Mom is making up bank charges now

[easterncappy]

I'm going to try to keep this short. I am having one of the worst weeks of my life. I guess this isn't the place to get into it.

Months before I went NC, my mom did pay for my car insurance. I wasn't happy about it but we were in a tough spot. She offered to continue paying for it and I declined because I didn't need another "gift with strings attached". I switched the card on file to mine, and I deleted her card information to make double sure. When I declined her offer, she actually got pretty upset with me.

After I went NC, she started sending me texts about how there is still money supposedly being taken out for the car insurance. This is not true. I checked the insurance account and my bank account, and both indicate that there has only been money taken out of my account for it. So at this point I'm convinced this is just made up and an excuse to text me. She also got the amount I am charged wrong in the text message. I don't know if insurance works the same everywhere, but here you get a 6 month premium so your monthly payments change every 6 months based on things like car accidents and tickets. She is using the amount from a previous premium.

I got a few texts from her about it today. Might I add today is 10 days after it's usually taken out so I don't know why she'd wait this long even if it was true. The most important text:

"Your silence is pathetic/embarrassing*. I fully respect that you are disconnecting us from your life. In that case, I don't understand why you take $57** from us each month. If you think (car insurance company) is making a mistake, I will cancel it. And if you think we owe you some sort of money, for what and how much?"

* the word I'm trying to translate is somewhere in between the two words and is particularly impolite.

**the number from the previous premium that I've confirmed is both outdated and certainly not being taken out of their account.

Am I going insane? Why would she make something this dumb up? It's literal nonsense. It's verifiably false and just a stupid thing to lie about. Why???

Admittedly just seeing her text me sent me into panic mode.

[Rose1]

If you feel up to it get her to prove it with a photo of her card statement. If you don't get one consider it rubbish.
There is an outside chance the insurance co messed up but very unlikely if your account is ok. They could have mixed up with someone else or it's her own bill.
In any case being called on it should stop the behaviour, or exchange it for something else.

[easterncappy]

If you feel up to it get her to prove it with a photo of her card statement. If you don't get one consider it rubbish.
There is an outside chance the insurance co messed up but very unlikely if your account is ok. They could have mixed up with someone else or it's her own bill.
In any case being called on it should stop the behaviour, or exchange it for something else.

I suppose I can call the company on Monday and double check. No contact is no contact. If they really made a mistake, they can just reverse the charges and I don't have to talk to her. But I doubt it - she's made up all sorts of nonsense in the past and I think she's desperate for me to pay her some form of attention. Like if I think back to her previous interactions with people... she made stuff up like this. She's even faked illnesses and medical events and admitted it to me. It just smells really fishy.

[Rose1]

I can never understand why they try to fake this stuff and keep it going for as long as they do. Maybe they convince themselves it's true.

[Leonor]

Hi Eastern, lovely mamma,

Let us  mamma hen around you for a moment.

Now my dear, there is this ridiculous, untrue and completely misogynist slander that having a baby is "no big deal." Women have babies every day. Women squat in a field and go back to work. Women balance babies with executive careers, harmonious marriages and bikini selfies!

WRONG. LIE. UN $#@ TRUE.

The places in the world where women squat in fields are the places women die in childbirth. The places in the world where women have dozens of children are the places where babies perish from malnutrition. And the places where women juggle job, marriage, baby and Pilates are the movies.

You don't know this because your mom is dysfunctional. I didn't know this because my mom is dysfunctional. Do not trust what you have heard from the women in your family because they are dysfunctional.

The truth is that postpartum depression is real and everyone gets it. How can you not be depressed, anxious, irritable, disoriented, stressed, weepy and snappish? Sweetheart, you just created an entire human being inside your uterus and then pushed her out your yoo-hoo! Your body has literally turned itself I side out to bring your precious baby girl into the world. Um, &$#@ ouch.

And now your little twosome has burgeoned into an entirely new relationship. Before, you loved your dh and he adored you. Now you are no longer boyfriend - girlfriend with a contract. You are co-parents, and your relationship has turned itself inside out too. You're no longer focussed on one another, because you must be focussed on this other Person you created, who is gorgeous and darling and hilarious, but also you don't know each other very well yet. Will you be a good mom? Will you know what to do? Will she like you? ("yes" to all three questions btw.)

When I was first postpartum I told a friend I felt like I was through the looking glass - everything looked the same, but inside out or backwards. "I have two kids and I still feel that way!" she said. Well, now I have three, and I still feel that way!

So if you are having a really hard time, congratulations, dearest mommy, you are doing the hard work. The emotional labor of birthing and tending and mothering. It is amazing and breathtaking and euphoric and exhausting and excruciating and dizzying. It will not always be like this. You will find your sea legs and life will smooth out and the sun will break through the clouds to warm you again.

