My neglectful parent still scapegoats me. A xennial trend?
Posted by veggieburyin@reddit | Xennials | View on Reddit | 113 comments
I feel like this is much more common with our generation. I’m aware of the boomer xennial dynamic and can’t help but hope that it dies with our generation. Please younger gens stop with the divisive roles in families.
This is a small thing compared to a ton of really bad (some unforgivable) stuff that happened. But it all adds up.
My (never nurturing) mom texts me: your birthday is coming up! Here are some (very ultra low effort) ideas I have for you. You can choose one! However:
Then she spends the other part of the text elaborating on the expenses she has had over the few months. She has spent SO MUCH money! Dental bills, an attorney she needed to pay, rent increase. Damn. Ok. Sorry…
After I say I’ll think it over, sorry she is struggling, she tells me of all her plans with her friends coming up: going to see a movie tomorrow. Pretty much goes out to eat multiple times a week with friends. But a breakfast with me is like a burden? One day a year? I just don’t get it. (But I do get it, because I’ve internalized the message my entire life).
So it’s really just a manipulation for me to say I don’t need anything, I know she has felt I never was worth it. I’ve tried for her to see this hundreds of times, it only goes in circles. Then I get the silent treatment and blamed for being the problem in the family. That’s the result of me fighting to be loved and being abused more instead. Sad really.
Just makes me feel like a burden still. Really I don’t need anything. A surprise card would be nice. Just a card with her saying I love you. Also, she knows I’m recently divorced, in debt, lost a house, am mentally and emotionally struggling deeply with zero support…and she really has no place to whine to me about finances lol. She is well off with my dad’s pension, house paid off and so on. Anyway, I would NEVER speak this way to my kid. I’m literally saving everything FOR HER. Shit seems so dark to me after raising my own child.
It’s funny because while I was intentionally neglected my brother was nurtured, given an expensed life in Europe during college, etc. I don’t even talk to him any longer because he is such a bully still! Literally treats me like he did when we were growing up. That’s the consequence of being raised in such rigid roles.
I know I’m the scapegoat. I’m not even considered family at this point. It’s crazy. I never even did anything as far as I know I was born into the role. And I am a good person, have a lovely daughter, work hard, not a drug addict or thief or criminal. Crazy to feel like I’m such a problem to the people that should have nurtured me my whole life. It really screws with your self esteem and mind set.
Like it really derailed my self image and self worth and took until my divorce in my 40s to get the necessary help to feel proper self love.
So mom? For my birthday? Go back in time and actually love me. That would be great.
theMightBoop@reddit
One day I had this revelation.
That some people have emotionally healthy, supportive parents.
I don’t. OP doesn’t but some people do. It’s so outside my realm of experience it’s hard to imagine.
Blackbird136@reddit
This is exactly it. My friends within ~10 years of us in either direction, many seem to enjoy seeing their parents. Like, what?! I haven’t seen a family member since 2019. They don’t love or accept me so why bother.
mosscollection@reddit
It’s truly a surreal idea to me that people actually LIKE their parents and desire to spend time with them. They aren’t just bearing it. They actually enjoy and look forward to it.
It’s been something I only fully realized was a mental barrier for me in my relationships recently. When I date ppl who have healthy(ish), loving relationships with their parents and they want to spend time with them, my kneejerk mental reaction is to assume something negative like that they are enmeshed or lying. It’s a deep emotional narrative I’m carrying around bc I never once have had the feeling “I can’t wait to see my mom and be around her”. People who answer the question “what do you do with your free time” with “I spend time with my family” as one of the top things… I immediately judge them in some weird way. I’m now understanding that they actually mean it and I’m the one who’s screwed up for having the instinct that family = bad/enduring
These kinds of people could never understand me in the same way I can never understand them.
But I have kids who are teenagers now and it would mean everything in the world to me if my kids become adults who look forward to seeing me, and the things that annoy them about me are minor and silly and their love and enjoyment of our relationship is a stronger feeling. I think we have a pretty great relationship and I’m breaking cycles.
Blackbird136@reddit
Sorry to reply again to the same comment. But my dad was barely in my life after I was 3, and my mom was barely in my life after I was 18.
So it’s like, I think for them, time froze me at those ages. They never saw me as an adult, capable of making decisions, or having feelings or opinions. Which then turned into almost having to role play as being a lot younger on the rare occasions I did see them. Walking on eggshells.
My friends who talk to their parents about beers, or about sex?! Completely unimaginable.
mosscollection@reddit
No apology needed!
That would be a very difficult dynamic and I don’t blame you for avoiding enduring that.
I feel like the loss of healthy parent-child relationships is something we end up grieving multiple times in our lives and have to keep getting past some aspect of it each time. It’s this thing where we didn’t know about some other part of it we would need to grieve and then a new realization pops up and we are like “oh another thing I didn’t know I was missing and now I know it and have to deal with that knowledge and be sad about a new thing until I reach acceptance”. It’s this cruel thing bc we can think we moved on and healed from the core wound but there’s so many parts of it. It’s metastatic.
Grand-Associate-4694@reddit
You have articulated this so well. I am generally not an envious person. I don’t need to be wealthy, powerful, or admired. If anything, I wish I could be invisible. The only time I feel intense jealousy is when I encounter people who have genuinely loving and healthy relationships with their parents. When I see someone being cared for and supported by their parents, it tears me apart inside. I know that I shouldn’t feel this way, but it shakes me deeply. Since childhood,I have mentally adopted other parent figures in my life, whether they wanted me or not. It was usually the parents of friends who had great relationships with their children. I would be helpful and kind, and was always thankful when they let me eat dinner at their house or sleep there overnight. This is what kept me alive, but I’ll never truly have loving and supportive parents of my own.
