Mom’s mistreatment has lingering effect

[conuly]

Dear Amy: My adult middle child and I struggled during my parenting years.

I always connected with her older brother and younger sister more easily than with her.

I had no idea how much this hurt her until she moved out. Once during a conversation, she shared many, many incidents showing a lack of affection during her childhood that hurt her. There is truth to this; however, at the time I did not see it. Now that she is an adult, I have tried to “make up” for the pain that I caused her. I have been there for her. She still (subconsciously) punishes me.

She is now a doctor, and all through medical school she wrote me loving cards of kindness and appreciation, thanking me for my support and love.

Yet we can hardly be around each other for two days without her picking apart everything that I say or do.

I am always on eggshells around her. She is very beautiful and professionally driven. I know that I annoy her. I can’t figure out if she still has resentments from her childhood. She is currently distancing herself from me. This happened after she and I drove several hundreds of miles together to the location of her medical residency. Even though she lived with me pretty happily for a month beforehand, the trip itself didn’t go well.

She says that she doesn’t like the person that I am. This came out of left field.

I don’t know how to react. She ignores my texts.

Should I just give her space?

— Dumbfounded

Dear Dumbfounded: First this: You cannot “make up” for a lack of affection, neglect, or imbalanced treatment during your daughter’s earlier years. You can only do your best to acknowledge the validity of your daughter’s experience, apologize, ask for forgiveness and try to start fresh — as two adults who share a complicated history.

Your daughter is a medical resident, and so she is probably not going to have the extra emotional bandwidth to work on your relationship. During a very high stress situation (headed to a new place with an extremely challenging job), she said something harsh and unkind. I think you should try to let this incident go, give your daughter space to succeed and heal, and emphasize to her that you are working hard to become the mother she deserves to have.

https://www.arcamax.com/healthandspirit/lifeadvice/askamy/s-2408759?fs

Comments

[conuly]

LW, don't diagnose your daughter. She's not "subconsciously punishing" you, she just doesn't get along with you. Because she doesn't like you. Because you didn't treat her well as a kid. This didn't come out of left field, either. I don't know who you're trying to fool here, but you're lying when you say that. You already knew your daughter didn't like you, and you know why, too.

Also, maybe this is just me, but it always seems to me that when people speak of others as having "resentment" for past treatment they're trying to downplay that past treatment. If your daughter resents you, she's got a good reason for it.

Also also, which is it? Is it that you can hardly be near each other for two days without fighting, or that you lived together happily for a month before she left to go to her medical residency?

(Amy's also right about the fact that your daughter is probably too busy right now to reply to texts, spend hours chatting on the phone, or otherwise put a lot of energy into a relationship with you.)

[ex_flameandsong751]

it always seems to me that when people speak of others as having "resentment" for past treatment they're trying to downplay that past treatment. If your daughter resents you, she's got a good reason for it.

It isn't just you. My mother was absolutely terrible to me growing up and is still pretty terrible and about a year ago she was like, "I don't know why you resent me so much." I've noticed that's very common language with people who treat others badly and then make the shocked Pikachu face when the people they've treated badly don't like them. Like somehow we're the bad people with anger problems or something.

[cereta]

At my older brother's wedding, he said something to the effect of, "I didn't treat you too badly." He didn't say it aggressively, more like he was reminiscing.

Every single person who knew us when we were kids laughs their asses off when I tell that story. I don't think any of my sibling get how spectacularly shitty they were and continue to be to me.

[minoanmiss]

Word.

[misbegotten]

She loves you, but she doesn't like you. Try being a better friend to her instead of assuming that she's punishing you, subconsciously or not.

[green_grrl]

This, right here. LW actually admits that she didn’t connect with kid when kid was a child (and actually NEEDED her!). But now LW is going all “but FAMILY” on her. Try for “good will from a distance and cordial when together”—that would be a complete win of an outcome for two people as mismatched as you used to admit to being.

[shirou]

I have two kids. The elder, a boy, has many wonderful qualities but also has some emotional problems. I love him fiercely and invest a LOT of time and energy in him. The younger, a girl, is sweet, brilliant, and just so easy. I love her just as much, and I love spending time with her. I also have to remember to give her the attention she needs because her brother demands so much, and I have to remember not to compare the two for fear of making my son feel inferior because of his difficulties.

I really hope neither child ever resents me. I’m doing my best.

LW may be a horrible human being. But taking the letter at face value, I can believe LW found her middle child harder to connect with than the other two and never realized how much it affected the girl. I’m not disagreeing with any of the prior advice. There’s no changing what happened, and LW can’t do anything but acknowledge what happened, apologize, and work to build a better relationship. But I can empathize with LW.

[conuly]

I can tell you *exactly* what makes me skeptical of LW's perspective here, and that's the phrase "walking on eggshells" combined with her later use of the word "resent", after stating that "She still (subconsciously) punishes me."

It's perhaps unfair, but I have rarely found that it's worth assuming good faith with people who use both the "eggshells" phrase and the word "resent" in the same breath, and I think it's inappropriate to say "she punishes me" instead of "she doesn't like me" or "she is critical of me and doesn't take my statements at face value" or whatever. That framing makes it sound like Daughter's dislike of her mother is a personal failing or a character flaw, some deliberate (if subconscious) decision.

One of those in a letter might be poor communication, but all three in such a short letter, rightly or wrongly, make me doubt LW.