Ask Lemmy

There are so many things.

After I was in a car accident in college, my mom convinced me that it was too risky to take my car to a shop in the city where I lived, so I let her take it to her own mechanic.

Months went by, and every time I asked about it, she claimed it was still at the shop and she had no idea why it was taking so long.

After I lost both my jobs because I didn't have reliable transportation, I found out that my mom hadn't taken my car to the shop.

She had been letting my younger brother, who still lived at home, drive my (unrepaired!) car to community college so she didn't have to give him a ride.

She got drunk and was crying about her regret about not aborting me. She came from a larger family and wanted more kids than she ended up having, but my dad's personal limit was 2-3 kids — and kid number three was only to try for a daughter if kid number 2 ended up being another boy. Me being a girl meant that she could only have two kids, and the fact that I was pretty fucked up means that she felt like she'd "wasted" a kid on me, so to speak

I don't blame my mum for having these thoughts, as awful as they may be. At the time, I had not long since been diagnosed with autism, and my mental health was pretty awful too, which must've been a lot of stress for a parent to handle. What I do blame her for is being deeply depressed and having her teenage daughter be her primary (and basically only) emotional outlet.

Whilst I am theoretically open to having a relationship with her in future, if she ever got sober (though that seems unlikely I'd learn of her being sober, as I went No Contact with her years ago), I'll never be able to forget how much she hurt me. She wasn't the root cause of my mental health problems, but she certainly made them a hell of a lot worse. And given that she never remembered the stuff she said when she was this drunk, I'll never get the closure of a genuine apology.

What's especially tragic about my mum is that she's actually pretty well adjusted, considering the awful childhood she had. The main thing she wanted from life was to be a mum, and to do a better job than her own mum had. I do think she achieved that, and there are so many things that I feel appreciative of her for. Unfortunately, no amount of good can make up for the hurt that she caused when she'd get drunk and pile her grief onto me. Most of the time her drunken tears were far less hurtful, but it's still a heavy burden to put on an already struggling teenager.

It's a shame, because I think she could've been an incredible parent if she'd been able to get therapy in the few years after she moved out but before she fell pregnant.

Refused to acknowledge cystic fibrosis is actually a real difficult struggle that I needed help and support with

Calling me heretic and deviant in my early teens, Getting enormously angry when I try to challenge their viewpoints (once they said that even if we are wrong, you have to say that we are right, upon which I remained silent and they get angry), Being against other religions and ideologies, mocking them and calling LGBTQ+ a mental illness (luckily, I did not come out to them), Being angry and thinking I am arrogant if I choose not to talk to them and to be in my own space, Forcing me to eat and drink a lot more than I want, Comparing and belittling me yet still saying "We love you", Not letting me go outside and now they complain why I don't go outside, Always saying, "We did not even beat you or did anything physical. We give you so much comfort but you disappointed us, you pimp, dog, bastard", Saying I am not masculine just cuz I am extremely careful not to neglect my sunscreen, I get sick here and now and so I trust medicine over the pseudoscientific remedies, and many other things which made me lost trust in them and entire humanity and even myself sometimes. I will not forgive them.

Showed me his dick multiple times.

Me - "if you could go back and change your divorce from Mom, would you change anything?"

Dad - "no"

The man left and I mean LEFT. When I told him about how much that had damaged me, I asked him this. This is merely a crumb of how little a shit he gave about me. Die alone, fuck face.

Mine has turned every conversation into a political fight and now refuses to speak with me unless I agree with their prejudices and medical quackery.

My mother returned to Canada to visit her mother who was slowly dying of ALS. (Where I was born. We had moved to my fathers home country when I was 10, to see his side of the family and experience more of the world)

During her whole absence, my father cheated on her with various women, even taking me on a couple of his dates. When she got back and found out, she decided to leave permanently.

I (12m) was given the option of staying with either. I chose to go with her.

In the last week before I was to leave; he said he wanted to spend time with me and took me out to a couple 'fun tourist attractions'. A jet boat ride, a zipline, some random park. Each of these, he brought one of his girlfriends that he'd been cheating with (not the same one each time). We also went to at least one of their houses, as well as his weed dealers hidden under-house grow-op/party room thing. More focused on his dates than actually spending any time with me. Avoiding time with me had been a common theme throughout our lives/relationship.

I later learned he'd abused my older step-sister when she was much younger...

I've deliberately not spoken to him since. ~15 years later I sent him a couple old family videos I'd digitised (with my sister censored out of them), of when I was born and a few of the years immediately after. Mostly as a reminder of what he threw in the trash.

From what I've heard, he ended up homeless and jobless for quite a while and now lives with his mother.

boy that is a can of worms. my mom sorta spoiled the relationship with all her kids. Whats funny is she is really not that bad. If you have distance from her. My father in law was kinda the same and early on my wife and I bonded on how our parents were. Essentially there is a type of person where if they have any type of authority they are aweful but if you are completely out of their control then they are not all that bad.