But not now because you are going to be super hormonal and your body is going to be all over the place for at least a full year. Maybe two.

Now, with all this going on in a physical, soulful, heart and bonesful, and existential way, do you really have time to be listening to this old woman's nonsense about the dang car insurance?

Let me help you with that: No you do not.

She has a problem with her bank statement? Let her take it up with her bank. Period.

She does not get to upset your daughter's mommy with this ridiculousness. Enough!

Now you go change your pads and brush your teeth and scoop up that angel baby girl and snuggle and coo and take pictures.

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi Easterncappy,

Leonor makes some solid points about:

a. many many women have post-partum shifts in hormones that cause all sorts of experiences for us mood wise and physically - our bodies are transitioning out of being pregnant. (medicine created a myth that once the baby is out, everything is 'done'). Not true. Your body is now producing all sorts of hormones that will cause fluctuations and different feelings and sensations as you are now post-partum
- and will be for about a year.

b. I agree with Leonor. In a less toxic culture, we women would KNOW these things because women would share information like this with one another. Some women have that info shared with them, and many of us were isolated (especially by our narc mothers) from learning and knowing and having community to help us during our important, sacred post-partum time.

There is a saying "nine in / nine out" that someone told me about when I had my baby. They used it to refer to how the first 9 months after baby arrives is still an important time for mum, physically, physiologically, emotionally and socially.

We women ideally we would have strong circles of protection around you after you give birth to your baby so that you do not have to deal with any of this dysfunctional narc-based nonsense. And my dear, this insurance crap is nonsense, and I am so sorry you are dealing with it.

What I would do: call the insurance co. on Monday, ask if they have more than just your card on file, and then you can tell them that your mother is claiming they charged her card too. I suspect they will confirm this is not the case. And then be done with that. If they ask you to contact your mom, tell them, no, she can deal with her concerns on her own. If they have charged her card, she would have to be the one to connect with them since it is her card. And given her history of lying, I'd bet that they didn't charge her card.

(also good for you for changing this and not letter her pay it anymore. That financial entanglement is like catnip for narcissistic parents. They use it to maintain access to us. Just like any other abusive relationship we have to find ways to cut off their access to us).

As I pulled away, mine started lying more as well. It is their desperate attempt to get back into our lives, after we have shown that we are done with their abusive ways.

The reason that you can recall the many other times when she lied in the past, is because that is something she learned to do.

I'd bet that whenever you or anyone else tried to individuate or get some distance from her, she learned that gaslighting (lying) was an effective way to temporarily pull people back in. It was a way for her to get more supply from someone after she saw them pulling away (taking away supply).

It is all about seeking that supply, due to their dysfunction. She's probably desperate to get the attention back that she used to get.

When I had my baby, right beneath the surface of all the drama (they ginned up) was anger. They were so angry at the fact that the baby was now getting my attention...not them. Classic narcissism.

When I went NC, I got some random messages about how they were not angry with me. Translation? They were furious with me for daring to have a baby and have my own life. I had not mentioned anger, or talked about their anger, or asked if they were angry with me. The random messages telling me they were not angry with me were very good reminders of why I had to go NC.

They were extremely angry with me, and they were lying about it in order to get my attention. If they had said the truth: "We're really angry with you trees" they knew I would never respond to their messages again. They have to lie because its the only way for them to ply a response and reaction out of us.

After you made your decision to go NC, the truth would be forever in your favour. The truth is that she is disordered, she is lying to you, and she has a history of lying to you.

I found that after NC, the lies ramped up.

If you ask me "Is the sky blue" and I say "Yep it sure is" then there is nothing else to discuss. But if you ask me "Is the sky blue?" and i say "No. The sky is not blue. You are wrong" then you are going to be much much more likely to engage, to react, to wonder why I am lying about the colour of the sky...so that is how lying is an attempt at getting your attention.

The truth is something you already know, but lies sorta throw you off and a lot of us feel confused when someone lies to us, so we try to get clarity around what they are lying about. Which results in the narc getting attention. 

I believe that narcs have learned that when they lie, they get a lot more attention than when they face the truth. I never ever saw my narc parents acknowledge this, nor did they acknowledge the damage that they do when they go around lying to people. For them, honestly? I think they found the damage they caused to be 'fun' to watch. That's creepy to think about.

Being lied to is stressful - but now I can look back and see how they didn't care. They just wanted attention.

I am sorry you are had a tough week. Let us try here to offer you what we can as you are now in your "nine out" stage of the mothering journey. This is a very valuable time of bonding with your baby and taking good care of yourself.

Big hugs to you today.