I have broken this cycle by being consistently loving and supportive with my own children. They know that I love them, and I support them in a variety of ways each day. We enjoy spending time together. Some of the most reassuring moments of my life are when my children come home after spending some time at a friends house, and they tell me that they’re happy that I’m their mom.
mosscollection@reddit
Yes!! All of this! I did/do the exact same thing”mental adoption” thing. It feels kind of good, but it also leaves me a little bit empty realizing that it will never be a fully reciprocal relationship. But I take what I can get I guess. But becoming a parent and raising my children has been both the most healing and complicated saying I’ve ever done as far as my own emotional and mental health. It’s been healing, cause I’m breaking cycles and giving them a better life than I ever had. But it’s also sometimes these stabilizing because it brings up stuff with my own parental figures that I realize I could’ve just probably lived on ignoring or pushing down if I had never become a parent myself.
Blackbird136@reddit
Anytime I’m going anywhere, my coworkers are like “For what? To visit family?”
Absolutely not. I get 10 days PTO a year, I’m not wasting a single hour of that on anything I consider a chore.
mosscollection@reddit
“To visit family” is a foreign concept that does not compute to me. I would laugh at anyone who said that to me. But what’s hitting now is that most other people would not get why I’m laughing. They probably think I’m cruel or strange for it.
Spiritual-Promise402@reddit
THIS. During college I met a guy and met his mom about a year into our relationship. I stayed with them for a couple weeks and every night she would cook breakfast and leave some sort of pastry/bread out for breakfast before she headed out to work around 6 am. I was floored at the care nurturing she provided. Then after dinner she encouraged her kids (adult children) to make lunches out of the leftovers for work/school.
I asked my bf at the time if this was normal and not just for show, and reassured me that was normal life for them. It was also one of the many reasons none of the kids moved out until they got married. They also weren't forced out like my siblings by 18. Heck, my parents were so difficult that my younger sibling moved out during high school. That's when I realized what healthy parent/child relationships looked like
_buffy_summers@reddit
My husband and I both grew up in households with angry, screaming parents. The difference is that his parents apologize for things, and their affection isn't transactional.
NewKojak@reddit
Hey I got a narcissist mom too. I see you and I know you’ll be okay. Just try to remember that other people DO love you, even if you are conditioned otherwise.
tres-vip@reddit
I think we are amongst the last generations whose parents had kids just because they were expected to, or had unplanned pregnancies. So many terrible Boomer parents that really shouldn't have had kids but did anyway, due to cultural and societal expectations or they didn't have a choice. I really believe that horrible Boomer parents who abused and/or mistreated their Gen X and older Millennial kids is the reason some of us are childfree and normalized the option for the younger folks.
Go low or no contact with your mom.
Take-it-like-a-Taker@reddit
You can tell which people actually wanted their children based on how they interact with their grandkids
The ones who care never stopped being parents
GoldDiamondsAndBags@reddit
Fuck this comment. It just made me have a revelation.
My mom was at her summer house in a different state and told me she’d come back for my surgery to help me out with the kids. She’s back and totally forgot about it. She’s planning a cruise now bc she’s getting a good deal. I didn’t even remind her of my surgery and help with the kids. She did slip up the other day and say “I came back to help with….” and then says “to tie up some loose ends with some appointments” and then I’ll go on the cruise. She never finished her sentence, but I *think* she totally remembered why she was coming back. I don’t doubt she told all her family that she was coming back to help me…because at least she’ll look good. The ever dotting grandma.….who in reality always has something else to do when I need help. And then she says “I wish you didn’t have so much stress always having to do everything on your own. If I could I’d take all that stress away from you”. Really mom?
ItsDarwinMan82@reddit
No life is perfect. My parents fought over bills and my drank a bit too much, but I will say they loved the hell out of us and we were extremely close to the day’s they both died.
FearMcDoogins@reddit
It's also a millennial trend. Had a twin sister who was their golden child and an older sister who was neglected like me. I don't talk to anyone anymore and I'm seeing a therapist finally and getting treatment for mental issues not addressed early in my life. I hold alot of resentment towards them, especially my father. The boomers really are an awful generation of people but it's nice knowing that people are breaking the generational trauma caused by them. It's sad that you have to literally cut them out of your life in order to heal, but they're unable to reflect or change even at the end of their lives.
No-Kaleidoscope6848@reddit
Curious if you are a woman. I had the same dynamic with my mom. My older brother was the golden child and still is despite always being in trouble with authorities. Given every advantage, endless financial bailouts, eternally praised- while I was left to fend for myself my whole life.
FlyingAnvils@reddit
TLDR
The only response needed is “You’re the parent, the responsibility and burden belongs to you.” End of story.
GoldDiamondsAndBags@reddit
I get that my mom grew up dirt poor. I was raised comfortably middle class and then my mom had an accident where she was pensioned at 40, never having to work again plus a payout that among other things allowed them to buy a very nice house in cash. On top of the already free and clear house they had somewhere else. They made food financial decisions, but they were also lucky. They both have pension, which is only of the most valuable assets in a divorce. Because surprise surprise they divorced after 50+ years of marriage. Not a surprise bc I was the emotional support child since I was 10 years old having to emotionally coach my mom mom through my dad’s shitty behavior.
