Narcissistic/controlling mother??

[angelfire138]

Hi there guys,

 

New here, though I've been lurking for awhile I noticed a lot of great advice has been given on here, so here I am, hoping you all would impart some of your wisdom on my situation, can relate, or share your own experiences with this.

 

Little background, I am 26, almost 27, and my mother is 55 and perfectly healthy. I moved out of the house when I was 23, moved back in with my mom and my brother for a year to save money, and I just recently moved out again, about 40 minutes away from her. I love my mother, I really do, and I want nothing more than to maintain a close relationship with her, however, I'm not sure if that's possible at this point, and she really is making me feel guilty about it.

 

To make a long story short, I really believe that I have a narcissistic mom. Or controlling. Or both, maybe. She's always been overprotective, which I appreciated when I was younger, but as I grew older and wanted to do things on my own, I saw her overprotectiveness turn to controlling, to needy, to narcissism. So after doing some research and coming across article upon article about narcissistic people, parents in particular, I was horrified to realize that my mother fit 90% of the indications of narcissism down to a T. Horrified because this was my mom we were talking about.

 

I am Chinese, so my mother constantly tries to lord the "respect your elders at all costs" over me at all times, and she hasn't shied away from verbally abusing me or calling me names in the past. When all else failed, she resorted to guilt trips, saying that I was giving her heart problems and always saying "well your brother would do that for me, you must not care about me.", or "If I died tomorrow you wouldn't even care", to name a few. She refuses to get a job because nothing pays enough for her (even though she was recently offered a job that paid $120k a year, which I thought was really good considering she hadn't worked in 8 years), and refuses to keep friends because she doesn't trust any of them and has something negative to say about all her friends. She dated after her divorce, but only so she could "use" the men for their money and so they could be her servant (by her own admittance, by the way), and when she drew them in enough so that they wanted a more serious commitment, she dropped them and went to the next guy.

 

Even when I read about narcissistic parents' effects on the children, many of those points applied to me and I never even realized it, until recently. I went and spoke to my father, who had always pushed me to become independent and think on my own, and supported me in all my decisions, and it is only thanks to him that I can still live some semblance of a normal adult life. It was him who encouraged me to move out (even offering to support me for the first few months while I finished grad school. I'm in my final few months), paid for my entire tuition for graduate school, and encouraged me to date and gain relationship experience, while giving me advice and helping me keep my head on straight.

 

Now that I've moved out, my mother hasn't let up. I call or text her a few times a week to keep up with her, however, it's never enough. If I don't tell her exactly what I'm doing and with who, even though I don't even live with her, she'll text or call me four or five times in a row asking me what the hell I'm doing that I have to ignore my family. I've considered cutting off all contact for awhile, but I haven't been able to bring myself to for fear of losing my brother and my grandma, who side with her no matter what, although my brother has admitted recently that he wanted to move out but was scared / guilty of leaving my mom alone. As a side note, my grandparents sheltered my mom and her siblings all their lives & discouraged them from dating/having friends. Hasn't turned out well for any of them.

 

She expects that I come home every weekend, because that's what I used to do when I lived on my own previously. If I choose to spend my weekends with my friends or boyfriend instead, she gets offended, again, calls me multiple times, many times calling me disrespectful or a bad daughter, often saying things like "I thought I raised you well, what happened to you? You're no better than those trashy girls that just sleep around and party all the time".

 

When it comes to my friends and boyfriend, she'll say "your friends aren't really your friends, they're just using you. Your boyfriend will just cheat on you, get bored with you, or abuse you later because all men are like that. Your mother is the only person you can trust and who truly cares about you. No one gives a crap about you out there,"

 

Also, let me clarify that even until now, I have never done one thing to make my parents worry. I did well in school, never did drugs, smoked, and only began to drink alcohol when I was of legal age. I visited often even when I lived out of state for 2 years (every 3 months I'd take a few days off work and visit), and kept in touch with her a few times a week via email/text/phone. When I lived with her, I respected her and when I went out with my friends/boyfriend I always let her know when I'd be coming home.

 

On the flip side, whenever I do what she wants, she turns into this sweet, funny woman who's fun to be around.

 

What am I supposed to do about this? I'd considered moving further away, however that's not feasible now because mainly, I'd just lengthen the commute to my school, work and internship sites, and as a side note, I'd also be further away from my boyfriend and my brother.

 

Also, I'd be happy to provide more examples of anything I mentioned above. Thanks in advance!

[ilikesunita]

I often hear the Chinese parents are strict, and I'm sorry to read that it affects you.

 

This said, sometimes we have to learn how to manage people. And by that I mean learning how to anticipate their actions and work around them.

[Almond_Joy]

So.....have you brought any of this up to your mother, or are you here to get advice about how to broach this issue with your mom? Just want to clarify before sharing my $.02....