Who has cut off a parent and what did they do?

[Anonymous]

For me, my mother lies but not in an malicious way, I can see that she’s often unable to accept certain realities but this has meant, she’s withheld information and has also flat out lied regularly to me and my husband. It’s often connected to her lying about her partner/boyfriends.

I am open to reconciliation but she’s too afraid to have that conversation. So here we are. First holiday we have not communicated.

What’s your issue and how long has it been?

[Anonymous]

Why would you cut off your mother because she lies about her boyfriends? What business is that of yours anyway? You've spent too much time on DCUM, which is filled with stories of posters estranged from their mothers. That's a really extreme position to take, especially in your case. What a flimsy excuse to do something that drastic. It's like posting in the beauty section that you have a birthmark on your leg and are considering amputation.

[Anonymous]

MIL is leaving her millions all to her unemployed son who is 51 and lives with her. He hasn't worked in 16 years.

She is leaving DH nothing.
She has lied about this and told DH he is trashy for asking about the will.
She lies and enables her other son.

DH cut her off 1.5 years ago.

[Anonymous]

A few years ago, my father assaulted me when I was trying to ask my mother questions about her wishes. I was using conversational techniques that I had learned from Cameron Huddleston’s articles and he became hostile and attacked me.

She then threatened me and he threatened to report me to CPS for child abuse and the local police for elder abuse.

I took that to mean that they had gone outside the family to have their wishes known and so have stayed away at the advice of a local social worker whom I called after this incident.

I realize that they cut me off technically but they lie and tell their friends and extended family that I cut them off for no reason. So it’s all a question of who one believes. It’s all I said- they said. That’s the price of being an only child.

I go out of my way to not make requests of them, including not attending holiday parties where gifts are customary. I send a small gift and call to wish my mother a happy holiday for five minutes. I expect nothing in return. That’s all the contact we have. I haven’t spoken to my father since the assault.

[Anonymous]

I've gone very low contact. Mom for decades refused to treat her mental illness and finally got help 5 years ago, but refuses to stay on meds. Thne tantrums and rage fits were too hard on our family. Then she kept rescuing my addict sibling and expecting me to join in the dramatics and play the game. My refusal to enable led to mom hurling a barrage of insults at me. For someone who is into keeping up appearances somehow my stable low key family self with my stable family I created is a horror and my sibling who is descends into chaos on a regular basis and relationships explode...is the golden child. If I did even a small fraction of what my sibling did mom would have cut me off.

[Anonymous]

Wow! I'm surprised by these answers.

I cut my mom off for continuing her verbal abuse to me even though I was married, pregnant, and successful career wise. She left long violent voicemails and wrote crazy threatening letters. I just got one today in fact. I cut her off 15 yrs ago.

The last time she hit me, I was 23. She's drawn blood, left bruises, cuts, gave me a concussion.

[Anonymous]

I went no contact with my mother. She stayed with the man who abused me (in every way), and blamed me for the abuse. Her blaming me and doing things to try to hurt me continued into my 20s. I finally said enough was enough.

She continued to do horrible things to people to entertain herself, just not to me, after I shut it all down.

[Anonymous]

I cut my mother off a year ago. I think she is vile. She is the only high energy, able bodied, college educated adult I know who gloats about being chronically unemployed. A job is beneath her and causes too much stress and chaos! My working class grandparents sacrified to put her through college. She got pregnant one week after graduation on her wedding night and never used her degree. She was always "so busy" taking care of her 2500 square foot home on 1/4 of an acre--so much work.

She emotionally abused my father. She manipulated him into letting her stay home for 50 years of their marriage while he worked insane hours and ruined his health due to the stress of it. Her motivations and manipulative behaviors became crystal clear to me after he died.

My mind is more clear as time passes. I should have cut her off decades ago--she enjoyed kicking people when they were up and when they were down.

She threw her infant sister out of a moving car when she was 7 and said not one word as the car drove off. She wrote about it in a family "memoir" she gave to dozens of our relatives as though it was no big deal.

Her doctor said she could live to see 105. I will be close to 80. I am not wasting the next 30 years of my life tolerating her b.s.

With people living longer lives, I suspect parent cutoffs are becoming more common. If you have an emotionally abusive parent who lives to see 105, it makes zero sense to maintain a relationship with them just because they are your parent. Why do I owe my abusive parent 60 years of abusive contact in my adulthood just because she cared for me in my first 18 years?

[Anonymous]

Damn. These responses are making my selfish neglectful mother seem peachy.

[Anonymous]

My mother has over the years turned every major difficult period of my life into *her* drama. When I had heart surgery she afterward was mad at me that I didn't thank her enough for watching my kids. When I was in the news about a trauma I told her about it and she had a hissy fit I didn't tell her first. She's obsessed with weight and money. The clincher was when I separated from exDH due to financial and emotional abuse and she immediately reached out to him behind my back and didn't talk to me, preferring interacting with the grandkids through him.

[Anonymous]

Just a lot of insults and drama. Every time I was around her I would eventually get screamed at for not living closer and getting involved in her squabbles with my siblings (which usually resulted in someone going to jail). She called me a f** b****, stuck-up, etc. And like PP she turned my difficulties into hers. I came extremely close to dying because of this weird disease I have and I was in the hospital for two weeks and she just kept talking about how things like that are more difficult for the parents.

But we still text! I really like that. All the neglect and serious abuse is now decades behind me and I can let it go and just have goofy chats with her.

[Anonymous]

Almost 20 years ago. She abused me my whole life. Physically, emotionally, verbally. Everything is about her. Like others, when I had a serious health crisis, it was about her. Made jokes about how close I came to dying. I can’t even list all the reasons.

One thing I know, she is so mentally unstable that she rather be right than have a relationship with her kids. I don’t even miss her a tiny bit.