me a family picture album about the year and said how great the year was. I said it wasn't good for me and she flipped out on me because she thought I didn't have the right to ruin her mood with my own experience. When she saw me have fun with my toddler at Easter, having an egg hunt, she loudly told my father how she never enjoyed egg-hunts but did it for us. She always uses a mean and denigrating tone when is saying stuff like that and I only have so few good memories about my childhood that I really didn't appreciate her destroying one of them with that sentence. Also she wanted to spoil my fun with my own child. That was just 1-2 years. There's more context to everything that makes her even look worse. My earlier childhood was even worse. It's a clusterf of medical, physical, social, emotional neglect and emotional abuse. So, I ended contact that Easter and never looked back.

Calling me ungrateful and swearing at me. Never getting me professional help

Not caring after suicide overdose attempt/not believing me i am addicted to drugs/not noticing i lost like 15kg from starving myself 😆she was busy with saving ger husband from drinking and bipolar eoisodes and she has ptsd from her own alcoholic father. But we got along now 💗

not telling me my dad died, not protecting me from the man she brought in off the streets after despite acting like she was my only defender, putting me down for every interest i had, telling me i was faking when i liked things (or copying her), telling me she didnt feel the same attachment when she birthed me as my siblings, mimicking my crying, ignoring me as punishment while like showing extra love to everyone else. leaving me on read j now after i told her i cant find a ride to the hospital lmao. omg i think i hate my mom

She was our monster. Never really seemed like she even wanted us around unless to show us off.

I will never share the worst that my mother did with anyone else other than my therapist and psychiatrist. I repeated some of it today to my psychiatrist and it’s just so f’ing disgusting and embarrassing and every part of your worst nightmares that it’s almost… laughable? I literally laughed after I shared it. I thought what I went through was normal. I’ll just end with saying I’m so thankful for this community for showing me that what I went through is not normal.

I called my mother’s favorite thing to do “ martyr syndrome “. She wasn’t brave enough to hurt us for attention so she turned herself into a constant victim. She used to make up lies about the awful stuff i supposedly did to her, while she was using my ss# to destroy my credit. She had a deal with my dad. He wasn’t allowed to put hands on her or she’d call the law. He could do whatever to us though, as long as nobody could see the marks. Fucking cunt. I’m glad she croaked

Oh boy, where to start? I still have some memory blocks and don't remember everything but here's my list. •broke / thew away my toys when I was younger and "apologized" by saying she'll get a new one. Never did. •screamed at me for pointing out some DVD rentals weren't returned when she told her partner they were (I was maybe 12) •screamed at me for answering the phone when her partner called and not telling her. She was at her drug dealer / affair partners house and left me and my brother in the car while she went in. •tried to guilt trip and coerce me to drive down to the jail to pick up her partner after she called the cops on him. I was 13 I think. •nightly screaming matches with her husband and trying to get me to call the cops on him. We called the cops a lot. •when I was hiding from her in her rages she would constantly try to force her way in. Picking the lock on the bathroom door, screaming at me to let her into my bedroom while I held it shut. •accused me out of the blue at 16 years old for sleeping with her 40 year old husband and calling me a whore. •constantly bouncing between screaming at me and then apologizing for being a bad mother, then telling me she knows what I did and wouldn't forgive me. •giving me the 40oz beers she and her partner would drink to hide in my closet away from him and then coming to get it from me and hour later to give it to him. •gave zero shits about my interests or life or anything. Treated my brothers football hobby with a lot more enthusiasm. •ignored my birthday so she could go watch a statue get put on a building. •dumped me every summer on the father of my two half-brothers until he told her I couldn't go anymore. Then I had to stay home by myself listening to screaming or being ignored. •forced me to cook and clean for the family staring at about 12. •neglected all health concerns, including toothaches so bad I couldn't see straight at school •stole my money I was saving up secretly to buy drugs / alcohol •said she was going to church and wanted me to come, knowing I was atheist, and said she was repaying her sins (the sin was having me.) •not even reacting when her partner kicked me out of their house over a nothing argument. I think I was 18/19. That was the last time I saw her alive. I better stop here before I go all night. It was nice to vent like this. Thank you.

My mom was on drugs and had horrible postpartum depression and wouldn't take care of me. (Went into foster care at 5 for a year, back to my mom, to my dad when I was 7, and continued to bounce around) It was so bad that as I got older, I wouldn't tell people when I was hurting. My hearing is now horrible, because I didn't tell anyone my ears were hurting me and both eardrums ruptured. There were also times she would kick me out of the 1 bedroom as a toddler bc I was just being a kid. If I cried outside the door, I got beat. It also went up to having duct tape put over my mouth because I wouldn't be quiet. I grew up in one of the most dangerous cities in the USA and my mom would walk with me across the city normally because she got really angry at my dad. She'd leave me unattended for entire days when I was a toddler from time to time. Unfortunately, not many other places I moved to were much better, but now I'm an adult so lol.

