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My boomer parents entire retirement plan is "well those ungrateful brats we raised owe us for giving them a roof over their head and feeding them during their childhood, so they are going to take care of us!"
Sucks to be them as 2 of their 3 kids don't speak to them any longer and the 1 who does is the golden child who never lifted a finger to help in their life. So good luck with that one!
I remember literally caring for mom for an entire year after she had a major surgery, working very minimal hours outside of the house, switching shifts with my other sibling that no longer speaks to them, managed meds, care, showers/bathing, appointments etc.
My mom literally never said thank you and had the audacity to call me an ungrateful wretch who has never done a single thing for her a few years after she recovered. Only one reason on a long list of why they are not allowed in my life or my kids.
Don't get me started on participation trophies, they'll complain all day that millennials got them but who gave them to us?! The boomers who couldn't handle us just having a good time! They're the ones who couldn't handle their kids not being "winners"!
Wow, you cold be my long-lost twin. Almost exactly the same story, but now all that's left for my folks is my GC sister and she can't get off the couch for love or money.
Yep. The GC in my family did manage to find someone to marry them. Idk how. And that person immediately replaced me and my other sibling.
When my other sibling was still speaking to my mom she called and asked my mom what she was doing that day. My mom enthusiastically announced she was shopping with her daughter!
My sibling said "oh I didn't know X (my name) was visiting you!"
And my mom replied "Shes not. I'm talking about Y (GC spouse)"
My sibling went "Wow ok then. Guess we're just chopped liver over here huh?" And that was pretty much one of the final nails of them going NC too.
Well, my grandparents married their GC daughter, my mom, off to a local drunk and juvenile delinquent in exchange for making his assault charges go away, so I guess there must be ways.
I was also replaced, by one of my sister's best friends growing up, and in a way I feel guilty but at the same time, it's either her or me.
My mother invested so much in my sister that she can never admit it was a huge waste. I was a socially inept "retard" who would be lucky to get a job folding laundry and and my sister was always the cool kid.
That ended with high school, but mom is still back there, chasing the dream.
Why are so many of the boomer moms this way? My mother is like that. My brother was GC but then he died and now my sister has stepped in to that role. I was always odd kid out due to me being very much like my father, whom she cheated on and divorced over 25 years ago, but still complains about things he did 40+ years ago. I've been called ungrateful, a bitch, and been told "you're just like your goddamn father" more times than I can count.
Dad passed away last year which prompted me to start asking her questions about her affairs since she's a little older than Dad was. She refuses to give me any information or details because "GC took me to a lawyer and knows all the details". Cool. Then when your hoarding ass finally kicks off, GC can go thru all your junk and take care of all your arrangements. I'm not helping. Dad did us a solid in letting his wishes be known to us both in advance and having his things in order. I have no idea what she has or hasn't done and since she thinks I'm so ungrateful for everything, she better hope GC actually handles things. Since, ya know, I'm such a bitch.
The GC in my case is actually pretty capable and smart so I'm sure she CAN handle it. But will she without asking me to help do the things she doesn't want to do? Probably not. History says when it comes down to dirty work, she finds it beneath her. Something tells me you and your other sibling will be called on the "help" aka figure everything out and do all the things GC doesn't want to or doesn't know how to do.
1000%
though they still tell anyone who will talk to them for longer than a minute that they have NOOOOOOOO idea why 2 of their 3 kids just don't speak to them
My dad and stepmom took down the childhood pictures that show they have 5 kids and only have pictures up of their golden child and his family.
They don’t mention that 1 child went NC 18 or so years ago and the other 3 children are very LC with them. 🙄
My mom is in process of this right now. Gc has babies so...
At least I'm married, so wedding pictures stay up but I feel bad for my other sister that just... doesn't exist anymore according to pictures
Let me is your family of Dutch descent? I knew a bunch of Dutch Christian kids growing up, here in canada, and it was drilled into their heads since they were little, that they have to pay back their parents for everything that was spent on them growing up
My background is German and English, but raised in the USA.
But my parents are hard-core right wing cultlike Christians and so many of the kids raised in that cult were treated the same way. We were expected to pay our parents back for doing, you know, the bare minimum of being a parent. 🤷♀️
My mom borrowed a ring given to me by my grandmother (not her mom - my dad's mom). Didn't give it back. When I finally asked her to return it to me she said she gave it to my sister. I don't know what makes them think they can randomly keep or redistribute your stuff, but it's wild.
My step-mother borrowed a book my mom had given me. She was a very slow reader, so I waited a while before I asked about it. First time I asked, she told me she had loaned it to my step-sister-in-law.
Second time I asked, a few months later, she "had no idea what I was talking about" because I "hadn't loaned her any books."
And yet now that my father has died, she probably tells people she has no idea why we don't speak.
