Any idea whats wrong with my mother?

Hi,

For the last few years, I've become increasingly aware that there is something off about my mother and the way she interacts with people. Difficult thing to get perspective on, as my dad was always the blatantly abusive one and my mother performed some sort of protector role. Not very well, but it was the impression that she liked to give, if nothing else.

When I was a child, I was never allowed to have my own identity. No matter what I thought, or I did, my emotions always required revision and weren't quite appropriate. Even today, she constantly tries to handle me and my interactions with other people. I always had to put myself in other people's shoes, no matter who it was, I had to put their needs before my own, in order to be a 'good' person.

It's quite mild but a good example would that she gave me a lift to the doctors surgery earlier today and as she knows the doctor, started trying to get me to rehearse what I was going to say, prepping me for what kind of person the doctor was, telling me how to interact and deal with her. My mother set up the appt it was clear she thought I would reflect badly on her. Then, even though she knows I'm quite private and the appt was to do with mental health stuff, she then tried to give me the third degree in front of all my family, dropping in a cursory 'do you want to talk about this in front of everyone else' as she couldn't control herself and had to know exactly what had happened as soon as I walked in the door.

She's pulled stuff like this my entire life, constantly guilt tripping me to get me to conform. i was known as the golden child while my brother was the scapegoat. She almost encouraged me to be abusive towards him when we were children, talked about his similarities with my dad, even though the majority of the reason he's messed up is down to her and her constant anger and dismissive behaviour towards him.

Everything is reactive, she has no perspective, no pragmatism, no control, it's like she gets off on all the drama. She can be totally hypocritical, has huge double standards, very judgemental but then unlike a narcissistic backs down, fakes sorrow and then conforms if she's scared you're going to reject her, more like a major co-dependant, or an inverted narcissist (she lives with someone who def has major narc tendencies, if not full blown PD)

She has no idea of boundaries and told me all sorts of inappropriate stuff about her relationships with other family members, including stuff to do with sexual abuse by the time I was 6-7 years old. Since I was very small, I have essentially been her counsellor and she can be extremely needy towards me. Through what she told me, she wrecked my relationships with most of my family members as I knew far too much about the bad things they had done from a very early age.

She always asked totally inappropriate things about my personal relationships and thought nothing of going through my private stuff when she was 'worried' about me as a child. She'd then use anything she found to berate me for being a disappointment.

It's made much, much harder because the majority of the time, she seems like a lovely person but if I went through the list of the stuff she's done, I'd be here forever. There's a massive incongruence between how she appears and what she's actually done.

I know that we can't 'do' diagnoses on here but I don't know much about PD and I wondered if this stuff sounded familiar to anyone? She's not evil or anything but seems more like a very needy, manipulative, myopic toddler.

Oh, and she splits with people, they're either perfect, or evil, no middle ground, once you're in the evil box, you're done. Has some long standing relationships with others but then will drop them the instant she perceives them unfavourably (or gets bored). Overcommits, overpromises, obsesses over small irrelevant details.

Would appreciate any insight!

Cheers
Frael

Frael,

We are not professionals capable of diagnosing anyone, plus it's just not possible to know enough about a person online, but what you are describing sounds awfully familiar to the type of parent I grew up with.

Diagnosis aside -

You know enough to know she has personality issues that are damaging you. You mentioned you've had to play counselor to her much of her life. You also mentioned guilt trips. I suspect you already know that while it is admirable to want to be helpful, that it is also not a child's job to parent their parents. It not only doesn't work, but it is harmful to you.

Odds are you can't change her, but you can do somethings to repair the damage done to you. In a way that's the best thing you can do for her too.