Now 20 years into my marriage I have decided I’m not going to wait like her until my 70s to rid myself of the abuse. I’m fucked bc I don’t have a pension, I put my career aside to raise our children, my husband has been very irresponsible with money and I’ll be working until the day I die. I shared with her that I’m planning to get a divorce. Every fucking conversation I have with my mom is her telling me my dad was worse (he wasn’t..not only did I live it, she told me about every little thing). She also complains she’s poor. Ummmm….she has a free and clear house, car bought in cash, a nice chunk of change in the bank and a hefty pension, social security and alimony. But god forbid I share anything what I’m going through. There is not one conversation that is not about her or how bad she has it or how bad my dad is.
kallisti_gold@reddit
Why not tell her all of this? What have you got to lose?
AutomaticNovel2153@reddit
I tried having a talk with my mom about this when I was 30 but she called me a “nasty ungrateful brat.” It wasn’t until my current wife stepped in to defend me 15 years later that she opened her eyes to her behavior.
The context of the confrontation was that my mom interrupted a conversation about our garden and started yelling at me to shut up and quit my b!tching. She thought she was defending my wife. My wife explained to her that I was just talking normally and answering questions she asked, not attacking. Then she went on to go over some other incidences and brought it back to the abuse I went through as a child.
My point being, when you have a parent who views you though the lens of being terrible no matter what you do, it can be hard to express anything without them feeling like you’re just being the nasty person they already know you are. I’m just really fortunate to have a wonderful wife that my mom also likes.
IDQDD@reddit
Wait a minute, this reads like a story about my mother and me. Holy shit.
WarhammerRyan@reddit
Have gone Non Contact with my parents because of this.
So this year, for my birthday, they texted me and told me to grow up and go back to how things were before - when they treated me as you are describing.
I literally blocked them after that message. Im worth more than that, and so are you.
Dont let anyone treat you that way, its not love, its abuse.
badwolf42@reddit
It’s the thinly veiled if veiled at all manipulation. I moved away. When I go home I hear stuff like “Oh I understand moving away. No problem. Some people say you shouldn’t have moved though.”.
She moved continents when she was 18.
Eziekiel23_20@reddit
My mom destroyed our family w/ textbook narcissism. Both parents gone now and due to her lies and manipulation I have zero contact w/ any other extended family.
I dont remember my grandparents being anything like this but hear stories of early boomers having these traits all the time.
Yagoua81@reddit
So I am a therapist and I have a theory. One of the defining traits of baby boomers is attaching emotional neediness on their kids. Basically they use their kids as a way of validating their emotions. It results in “if my kids develop a dependence on me, that means they love me.” It’s really controlling and selfish. If something is wrong it’s because they are a failure.
6inchVert@reddit
I still have unresolved issues over my mom making me feel like shit for needing a new pair of Payless shoes more frequently than she wanted to pay. It was about a 30 min car ride to the closest town with a Payless, most of that time was spent with her dumping on me all the details of how poor we are and how my $15 shoes were breaking the budget.
Fast forward 30 years I’m now done raising my kid and she was always wearing comfortable stylish new sneakers and never felt it was a burden for me. If anything I embraced giving her things that I never had.
JustTinman@reddit
Holy shit, I always thought I was alone, and that my mother and father now divorced, were just damaged as they made me. I feel op's post wholeheartedly in every aspect mine have done the same to me since I was a teenager, and even with the sibling that was given everything sadly I have 4 on one side and 1 on the other. I thought because they had gaslighted me that it was somehow my fault, but now I have some sense of belonging to a place where others have felt this pain, and it's a pain I wouldn't wish upon my greatest enemies. Sadly my wife also has this and she's a Xen as well and we came up with a term for it we call ourselves "Leftovers" as both sides of both of our families have treated us like this and as started new families that they didn't do this to so we're like the term leftovers that you put in the fridge and say you're going to eat but never get to until they go bad and you throw them out. But so sorry Op you don't deserve that, happy belated birthday hope you did something nice if not you should because fuck them enjoy life even if they try to forget or neglect you, you're awesome and they're not worth the time. It's sad but I've had to numb myself and temper expectations over the years as mine will never see what they've done or admit to anything and it's easier then being hurt over and over again.
Dickrubin14094@reddit
I’ve been feeling this way for a while with my dad. My daughter’s birthday is coming up and he won’t make the time to see his own granddaughter. Whatever, his loss. I love my kids, and hope I never do anything to alienate them
dsly4425@reddit
My mother was early Gen X and my grandparents were silent generation. I get along well with all the ones still living.
DigDugged@reddit
Not a Xennial trend, a narcissistic parent trend. Read a few posts on the Raised By Narcissists sub - they'll all sound familiar to you.
theforestbather@reddit
Omg there's a sub for this?! I'm heading there right frickin now.
Antique-Page7945@reddit
Finally got therapy in my mid 40s for similar issues with parents and it saved my life. 2 books that were super helpful: Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Lindsay Gibson; Stop Caretaking the Borderline or Narcissist by Margalis-Fjelstad. Here’s to a healing journey!
DookieMcDookface@reddit
💯 Those are great books if you were raised by asshole parents. Going no contact with them is good for your mental state too.
trustme1maDR@reddit
A good companion to Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents is Running on Empty by Jonice Webb. She focuses on "emotional neglect," which is helpful when you're like, there's definitely something missing here but it's hard to articulate what.