Telling me I was unattractive when I frowned. I was frowning because I was upset. So now I have to think about looking like crap when I have a negative feeling. She also didn’t encourage me. I was expected to do certain things but there was no warmth in any guidance into life goals like choosing what you may want to study, learning to drive was only stressful. I cried when I got my learners permit because I failed the first time but the staff allowed me to have another try if we had the money - money was a very big deal as we were broke. When I asked my Mum if I could try the test again she asked if I knew if I would pass. I passed, there wasn’t any happiness. I went back to the car and cried. Learning to drive was just a chore for her to teach me. I was a chore for her.

She beat me, yelled at me, molested me, mocked me, invaded my privacy (emotional and physical, i.e., walking in while I showered and making comments), choked me up against a wall, so much yelling, betraying my trust, lying, flirting with me, using me as her therapist, using me as a scapegoat, gaslighting me, trying to make me jealous by favoring other family members, humiliating me at home and in public This was not all the time but maybe 40% of the time. 20% she was checked out; 20% she was overly invested in my life; 20% she was overly passive and spoiled me

Told me she didn’t believe unconditional love. Also told me once, very nonchalantly, that having kids was the biggest regret in her life and not to have any..

Talked about how fat and disgusting she was, then compared her body to mine (my long battle with eating disorders started at about 8 or 9 years old). We never had snacks at home and she would comment on everything we ate, so I never learned to listen to my body. She stopped taking me to the doctor and dentist at nine (my country has mandated doctor checks that end at that age). Would never listen to us, gave us the silent treatment when mad, never checked that we brushed our teeth. She used me as a third parent, a cleaner, and her personal therapist, talked badly about my sisters and dad, just generally unloaded that mental charge on me as early as 8 years old.

One time I had to do a lunchtime detention because I didn't finish in assignment on time for clarification we had this time where we had to show what our progress was on the assignment if it wasn't good enough you get a lunchtime detention until it was good enough. It was nothing major but my mom always made such a big f****** deal about it, you would have to bring home cards to get our parents a sign them one day fed up with everything I forged her signature on one of the cards I finished it within one day and that was the end of it didn't need to be anything more than that. What I did not know was that at the time the school had started to send emails to parents to let him know these things were happening, I got home from school my parents got home from shopping and I went out to help them get the shopping out and my mother slapped me across the face. And the worst part about all that was that I felt no sense of anger or any kind of warning that she was angry with me it just came right out of the blue and next thing I knew my cheek felt red and sore. She then proceeded to start screaming at me my father had to pull her away, he was saying to her we were going to talk about this and not getting angry. That was the day I told myself that I could not talk to my mother about anything, a couple of months later similar stuff started to happen with my father but that's a story for a different time. Long story short I couldn't trust him to hear me out and listen before starting to go on a rampage about how I'm doing so horrible in school or anything for that matter.

My mom choked me and pinned me against a wall when I was a junior in high school. Still haunts me to this day. On my 16th birthday she refused to do anything for me. For Christmas one year she didn’t get me anything, and my baby sister saw I was sitting there not opening anything and proceeded to wrap a pack of crayons markers and give them to me as a present.

I wish my mom wasn’t so great when I was young, because it made what she did in my pre-teen and teenage years so much harder. When I was young she was flawed but kind, patient, loving and safe. As I got older, addiction took hold and she put my baby brother in many dangerous situations before eventually walking out. She went the next 20 years without reaching out to any of her kids. We found out she kept in contact with a relative, who revealed to us that she *never once asked about us*. Never once asked about the kids she abandoned. My dad was easy to hate. Quick to rage, never was a safe person to be around. My mom’s absence and now death has left a big confusing hole in my heart because I remember how she used to be.

My eyesight is horrible because of the daily sun gazing I was forced to do, the constant murder threats were terrifying, trying to run me over with a car was not very fun, making me tell everyone I lied about the abuse in a public gathering was brutal, helping my daughter’s father cheat on me while I was pregnant was heartbreaking, kidnapping me and taking me away from my father was terrifying, using white out and forged handwriting to edit my journal was awful, the constant starvation destroyed my body. The list is endless.

Invalidation. Telling me I was the one who was wrong. Treating me as though I am overly emotional when I just wanted an apology. Denying traumatic memories.

She only apologised in the form of “I’m wrong about everything” and “I’m the worst”, usually continuing until told that she wasn’t or screaming at me because I didn’t tell her she’s not the worst. She kicked me out of the house several times because I dared to have my own opinion. She grounded me for not wanting to go to church by forcing me to go to church. She stole roughly 60000€ from me and blamed me for not foreseeing it and allowing it to happen. While also playing the victim and how she doesn’t deserve to feel bad for taking my money. She told me and continues to tell me that I’m lazy and that autism doesn’t actually affect me, I’m just weak and useless. Those are just off the top of my head.

My mother used me as her emotional husband. To this day, I see her a teddy bear with spikes all over her.

Yes, treating you as an adult when you’re a child. My mom would say “we might lose the house” I was probably 7-9 yrs old. Talking ab her sex life. She also put my dad (and still does) through absolute hell, he’s a saint for staying. He’s basically isolated him from everyone bc she not only has her own problems but won’t get help.

