25 Years Of Abuse From Mom

[imstillalive]

I do not have those concerns. My Mom and I think yours do what they damn well please no matter who it h...

What helped you realize that you had to cut her out of your life? Is there a way you think that I could reach that state earlier on in my life? Sometimes I worry too because I think that maybe things will get better when I'm married or when I graduate and have a job but I also know in the back of my head that there is no guarantee that anything will be better and it might just be my own hopeful thinking again. I don't think you sound cold or heartless, I know you had to do what's best for your own life. I'm just having a hard time following in those footsteps from fear and guilt. I do however, agree with your actions 100% as I feel like that is probably my only option as well in order to have a better life. And yes I know what you mean about the 200lb brick phone...I'm so paranoid that I always make sure to have my phone on me or close by because I feel like if I miss one of her calls she will lose it or give attitude. I wish moving to another state meant that I could just not visit her anymore but I still do every weekend. This cycle needs to eventually stop, it's a matter of when.

 

[Hooper]

What finally did it was when we got a $100k plus judgement that was paid from a conman she trusted and not only never said thank you but threatened to sue me over putting other assets in trusts. Her abusiveness is only rivaled by her incompetence. Property was going to be lost because she had not paid property taxes. We got her higher rents and took no compensation but were paid with heaps of grief. I still play a small part in her finances. Your situation is much simpler. She has threatened to kill you and herself. She's attempted to kill herself so your fear is more than justified. A restraining order would be mild in my opinion. Ask for space and if it is not given then demand it. I get that it is not your style but she will out assert you if you don't follow through. You have everything to gain and nothing to lose unless she would follow up on threats of old. If that's the case you definitely need to remove yourself from her life. I get your fear but your guilt is misplaced. There was a time in my life when I thought I had cancer (didn't) and general to extreme dysfunctional family situation where I just strapped on a back pack and left. I was gone for 4 months and traveled all through Mexico and central america. I know that is extreme but when your mortality is shoved in your face and you have nothing to lose it's quite liberating. That was in the mid 90's and cost $3k. Did me a world of good. It scared the hell out of my family. They actually thought I was dead because I'd call once a week. If no one answered I'd take a 3 hour ride by boat to where there were no phones or computers and try again a week later which went on for a month. You will be fine especially with the support of the likes of your boyfriend but it's not like you have to have that. I know I am not conventional but neither is your situation. Your Mom has had it her way for 25 years. It's your turn. You can print this out and take it to your therapist, boyfriend, Dad or whomever you trust. I am concerned your Mom may still be dangerous so think it out but you can do this. One day your Mom will die. One day you will die. Between now and then live. I've been skewered for some of my posts before and this may be one of them but I really think your Mom is a hopeless cause. You are not.

 

[imstillalive]

What finally did it was when we got a $100k plus judgement that was paid from a conman she trusted and n...

I think it sounds amazing you could just go to Mexico like that for a while. I wish I could do something similar. I can't imagine just leaving for 4 months like that to travel around and find myself because I feel like I have too much responsibilities here. It's very difficult for me to even set some more ground rules on my mom to make her talk to me less or to just give me more freedom. In the back of my head i know that I will likely outlive her, (thank goodness) but it's just hard to imagine the future where I am actually free of this. It's nice to know you believe I can get out of this and that I'm not hopeless. Sometimes it's just helpful to know I'm not alone in this and I'm trying to develop a wider circle of people I can talk to about this when I am feeling especially low. How long have you participated on this site? I'm sure it was and still is plenty helpful.

 

[Hooper]

This took too long to respond but I've been here for 2 Aprils but it seems like a very long time ago. This is a unique place. I came because of the difficulty I was having with my wife's rape at the age of 13. I found out who he was through a lot of work during time I would normally spend sleeping because I was unable to at the time once I knew the full details. It was a very difficult period that has gradually gotten better. I was searching google and stumbled across this site. It is full of people that have endured more crap than you can imagine who will give there no holds barred opinion of whatever you ask or whatever you are doing that they agree or disagree with. So I posted my story and wound up in a much better place although I still have a lot of issues with the whole situation. What I can do is sleep which greatly aids in thinking straight and not doing something stupid or more importantly damaging to my wife.

I can't imagine just leaving for 4 months like that to travel around and find myself because I feel like I have too much responsibilities here. It's very difficult for me to even set some more ground rules on my mom to make her talk to me less or to just give me more freedom.

I understand most people don't thing they can just get up and go but I knew if I didn't do it when I was single without any kids it may never happen. Your definition of freedom is totally different from mine. If you expect someone who is controlling and manipulating you to give you freedom you will never get that. Freedom is kind of like privacy. You have to assert it. I know I am probably being tracked and my identity could be revealed but I don't really care. I'm not doing anything illegal so I don't have to get on here with proxies and exert my privacy. Freedom is different. You either are or you are not free and you have to exert it. If you don't assert your freedom you will never have it. There is a reason people have fought and died for it. Your freedom will not be given to you until you take it. If you wait for your mother's death it is likely that by that point you will have given your freedom to someone else. In a lot of ways I no longer have a certain degree of freedom I had at your age but I made a good trade for my wife and kids. I could never pack my bags and go now nor would I want to. I'm a good 15 years away from that but I do think my life will continue to be unconventional. Again best of luck.