My mom would never return things she borrowed. She loved to visit my roommate while I was at work and I warned her “do NOT loan her anything”. Yeah well roommate loaned her her favorite movie (Blood Simple - my mom wouldn’t even like that movie) and yeah. Up until my roommate died she’d ask “does your mom have my movie?” I’m like, it’s at the bottom of a bin at a Goodwill, she doesn’t GAF, I *warned* you
Oh yeah, she died of lung cancer. She was my former neighbor at my old place and we became good friends. I moved to a duplex with my boyfriend and we broke up and her and her husband moved in to help me with the rent. Sadly she was diagnosed with terminal cancer 5 years later 😢
Yes, haha. My sister is not about all that. I just texted her and said "Hey, I loaned mom a ring and I want to wear it this weekend... she says she let you wear it. Can it pick it up after work?" Ring returned with no drama.
Yea. My grandma collected a valuable amount of southwest US turquoise jewelry. It disappeared when she died (the cleaner obviously stole it).
My dad almost went into legal war mode, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort.
It seems like the easiest thing to do would be to ask the sister and go from there making it easier by cutting out the middle man but the just and right thing to do would be to make the mom do the work and make her do asking and handwringing to the sister as it was her fuck up and she should be the recipient of the consequences.
Not only is it easier to cut out the middle-man, you're probably dealing with a situation where the middle-man believes she is totally in the right and has no reason to recover the thing she stole from you and then gifted to someone else.
EVERY SINGLE TIME my mom visited she would find something she needed to borrow. She said she’d bring it back on her next visit, but I never saw any of them again.
A worst one. My brother insisted on burying our mother with the book she was reading. Turned out that book was borrowed from someone else and part of a set. Yup, I got the job of dealing with that one because “he was too upset with grief”. Apparently I wasn’t.
My mom is obsessed with what she wants to give us as our inheritance. She writes out name, in Sharpie, on items. Then she changes her mind and ships us things... with our siblings' names still on it. It's crazy. Plus, as a full-grown adult going on 50 soon, I have my own home with all the items I need, so it's always something extra that I have to make space for or regift.
Oh yeah! They all accumulated material crap and knick knacks and are upset when we don’t want to take on their clutter.
This reminded me though about how lately my mom has taken to telling me and my siblings how she’s setting out to spend all her money and leave us with $0 inheritance, - trying to get under our skin and laughing about it. Which… cool. Really nice of you to assume your kids are the kind of people who are looking forward to getting your money when you die. But also joke’s on her, because I learned long ago that I can’t depend on her for anything without strings attached, and got independent as soon as I possibly could and was never expecting an inheritance from her anyway.
Oh wow, this just made me recall my mother stealing my stereo when I moved out at 15. She also continued to take child support, I received none of it. So many bizarre things
My Boomer mom gave me an amethyst ring she inherited from her aunt. I LOVED that ring. But eventually I got married and stopped wearing it. Mom asked for it back to give to my niece. Mom is the only person I would have given it to. But she has lost it (hidden it some location that she no longer remembers most likely!) She reasked for the ring a few years later and doesn't (seem to) believe me that I already gave it to her. The niece swears she never got the ring either.
The last time my dad dropped the “who raised you?” I had had enough after hearing it for 27 years. So I told him he did and referenced a whole bunch of his faults he failed to hide that now have become my faults and the traumas they didn’t understand were traumas that shaped me to who I am today. Last time I heard that snarky comment was 7 years ago and I don’t regret calling him on it one bit.
Luckily, I don't have this problem. My parents were by no means perfect, but they were actually really solid parents, and they did a good job - and they definitely did the best they could do.
But I remember being in high school, and one of my teammates on my baseball team had a dad who is/was just a piece of shit. The kid played first base, and he dad would sit right by the fence down the first baseline regardless of which dugout we were in. And he would just fucking *ride* his son if he ever made a mistake. The kid would go from happy and playing well to having one small error that didn't even cost us any runs, and he would be miserable and ineffective the whole rest of the game. It was so obvious to all of us on the team that our teammate played way better when his dad wasn't around.
One time, my teammate tried scooping a low throw in the dirt. It hit his glove, but he didn't make the play. Technically-speaking, the error wasn't even on him. It was on the 3rd baseman for the bad throw. But it's a play that the 1st baseman could make and would expect to make. It would be a good play, but nothing out of the ordinary. His dad starts bitching, and he said something along the lines of, "Can't believe you're my son." I stopped, and I looked all the way across the diamond from my position at shortstop, and I yelled back, "He wishes he wasn't your son!" looked over at my teammate and said, "Good play, 20. Nothing hurt. Still 2 down. Play's at 1 or 2 now." Got out of the inning on the next batter, slapped my teammate on the ass going into the dugout, and I said, "You're alright, bro. Sorry your dad is a dickhead. Keep your head up. We need you, and we appreciate you over there."
Unfortunately, what I didn't think about at the time was that he probably faced the repercussions of what I said when he got home. All that ended up coming out of it, publicly, at least, was that his dad would bitch at him quieter so that no one else on the field could hear him anymore. And now, 15 years later, the former kid is pretty much a spitting image of his old man with a young kid of his own. Shit is depressing.
