Not the same life style as my so-called mother

[Alexandra]

Hello; My so-called mother lived a high life, her clothes were hand tailored,she owned three mink coats , she spent a lot of money on cosmetics she dated men so eat out in fancy restaurants, as for me, I was food  insecure ,my clothes came from Charity shops ,they were clothes for adults, which she cut down ,I felt very ashamed in school, sometimes a teacher would comment, " tell your mother to get you some children's clothes or "tell your mother  to change your shirt" in high school the teachers thought I was being hostile by dressing so badly. I was viewed as a discipline, problem. I felt so ashamed ,as  if I were  invisible, I used to have a day dream of how wonderful it would be to actually be invisible. On top of all this, my so-called mother demanded that I be grateful to her for what she was giving me. I was wondering if any of you had a different life style from your family , Thank you

[zen_racer]

Hello Alexandra.  I'm sorry you went through that.  I relate to that a lot though.  My M did not have any mink coats, but she did dress nice.  She kept the big house that my F had bought.  While I was still a child and forced to live with her, she got a LOT of money for child support.  I didn't get any new clothes, or shoes.  Instead, she used that money to spend time with boyfriends, including doing things like going on vacation for up to a month in other countries and left me at home.  I had similar issues at school, though I don't think as bad as your's.  When my D would visit, he'd be appalled at my clothes and shoes and would buy stuff for me then.  When they split up, I wanted to go with him at any cost.  It was devastating not having any choice and being forced to live with the parent that seemed to hate me.

[Alexandra]

Hello Zen_racer ; Thank you for your sympathy, I am so sorry you had similar experiences. It took me time to realize Just  how selfish ,immature and  self absorbed my so-called mother was ,that it was not ,about me. I know the feeling, of having no choice but to live  where you do not want to be ,I felt  so trapped , I was desperate to get out, I kept hoping someone would notice, and rescue me, they never did . May I ask, if you were able to have a good relationship with your Father  as an adult, I do hope so, for you .

[zen_racer]

Alexandra, that's a difficult thing to give a straight answer to.  For a while, yeah.  It was always from a distance.  We'd have vacations together, and during those times, I mostly wasn't a target for anything, though I can't say never.  Maybe there was one trip together where nothing negative happened.  But he came out to where I lived twice to help me out.  Once when I had shoulder surgery, and then later when I was getting my house ready to sell.  I think the bad blood started when he came to help with the shoulder surgery.  He started making everything about him, while I was in literally the worst pain of my life and unable to drive myself or make him leave my house.  I didn't remember that previously, but I guess that's where it started.

Later when I was prepping my house to sell to I could move 1000 miles away, he became very argumentative, and I didn't know why.  The house needed a bit of work to get the most out of it, and I had been unemployed for a few months, and needed to get the money out of the house.  He viewed things as too difficult when I'd see tasks as no big deal due to how much I'd learned to work on things, make stuff, fix anything, and had the appropriate tools.  He'd argue, without any knowledge on what I knew, that I couldn't really do the stuff I said I could.  The more I proved him wrong by being every bit as good as I'd said, the more he'd get upset and angry.  That's when he starting trying to prove every word that came out of my mouth as wrong.  At one point, I even directly told him that he was no longer helping, and I was under too much stress and pressure to deal with it anymore and wanted him to leave.  He wouldn't. After all that, he spent the next few years being spiteful and demeaning in the way he would talk to me.  He's created arguments out of nothing at family get togethers and get other people to all verbally gang up on me over things they literally had no information on and try to lecture me about the reality of things where I had all the facts and they were making things up.  Things like telling me how my job really was.  A job I worked at every day, and they didn't even know the name of where I worked, let alone what the job was like.

He has since calmed down and has put effort into being better, but to me, I've already seen the proof that the last family member that was ever safe to me turned on me the moment his ego was hurt because he was wrong when I wanted to tell me that I was incapable.  He'll never again be my dad, he's someone that I have some kind of familial obligation to.

[Alexandra]

Hello Zen-racer Thank you telling me, you have my sympathy .I am so sorry that you can not have a good relationship with your father, good for you for trying, to, it is too bad, that he is turning down , a relationship with you,it is his loss I know you loose out, of course .You are not alone I do not have any connection, to my family either , some families are just toxic ,good self care is to not be involved with them. After what I have been through, self care is my top priority.

[zen_racer]

Thank you Alexandra. I'm sorry you've had issues too. I also apologize. I'm new here and a bit self absorbed in discovering a lot about myself. I should have asked about your relationship with your father too. Thank you for sharing that.

[Alexandra]

Hello Zen-Racer ; Please ,do not ,concern yourself , about asking me about my Father, please ,do not ,criticize yourself. I know all too well, the very bad habit self criticism ,  I have not said the right thing  etc.I know that  it comes from walking on egg shells , with the abuser, if only I could say the right thing, it has taken me years to understand, that there was no such thing, nothing, would prevent the abuse, or get the person to take care of me.An example to show you how absurd, someone can be , I had to serve my so-called mother her coffee, if the spoon was not at the right angle, she would yell at me. I had been out of contact with my Father for many years , towards the end of his life, I took a change and contacted him ,we were able to have a very modest relationship , before he died.