The One Big Reason I Refuse to Go ‘No Contact’ With My Mother

As a child, I sensed something was not quite right in my relationship with her. I needed her, but I felt irritated when she was around. As a teen, her constant expectations and criticism became a quicksand that swallowed me. Depression and low self-esteem set in, convincing me I was the problem. Two failed attempts at suicide only left me more miserable for not escaping her.

Everyone who knew my mother thought she was fabulous and pitied her based on the tales of her difficult daughter she spread far and wide. Her constant feed of derogatory comments toward me became my inner voice that I believed without question. Her false charisma was so powerful that a crisis worker in the emergency room told me, “She seems like a really great person!” He was surprised by my tearful admission that dying felt like my only option to be free of her, not even asking if there was abuse or neglect involved. There wasn’t, of course; at least not the physical kind. It took years of therapy for me to accept that her treatment of me is a form of abuse that many adults refuse to tolerate.

“Estrangement is way more common than most people think,” confirms Stephi Wagner, an estrangement expert who founded Mother Wound Project. “A recent study in the Journal of Marriage and Family found that 27 percent of Americans are actively estranged from one or more family members. In the study, 6 percent of survey respondents reported being estranged from their mom. This means there’s as many Americans estranged from their mothers as there are living veterans in the U.S. or people aged 75 and over.”

My mother’s way of demonstrating love and respect for her own mother was to emulate her in tribute, but her maternal homage also became her expectation of me. I dared to be born a unique human, making her fragile ego perceive my distinctness from her as the ultimate rejection. I repeatedly disappointed for not being exactly like her and worse, for not wanting to try. Thankfully, therapy helped me realize that was a “her” problem and not my issue to fix.

I am a mother now also, and I encourage my daughter to be her own person and make her own decisions. I tell her regularly my unconditional love isn’t based on how much she resembles me. I make mistakes like all parents do, but when my daughter tells me I’ve messed up, I take ownership and say I’m sorry, then try my best to not repeat what I did to hurt her.

I’ve attempted many times to discuss with my mother the depth of pain she has caused me, but she instantly turns on the tears, declares herself a victim, builds a case against me with my dad to engage his support and never apologizes, never takes responsibility for hurting me, and definitely never changes. She sulks and gives me the silent treatment for a few days before returning to her comfort zone of toxic dysfunction.

I’m well past middle age and could have cut contact with her years ago, despite negative public opinion that persists about doing so. Sadly, there is one thing that keeps me around her intolerable behavior. My mother is still married to my father (who also continues to endure a deluge of denigration from her) and he has dementia. 

My dad has always loved me unconditionally. He didn’t always agree with me or my opinions and choices, but he never made me feel I wasn’t enough and never pressured me to fit a mold shaped like him. But now he is slowly and painfully dying and I am heartbroken. Although I am grateful for my mother’s good physical care of him, I struggle when I see her continue to criticize him for the dementia-spawned mistakes he increasingly makes. I feel trapped. All I want is peaceful time alone with my dad while he still knows who I am, but she won’t allow it. I must continue to endure her not-so-subtle put-downs of both of us if I want to have any time at all with him.

“Boundaries can only go so far,” says Wagner. “The onus would be on the parent to respect said boundaries, and many abusive parents, just like other abusers, aren’t willing to do this. They’re after power and control, not love and connection.”

I cannot block her from my life because she would block me from my dad. I’ve tried to offer her breaks from my dad’s care like a manicure/pedicure where I would stay with my dad. She refuses. I’ve stayed with him alone only a few times when she’s had medical appointments, but I was deemed unreliable when my daughter was sick one day and I couldn’t be there. She now arranges her appointments during visits from a support worker stranger or during my dad’s attendance at a local group program for adults with dementia. She has no concerns leaving him with strangers, but leaving him alone with me riles her. She has always resented our closeness, our inside jokes and our shared quick wit that she rarely understood. She is jealous, I suspect. Jealous that I love him beyond measure, without understanding the reason for my love is partially because he loves me back in ways she never will. 

Wagner commiserates that there’s only so much that can be done in my position.

“In a situation like this (where the loving parent has something like dementia), the adult child is in a really difficult spot. The relationship a parent does (or doesn’t) have with an adult child really is that parent’s performance review, and some parents will go to great lengths to punish their adult children for leaving such a review, even it means hurting someone else in the process.”

Despite this, I will continue to endure her unpleasantness toward me, while occasionally defending my dad from her when it’s warranted. He’s worth it.

AARP essays share a point of view in the author’s voice, drawn from expertise or experience, and do not necessarily reflect the views of AARP.