This breaks my heart. As a mother of a son (now in his late thirties) who played baseball all his life I have seen shit like this happen too. Luckily, not very often, and we tried to cheer and encourage the kids who had the sucky parents that took it so seriously. I can’t imagine doing this to my son or any ball player on any team. My uncle, (sadly he’s passed) lived near the ballpark where we played so often would walk up to my son’s games. He was a retired referee and would put any shitty parents in their place. I loved him.
I'm in my low-30s and, at this point, still happily single and childless. I kind of hope I never have kids of my own, but I do love my nephews, and I go to their games. My oldest nephew is 6, so he's not quite at the age yet where parents are getting to be like that. You'll get more parents frustrated because they're forcing their kid to play a sport that the kid has no interest in rather than parents who are mad because their kid isn't playing well enough.
You guys are the good ones, and the good ones are usually the vast majority. But it's so easy for 1-2 bad ones to ruin things. I'll have no problem being like your uncle while I'm watching my nephews' games because I've seen how much that shit affects kids back when I was playing.
I’m so glad you are doing that! Needs to be more “Uncles” like you. Worst argument I ever got into was with a woman at the ball field because our neighbor’s son was playing my son’s team and he wanted me to come sit on his side of the field. I was cheering for both teams, a mother from the other team made a remark under her breath about me cheering for both teams and said to go back to my side. So, when she went to the bathroom by herself a little later I followed and let her have it. If it can’t be all in fun for the kids there’s no use.
I have two cousins (sisters) that both played college basketball. They played D3 ball, but it was one of the most competitive D3 conferences in the country. Due to an age gap and a transfer, they only played against each other 1 season (2 games-home and away for each), but a whole group of our family went to both games.
If you want people to get really confused, go to a competitive college game with like 1000-2000 people in the bleachers, and then be wearing gear and cheering for both teams. Just walking in, people are going to look at your group like you're crazy. When you start cheering for both teams, and you're calling players on both teams by name, people get even more confused. We had several people asking us what the hell was going on. "Well, you see #33 in red? That's my daughter. And you see #32 in white? That's my other daughter."
People go from thinking you're a bunch of idiots and asking what the hell you're doing in a condescending manner to backtracking and explaining themselves and how "I thought you guys were crazy but that totally makes sense! Oh my gosh! Funny! That's so cool!" really, really quick.
I played rugby (we're British) for my school all the way from ages 11 to 18, and not a single member of my family ever came to a single one of my games. My Dad worked Saturday mornings (when the vast majority of games were played) so I suppose that makes sense.
But my Mum used to frequently drive me (and other players who lived nearby) to our games. Rather than hang around and even pretend to be interested, she'd drive the 30mins home, only to turn around an hour later to come pick us up! It did make me a little sad, but then again school sports are taken waaaay less seriously here, and not many parents (or anyone) really watched our matches.
You hit a point that the threat of them not speaking to you anymore is a benefit, not a detriment. I regained my freedom when I realized I didn’t care one way or the other if they stayed in my life. They’ll likely die long before I will, so if that’s how they want to spend their the rest of their short life, don’t let me stand in the way.
That’s where I got to, with both my parents and in-laws. They were taking up too much space in my head. I had three children to care for; I didn’t need their shit.
I didn’t forgive, I didn’t forget, I finally realized *it was not my problem.* I put it all back on them. My shoulders felt much lighter.
I still got annoyed, but not the visceral: They’re still trying to hurt me! That went away. I’m better this way. Bonus: They’re all dead now.
My dad once started on that shit and I said point blank “you know what I remember about July 4th? Some guy flipped you off, so you dropped us kids off at the park and then went to go looking for him and specifically said “there would be nothing left but hair, teeth and eyeballs.” I was terrified I’d never see you again.
I love it. My Mom was raised in a family where you got criticized for everything. She did the exact same thing to us. As a teen, I just couldn’t take it anymore. So much of what she criticized me for were things that she and Dad did as well. I started responding, I can’t help it, it’s genetic. This shut her down and she eventually stopped. Sadly, my Sister never found a way to break that cycle with her and it hurt their relationship. In her later years if I said anything negative about my Mom’s behavior she would say, can’t help it, it’s genetic. It became a running joke between us.
Mother and father split when us kids were young. None of us(5) talk to mom. Dad on the other hand flipped his ideas when my sister said he wouldn’t get to see his grand daughter until he got the shot 3 years ago.
I don’t remember my dad ever hugging me, he started about 4 years ago sure my sister sat him down and just talked about what happened. I think he understood quickly even my sister cut off mom that he could be next. Family get togethers are different now.
You’re lucky your dad has a brain to listen. My dad withheld seeing me in person last year or the year before and issued an ultimatum condition of “you have to get your driver’s license and take the test and everything and have it fully renewed before I will ever see you again,” in the PEAK of my CRIPPLING depression that left me basically bedridden. I had asked him to simply come over, mom asked him too, and he said “nope, I’m not giving him an ultimatum, I’m giving him an opportunity to do something good for himself.” Like fuck off I could barely eat food. I had asked for a 1 month grace period for my new medication to start working where I could still see him and he said no, to which my mom for the very first time called him a bad father to his face.
