Triggered and invalidated by compassionate "forgive your mom"-tok

[donutmoonpanda]

Ah, mother's day is already in the air.

I saw a tiktok today where someone asked "Would you like your mom to also be your mother in your next life?" To which most people responded No. Some cited abuse. Others said something along the lines of "I'd like an upgrade." Very few said yes (which is how it found its way onto my timeline. I'm sure I'm liking a lot of narc-mom tiktoks).

But I was triggered by a series of responses that said more or less: "I'd like to be my mom's mother because she didn't get the love she needed from her mother, and that's why she wasn't a great mom to me." The op was praising these responses as being so compassionate. More or less giving people a cookie for putting their mother first. As usual.

It pains me to know that most people with abusive mothers are used to putting her first, pushing all their own needs away. When being faced with having to reparent themselves, there are so many stumbling blocks in your way, sucking you back into PD mom's orbit. So when asked the simple question "Would you like a different mom in your next life?" even then we're expected to be compassionate to her, put her needs first. The op told me I'm supposed to "have gotten far enough in recovery" that I can "forgive her" and be "willing to give something back"!

It's not that I never considered how much better off she'd be with a different mother of her own, but it's really irrelevant at this point. All the therapy I've paid for. All the work. All the personal growth. That all stems from her abysmal performance as a mother. I don't have anything to give back; I don't owe her anything.

I get it, maybe op had no idea he'd end up on trauma-tok, but his reaction to all the traumatized replies was hyper-invalidating. Not everyone's goal is to forgive. I'm just trying to heal the child she hurt and put my needs first for the first time in my life. My goal isn't to forgive, it's to recover from PTSD. Even if I forgave her, it would be none of her business! It would be for me, not for her. And if I want to parent someone with unconditional love so they can have a solid start in life, I'll start with my own kids, thank you very much. Not the lady who failed me.

Sorry for the rant. Y'all are the best.

[Amadahy]

This is one of the wisest, healthiest responses to the whole mess of N parenting I've seen.  Bravo!  ❤️

[Call Me Cordelia]

Yes indeed! I don't believe in reincarnation, or that you choose your parents, so there's that. I've seen the latter belief in New Age circles. (Implying that you chose your current abusive parents, implying your responsibility for them or somehow deserving them. Yuck.)

But around here we have a word for that implicit and here explicit role reversal: Parentification. It's got an entry on the website. Making the child take on the role of parent for the one who should be a parent to him or her. It's abusive. It's unhealthy. It's dysfunctional. Wishing you could step into that mother role for your mother, even out of compassion, is likewise unhealthy. And you are far enough in recovery to see it for what it is. Your mother's mental health is not and will not be in your power to fix, or your responsibility, in this life or any other.

The OP's response to you is a pile of shame. "Far enough" shows that person does not understand recovery.  I really hate that when people use your trauma against you in that way. It's really toxic, especially when they are setting themselves up to look so virtuous.

[Cat of the Canals]

A friend shared a meme earlier this week. It said, "Empathy without boundaries is self-destruction." I think that sums it up for a lot of us. Not wanting to endlessly caretake our disordered parents does NOT mean we lack compassion or empathy. And anyone who thinks it does is setting themselves up for a lot of pain (or, perhaps more likely, not speaking from experience).

[donutmoonpanda]

But around here we have a word for that implicit and here explicit role reversal: Parentification. It's got an entry on the website. Making the child take on the role of parent for the one who should be a parent to him or her. It's abusive. It's unhealthy. It's dysfunctional. Wishing you could step into that mother role for your mother, even out of compassion, is likewise unhealthy. And you are far enough in recovery to see it for what it is. Your mother's mental health is not and will not be in your power to fix, or your responsibility, in this life or any other.

Yes! You hit the nail on the head. I forgot about that term. Taking care of mom is actually the easiest response for a parentified person like me. It's like, "I'm gonna parent my mom no matter what the circumstances!" That's what I'm trying to unlearn and it was so sad to see it praised by someone who doesn't understand how damaging it can be.

A friend shared a meme earlier this week. It said, "Empathy without boundaries is self-destruction." I think that sums it up for a lot of us. Not wanting to endlessly caretake our disordered parents does NOT mean we lack compassion or empathy. And anyone who thinks it does is setting themselves up for a lot of pain (or, perhaps more likely, not speaking from experience).

"Empathy without boundaries is self-destruction." For most of my life, I wouldn't have known what that meant! But now I understand why it always felt like being obliterated.

