Care & Feeding: My Mom Won’t Stop Harassing Me About Coming Home for Christmas

[minoanmiss]

She’s always been overbearing, but this is too much.



I’m an almost-30 only child to an overbearing single mom. My husband of three years and I moved this year across the country for work, and my mom has not stopped holding it against us. When I started dating my husband, it was like a switch: My mom suddenly hated him and couldn’t say enough mean things about him. She criticized our decisions on when to get married, even trying to bribe us to pick a later date, despite our having dated for years at that point. Pre-pandemic, she would drive to my house where my husband worked from home, harass him about chores, and leave before I could get home from work, so she wasn’t even spending time with me.

We’ve been looking forward to the natural boundaries of physical space from our move. When it became clear that we would be moving in the fall, I started to prepare my mom. I’ve been planning this move since college, so it wasn’t a secret, but my mom acted shocked or dismissive at any discussion. Finally, our moving trucks were about to arrive, and she still was in denial, so I had to call her and be very direct: We are moving in a few weeks and it’s already settled. She did not take it well.

We’ve been in our new place for several months, and the guilt trips haven’t stopped. She still says that I didn’t tell her we were moving. For the last few weeks, my mom has weaponized Christmas. Every call—and there are a lot of calls, even if I don’t pick up—seems to include the question of when we’re traveling home for Christmas and how we can stay extra-long. We don’t want to travel this year. Any concerns I’ve mentioned about the pandemic, traveling stress, and the expense (and fear) of leaving my dog with a stranger are countered with criticism and dismissed. She sends family group texts of photos of all the Christmas decorations she’s putting up for me. If I don’t respond, she sends texts that sound like there’s an emergency—but there’s not. It’s getting to the point where I want to leave my phone on silent and never pick up.


Twice this week she’s asked if we could just move “home” and live with her. I’ve excused myself from the phone calls after that. I get so angry that I can’t see a kind but firm way of telling her we aren’t traveling, let alone to please let me live my life in a way that I can enjoy our relationship again. I’m seeing a therapist, but we can only do so much. How can I establish boundaries with my mom that won’t ruin the holidays for all of us?

—The Christmas Canceller

Dear Christmas Canceller,

I’m very sorry that your mother has chosen to harass you in this way from a distance. You’ve done nothing wrong by marrying, moving, or choosing not to travel during a pandemic, and she has no right to put you through this. I’m glad that you and your husband now have physical distance from her, at least, and I’m also glad that you have the support of a therapist.

If you have not yet explicitly told her, you can let your mother know that her many angry calls and texts and guilt trips are unacceptable and actively harming her relationship with you. Unfortunately (and I think you already know this), she most likely won’t let up after Christmas. If you want to maintain this challenging relationship, try to set some very firm boundaries regarding if, when, and how you communicate with your mother. Decide what sort of frequency you can handle—one 20-minute call a month? A 10-minute call every two weeks? Texts/emails only?—and stick to that plan. (If there’s another relative you trust on your mom’s side of the family, ask them to let you know if there’s a genuine emergency.) I also want you to know that it is completely OK to take a break from communicating with her, if you need to, for the sake of your mental health and/or your marriage.

You said it yourself: “We can only do so much.” You have very little power to change what she does, but you do get to decide how you will act and how much you can endure. Your mother is the one ruining your holiday, not the other way around, and I don’t think you should feel a moment’s guilt for setting and sticking to whatever boundaries you need where she’s concerned.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

"Adulthood isn't an award they'll give you for being a good child. You can waste . . . years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just . . . take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose. Say, I'm sorry you feel like that, and walk away. But that's hard."

-- Ekaterin Vorsoisson Vorkosigan, via Lois McMaster Bujold

[conuly]

Lemme guess. Mom is just so "hurt" that her daughter is being so "selfish".

LW ought to block Mom's number.

[angelofthenorth]

And mum doesn't know the reasons that her daughter would treat her this way, her daughter hasn't told her anything, why would she keep secretes from her like moving across the country?!

Yup, this is an old familiar story.... I just want to take her to one side, give her a hug and strengthen the backbone that has been so damaged by her mother and tell her it's OK to upset people sometimes, when they're being manipulative so and sos

[conuly]

Personally, I think LW has been more than accommodating enough to Mom! I really hope the physical distance helps them strengthen their own emotional distance.

[xenacryst]

This advice starts down the path of being ok, but sorta peters out after half a tentative step. Here, let me put it a little more plainly: "Mom" has always been overbearing. LW has grown up trying to appease Mom, trying not to make her angry, trying to be the perfect child, and at this point, even though she wants to get out, she doesn't know how to put up the emotional barriers to say "STOP. Here is the line and you will not cross it." Telling her a couple of simple strategies that hint at that is not sufficient. She needs some help to recognize her own appeasing behavior and to be able to state - and stick to - some very firm boundaries, regardless of the tantrums that Mom is going to throw (and believe me, she will throw them, hard and furiously).

[azurelunatic]

Block her number for calls and limit yourself to checking texts/emails from her to once per day. If your husband agrees, you could set up a mailbox rule to forward her emails to him before deleting them, or before marking them read and archiving them, so you don't see them. He could then tell you if it's something that actually requires your attention.

She will absolutely do an extinction burst when she realizes that you are not being responsive. Do your best to hold firm.

If you feel the need to talk on the phone with her, do it on a schedule at a time you set (you make the call to her), and stick to your plan of excusing yourself from the call if she brings up travel or how you're being a terrible daughter. "Oops, got to go de-wax the cat! Love you! Bye!"

[mommy]

This.

[frenzy]

There are some posts I am constantly amazed that someone just hasn't gone no-contact. This is an absolute nightmare of a person, and I've happily kicked them out of my life. Gosh. How on earth has LW put up with this for this long?

[shirou]

How can I establish boundaries with my mom that won’t ruin the holidays for all of us?

LW: Please, please recognize that you aren't responsible for your mother ruining your relationship—or the holidays.

[cimorene]

This is so much the archetypal other side of this letter ("All I want is for you to do what I want for Christmas") that it's funny.

[minoanmiss]

Heh, I nearly titled this post with that, yeah.

[lemonsharks]

I wish this had gone to Captain Awkward and not care & feeding, because LW needs to take a serious look at whether she wants her mom in her life *at all*.