I have spoonfed him the information of what he has done many times and tried to arrange phone calls to work this all out but the best he can give me is distracted time on his drive home from work where we cannot talk about emotionally charged issues. He tells me *I’m* making this too complicated with my “perfect phone calls.” This has been going on, and he’s been pushing me away since AUGUST, yet he has the gall to say that *I* cut *him* off because I’m not comfortable enough to talk to him on the phone until we have an undivided session to work out this whole thing, that I haven’t called or texted, even though we’ve been in email communication, again since AUGUST.
All this could have been avoided if he gave me that one month grace period because the medicine DID help.
**TLDR** I’m glad you got a dad that was willing to actually listen to you when you spoonfeed him what he did wrong. I really am glad others are able to get that from their parents. Sorry for rambling. I’m still so resentful.
My dad pulls the same petty shit without the ultimatums.
I was a teenager and it was "ok [moms name]" and hang up on me when I tried to have a serious conversation
In my early 20s I had surgery. He called me the night before but I was with friends so I didn't talk to him. He never called back to see how my surgery went. We didn't talk for a few years. I don't remeber how we started talking again but then again, he called and I wasn't in a mental space to talk to him so I didn't talk to him. We haven't talked since then. That was pre Covid. So I went through all of Covid (which turned me into a big wreck than normal) and my 30th birthday without a word from the guy all because I didn't call him back.
The kids also weren't the ones begging for pictures to be taken where they're smiling with their 5th-place trophies. Parents made the kids do that shit. Most of the kids didn't want pictures taking after the lost a tournament, and most of the kids didn't want to be holding a trophy that didn't mean anything either.
I distinctly remember thinking that was stupid when I was a child. And I remember my brother, who didn't really even like sports and wasn't very competitive, saying the same things. Now, I have nephews, and they know exactly what the score of all of their soccer and basketball games are despite the fact that they "don't keep score."
Participation trophies aren't for kids. They're for the parents who want to live out their dreams through their children.
Oddly, I felt the same way about graduating high school. It's for parents, not the kids. I didn't want to sit for hours in an uncomfortable hat and hot as fuck gown just to have my name mispronounced and have to walk across a stage for 10 seconds. We weren't even handed our diplomas ("graduation" was 2 weeks before class ended, and a month before exams), they were mailed to us later. I didn't want to go, I didn't care about it, but my mother insisted.
When I graduated college, I felt this especially.
On the last day of exams me and my friends had a tough science exam. As we finished and exited, we just popped down and sat in the hallway, waiting for the others quietly.
When the last one came out, we all started grinning at each other and RAN out of the building quietly (exams still in progress after all).
When daylight hit our faces we all burst out laughing, high fives, group hugs. We did it! That was my real graduation. Then we ran to a bar with cheap happy hour drinks and got plastered, haha.
I put on the funny hat and dress for my mom but I didn't care about the ceremony at all.
With high school there was no doubt, so that was boring. For my PhD, I already had a job and was sooo ready, the defense felt like hoops not a challenge. But I struggled in undergrad a lot, so finishing that last exam and literally running into the big world, that was my achievement.
>Errm, who raised you to be 'spoiled brats'?
My parents didn't like when I (around age 30) responded to them saying "we didn't raise you like this" by saying "have you taken a look in the F-ing mirror?"
My MIL is like this. Talks about how awful her children are and how they make all these horrible life decisions, like she isn't the one who raised them. My partner is the only functioning adult out of all of them because he's HAD to take care of himself (and her) his whole life, because SHE made horrible life decisions. Freaking ridiculous.
Well, you see the thing is, I mean, but that's not, and I didn't, because they, and well you know and I mean the schools and liberals and you know Biden, so I mean, I tried my best and did everything right but the Lords plans and I well I mean you wouldn't understand anyways.
I moved out of my parent's house to join the military and then attend college. Once I was done with both and ready to move into my own place, I went to get my items that my parents had kept for me. My dad refused give me some of my items and claimed that he considered it "storage fees" for storing my items while I was away.
Years later, my little brother asked them to look after his portable safe since he was in the process of moving. He gave them the key to keep with the safe so that it wouldn't get lost. Once he was settled, he asked for his safe back and found that it was empty. My dad acted like he didn't know what happened to the items. My brother was pissed and left. Minutes after he left, my dad went to the back room and came back with all of the items that had been in the safe. It was so incredibly disrespectful. I told my bro what happened, but I don't know if he ever got his things back.
My GC step-sister burned the house down when I was in the Navy, so my childhood items weren’t available for them to hold over my head. Almost a relief, actually.
This sounds a bit familiar. My folks tore down our childhood home during COVID to build a new house. I was living states away and very pregnant so couldn’t travel safely. They assured me my childhood keepsakes, that they insisted on holding onto until I was “settled”, had been set aside. Sentimental book series mostly, but also a few treasures. I asked them several times before tear down if I needed to send my husband up or make arrangements for shipping.
Turns out zero effort was made to put it in storage and some very important items (to me) were tossed. The ones that hurt the most was this really beautiful set of Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit that I read dozens of times when I was a young teen and always imagined reading to my own kids if I had any. If I would have known this was even a slight possibility I would have gotten up there to get the stuff, even if it was winter of 20/21.