Thank you all, as always 

[feralcat]

 
All of that !
I've written  the saying " Empathy without boundaries is self destruction" on my kitchen chalkboard.
The story of my life. I was bought up to be useful, and as a parentified carer.

( Trigger ? )I lost a child some time back. My unPdM 's response was that 'every cloud has a silver lining'. Which just goes to show how totally non empathic she is.
But in a way it's true. If you look for it, there's always something you can pull out of even the most awful situation.
For me at the moment it's having to come to terms with having Long  Covid. Hard for a do-er like me. But a silver lining is that I find I just don't have the emotional energy , or brain power, to spare for the shenanigans and pity parties of my FOO. The apathy is my boundary. As abused kids we on this board were bought up to be hyper vigilant , to be attentive to the needs of the Borg.
I've learned to register that in theory , but in practice it's hard to counteract the Nice Girl conditioning. Now my brain thinks 

I suppose it's like giving up smoking. You hope that one day one day you'll be able to throw the unopened pack in the bin. Where it belongs.

[feralcat]

Ps fantastic post DonutMoon. Really thought provoking. And validating, lol

[bee well]

"I get it, maybe op had no idea he'd end up on trauma-tok, but his reaction to all the traumatized replies was hyper-invalidating. Not everyone's goal is to forgive. I'm just trying to heal the child she hurt and put my needs first for the first time in my life. My goal isn't to forgive, it's to recover from PTSD. Even if I forgave her, it would be none of her business! It would be for me, not for her. And if I want to parent someone with unconditional love so they can have a solid start in life, I'll start with my own kids, thank you very much. Not the lady who failed me."


Thank you for stading up, donutmoonpanda, so many of us needed to hear this. Right now.

Someone once said "a child isn't born with a job."

It's not our job to love, or forgive our parents, or anyone else for that matter. That comes from our heart. And (obligatory) forgiveness is a big F word. I spent years trying to get there, even fooled myself into it. The results were not pretty.

Keep taking care of you, you are the best friend you will ever have.

[SunnyMeadow]

It's not that I never considered how much better off she'd be with a different mother of her own, but it's really irrelevant at this point. All the therapy I've paid for. All the work. All the personal growth. That all stems from her abysmal performance as a mother. I don't have anything to give back; I don't owe her anything.

I get it, maybe op had no idea he'd end up on trauma-tok, but his reaction to all the traumatized replies was hyper-invalidating. Not everyone's goal is to forgive. I'm just trying to heal the child she hurt and put my needs first for the first time in my life. My goal isn't to forgive, it's to recover from PTSD. Even if I forgave her, it would be none of her business! It would be for me, not for her. And if I want to parent someone with unconditional love so they can have a solid start in life, I'll start with my own kids, thank you very much. Not the lady who failed me.

I like and agree with every part of your post! A very mature and self-caring way to look at your situation. I won't be forgiving my mother, never even considered the idea. It really does boil down to their abysmal performances as mothers. They never tried to find better ways of raising their children. They failed at the job of mothering.

I hate Mother's Day thanks to my mother. I don't even like it for me with my children. I'm always worried they're rolling their eyes at putting forth the effort for a made up, commercialized day. 

[treesgrowslowly]

So he thinks that he would have the capacity to love and forgive well, but when given the opportunity to respect your experience as valid, he went defensive? Doesn't sound like he's ready to parent his mother in a non-shaming way.

I agree with you, it is gross that the OP praised this sort of thing....IF I gave them the benefit of the doubt, they may be hoping to talk about how it would have been nice for all of us to have had non-traumatized parents in the first place. ...But it doesn't sound like that was the intended message, and at best, this whole tok sounds like a real clumsy and inevitably toxic attempt to bait people. Which is common on the tok.

There's a lot of denying the real wounding that has occurred in people's lives - especially around Mother's Day. This is the time of year where the cultural narrative is deafening - "Moms are the best - hooray for moms". Um, those of us who didn't have loving mothers? We are told to shut up basically at this time of year. Except for in honest forums like this.

I wouldn't be quick to assume the OP didn't know what he was doing. I wouldn't follow this person, just IMHO. There are some really insightful people on social media who have excellent messages for trauma survivors. Who don't shame their followers for 'not being able to forgive'.

I sense some baiting happening here - pulling people in so he could feel superior.

People like this are everywhere. It's just another form of virtue signalling. He hasn't addressed his issues with shame, and of course social media is a perfect platform for him to appear as if he has.... Except to those of us who see through it. Like you did! Bravo indeed.

Trees

[NarcKiddo]

Ugh. Having my mother as my mother again in the next life would be my idea of hell. Being her mother? I can't even compute.

