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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Your mom is passive aggressive and provocative.

Ignore such emails and photo captions. And when I say ignore, I mean do not acknowledge in any way whatsoever.  She is desperate to gets rise out of you.[/quote]

Yep, ignore. I have family members who do this too. She probably won't "let" you ignore all of them though. 
My Mom wanted me to do things she could brag to family members about so she would look better; it was messed up, and I didn't figure it out until I started making choices she did not agree with in my 20s. In her view, everyone else's life and/or daughter was better.

If you want, you can send replies, consisting of "that's so great for Larla" or "glad they had a great time!" and scrubbed, "perfect-life" pictures and stories to your Mom in return. Don't call her out, don't tell her any problems you may have or count on her for any advice; if she sees anger, she will attack you for that too. Sadly, I know from experience.

If you are currently telling her about life as it really is, with any challenges with you or your children or your husband/parme tner etc..., stop doing that and just send her (or talk to her about) a the perfect fantasy-land version of your life, when you do talk to her. Minimize contact as much as possible. When attacking you, she will have less ammunition. If she sends you daily messages, condition her to receive one weekly message or phone cal (or whatever time frame works for you.) Say, "oh mom, I'm so busy with "insert perfect scrubbed life example here" that I "just got around to writing, thanks for all the updates Mom."

This approach may or may not work, but it's something to try. Worked for me for many years and until my Mom's behaviour escalated. Good luck. [/quote]

How did your mother's behavior escalate?[/quote]

She also had problems with anxiety (as does my whole family) and as she became very elderly the stress of health problems and living on her own just made her anxiety and lashing out so much worse. Basically a lifetime of anger at people who would not or could not do things her way came out when, due to health conditions, she could not live the way she had any longer. For example she started making random unflattering comments: I took her to shop for clothes and a salesperson who had helped her regularly waited on us--when she was still in earshot Mom said "she looks awful, like she has cancer or something." Sigh, the really nice lady heard her. For me, she really fixation on my appearance; if I would not let her complain incessantly (and unfairly) about other family members, she would attack my weight or any wrinkles I have. At some points, anything I did was "awful" and not enough.

Just take the behavior of your mother and double it.[/quote]

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