a mother’s love
I met my mother again and it made me wanna go no contact forever just like with my dad. It wasn’t outright bad, and the meeting before this one was even good. But I will just never be able to change her hyper-perfectionistic and overly critical ways, and that no matter what, I will never be good enough.
She can compliment me, but it’s hollow, and other things she says are just backhanded.
“Are you on Prednisone again?” Is her way of thinking she’s subtle and kind about my face getting chubbier again. For her it’s a win, I guess, because other times she’d just cock her head and just say “Umm, your face has gotten rounder again.”
I had my hair up, and some of the neck hair fell out and was loose and down my back. She had to comment on it weirdly with that backhanded-ness, saying “Oh yeah, when those fall out of the hairtie, they always look a little greasy…” (nervous) as if it was a common problem everyone has. But it isn’t? And oh my god, it’s just a little hair on my neck, and my hair is fine. Like…?
Other stuff like “When I see you, I always think jeans would suit you so well, have you ever considered that? You don’t wear any anymore, right?” It’s just infantilizing and stupid, because she thinks this is the polite way to subtly get me to change. It’s not subtle at all, just a slightly less asshole-ish way to say “I think you could dress better”. This shithead sees me 2-3 times a year!
I’m a 30 year old chronically ill person, an only child whose mother smoked during pregnancy and caused all these health issues for me, and she internally can’t help comparing me to the 5 years younger and healthy triplets she knowns that have been small and underweight all their life and raised to be active, having equally fit and skinny parents. She has made clear in the past that she prefers them over me, even making them better and more expensive gifts.
Anyway, of course I know what jeans are. I used to wear them because she bought them for me all the time when I was living at her home. I just developed a different taste since moving out almost 10 years ago, and prefer more comfortable clothes like wide flowing leggings.
It continued with a pityful, cringing look about me keeping some clothes that are already 15 years old that still fit me. I said I will replace one winter coat now because it’s falling apart and unfixable, and she acted like she had to carefully measure her reaction and words while offering me to go shopping together to find new clothes as if she feels sorry for me. Same woman that teenage-me got yelled at by for buying the more expensive strawberries in the supermarket. Now that she earns more, no more frugality, I guess; since those days, she has made more rich friends and she needs to keep up with their wasteful behavior.
This is so ridiculous, because while I do want new clothes soon, I have enough, and it’s not like money is an issue. Most of them aren’t washed out or full of holes, and the holes that come up get stitched; the ones that are washed out are strictly sleep/home clothes, mostly when I am sick or on my period. I am genuinely not walking around like a hobo with nasty clothes; my work clothes are black and elegant.
She just genuinely always had the need to constantly buy new clothes, and I don’t. I do that maybe every two years.
It’s tiring! Especially when we have no good relationship! Especially when we don’t really see each other and she doesn’t really know me! Especially when I have body image issues! Especially when I know she wouldn’t be able to take the reverse.
Like oh, since seeing you last time, your jowls have dropped further, and your wrinkles have gotten worse! This clown is always filtering her profile images online and it’s happening live within the apps she records them on, so she really thinks that’s what she looks like. She’s so into TikTok and Insta that she has her mind poisoned against her own daughter even more than before on her own.
She’s so superficial, and since hanging with wealthier people, she’s wasteful with resources and money, and she has become a lot more materialistic. Getting the newest phone, switching to more expensive brands, bragging to me about her new BMW… it’s not how I was raised. This is hard to reconcile with the woman who was over 4k in debt all my youth, who cried over money and rent, who forbid me to flush the toilet for peeing and just allowed it for pooing, who screamed at me for wanting to heat my room, and all that.
She raised me to be frugal, to not be needy, to not constantly spend money as a hobby, and to be ok with the minimum, and now she practically laughs at me for it.
She isn’t even in the minority. Most people don’t give a fuck. They think they have earned it, the world is their oyster, everything is hopeless and they can’t change anything so better live it up before death.
They don’t look at people like me with some sort of respect for the ways we are content with little, are barely buying anything, try to avoid extra plastic, donate to good causes, are vegan, treat our belongings well so they’re still good years later, buy used, use public transport/bikes and don’t fly etc.; instead, pity and disgust and thinking we’re the dumb ones for worrying, caring, and letting it dictate our consumer behavior, and “depriving ourselves”.
When my mum left my apartment, she said “Oh, I’m so full. I ate so much yesterday. So much meat. I had to. Because of the company’s Christmas festival.” Smirk. After swearing to me up and down for no reason the last few years that she’s basically vegetarian and doesn’t care to eat meat anymore.
These people will always find ways to “have to”. They will always rationalize the mindless, useless, and needless consumer behavior caused by their environment, especially online. And they have to pretend everyone who isn’t like this is just a poor fucking idiot who’s too woke and emotional, otherwise they would potentially have to face the fact that they’re contributing to something, or not contributing to the right things, or being a huge fucking liar and hypocrite.
It’s so fucking sad, because I remember one time my mother looked sadly at me in my teens and said “I won’t ever own a house. But I’m sure you will. You definitely will.” Even though she was abusive and disrespectful, she had times where she could see I’m intelligent and hardworking. Now everything is going down the shitter because of her generation and above, my generation cannot afford a house unless there’s inheritance, and this hoe who managed to climb out of poverty is smirking at me about not wearing new clothes all the time. Bitch are you fucking for real? That’s what I should be spending my money on, you cunt?
You know what makes me infinitely happier than new shit-clothes that don’t last a year? Spending 50 Euro on new pullover every two years that’s organic, fair, high quality and all that. 1k attendance fee for a conference in my niche. 3k for a certificate for my job. 100-200 Euro every semester for my degree. 200+ Euro membership donations to orgs I wanna support. A 6 Euro beverage on the way to work as a treat. Buying new domains.
I still bought her a 100 Euro coupon for a nice cafe.