I've also never considered forgiving my mother. I've always felt that a part of true forgiveness is that the person concerned is actually sorry and wants forgiveness. My mother is very hung up on forgiveness. Although she is not a Catholic she likes to confess to a priest from time to time and I truly believe she thinks it automatically wipes the slate clean, whether or not she has genuine remorse. She would occasionally apologise to me as a child when she lost her temper over something so trivial even she could see it was unreasonable. After every apology she would say "Do you forgive me?". Once I replied "No," and all hell broke loose!

I'm sorry you got involved with that awful Tik Tok and I don't think there is any need to forgive if that is not the right approach for you.

[Danden]

I think that the people who said they would like to be their mother's mother in the next life are in denial.  They understand their mothers were not great, but they have not yet acknowledged the harm it caused them in their childhood, and they are pushing away their emotions.  They are in denial of their own pain.  That has been my experience.  Whenever I talk to someone, usually family members, about things that happened with my mother, a standard response was "you should forgive her".  None of them could empathize with me.  Then I figured out this is because lots of people have problems with their own mothers and don't acknowledge or admit it to themselves.  They are in denial.   So they tell themselves "I wish I could make it better for my mom"  rather than "I wish I could make it better for myself."

[donutmoonpanda]

I think that the people who said they would like to be their mother's mother in the next life are in denial.  They understand their mothers were not great, but they have not yet acknowledged the harm it caused them in their childhood, and they are pushing away their emotions.  They are in denial of their own pain.  That has been my experience.  Whenever I talk to someone, usually family members, about things that happened with my mother, a standard response was "you should forgive her".  None of them could empathize with me.  Then I figured out this is because lots of people have problems with their own mothers and don't acknowledge or admit it to themselves.  They are in denial.   So they tell themselves "I wish I could make it better for my mom"  rather than "I wish I could make it better for myself."

Probably so! If you asked me years ago would I like my mom to be my mom in my next life, I probably would have also said "I would like to be her mother..." I worried for the people responding that way to the tiktok, and that's why it seemed so misleading to congratulate them for "being compassionate." Putting mom first is literally the easiest thing for me to do -- I was trained to do it my entire life. I had no idea I was doing it for 40 years. I actually thought she was looking after me. I really had it all backwards. I didn't know that being around my mom shouldn't make me feel totally crazy or obliterated. And I had no idea I was in denial of anything.

That's why I reacted so strongly! Wow. I didn't realize that until now. You all walked me straight into the epiphany.

[Liketheducks]

I must be on a totally other side of tiktok.   All I get is mental health pros taking about surviving narc abuse.   It is a wonderfully validating space for me:).     Would I want my mom in my next life?   I don't think so.   There is already too much of her in me as it is.   I feel fairly certain that if there are next or past lives, the two of us have been circling each other for eons.   I often wonder what we're here to teach each other.   What lessons have we not learned yet?     Because, it would be really great to figure that out and not repeat it.

[mary_poppins]

I try to avoid social media-had an attempt at deleting Facebook which failed..
Social media is very triggering for me, especially the platforms my family uses. If you feel bad, delete the platforms from your phone so if you'd like to log in, you'll need to do it via a computer. I found this method to work for me.

[mary_poppins]

Also, I would stay away from those 'in denial' people in real life. They are so dangerous emotionally. If they have compassion for their poor, abusive mother, they're definitely in deep and messy F.O.G. It is VERY triggering to be around these types. I had a friend like this. Mother was so enmeshed with her and used her tremendously. I would tell her often that she's abusive and she should not deserve this treatement. She'd get angry and mean, trying to defend her 'poor, insecure' mother. I couldn't take my friend and her denial anymore so I cut her off. It was as if I was talking to an angry child who was crying daily about her mother's abuses but did absolutely nothing to set boundaries and/or go low contact.

[Jolie40]

shared on a thread of mine, that GC posted on FB that PD parent says "love you forever" to GC

I don't remember ever hearing "I love you" let alone love you forever
no I would not choose PD parent again because I never felt loved by her

I do not wish to have dishes thrown at me or being grabbed by the arm & having her dig her long nails in my flesh leaving nail marks
I do not wish to be called "crybaby" or overhear PD parent on the phone talking about me to her friends
I do not wish to be her slave, being tasked with all the mom jobs including family laundry she could nap for 3 hrs daily until dad came home from work

instead I want my HS friend's mom, who became my stand in mom
we still talk on phone for an hour each time & she says "I love you" to me when we hang up!