 

[imstillalive]

This took too long to respond but I've been here for 2 Aprils but it seems like a very long time ago. T...

I'm so terribly sorry that had to happen to your wife but I am very glad that you are able to move past it with the help from the people on this website. I can't imagine how awful I would feel if someone I cared about so much had to endure something so awful only to find out about it so long afterwards. I can only hope that your wife is coping with the ordeal. I was molested by a child by a older cousin and never got to telling my therapist or anyone about it really, except my boyfriend. For some reason it doesn't cross my mind as much, maybe because I'm usually much more focused on my mother and how much trauma she's caused me even though I'm sure what happened to me when I was much younger affected my ideas of sex and love.

I would love to have the kind of freedom that you are describing and just to have even more privacy from my mother or even just have a more separate life from her. I've never had that sense of freedom from her and it could be because the way she was raised or maybe because of Chinese culture in general. For example when I used to live with her, she didn't want me to close the bathroom door ever. She believed that, since we are mother and daughter we are close, there should be no secrets, even when you're taking a shit. It's better now because I don't live with her anymore but when I visit her every weekend sometimes she just forces her way into the bathroom with me while I'm trying to seek some privacy. My mom has boundaries issues where she both doesn't respect my physical boundaries and also doesn't have much of a filter of what she says to me. She taught me about sex in graphic detail (ie, anal, blowjobs, pleasure, etc) way too early and didn't even tell me I shouldn't have brought it up to the other kids in my 2nd grade class which got me in trouble. According to her, she taught me because she didn't want me to get pregnant and to have a man screw me over like she thought my dad did to her. She also is still over possessive over me that she always refer to whatever one of us does as both of us doing the same thing and any accomplishment is shared. This only applies to accomplishments though, anything bad will always be only my fault. She will never admit that she had any part of something wrong and even if I'm not nearby her and she does something wrong, she will yell out that I messed her up somehow, whether from distracting her or I misplaced something or some other random obscure excuse that she instantly comes up with.

Since I've always been her scapegoat ever since I was little, I find it very hard to pull away from her and have that freedom you were talking about. Even though I tell myself all the time that I shouldn't be worried about her or feel guilty about her I still do all the time. I even had a nightmare being sad last night and guilt tripping me and even though nothing physically terrible happened to me in the dream I still woke up feeling very fearful and panicked. I know one day I will have to stand up to her and assert my freedom like you say but it seems so hard to get to that point.

 

[Hooper]

Actually my wife is currently handling it better than me but she's had much longer to process it and I am doing much better. Out of curiosity is your father and boyfriend Chinese as well? If I had to guess I'd say your boyfriend is not since he seems to think like me. If asserting your complete freedom is too much for you what about some freedom like 1 call a day or every 2 days. Give her something that will provoke her. When she snaps remind her of the past when she threatened to kill you. Less time is a good compromise. It's a partial killing of sorts. I know what changed my relationship with my Mom was when I quit just taking the abuse. One day I fought back. We went from her terms to mine. My hope was that it would steer conversations into something bearable but it didn't. Once I concluded it was hopeless I withdrew completely.

 

[imstillalive]

My boyfriend is actually Chinese. He's just interested in many western philosophies (stoicism) as well as some eastern ones such as Buddhism and he tries to apply those concepts into my situation. My dad is Taiwanese but he divorced my mother when I was 9. He knew about the abuse and her drunkenness all too well but when anything bad happened he would just turn a blind eye.

My mom is the queen of rewriting history, she sort of lives in her own reality many times. I've tried bringing up some of her past behaviors and she almost always either doesn't remember or somehow twists around to make it sound a lot less severe. I can never tell if she actually remembers doing any of the terrible things that she did to me partly because she was so drunk during that time period. In either case, most of the time she talks as if she gave me a relatively decent childhood. She said to me last month how lucky I am to have lived a normal and happy childhood and traveled the world with her (we went to a few foreign countries over the years, but the trips were abusive, controlling, and upsetting). She seems to only remember the good times and constantly makes up happy and random stories in her mind that she believes actually happened. The only thing she will admit was bad about my childhood was that I didn't have a father or fatherly figure but this is because the divorce affected her so severely.

I always tell myself that it would be so great if either her or I could cut each other out of our lives or disown one another if I ever actually did confront her. I always worry though that if we were to have that confrontation and she would say to never call her again or interact with her again, I know she would call me constantly or late at night drunk and it wouldn't actually be any disowning or separation it would just make the situation a lot worst. I always tell my boyfriend that it would be great if she would just disown but actually make it permanent and really leave me alone. I know I could just block her number and not visit on the weekends anymore to avoid seeing her but I also know somewhere in my heart that I will eventually see her again and then it's another thing on her list to hold against me. But of course one must take a step forward in order to make anything happen at all.