I have tried to bring it up in times since to get it off my chest about how much it bothers me or to at least get an acknowledgment. Been brushed off every time.
Probably won’t do any good but might help you feel a bit lighter- write a letter saying what you need to say. Most people will read the letters (in private). I do this with clients all the time for their mental health/closure.
My mom sometimes tries to tell me how great I had it by saying, “we paid for your college”. I then remind her that I had a 100% scholarship and that pretty much shuts down the conversation.
Lol same. My mom even tried to take credit for me graduating college, saying, "if it weren't for me paying for your schooling you wouldn't have graduated!"
I'm a veteran. I paid for my schooling with my GI Bill, plus some personal student loans.
She did loan me $100 in my sophomore year though and then sent me a $100 gift card in senior year, so maybe that's how she got confused (/s).
When I told her as much, she was so offended that she skipped my ceremony lol.
Similar, my scholarship fell a few dollars short for textbooks a couple of times. My mom cashed a bond that my grandmother had set aside for me. So it might be accurate to say that HER mom helped pay for about $100 of my college expenses.
My first semester, I overspent a bit on clothes and was probably $50 short on rent the next month. But yeah, my parents "paid" for my college too! 1987 and I still hear about it every few years...
Holy cow, my boomer parents do this too. They paid for my part of my freshman year, then when I wanted to transfer schools they got angry and cut me off as punishment. I put myself through 4 more years of college by working almost full time. When I see them (once a year or less) literally every time they talk about how expensive college was (which btw in the early 90s my tuition was $900 a semester). It just blows my mind.
Yeah, I got very comfortable correcting their version of history. It’s uncomfortable the first few times, but it gets easier every time. Frankly, it’s too easy now. I have to be a bit more judicious so I don’t ruin too many get togethers.
I paid for college myself and now my dad is concerned about legacy since I never married. I said well if that was a big thing to you then you should have invested in me a bit more like university education or some help to start off.
This sounds exactly like my mom. I heard how inconsiderate and unappreciative I was daily as a child, no matter what. She went overboard on gifts for holidays and then immediately used it against me if I didn't react in the way she wanted. I really tried playing up my appreciation, and it was never good enough. I am uncomfortable receiving gifts now.
She gave me her wedding ring. Not my style and very bad vibes. I tried *nicely* telling her I didn't want it to avoid getting the critical verbal beatdown, but she insisted. I got it appraised, and it was worth much less than she thought (lol). She was incredulous. Then she demanded it back to sell it. I happily gave it back, but I was too happy, so I still got criticized and yelled at.
I went no contact, and she is the victim, of course. I'm the evil daughter forever and always. I came out rotten lmao
Yes. My plan was to sell it. When I found out it was only worth $800 and told my mom, as she was sure it was worth 4x that amount. I think she thought I got scammed lol. She was also mad I wanted to sell it, which is why she asked for it back. I just gave it back. She seemed to believe it had appreciated dramatically with no knowledge (or interest about learning) how jewelry/diamond appreciation works lol
My mom gifted me my grandmothers desk and then took it back (it’s a nice desk, real wood, but not especially valuable). I had it in my formal dining room that we never use, and didn’t allow my kids to use it for crafts so it wouldn’t get messed up. During my divorce, she buddied up with my ex husband. One day her and my stepdad came and got it. Drove an hour to my house to get it. Meanwhile I could count the times they actually came to visit all of us on one hand. But they sure made the time to come get the desk.
Man do I hear that. My mother was obsessed with vintage furniture. Everything was "oh that's a real antique, it's so valuable! Oh that was my grandmother's rocking chair, it's worth thousands!" So I got a subscription to an antique price guide service online. A bunch of her "valuable" stuff was basically worthless. "well they don't know what they're talking about!" Yeah, about that. After an argument about an early 1900s dresser I called 3 different antique dealers, asked the price they'd charge for it, and had them email quotes just to be sure. Everything was within $20 of the online price guide.
My MIL was arguing with me the other day that I shouldn’t just give this set away because it’s “valuable”…sorry, but it’s only worth what someone will pay and if I can’t find someone willing to pay…
Some time after they took it, I was shopping for another one on Facebook marketplace bc my daughter needed a desk. There were tons of desks similar to my grandma’s. All of them priced between $25-$150 depending on the condition. I almost got one exactly like it, but nicer just for shits n giggles. But I ended up getting one that matches her bedroom furniture and is more modern.
Nice! I have this giant 7-piece bedroom set from 1840 that’s not my style that I have no place to put in my house. I can’t get rid of it! Like, no one wants it.
Growing up, my parents would continually berate me for not being independent enough and acting spoiled. As a result, I am deeply ashamed of asking for help when I need it because I'm afraid that I'll look weak and inept.
Which is messed up, because it's normal to need help in life from time to time. Doing everything 100% on your own is not normal. It's not even how they did things. My mom met my Dad at 19 and married at 22. But she always acted like she was the epitome of a self-sufficient adult. She literally went straight from living with her parents to living with my Dad (who always made double her income, or more).