Antique-Page7945@reddit
This! I was always like…I have nothing to complain about. I had everything I needed and was not abused (because I was not physically abused) and did the comparative suffering bit. But emotional neglect, especially through critical development periods, is a form of abuse with real, lasting impacts. I’m so proud of xennial parents who are doing so much better for their kiddos. I stopped trans-generational trauma by never having kids. Wouldn’t have been ready emotionally to do well before it was biologically too late. But I know so many of you are excellent parents and it gives me hope for the future.
lcl0706@reddit
It took a lot of therapy for me to realize the emotional neglect from my mother did just as much damage as the manipulation, abandonment, and gaslighting from my alcoholic, now deceased, father.
Whosaidthatthing@reddit
Also it’s not you, by Dr Ramani Durvasula. Life changing.
Spiritual-Promise402@reddit
Thanks for the rec!
DasKittySmoosh@reddit
Adult children of emotionally immature parents had me crying at some points. I’d never felt so SEEN
mizlurksalot@reddit
I could have written the first half of OP’s post. Just borrowed Adult Children based off of your comment. That combined with feeling seen by OP’s post has been a bit of a powerful experience this morning. Funfact: went to Libby (library app) and only had to type “adult” into the search and at the top of the list was the book. We are not alonee.
Captain_Desi_Pants@reddit
What I find interesting is that in the last 20-30 years, that search term has evolved.
Searching “Adult” in the past would be for sexy time things. Now the top results are for resources to help deal with adult trauma etc.
WhatTheCluck802@reddit
Thanks for sharing these recommendations. I have the first book on order now.
slowdaygames@reddit
I have the passive-aggressive mom where nothing good is ever happening in her life. I have the no emotion dad whose response to things is, “Oh well”. I moved to the other side of the country over 20 years ago and have had exactly 4 visits combined from the two of them over that time. I know where I stand with them, and made my decision to get out of that environment.
ICLazeru@reddit
It's weird how I thought everything was fine when I was younger, well...not fine, but I didn't realize how bad they were until I was older.
At any time, as a full grown adult, you can have a realization about how bad your parents actually were, or at least I can, because a behavior you though was normal or not a big deal turns out to be that it wasn't normal and it was a big deal.
I'm sorry you're going through it. I know what it's like.
ICLazeru@reddit
Sorry, I just had such a revelation after reading your post.
I got separated from my family at 11, so I never got to spend much time around them. But on the rare occasions I was around, my mom was always super nice to me. I thought I was the favorite, it made me feel guilty and bad for my siblings. They thought so too, it made them jealous. Poisoned our entire relationship.
I just realized it though, I wasn't the favorite. I was the LEAST favorite. She wasn't being nice because she liked me, she was being nice as an apology for sending me away, again. Happened once before for a year when I was 5. Then again when I was 11.
I came back in my 20s to visit her before joining the Navy...everything makes so much sense now.
Allureme@reddit
Victoomhood will never get you far. My sister still plays this card and thinks it’s therapeutic to seek online stranger advise opposed to professional help. I find it especially interesting is that a person cut off contact with everyone in their fam but don’t find it odd that everyone else still communicates and gets along. Also the one sided comparison is a tell tale sign. My sister still complains about the one time my parents did something for me but conveniently forgets that my parents have been wiping her ass for the last 25 years and being the main role as care giver for her two kids.
ailish@reddit
Man, I'm really sorry your mom treats you like that. I don't know what it is with boomers treating their kids that way. My mom was just an emotionally absent person.
My husband's dad is like this. Not rich, but decently well off with two pensions and a 401k. His wife also has a pension. They travel to Europe at least once a year. They spend lots of money on the wife's kids. But if we ask for help on anything they are suddenly strapped for cash because of this and that reason. Christmas and birthdays we just get a card and the wife's kids get extravagant gifts like last year they rented a cottage on the lake, the year before that they bought them expensive cameras. Stuff like that. My husband says it doesn't bother him, but I know it does.
Quirky_Dog5869@reddit
Ah yeah. I tried with my parents after my kids were born. A few years later weer had to explain our children it was impossible to continue with the grandparents since I was all but standing on the bridge nearby to jump.
Quite recently ran into quite some info about the narcissist parent. I'm quite convinced they aren't narcissist but they do have quite a few traits which are really neglectful. There was also an explanation why they will never change nor say sorry and it actually made a lot of sense.
Weirdly enough I also noticed some thing that make a lot of sense for my wife's family although more for her grandparents who, long story short, had a lot of influence on my wife's household as a kid.
So I rigged a little bit and there is no data that actually supports a narcissistic generation, however it does seem to be a generation that scores rather high on certain traits.
aliceinadreamyland@reddit
This is one of the many reasons I went no contact with my mother. My older brother could do no wrong, even had swat surrounding the house once and still he did nothing wrong. Me, I couldn’t even breathe without getting in trouble. Going no contact was such a positive game changer for me.
InterestingTry5190@reddit
I have been no contact for years with my mom and life has been so much better.
JCarpe05@reddit
Oh wow. This sounds a lot like my husband's family! A lot more to it than that but yeah...
giraffemoo@reddit
You can just go no contact, you know. It's weird because it kind of feels like a breakup, at first. Like you'd think it would be easy if this was the right choice. But it's not. I went NC about 11 years ago. The people who raised me are complete strangers to me now. I'm a lot happier for it. I gave myself the attention that I wanted to receive. It took a fair amount of time and a good therapist to get there though. I had to "get over myself" first, like first I had to accept that I was actually worthy of love and attention. Then I had to accept that it's not selfish to be nice to yourself.
It doesn't happen overnight. But try to make some positive changes today!
Lord-Curriculum@reddit
My father was abusive to my sister and me when we were kids. I started lifting weights in high school. The abuse was gonna stop. We got into a huge fight in the mid 90s. He pulled a knife on me. I tackled him to the ground and immobilized him. Huge gut punch to his ego that he couldn't overpower me physically.