Trees

[Cat of the Canals]

I think your idea of contacting the company (and NOT your mother) is the best way to go here. Just for your own peace of mind. Because you're right: NC is NC. If you respond to her directly in any way, she will be getting exactly what she wants: attention and the knowledge that she got to you. That's why she's doing this, after all. She doesn't care if you can prove she's lying. If she gets a reaction or a response -- ANYTHING -- she got her little dose of narc supply.

[Srcyu]

Why?
She's poking you for supply is why. She wants your attention anyway she can get it.

No contact IS no contact. She should not be able to text you. Block, block and block again.

[easterncappy]

You guys might be right about the post-partum depression. I don't think it's quite that bad, but it sucks. I love my daughter more than anything, I love being a mommy, I love taking care of her... but I've often cried that I just wish there was some help. I feel like if I was from a normal family, I'd have a mom or a grandma that'd come and watch her so I can get some sleep while they do some diaper changes and bottles. My MIL is no help either... she offers, but she is PD in her own special way that's very different from what I grew up with, and I just wouldn't trust her to not screw my kid up the way she screwed my husband and his sister up. And of course, my mom is far more malicious... I'm sure she'd offer if we still talked, but she'd definitely screw my daughter up. I have no aunts and cousins or female friends to help me. The two I know would love to but one runs a warehouse all by herself and thus works 60 hour weeks and the other is too elderly to even hold my baby, by her own admission (and she's right - she walks with a cane, she can't even carry a baby).

So it's just me. And my husband, who works, which I can't be upset about.

I don't know if my mom is intentionally trying to get under my skin because she remembers how hard it is to have a baby. I don't think she ever provided me with a fraction of the level of care I provide my daughter with, plus she had her mom to help, so I doubt it was this bad for her.

It's interesting how this is the same woman that used to come to my room and make me help her come up with elaborate lies. She once invented a fictional trip to another state, with people who don't even exist, and at the end she got a fictional case of COVID and a fictional case of a fictional disorder she made up ("post-COVID syndrome" - there are long haul COVID symptoms, post-COVID syndrome however is a figment of my mom's imagination)... all so she could get out of work. For a couple of days. I was still in the FOG and even then I asked her why she doesn't just ask for a week off. She expected me and one of her PD friends to help her fake medical paperwork for this, she was offended when I said no. She was horrified and deeply hurt when her story wasn't believed. "So everyone lies, but when I do it, I get in trouble?".

There's been many other cases. She'd make up medical events and traumatic family events to make people feel bad all of the time. She pretended she works from home and screamed over the phone at an internet service provider about how they're preventing her from doing her job correctly. I can list at least 20 events like this. This is just habitual, compulsive lying to get her way.

And it's like she doesn't realize that I WAS THERE when she did those things. She made me participate when I was too young to really understand what was going on and say no. And now she thinks I'll just believe this.

[Rose1]

I'm so sorry this is happening to you. Missed the part about you just having a child. It sounds to me in that case that it's attention seeking.

A friend of mine told me what her mother had told her (so this would be over 50 years ago). Make sure your bed is clean, the rest can wait.

I had my mother stay with me and between her pressure to do things her way and my pdmil fighting for her turn I ended up with post natal depression because I was trying to please everyone and also work in the family business.

I think I would have been better off if we had closed our family down for a few months and just slept when I needed and fed when I needed. Unfortunately no one suggested that as an option .
Take care and look after yourself. The mother problems she is manufacturing are not important. Don't bother with the insurance company. It can all wait
.

[moglow]

My guess is she's caught herself up in a past loop and for her it's NOW [mine has been known to do that, dredge up things from the past as if it's going on right this minute, demanding that I resolve them for her]. She may well have account showing amount taken out and is either not noticing or ignoring altogether the actual dates of those transactions. She could be proactive and take it up with her bank, if she's maintaining the funds are being taken out she could address them as fraudulent and let the bank handle it. But - like mine with claimed cell phone issues that are supposedly mine to address - she's refusing to do her own due diligence. This way she always has a fight.

She's trying to goad you into contact. Seriously, you can block her texts and never say another word about it. What she thinks or does about it has nothing to do with you.

[treesgrowslowly]

Easterncappy,

You're probably grieving for the help you wish you had. I really really get that.

Post partum is a time of a lot for your body - in terms of regulating sleep etc.

It has nothing to do with loving our newborn baby. It is just a way that each of us goes through the physiological shifts after we've had a child and the post-pregnancy state we're in after being pregnant.

Also you are now taking care of someone whose sleep cycle are a newborn's sleep cycle. They wake up every few hours. Since their tummy is small, they get up to feed every few hours, which is normal. But it's hard to get enough rest as a new mom. So don't feel bad about how you feel these days.

Are there any support groups for new moms in your area that are active? Sometimes there are groups that meet once a week or once a month and you can meet other new moms and their babies.

Hugs,

Trees