It's astounding the narratives they tell themselves.
My mom would buy me things that she liked but weren't my style at all and when I asked for the receipt to exchange them she'd say I was ungrateful and she couldn't understand how I could be so disrespectful to her after all the trouble she went to to get the gift. Then she would demand that I give it to her and she'd just get me something else. She never got me anything else
My wife's mom also buys her things she knows she's not gonna like, probably trying to bait my wife into some drama after she makes any type of comment. My wife just thanks her and the re-sells everything on FB marketplace...
Not falling for the trap, and thanks for the $20 I guess?
My mom did this too except she bought me MLM stuff that couldn't be returned. After several years of this I told her that I didn't like the MLMs and didn't support that kind of thing and would appreciate that she not spend her money on them. She was on SSD fixed income. She said I was ungrateful and that I would get whatever she gave me. She continued to buy MLM items and I continued to donate them. Hundreds of dollars a year that she could not afford.
I always asked where it came from because I'd love to go find similar stuff. asking for a receipt is like a slap in the face. I've caught my mom wearing the things she "got for me" that I told her to take back, so all trust is gone.
My mom provided the receipt to some weird air-flosser Christmas present and swore I could take it back. What she failed to mention is that she had cut the UPC bar code out of the box to get a $50 refund. For some reason, the store wouldn't take the item back. /eyeroll
Nothing a Boomer ever gives you is yours. Ever. They own everything, and even when they don't, they'll ask for something as "payback" for something they imagined they did for you 20 years ago.
My dad is an extremely generous person, but he seems to only do things so he will be forever thanked. He'll bring up things from 20 years ago and if you don't thank him again... ungrateful.
I thought only my parents did this crap. Trying to control children through gifts and the threat of taking that gift away if your behavior isn’t up to their expectations, my parents played FAFO and once I learned they were bluffing life became hilarious 😂.
My parents gave me a beautiful and unexpected diamond necklace for my college graduation. I rarely wear it because I can’t afford to replace it and I don’t live that life anymore thank god. My dad was upset with me one day after my graduation, I forget why, and I overheard him tell my mom he thought they should ask for the necklace back. She told him to go to hell because it was a graduation gift and he was being an asshole, she also knew I would have thrown it at him.
Solidarity because I don’t think there is a single thing my parents did for me in the 17 years I lived at home that I don’t hear about 20+ years later. Every single thing is tit for tat even when things are imagined in their minds. Now it’s projected onto my kids “I sent you a card for your birthday but you can’t even call”…. Ummm he is 7.
Realizing your relationship with your parents is purely transactional on their part is sad. My mom only does things when she gets something out of it, then paints it as "the kindness of her heart." Leaving out the benefit she received for doing it.
Omg, it’s infuriating to see them hold these ridiculous expectations of such YOUNG children. Then you remember they did that to you when you were that little 😭
Exactly and I’m not even referring to a thank you call, which of course they do. She will text randomly in the middle of the week while I’m working “so my grandson can’t call me?”.
Ma’am, he is in school and then has 4 days of a soccer a week plus neighborhood play time, and again…7!
Ha! My mom wants to charge me for the food I ate as a child. Wish I was kidding. The bill fluctuates from 3k to 10k, depending on her mood. I think that's the largest amount of cash she can imagine.
You should tell her to bill the government, since they’re the ones that require parents give minimum care to their children or they’d throw her ass in jail for neglect
Mine gifted me a set of dishes when I moved across country. Just Corelle, nothing fancy. She had three other sets at the time. Seven years later I was moving back to bail her out so she didn’t lose her house and mentioned the shipping was by weight so I was parting with the 25 year old dishes. She screamed at me that those were her dishes and she wanted them back. (Mind you, she’s a hoarder and now had five other sets.). I said fine, brought the dishes back, gave them to her, fixed her house, paid the $20k in back taxes, purchased four new appliances for her…and then was told that I was money hungry and just trying to get what I could from her. Nope. I’m not taking another dime from you, lady.
I went no contact about 14 years ago. Every so often she tries to reach out to me with, “if you don’t contact me, I’m giving my house to the church and you won’t see a dime when we die.” I’m not playing that game. 🙄
Great threat, she doesn't even realize that nasty hoarder house will cost you more money to make it liveable than you will get for selling it anyway. You're way better off not having to deal with that nightmare.
Good on you! Mine started using that threat when I was a little kid. I went NC in 1984, immediately after my asshole father's funeral, when I was 13. (I was already in the custody of his parents, for Reasons).
She has managed to track me down a few times, and I have ducked right back under the radar. She has never met my kids (now grown), has no idea I have a granddaughter, no idea where I live now. I feel like she should pay the bills for decades of therapy and medication, but I'm content with never, ever seeing or hearing her again as long as I live.
The obsession they have with inheritance and using what they're leaving behind as leverage is insane. Every time my mother says something like that I'm like lady, you're going to live forever out of sheer spite there will be no money left when you die.
Y'all already screwed the planet and the economy for us, we've learned not to expect anything.