He and I don't have a relationship and are estranged. He won't change, and that is fine.
I don't need to forgive him seeking some sort of revelation from him. I just needed to let him go. He'll fade away and that's that. I won't be at his funeral, and that is fine.
You don't need your parent's love. Like you said, you need to love yourself first. I have a family myself now. My priority is NOT to repeat the sins of the father. I don't want my relationship with my daughter to become what it was with my father.
You are fine.
William_Shaftner@reddit
I don’t know why but I feel like I just need to give you a hug. That’s a lot of shit you had to deal with and it sounds like you’re turning it into something beautiful for your family.
Emotional transmutation.
PrairieMaths@reddit
I hear you, I have a similar dynamic. Sometimes I wonder if my mother can only bond through complaining. 🤷♀️
The money always seems upside-down on her end with multiple vehicles, trips, toys, rarely used camper, classic car - all on loans paid via a pension matching prior income at retirement. Add on a few unnecessary home renovations and eating out multiple times a week and constant vague complaints about lack of wealth, never had money, bla bla bla. All closets and basement and back of the SUVs busting at the seams with junk. Then complaining about the cost of Medicare.
A financial mystery indeed.
walter_grimsley@reddit
Bonding through complaining struck a chord with me. That’s my mother 100%. I have to hold the phone away from my ear or simply zone out in person
lcl0706@reddit
This is exactly my mother as well and she’s developing dementia now and it’s only getting worse
Rare_Background8891@reddit
Me too!
TheBr0fessor@reddit
A couple years ago, someone on this subreddit said we were raised like pets and that really stuck with me.
Extra-Blueberry-4320@reddit
My mom was a total child emotionally when she started having kids. It showed. She was very much not nurturing, didn’t want to ever come to visit me after I got married and moved away. Whenever she did see me, it was always a huge deal and she would complain that the 1 1/2 hour drive was “soooo long” and that they had to spend $xx on gas, etc. Definitely made me feel like a burden, even as an adult. This was also the same woman who wanted me to go to med school and become rich so I could bankroll her retirement. She actually died about 6 years ago from early Alzheimer’s and while it was grueling to watch her be sick, it’s sort of good that we don’t have to worry about her being overly manipulative towards us in our older age. She had just started going to therapy when she got sick and I wonder if my relationship would have improved if she addressed some of her issues.
Flashy-Share8186@reddit
ah, this post makes me so sad. I feel for you! You deserve someone in your life who finds you delightful and wonderful to be around!
I gotta say my parents were kind of harsh and manipulative and neglectful, but not to the extent of the stories presented on this post. A mixed bag, maybe my parents get a C in parenting while those others get an f.
ooo-ooo-oooyea@reddit
My parents decided my older brother could no do wrong, and put him in charge of all their old people planning. He's also captain passive aggressive, and will never lift his finger. The fun part is that in the past whenever they needed anything they would go to my brother and he of course wouldn't do anything. I would come in, fix it, and he would get the credit.
Now since they signed over all their stuff to my brother he has to come and sign stuff, so I have a built in excuse not to help since I legally can't. I also have access to their finances to make sure they don't do anything stupid.
Frustrating part is how much money, time and energy they've devoted to my brother and how useless he is - like they still pay his bills into his late 40s bad.
Gullible_Rich_7156@reddit
For some reason it’s a xennials sub trend. Not so sure about society at large. My parents are awesome, have a great relationship with my three kids and even my girlfriend’s two children. They come to every concert, play, games, horse shows, we do holidays together….We also go on big family vacations together with my brother, his wife, their daughter, cousins, etc…
roonilwonwonweasly@reddit
I don't think it's a trend for us specifically. We're just more vocal about it.
trustme1maDR@reddit
I'm so sorry. I experienced a different flavor of this.
My mom always made clear that my birthday was a massive inconvenience to her, even into my adult years. As a kid, I once asked her to bake me my favorite cake and she laughed at me.
To be clear, she was a stay-at-home mom at the time.
Now she's old enough to just out and out forget my birthday. I think it has been for the past 2 years that I haven't gotten a birthday call.
I'm not one of those weirdos who - as an adult - expects everybody to drop everything for my birthday, but that felt rough.
_buffy_summers@reddit
My father told me on my birthday, two years ago, that I deserved every beating he ever gave me. Six months before that, he said I should be grateful he never murdered me when I was a kid, because I got on his nerves all the time. He'd come home drunk and my mother would refuse to take care of him, so I had to do it. I should have let him go full Hendrix.
Red_Car_Singer@reddit
My heart breaks for you. My experience was not this, but a resource I discovered many years ago is https://adultchildren.org/ May we all find the healing we need for ourselves, however we need to find it, and break the cycle with our own families and relationships. 💜
trustme1maDR@reddit
Jesus. I'm so so sorry.
iam317537@reddit
My mom used to tell me that my birthday should really be about her because she’s the one that did the hard labor. Every time we’d celebrate with a cake she’d get the type of cake she’d preferred because “she was paying” etc. Like others I guess ultimately it worked in her favor because over time I learned to devalue the importance of celebrating me and in turn every birthday became “no big deal”/ green light for to treat it like another regular day.
Rare_Background8891@reddit
I feel this. I was made to be small and have no needs. My brother is allowed to have needs and fit those to be met. But if you asked my parents they “would do anything for me!” Except you know, the times I did and they didn’t.