Cheated on my mom with a vile woman who had vile children (most much older than me) Let her push my sister and I around and eventually away. Stood there and did nothing while her entire family belittled and emotionally abused my sister on a near daily basis and had the balls to ask us why we don't reach out to him. There is a lot but that's the tldr.

Neglect stories... I've got a few.

From the time I was six or seven she tried to reason with me (with +3-hr scoldings) and get me to change to her christo-Amway of thinking up till I was 16. Than I has a choice: knuckle under or get out. Being 16 and full of great, well thought out plans I left with three garbage bags of winter wear and clothes. Yes, she and him (my father) agreed that the decision to leave was my own to make. At sixteen.

Fast forward to me being 62. She lies dying in a home, and forgives me as her final act of charity. Yeah, ok, so buh-bye.

And him? Dementia. Game. Set. Match.

Treat your children as precious (if temporarily irritating) treasures and remember you only get to throw them away once.

Vote for Trump a third time. Fuck you, mom. You're officially a Bad Person™.

Visiting the family next month and I forbade them from telling her we're coming. I said they can tell her whatever they want after we're gone.

My mom was similar. The worst thing that happened was I was assaulted by a stranger at age 4, I happily told her about it as part of my day, I had no idea anything bad happened because he told me he was a doctor. She understandibly lost her shit and that scared me, she started calling me stupid and how could I let this happen and on and on. As an autistic kid obsessed with being good, it completely shattered me. I was never able to trust her with anything ever again. One traumatic event broke the relationship in that way for good. Her narcissistic bullshit, like what you've described, is what broke the rest of it as well as gave me a good case of cPTSD.

Recognized for being really intelligent.

Rejected my thoughts and opinions about everything because it scares their fundamentalist religious sensabilities.

That cognitive dissonance still fucks with me.

If I wasn't a good as her, I needed to do better, try harder, stop being lazy etc. If I was better than her at something she would pick out the most miniscule flaw she could come up with and give it to me as a back handed complement then slowly work it into random conversations until it became my insecurity.

The thing that sticks with me the most though, she had me absolutely convinced I was far too fat to wear shorts in public, let alone a bikini. Finally was convinced by my group of friends that I was in fact, normally sized and literally handed one and told to wear it.

I was not expecting to see my Mom between getting dressed and going to the pool. She asked me if I was really going out like that and how I was going to handle everyone making fun of me then highly suggested I go change into my 1 piece. Said she wasn't going to feel bad for me when I came back crying

That broke me. Of course I believed her. She was my Mom she just wanted what was best for me right? I can still see the look on my friend's face when I came back in the room to change and she said "you know that's not true right? There's nothing wrong with you. This is about her."

Took me years and years to realize she was very wrong. I didn't let anyone take pictures of me for awhile after that but I saw some recently of 3 years later when I had "gained some weight." Holy fuck, there is zero chance in hell I was fat.

Anyways, she had a horrible, long {9 years), and painful death and probably got abused pretty bad in the nursing home. Good riddance to that piece of shit. Because I got off easy with just emotional and mental trauma. What she did to my siblings was significantly worse.

Mine was a cold, brittle narcisst. Any good I did, she had done... frequently with stories how someone had told her she was the best they'd ever seen. A less stupid version of Trump.

Sadly, she was actually quite brilliant in her field (biochemistry), while simultaneously being so ardent of an adherent of a panoply of new age crap (psychic healing and the like) that she literally prevented me from getting surgery for a TBI. Instead of much needed medical assistance, I got veggie smoothies and visits to her weird friends. My head still hurts.

There was so much more crap after that, but it was such a revelation as an adult that she would rather I suffer than admit her 'genius' wasn't the solution to all problems.

She died in December. I shrugged.

I suppose most folks would consider my breaking point to be unwarranted.

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About four or so years back, a parent fell over. They are heavyset, requiring firemen to be lifted off the floor. They were nude, so I asked the fire department to send same-gender fighters, if that can be reasonably done. My parent threatened to have me thrown out of the household, out of embarrassment.

While that ultimately didn't happen, it was a great breach of trust for me. I don't have enough of an income to survive without a home, and quite frankly, I will take my life if I can't enjoy it. Far as I am concerned, the threat of homelessness and poverty, isn't much different than having a gun to my head.

I realized that this parent, like the other one, didn't love me. The affection I held for them was fading over the years, but this is what broke the chain for me. I don't love them anymore - they are like a rock or any random thing. They just exist. I won't hurt them, but I also stopped going the extra mile. I ceased patrolling to check on their health, nor did I try to cook real meals or ask if I should fetch restaurant food for them. I simply made TV dinners at the appropriate times, and didn't speak to my parent anymore.

