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Guilt or the Cane? I'll Take the Cane.

I wrote this a long time ago...it still feels incomplete. It is hard to describe just how damaging she is.


My mother didn't spank. She didn't have to. I was born a people pleaser, part of my submissive disposition no doubt, and she knew the greatest punishment and weapon she could use on me was guilt.


My mother had me when she was 15. She had supportive parents. My father was a great guy and remained part of my life until he died when I was 7 (he was 23). My mom finished college, got a good job, and married my step-dad (who I love...he is my dad).


My step-dad (they met when I was 5, married when I was 9) brought with him my two step-brothers, one was the same age as me, one was two years older. My step-dad had custody of my brothers because their mom was a deadbeat so we all lived together but he parented them and my mom parented me. To say that built resentments is an understatement.


My mother is a narcissist of epic proportions. It's almost...no it is...incomprehensible to me how self-centered and inconsiderate she is. Her caustic tongue leaves gaping emotional wounds.


I don't know how to disconnect myself from her power over me. I avoid her...but in that I feel guilty.


I was the reason she couldn't go away to college...because her parents wouldn't support her if she took me away from them. So HOW DARE I move across the country away from HER! Then...to add insult to injury...I left my entire support system with my 2 year old and moved three hours away for a job..."throwing it in her face" that she was just too scared/weak/etc. to do it herself when I was little. When in fact my decision had NOTHING to do with her.


I have example after example of situations like that.


She doesn't believe I'm submissive. She thinks the entire D/s relationship dynamic and swinging is disgusting and abusive. Something "men" force me to do in order to take advantage of me...because the construct that is "her daughter" would never do such things willingly.


She blamed my child for being sexually assaulted in the immediate aftermath (I was out of the country at the time) and her words and actions directly contributed to the downward spiral that almost led to my child's death. The words my mother said to my child in those few days make me feel guilty that I still speak to her at all. My child became a cutter during that time with my mother, never having cut prior to that. That is how caustic her words can be.


What is so incomprehensible to me is that my mother does not believe she owes my child an apology. We actually talked about it and that it was going to be necessary for them to have a relationship. My mother was so aghast and offended at the suggestion she refused to even speak of it.


My child, being the bigger person, tried to rise above and has actually articulated understanding that my mother behaved in the way she was raised and brought up to behave and it wasn't "personal" despite how hurtful it was. However, my mother, being determined to be RIGHT, continued to mistreat my child in the few opportunities my child tried to give her to move on...not make amends but pretend it hadn't happened and move on with the learning. My mother is incapable.


They have not spoken in three years. I now have a granddaughter that I know my mother will never see. I know that breaks her heart and I know she resents that I will not MAKE my child have a relationship with her. That I won't broker that deal. My child recently asked me not to share pictures of my granddaughter with my mother. It has always felt like a betrayal in sharing them in the first place...or even my granddaughter to my mother. Can you imagine what it takes to create that sentiment?


What is so sad is that my dad is a great person and my child really likes him and wants him to be able to have a relationship with his great-granddaughter...but he can't because of my mother. We've literally been plotting that if my mother ever goes out of town, we will arrange for a visit then for my dad to meet her. How does he not resent the shit out of my mother for that?


My dad is much older than my mother. My mother took care of my grandmother, who she despised, and her belief in my obligation is real...but I'd rather do anything than put myself in the position of having her standing over me with her whip of guilt threatening me constantly.


A complicating factor in all of this is that the home I own is actually the house I grew up in. "Her house". Though they didn't take care of it very well when they owned it and haven't lived there in over 20 years. She resents that I was capable of buying it, that I own it, that I'm taking care of it, that I'm not living in it, and she 100% expects that when my dad dies, she is moving into it...because it's "her house".


I tell you all of this because my relationship with my mother will frustrate you. You will hate her for how she makes me feel. You'll want me to cut her off for my own good. It's not so easy. She is really the last living blood relative of any real connection in my life. I have two drunk uncles and one sociopathic uncle. I have not yet taken the time to come to terms with being that alone. And I do think some of it has to do with the fact that in cutting her off, I lose the only dad I've ever had...she'd never tolerate him having a relationship with me if she couldn't.


It is a dilemma. My child is gracious in not hating me for still having a relationship with my mother. I don't know if I could be as tolerant.


Please be patient with me. Be gentle in your encouragement. I do know what I need to do. I believe I will be able to do it at some point. I'm just not there yet.


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