Hugs OP.
aversboyeeee@reddit
I’m the black sheep generational trama breaker. I have no family support. My dad died young and had a new family anyways. My mother and here husband saved all there money to the point of abandoning there family. The saving is almost a mental problem. My mom always said things like you don’t support your kids because they won’t leave. They are now supporting a distant step cousins family with the money they didn’t support their own family with. I was homeless in high-school because of this bullshit. They said I could stay with them because they like to walk around the house naked. So I slept in a park and needed up staying with friends. Now they’re paying for a manipulative ex con piece of shits kids college because of the old ass kissy kiss. they want grand children after they completely shit on their own. It’s always the other parent’s fault if you bring up anything. Yes it’s my dead dads fault. I could talk all day about them. I recently just cut them off completely . I have my own money. Fuck you and your will!!!!! Go ask the drunk meth whore for help. I understand the dynamic, but don’t know it was a thing. I kids would always have a home to sleep in.
jaggoffsmirnoff@reddit
Tell her you'd really like to volunteer together for a day, just the 2 of you.
sorrymizzjackson@reddit
And watch her make a victim of herself loudly while actually needy people are around? Oof, no thanks. Mine was a grown woman who threw herself in the floor and had to be relocated to her bedroom where she scream-cried happy birthday at me because she wasn’t getting enough attention.
Intelligent-Bed7284@reddit
Oh I am tucking this idea away for future. 😂
Silentbrouhaha@reddit
I was the forgotten one and still am. When my mom was in the hospital, my sister was great with visiting and asking needed questions (she lives the closet to our parents). My brother drove two hours to consistently visit over one weekend (he was praised the most for his sacrifices).
I visited, of course, but I took care of the home front (my sister did make sure my dad had what he needed for dinner and what not). I cleaned, did the laundry, tended to some very personal matters on my mom’s request (we’ll just call it dirty work), and ran the dishwasher because my high tech father still does not know how to do dishes.
At first, my parents recognized my efforts. But at a family function recently, my mom praised my sister (rightfully so) then went on and on about my brother (such a long drive…2 hours). Then she said my name, paused, and continued, “Well, she was there.”
Right. Fuck you for that. Next time, I won’t do shit…but I will because I always do.
TwilightTink@reddit
My mom ruined most of my birthdays. Usually she would ground me so my friends couldn't even call me. As I became an adult, she would suggest something I would totally love, and then just fuck it all up.
She took me to Vegas once, then wouldn't even leave the hotel room. One time, I wanted to drive up the hill to see the snow (about 45 min drive). She shows up at 3pm and insists we need snow gloves. My bday is in February, so the sun went down around 5 and with evening traffic we didn't end up going
She's gone now, but it's been drilled into my head that my birthday isn't something that deserves to be celebrated. Now all I want for my birthday is to be left alone so no one can ruin the day
card-board-board@reddit
Genuinely reminds me of my mom. Left my dad and me when I was a kid, I got the every-other-weekend with her thing when she bothered to show up.
But one year when I was an adult she said she wanted to make things up to me and told me she'd pay for me to get LASIK and I was floored. I made an appointment.
Then, a week later, she told me nevermind, she had no idea it was that expensive.
The next Christmas I got a carabiner. The following Christmas? Another carabiner. She bought a pack of them and was gifting them to me one at a time.
She owned 2 houses and let my older brother live in one of them for free.
VaselineHabits@reddit
Narcissist and their golden child, and trinkets for others.
sorrymizzjackson@reddit
Yeah, my sister got about a million dollars. I got absolutely nothing.
I’ve always been on my own to fend for myself. What else is new?
Professional-Loss743@reddit
Your mom and my mom:
yinchanvo@reddit
Recent Ric Flair post to his son David about naming his company "Green Flair Recycling", a perfect example of a Boomer-Xennial relationship:
“I’m obviously not suing my son. Just reminding him that you can’t have the best of both worlds!
Use your God-given name, Flier, which isn’t worth a cup of coffee, or your wife’s name, who has had three generations of success. Also, please don’t sell my robes that I let you use during your career, as you have already sold one. You’re 47 years old… now stand on your own two feet, please.”
Dimplefrom-YA@reddit
my brother accused my mom of loving me more than him. i’m going to say, NOT AT ALL. bro stopped talking to me and it tore me apart. If you were neglected, then trust me… it most likely was a different type of control experience for your sibling.
for me it was, I gave you everything.. so now you have to do everything for me. while my brother got… i gave you freedom, so you can make something out of yourself.
what my parents did not understand is i craved freedom while my brother craved empathy.
i think boomers just don’t get you have to give a balance of freedom and smothering.
it’s suffocating both ways.
bro never understood i wanted his life immensely. be able to make my own decisions… be able to make mistakes. learn from them. be able to be independent.
whereas he really wanted to be nurtured. be smothered. etc.
i love my brother. however. because he felt neglected he used to take it out on me. that made my parents smother me more and i HATED IT. i had NO SPACE.
yinchanvo@reddit
"A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America" by Bruce Cannon Gibney 😞
AutomaticNovel2153@reddit
Same. My mom even told my wife recently she “never had to worry about [older sister]” but I was always causing trouble. This is especially strange because I was in my room reading, listening to music, and drawing while my sister was out drinking and having sex with multiple partners. She signed up for credit cards and rang up 40k in debt before she was 22. When I asked my mom to explain why she felt I was the troublemaker she paused for a moment and then said “I have no idea why I think that way. You were just in your room all the time. [older sister] invited her whole school over for a party when your dad and I went out for 3 hours.”