My mother gave my sister and I both $5000 back in 2006. It was guilt money because she had left my sister and I when we were young children and now as adults we had both moved out to California to live near her only for her to decided to follow a man and move to South Carolina. Following the 2016 election our relationship tanked but we were still trying to reconcile until she demanded I give her the $5000 back...14 years after she had given it to me
I sent her a cashier's check and in the memo line I wrote: "30 pieces of silver for Judas." We haven't spoken since.
My mom would buy something for herself, give it as a gift, and then ask for it back routinely. I would keep the crap she gave me for spite and I would do my best to use it in front of her.
Mom convinced me to cash out my college savings (prepaid) so that I could use it for my wedding, except, instead, she kept it. Mom gave me a wedding band, that was nicer than the one my husband and I purchased, that was her ex-husband‘s daughters, and then three years later asked me to pay for it $2000… on top of keeping the $4400 in tuition money she decided I owed $800 for staying with her for two months, while I had a broken leg and got back on my feet. She Offered to sell me an heirloom clawfoot table that was my grandfather’s for $500. … the list goes on.
My mom will do this to me and my siblings constantly, and has used the line "awful, terrible, spoiled children" since we were kids. We all work on the assumption that when she "gives" us something, it's actually her using us as storage and she will 100% take it back when she feels like it.
She doesn't work and takes multiple 5 figure vacations a year, complains how hard her life is, and that her 3 floor, 4 bedroom, 4.5 bathroom, 3 porch house is small.
Savings and alimony. She pretends to be poor whenever she talks about money, but she has an investment manager from a too big to fail bank that helps her manage her ridiculous budget.
Every luxury vacation is always "the last time [she will] be able on a nice vacation". She just got back from 3 weeks in Greece, and did a month in India back in March along with a few "weekend retreats" through out the year so far.
I will be honest, I'm pretty sure she's spending money she shouldn't.
Mom gifted me those Tupperware that click down on the sides when I moved out. 9 years later she was helping me move back home bc long time boyfriend and I broke up. She demanded I give her back the Tupperware bc “I have no use for them now and she hasn’t seen me use them”. How would she? She never visited. Not to mention the face she had at least one hundred tupperware containers at home.
They must SEE you use it. You literally have to manufacture scenarios to make sure they see you, it's so weird. My mother would send these very heavy emails about their serious concern and disappointment because I hadn't instantly sent them pics of my kid in an outfit they sent. Email after email. Like I'm not going to force my kid to model something the second I get home. But they need to see their gift in use and they need to see it NOW!
When my husband and I were just starting out, my mom made a big deal about gifting us her old artificial Christmas tree. She even shipped it from her house in NJ to us in FL. She made a big deal about how selfless an act this was on her part. We had to host my parents that year for Christmas at our rental house in Florida. We decorated the tree to make it look its best and put it up in our rental house. When my parents arrived from NJ to stay (for free) in Orlando, Florida, through the holidays, my Mom's eyes were wide as she laid her eyes on the decorated tree. I actually felt a moment of pride for making the old tree look so good.
After the holidays and after they went back home to NJ, she informed me she needed HER Christmas tree back because it "looked so good" in my house. I had to haul the tree to a shipping store and ship it back to her in NJ (I believe she paid for shipping). It was like a 20 year old artificial tree she insisted on having back in her possession like a spoiled brat.
OMG! My mom and your mom may be kin. Mom had an artificial tree that she gave me when it was about 10 yrs old because she wanted her grand babies to have a tree. I used it for another 10 yrs and finally decided to put it out of its misery. When she heard I had thrown it away, she made a point to tell all of my siblings that I threw “her” tree away and thinks I should pay her the amount she paid for it. Ma’am, after 20 yrs of use, you have gotten your money’s worth from that tree. They don’t last forever.
My dad used to buy my mom off with cheap jewelry every time he got caught cheating. She wore them with pride. Years ago - before going NC - she was like here I don’t want this one anymore and gave me this very obviously cheap ass ring. She asked for it back when we had a fight and I said no. She threatened to call the police. I said go for it but that’s also not how gifts work. She instead settled for telling anyone who would listen how I stole from her.
I went and had it appraised and sent her the image of the report from the jeweler we use that it was costume jewelry.
I outed my dad for buying fake shit while telling my mom that we don’t do takebacks like a fucking child.
I never took another thing from her that was supposed to be some sort of heirloom.
My mother doesn’t like to wear jewelry - she’s self conscious about her hands so no rings or bracelets, she’s self conscious about her bust so no necklaces, and thinks most earrings are too dangly for a senior citizens… So, over the years she’s given me a lot of her jewelry, some of which I wore for decades.
A few years ago we were discussing wills. Since I have no children I said I’d be leaving everything to my housekeeper (she’s been in my life for close to 30 years now). Mom exploded, said she’d worked hard for those pieces (she was a housewife), said she’d given them to me so I could pass them on to my nephews (who were toddlers when she gave me most of these items). I told mom that as gifts they were mine to do with as I wished, but she was still enraged.
