I (19f) have been living with my mom (44f) while going to college. I rarely get into fights with my mom because she easily blows up at me and it ends up with me crying and taking the blame no matter the situation. a couple days ago we had another big argument, I was planning to see my friends and my mom needed help with something and she said she told me earlier in the week when I know for a fact she didn’t. she increasingly upset as I claimed she didn’t tell me earlier about it and it didn’t take long for it to turn into a big blowup. during this argument and almost every argument she mentions how I’m lucky to be living with her and that her childhood was hard and abusive and she became homeless as a teenager. she mentions it in every argument and I told her I didn’t care about her childhood for the first time in this argument. when I said that she looked horrified and told that was a very cruel thing to say. our argument ended up with us just giving each other the silent treatment that night. I feel guilty for saying that but mostly I don’t because I’m sick of hearing about her childhood every argument. AITA?
NTA. This is the same as the argument, “you should finish your food, there are starving kids in Africa.”
Nta. Was it a nice thing to say? No, but she is using her traumatic past to win arguments. My mom used to do the same thing except she would bring up my grandmother who had passed when my mom was young. It’s a manipulation tactic and it definitely worked. It caused me a lot of guilt.
NTA definitely not using stories like that is %100 a manipulation tactic
NTA, she’s unloading her baggage on you.
Your mother is guilty of generational abuse. She needs to deal with her own demons and you need to deal with yours. Study hard so you can be in a financial position to live on your own terms
As a parent i can understand her pov but she still won’t trying to guilt trip you over something you had nothing to do.
EHS…
This is when you start trauma dumping on her… you know that weird uncle/stepfather you ran away from home to get away from…
Why didn’t you believe me…
I go therapy about the trauma I inherited from you because you couldn’t deal with your own shit and dumped it on me…….
**Learn to be a *proper ass*, return the low blows**.then come ask here again… also, **backbones** are in aisle 2
NTA. She’s weaponizing her past to keep you under her control. You may benefit from Googling and reading Harpy’s Child. It might give you some insight and answers.
If you don’t have to engage with her, don’t. She’ll likely pick at you until you do and then blame you for making her mad.
Get out as soon as you can. She’s not going to change.
Your mom is just a human and this is her first time being alive too
NTA. It’s not ur fault she had a shitty childhood. She should have been striving to make sure you had a better life than she did.
NTA. everything you explained sounds exactly like my mother and I.
I can give my mom grace in the fact that she had a rough childhood, and that she’s done so much work to better herself, but those emotionally abusive tendencies still seep through the cracks. Well, more like gush through and break the cracks lol, but you know what I mean. Now, as I’m a young adult, I see that I am a better version of her, but I unfortunately have a lot of her faults too.
I can take that into consideration and still hold her accountable. I understand that she’s doing the best that she can, but the best that she can still hurts me. I do not think you’re the asshole, and I think that your frustration is valid. I told my mom something similar, that her trauma matters but that it does not get to justify her actions, and she needs to stop weaponizing it.
ESH. you’re both coming from trauma, just in different ways. her past explains her behavior, but it doesn’t excuse using it as a weapon in every argument to shut you down or guilt you. at the same time, you snapped after hearing it over and over, which is understandable, but saying you “don’t care” was still hurtful for her as someone dealing with trauma. if you can, try to talk it out when emotions aren’t high, you’re family, and this sounds fixable with honest communication.
this is a complicated relationship. you’re old enough to live on your own but still need your mom’s support to get through post secondary. you are allowed to have emotional boundaries with your mom, and ideally she’d respect them. sounds like she’s not able and/or willing to process her abusive childhood with her peers or a therapist or support group. likely this has been going on for years and parents are supposed to support their kids, not the other way around. you can’t make her get help but you can make your own choices to have a different relationship with yourself and with her. that doesn’t make you an asshole. it makes you a responsible adult.