My wife sat down with her a while back and explained her observations. This led to my mom going into hiding for a few days while she came to terms with the fact that she was neglectful and abusive, and has continued to feel comfortable snapping at me with no provocation well into my adulthood. I have a young child now she comes over often to see him, which was very taxing on me.
Since that conversation my mom has many times acknowledged her bias, corrected herself when she villainizes me, and when she compares my son to my sister acknowledges that she has no idea what I was like at that age. I can tell that she regrets the way she treated me for the last 45 years, but being called a “nasty brat” constantly when you’re literally minding your own business, studying hard, working to support your family, is hard to forget.
_buffy_summers@reddit
I am no-contact with both of my parents. I'm struggling right now with a lot of things, but there's also the knowing that if I lived closer to them and had to rely on them, everything they did would come with commentary and whining. My in-laws are willing to rearrange their day to get me to and from the commuter train; my parents treat every act of 'kindness' like an opportunity for further monetary transactions. Of course, they don't keep records, so they've tried to tell me and my sisters that we owe them the same amount of money half a dozen times, even after they've been paid back. Unfortunately for them, we do keep receipts.
Years ago, when I was pregnant, my husband was looking at the possibility of being gone for a few weeks, for job training. He didn't want me to be on my own, in case I needed to get to the hospital for any reason. I mentioned to my mother that I might need to stay with her, and asked if that was okay. She told me she was going to need five hundred dollars for me to stay two weeks. According to her, I was going to be needing $200/week in groceries, and she expected me to give her that money instead of, I don't know, buying my own groceries? The extra hundred was gas money. This was in 2007. My husband and I told his parents, and they said I could stay with them for free.
About a week later, on a winter holiday (I can't remember now if it was Thanksgiving or Christmas), my mom called and left me a voicemail, asking me to call her back. I thought 'oh, she misses me,' and immediately called her. The joke was on me, because the first thing she said was, "So, are you going to come stay here? Because I need the money." I told her to fuck off and hung up on her.
Useful_Menu_9863@reddit
My mom lives 15 minutes from my house. I do not see her unless I go to her house. My brother lives 2 hours away, and she will go tho his house to visit. I stopped trying to get her to come to my house long ago. I'm outspoken, I guess Mom doesn't like that; I'm supposed to pretend like my childhood was a fairy tale, I guess.
I learned how to be a decent mom by doing the opposite of what mine did. I've heard that some people are the kind of parent to their children that they needed themselves when they were young. It's true for me. I allowed my kids to show anger, frustration, sadness, etc, and I didn't toss them out of the house all day. I went places with them, did things with them, had difficult conversations with them. AFAIK my kids don't feel traumatized by me, considering one of my adult children is sitting on my couch right now and texts me every 5 minutes.
NoWordsJustDogs@reddit
At this point, it’s about radical acceptance.
You can’t change their behavior or toxicity anymore than you can change something fundamental about you.
Quit fighting a losing fight. Step back from it and let the crazies be crazies.
Sharing genetic similarities does not entitle them to use you as an emotional punching back or sounding board of whatever other NPC they view you as. I’m NC with my living parents and you can tell.
You can choose peace.
Writing_Femme@reddit
My parents were neglectful and abusive. I thought that was just my family...sad to see it so widespread. I am no contact with my family, best thing for me...but they didn't even ask why. Can't tell if it's because they already know, don't care, or just glad to be rid of me.
DetroitsGoingToWin@reddit
I’m going to meet my dad for coffee. After helping this guy for the last 10 years from medical issues, the loss of mom and doing our (my family and my sisters) best to tend to his needs.
I have to tell him if he insists on spending the rest of his dwindling money from mom’s life insurance policy on hookers, I’m done with him.
I feel ya.
stillmusiqal@reddit
I was the scapegoat... till I cut my mom off. Problem solved! They don't fuck with you? Don't fuck with them 🤷♀️ my life is amazing now. My mom has never even met my son and he's almost five. Nc means nc.
Ok-Maize3153@reddit
I also have emotionally immature parents. When I visit, she demands I do a bunch of things for her. She will demand that I drive her to the grocery store. Once we are there, she will tell me to pick out any vegetables I'd want and she can cook for me. However, then she complains that she doesn't know how to cook the vegetable I picked out.
It's exhausting. I've learned that no interaction with my parents and hiding my personal life from them is the best approach. Any personal interaction with them just makes it worse. I had mentioned that I hide my personal life with a group of older women (55+) who are mothers and they were aghast that I'm not truthful and forthright with my parents. They didn't get it at all. Whatever.
Lilysils@reddit
This sounds like my father. Cut all contact with him when I was early 20s and never looked back.
Capital-Mark1897@reddit
I'm not sure it's generational. My mother (72) gave me a pair of socks for my 50th birthday and said "If I can find a cheap enough ticket, I'll come visit you. Money has always been off topic and it's never given freely although her mother was exceptionally generous with her and she also has the means to be generous but chooses not to.
CosmicMamaBear@reddit
I'm the truthteller about the abuse in the protestant pastor and fake upstanding citizen family so that made me the scapegoat. The golden siblings who deny everything get the money.
tubagoat@reddit
I mean, its been 3 years since my parents remembered my birthday and Im in regular contact with them. They just forget, and at this point, i wanna see how long it is gonna be before they remember.
ET__@reddit
Just tell her if you’re not worth the effort, you’ll celebrate alone. It’s not about the money, it’s about the sentiment.
