From: anon.95@pax.tpa.com.au
Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery
Subject: Smothering Mom **SPOILERS**
Date: 25 Dec 1992 02:16:20 +1030
Organization: PAX - Public Access Unix (Adelaide,South Australia) - Anonymous Service
Reply-To: anon.95@pax.tpa.com.au
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***** Some spoilers- too new here to know how deep *****














I talked with my Mom the other day. We talk regularly. She called me this
time. I had sent her a holiday card that said some nice things. She said it
was the most beautiful card she has ever seen (they were 8 for $3.95) and
I had said the loveliest things; she showed it to her neighbors.

My mother has manic-depressive illness, which I may have inherited from her
(I take Lithium and an anti-anxiety medication, but am not completely
convinced my problems aren't just caused by abuse). Her sister was disabled
her entire life with schizophrenia. When I was young, I was first ignored
and then abused. I know that I wasn't touched as an infant at all. She would
feed me by propping a bottle on a rolled up baby blanket and putting it in
my mouth. I cried a lot, and eventually she started sticking me under the
shower until I stopped crying. Later, she dressed me up as a little
girl (I don't remember that, but when she admitted it, I was royally
ticked, since I had a problem with cross dressing for several years later
in life). She also beat me very badly at times.

Oddly enough, I'm not so mad at her, while I have cut off contact with my
Dad, who was more physically and emotionally abusive. The reason I'm
more forgiving with my mom is that even when I was young, I knew she was
screwed up, and she apologized after she hit us (my dad didn't apologize).
Later in life (my folks divorced when I was 10 or so, my dad got custody,
and screwed my mom out of the settlement she deserved), she got back in
touch with us, and she has tried to make things right.

She has apologized for things. She admitted the cross-dressing and shower
thing once, but when I mentioned it a couple of years later, she denied it
ever happened and hung up after threatening to commit suicide. Nonetheless,
she has tried to make things right, or has she. She always was very smothering.
My dad said I was a stupid **** who would never amount to anything. To my
mom, I was poor, incompetant <TJ>, who would never amount to anything.
We also had much inappropriate contact, (bathing together, nudity,
inappropriate talk about sex, warped attitudes about sex, etc). In many
ways I was the parent.

Now she is sending me $200 per month (10% of her income) to help me with
grad school (my dad, who is quite well off but debt burdened, gave nothing).
She wanted to increase it to $300 per month, and was so insistant I had to
scream her down. I could use the cash, don't get me wrong, but I know she
was obsessing on this. I'm "her life", "her reason for existence".

Here's my dilemna. Is she doing this as a method of repentence? Is she
doing this as a control mechanism in order to buy love? Yes and yes.
Should I accept the money? Before I broke contact with my dad, I asked
him about this, and he noted (rightly) that if I didn't take the money
she would find someone else to give it to (she has given excessively to
others as well). My idea is to keep track of what she's giving me and
help her out when she retires.

But. I feel somewhat used. When I feel that way, I stop feeling charitable
towards her. What she's doing is a form of abuse. On the other hand, she
was sort of manic when we talked (I know :)), so perhaps I should cut her
a little slack.

Ideas? Anyone else out have experience with smothering abusers?

TJ


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