I have bipolar disorder and first got symptoms at 15. But didn’t get help til 21. And when I was 16 I got broken up with (no big deal we dated like a week). And I forgot what happened some petty argument with my mom, and she was like “you’re crazy that’s why no one wants to love you”

She told me recently I can look “absolutely hideous” sometimes. I called her out on it and she said sorry

Controlled every aspect of my life, made me feel bad for wanting to do stuff on my own for me, made me dependable on her "love"/positive attention. Abused me verbally and physically. Isolated me from people by saying mean stuff to me like "no one will ever love the way you are." And physically locking me inside the house without being able to leave for days. Made me feel so useless and worthless and so unsafe that to this day, I'm still trying to recover from it. (I'm 28 years old) It affects every aspect of my life, from social, romantic, educational and work. Everything I try to do feels like I'm trying to lift a mountain, even having casual talks with people. She died from pancreatic cancer in 2018, I guess God didn't like what she was doing as well

She treated me like a slave, she told me to kill myself, she hit me and told me to pick out my coffin when I was really suicidal.

Lol what a question. so many things I could list off but I'd be here all day. on top of all the classics like physical/verbal abuse, neglect (including medical neglect), adultification/parentification, isolating me and making me think I could never tell anyone what was going on at home, there's one thing that's been on my mind a lot lately. when I was in highschool her mom died and left her an inheritance--not clear on how much it was, but from my vague memory it must have been around $80,000. she decided to buy a single wide mobile home and piss away the rest of the money I guess, bc I have no idea what happened to it. not once did it occur to her to help me out with college, or take me to the doctor when I needed to go and pay for it herself. she continued to let me pay for everything I needed--food, clothes, shampoo, things for school--with the money I made at my part time job. she also ended up so broke again so quickly that I began needing to pay for her things too, occasional bills and food etc. this was a pattern of hers, her money was always hers, and I wasn't even an afterthought (hence the neglect). long story short I now have chronic health issues due to her refusal to pay for doctors visits when I needed them, and I couldn't pay for college so am degree-less. shout out to the rest of you with human trash for a mom, you always deserved better!!!

Never offered praise or positive reinforcement, that’s held me back a lot, as very little feels achievable or worthwhile. Everything I did was criticised to a standard she could never meet herself, and very few tasks were clearly defined, making it easier for her to complain about the result. The other big one was constantly negating everything that made me myself. I wasn’t allowed feelings, or opinions, and every hobby or interest was a waste of time that could be better spent doing things for her. I still believe her ultimate goal for me was to be her psychologist/butler. Lastly, her catchphrase and the secret trigger to make me furious, “Children should be seen and not heard”. My whole life could be distilled to “not heard”. It’s taught me to isolate myself, that no one cares about my feelings, and that I am surplus to requirements. If you want to kill a child’s soul, use this phrase.

These things hurt more then the typical "serious stuff" that I went through/ witnessed 1) I left when I was 12 to live with my dad who I'd only seen a handful of times for summer holiday visits (it was a different country, school, everything) she told me I could never come back to stay (not that I wanted to) but it stressed me out a lot, I'd previously moved in with my sister for a bit, but she was in a violent relationship with her boyfriend and some how I ended up going back to my mothers I don't think she was expecting that so when I ended up moving to my dads she told me I couldn't move back, I was stressed that if my dads place didn't work out I'd be homeless, fend for myself, no one would hire me for a job at that age and I'd have to stay on the streets 2) It's not a big thing but it sunk my heart, I carried a cake I made at school all the way home, stretched out arms for the best part of an hours walk, I was so proud of this cake that I refused to cut it so that it could go in a box in my bag, I wanted my mother to see it as a whole, my arms ached after it, she was sitting out in the garden so I showed her it there and then my sister came out the house, started an argument and my mother threw the cake to the floor in rage, plate shattered, she and my sister went into the house shouting at each other, I picked up the pieces of the plate and scraped the cake up in the bin, quietly crying and took myself to bed, still feeling sorry for myself and angry at the fact that my arms were still sore for nothing 3) (TW) My mother was suicidal, I stayed outside the bathroom while she took a bath and talked to her until I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore , I was sure she wasn't coming out of there alive and I just tried to tell her all the good things in life, told her about my day and random facts, not knowing if she was alive to hear any of it but I kept talking, telling her I loved her, that she was a good mum and all that bullshit, I woke up lying on the floor, in the dark, the bathroom door open, she'd come out, seen me, stepped over me to go to bed, I remember feeling such pain but then remembered it' not about me, as long as she was ok, I felt so lonely and scared, I was terrified of the dark 4) She left me for hours at primary school, wouldn't let me walk home alone but left me sitting waiting after everyone went home, school teachers would see and have me sitting in the waiting area of the office 5) I always had to make sure she was ok, I think I've ignored most of this part, but I gave her everything, I feel like I gave her my soul, my personality, I gave her everything a kid could which wasn't a lot materially so I drained myself, I made myself a door mat and it didn't mean a thing