Timely-Ability-6521@reddit
Been there done that got the t shirt and the woman still breaths negativity to this day. Still treats my sister like she's the only worthwhile child. EVEN THOUGH my mother is elderly and needs help but my sister is where?? NO WHERE TO BE FOUND. Am I bitter about it? You damn right. But I'm also a better person than both these idjits. So I'm here at this awful woman's house helping her because 1. She's still the person that gave birth to me and 2. I can't in good conscience not help her. I just can't just walk away. But I suggest anyone else in this position to walk away before u see any of ur parents old age or u will (just like me) not be able to.
Blackbird136@reddit
I basically could have written this post. There are differences, but the core is the same.
I was never enough for either parent. I was a good student, honors in HS, never in any major trouble as a teen, 3.7 in college, got married, bought a house.
Because I was not a carbon copy of either parent, I had essentially no support. My dad didn’t even go to my HS graduation, he was too busy being drunk like he was my entire childhood. I bought my first home in 2007 and left it in 2023; neither parent ever even saw it. Mom passed fairly young of cancer in 2013. We weren’t estranged, but we definitely weren’t close.
Now I’m divorced, lost the house, struggling financially. I’m low contact with my dad and he insinuates that all of this is my fault. Should have chosen a better career path, should have chosen a better husband. Many months I’m struggling to make bills, I have almost nothing in savings. Meanwhile he was fired from his job when he was about my age, never worked again, and is set for life. Six figures in the bank, pulling pension and social. Doesn’t understand why I’m struggling and it feels fucking unfair that I am, seeing as though I’ve worked since I was 17 years old, and he hasn’t had a job since 1989.
Here and there he sends me a couple hundred dollars. I’m not in a place to not accept it, but I’d certainly trade it to have a dad I’ve never had, or even just one who seems to live in 2026 rather than the 1970s.
HoneyBadger302@reddit
There are a lot of great resources for people like us out there - "Children of Emotionally Immature Parents," "Stop Caretaking the Borderline or Narcissist," "Emotional Blackmail" (by Susan Forward), among many others.
Boundaries, low, very low, or no contact are all healthy ways to manage these relationships, because unfortunately, the sad part is, our parents are probably not going to change. We've hoped for it our entire lives, as children our entire being was trying to earn something that was never going to be given to us, because it simply wasn't in their capacity to give us. They are selfish beings with huge blackholes of need within themselves that they can never fill, and no matter how hard we try, we can never fill it for them either.
If you haven't, a therapist familiar with these kind of family dynamics can be great as well, if nothing else, to help keep you grounded and realize that no, you're not the crazy one, but also to help you see the responses you might otherwise have trouble finding on your own when situations like this come up.
For this particular situation, my response (for context, our father is NPD, our mother is BPD) would simply be: thanks, I'll think it over and let you know. NOTHING else. No acknowledgement of all of her whining, or her goings on, or her other things she's doing. Grey rock the entire response. The more you grey rock, the easier it gets, and over time they tend to push less because it doesn't get them anywhere. They never fully stop, because THEY haven't changed one bit, but they aren't getting the response they desire, so it's not as productive as it was, so they don't keep trying as often in my experience.
LurkyLoo28@reddit
I’m sorry this is your reality. Your mom seems to be more than just your average boomer. Obviously I don’t know all the nuance in your relationship with your mother, but she is displaying some narcissistic behaviors. You need to remember that you do not control her. You can only control your reactions to her. If you have an open and honest conversation with her about how this makes you feel and nothing changes, or worse, she uses the information against you, then you may want to consider going low or no contact for your own mental wellbeing.
I would recommend reading It's Not You: Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People by Ramani Durvasula.
Sending you a virtual hug and reminding you that you are good enough and you bring value to this world just by being you.
walter_grimsley@reddit
I wasn’t so much blamed for everything, but I became my mother’s punching bag once my father became ill and went to the NH. Everything she hammered him with for 40 years got aimed at me.
She basically replaced him with me in the dynamic. I get all the chores, tasks and complaints without regard to my own needs or those of my family. I also live two hours away. It’s beyond exhausting.
I refuse to burden my own child this way in old age. I will plan for old age as though I am childless. Visiting me will be her choice without additional obligations.
wifeski@reddit
Solidarity, my xennial friend. I no longer speak to my mother or brother either. Going on 12 years 💪
Reasonable-Wave8093@reddit
I am sorry. Scapegoat here too, i hope you have a therapy group. some of the older gens just cant stop manipulating.
Acceptable_Usual1646@reddit
Shat shall I say. Still not good enough for my parents at 47 so I just wuit putting effort in the relationship and quit phoning them. That is 3 years ago and haven’t heard from them ever since
sorrymizzjackson@reddit
Same. She’d make plans and then cancel at the last minute. Last plans I made with her were for my birthday and then to see her before I moved to another state two months later. She cancelled both. So I left and I never saw her again. She died last year. She pulled plenty more shit since then that led me to that decision.
She was not a good person.
Gras-Ober@reddit
Sounds like my mother in law. My wife broke off contact with her 15 years ago. She gets her motherly love from my mother instead.
Embarrassed_Key_4539@reddit
Go no contact and I also recommend therapy to process the relationship
Harkonnen_Dog@reddit
Yep.
Do like I did. Leave them to rot.
zerosevennine@reddit
Some people just suck, and they have kids. It sounds like your mom has issues of her own. I’m an only child, and my parents have been apathetic. I gave up trying to make them love me, and I’m so much happier.
DasKittySmoosh@reddit
One of the greatest things I ever did for myself was go super low contact with my parents. I hope we as a generation have learned to do better with our own children.
Ineedavodka2019@reddit
I’m sorry.