My relationship was simply one of going through the motions.

I don't speak to either of my parents. Both are still alive from what I can tell. My mom has deep mental health issues she refuses to accept and deal with. She probably has dementia and last time I spoke with her she thought everyone in the family was dead. Her story is sad and I tried for years to help her but you can't help someone who won't help themselves.

My father was never really around me growing up. I didn't even know who he was until I was like 8 and he was in the hospital because he almost died in a drunken car wreck. He killed his best friend and crippled his best friends brother. I was homeless and asked to live with him when I was 15. He was always drunk but one night after coming home from the bar slurring drunk and threatened to shoot me in the head with his shotgun in the wood shed, I went and lived with my best friend for a year and then my older sister for the last year in highschool. Later in life I tried to reconnect with him but one day he showed up on my doorstep demanding money for a car he cosigned and I couldn't afford so we turned it over to the bank. He demanded I pay him back because it hurt his credit score. Like the dude was never in my life and didn't pay child support or when he did it was always late. Caused me a lot of pain and suffering.

I unloaded years worth of pain and suffering he caused me that day and haven't spoken to him in over 30 years.

The joys of modern Native American life....

My mom and dad divorced soon after I was born because my mom had cheated on my dad and gotten pregnant with my little sister from her first husband. So I have the privilege of having an older brother and a younger sister that have the same dad and mom and me in the middle with a different dad and a different skin color.

Life was what it was, but then my dad, who was a huge Trump supporter and refused to mask up, got the 'rona and died from it. To this day I have no idea why my dad was a Trump supporter, Trump stood for everything that he personally hated, but for some reason just the delulu had gotten a hold of him.

His wife, my stepmom, put an obituary paper out and named my older brother and me but left my bastard younger sister off of it because my older brother had realized his dad was a piece of shit and asked my dad to be his dad in his place, which my dad agreed to while my younger sister had explicitly told my dad to forget that she exists, to fuck off, and to never speak to her again, to which my dad said, okay.

My mom called me up to bitch me out that my little sister was not included on my dad's death notice, and in the middle of bitching me out, told me she wishes she had divorced my dad sooner, and even though she didn't say it, she was implying that she wished she had divorced him before she had gotten pregnant with me.

I called her a cunt and blocked her completely for three and a half years, unblocked her to chew her out when I saw that even though I had her block she was sending me links to TikToks which I don't use TikTok to show me videos that say "I don't know what to say to you".

I am finally reaching the point where I can be rationally angry instead of irrationally angry when I think about it.

This is not the first time I've cut my mom out of my life. The first time was when I was 17 and I chose to be homeless for years rather than to enable her to enable her abusive husband to abuse me.

The only reason I ever opened the door again and allowed her back into my life was because my dad pleaded with me to do so.

So when she cursed his dead body, and implied that the child that she had with him should never have been born, despite the only reason she was in a position to do that was because the dead man had vouched for her, out of love, was fucking a bridge too far.

And I also have blocked my sister. She should be fucking ecstatic that my dad did precisely what she asked him to do.

When I was 15 or so I get home from school and get a AIM message from an account I don't know claiming to be a girl at my school who has a crush on me, but too shy to reveal who she is. Which was weird all by itself because I didn't use AIM often.

At first I'm delighted, but she quickly becomes sexual. Talking about masturbating to me in very explicit detail. I get freaked out and stop responding. Which prompts an angry phone call from my Dad saying the account is messaging him now and bothering him at work. How she got my account info wss confusing, but i didn't even know my dad had an account.

So I respond a few more times, and very quickly "she" starts sending me porn, which then turns to sending CSAM saying I need to masturbate to it too. I'm freaking tf out and block the account. Which prompts another angry phone call. I tell my dad I don't know this person and tell him to just block the account to stop him getting bothered. He calls me a pussy and hangs up.

When he gets home, I tell him that the account was sending me freaky stuff. He stomps over to the computer, opens an terminal and typed a long string of characters that returns our IP address. "If it happens again, do this and we can catch this freak". He then abruptly closes the window before I can even read what he typed, much less remember it. He slams his bedroom door and that's the last I see of him for the night.

Took me a long time to fully understand and accept what happened that night, but I never looked at my dad the same again. There were a few more odd situations where he put CSAM in front of me or sent it to my step-dad getting him fired. But he died before I gathered the courage to confront him.

Well, mine both died, so there's that.

But prior to that they voted for Brexit.

My dad invited me to meet him at work, one day. It was a bad week for me and the new step-mother getting along, and so I wasn't surprised. We took a little walk from the shop and stopped to chat.

"I've given you all 25 years of my life," was when the conversation changed, mid-speech. "Now it's time for me. It's my time."

It was how he invited me to go live with my mom, or just go. It began a bit of a formative time filled with stress and anger, and I daresay we've not been the same since.