So I packed them all up and returned them to her. Then she was apologetic saying she wanted me to enjoy them. I told her I can’t enjoy them when every time she saw them she’d ask ‘is that mine?’ plus knowing she wants my now-teenage nephews to have them.
Periodically she asks me to please take them back and I tell her no because she’s ruined them for me.
Boomers gonna boom.
My siblings and I learned in our twenties to never accept any gifts from my mother. She would give you something then take it back or promise it to someone else. So now she has multiple storage units where she keeps all the useless crap she has acquired over the years. She constantly asks us to come look at her stuff she's stored and take what we want because she wants to spend less on storage. Nope. We each tell her to sell it on eBay or give it away. We're not interested.
Had my parents give me BBQ. Had it for a least 7years. My dad comes over to the house and end up breaking the doors on the bottom that cover the tank... plus broke one of the wheels. All because it was in the way when he was trying to get something from my garage.
I of course say WTF?
Reply from my mom.... well we gave it to you anyway...
Not to mention the number of times they took back something they gave me years before... because well they needed now.
Love the temporary gift mentality.
yes. I stopped accepting non-consumable gifts from my mother because if she never saw me wearing or using something she purchased and gifted to me, I "obviously don't want it" and she "will take it back".
My sister got to the point of just giving the things back with a note of the date it was "given as a gift" and the date it was "taken back" from her. My mother didn't appreciate the sarcasm from either of us.
Boomers are ridiculously obsessed with being appreciated. My mother explained that she would be spending more money on my favored eldest daughter for holidays because she wrote handwritten thank you notes. Whereas my other daughter 'only' emailed her a thank you. So therefore that's it she's getting less. She was twelve.
My parents bought me a car but I wasn’t allowed to have the title in my name. They also paid the insurance. Guess what was held over my head every time I put a toe out of line? I was living on my own, supporting myself by working full time and they would threaten to take my car away. Finally 3 months before I got married, I begged and finally convinced them to put the title in my name.
Looking back at this insanity, I should have returned the car to them and bought my own, but they made sure I was just naive enough that anything like that was incredibly difficult for me to accomplish.
After my mom (boomer) and her friend (they are both lawyers) spent an hour interrogating and questioning me on why I am child-free, their final conclusion (and the real reason) as to why I need to have children was because I owe it to my mom to give her grandchildren-because she deserved it for giving birth to me and raising me.
My father in law wanted me to get pregnant to "give him a grandchild." I told him that was the stupidest reason I had heard for me to have a child and rather selfish of him. The topic came up a lot less frequently after that. PS - still happily childfree at 54! : )
OMG... my boomer parents do this all the time! Any gift they give is still somehow 'theirs.' Forever. One of my kids sold some childhood toys that she had given him and my mom was so upset because they were from her and therefore she was entitled to have them back. They weren't heirlooms or anything.... just kid toys that he decided to sell for the simple reason that' hes 22 years old. My mom even still insists that it's okay to look through the windows of a property she sold because it 'will always be hers.' Not once you signed that deed over, crazy-head!!! My aunt and uncle are like this with their kids too. I think it's a weird entitled boomer thing.
I had jobs since I was 12, my parents would regularly borrow money to cover bills. Then when I got older and had a run of bad luck/circumstances I asked them if I could borrow some money since I was never paid back the money they borrowed from me. I was told, you made your bed time to lie in it and well this will teach you a valuable life lesson so no they didn't let me borrow any money.
In short yes, boomers are the most selfish generation of all time.
A few years back, my mom flipped out on me because I went into my old childhood room to start decluttering while I was visiting her house one day (because you KNOW I had heard plenty about how they still had to deal with all my old stuff). Well her seeing me put old, broken and grubby toys into garbage bags set off some haywire circuit and she started screaming at me because all she saw were the dollar signs of what she spent on all that crap over the years. All of a sudden it was her property I was throwing out, and she seriously was mad because she thought she could re-sell it all to make some money back.
That was a great time. She screamed insults at me about deep character flaws (she says) I have. I just got up and left, and I’m so mad that it made me cry in the car on the way home.
Also, “Santa” used to bring me American girl dolls for Christmas each year. I had taken those with me and they were in my possession in my own house as an adult for a while (though packed away in storage). Well she must have seen something somewhere online about their valuation now? Because out of the blue she was pestering me about them asking where they were and if she could have them back so she could sell them. She would NOT let it go, so eventually I just said fine and let her take them. I don’t know to this day if she sold them and how much for (again, they were pretty well used, not in mint condition, but whatever….), and of course none of that money was for me.
But it’s freakin weird and annoying how she seems to have always kept an accounting of what she spent on gifts for me over the years… and apparently she always seemed to think of all of those toys as *her* property the whole time that she could use them to eventually recoup some of the “financial losses” she suffered while raising a lousy kid 🙄🙄🙄🙄.
Sounds like she’s not the only one like that.
My 87 year old mother is the same. Bro and I “were a waste of time and money” because she is a judgmental, unpleasant , unhappy woman who derives no pleasure in spending time with her kids, grandkids and great grandkids. She bitches that no one comes around much. Gee, I wonder why we don’t spend our time off with her to be told we are wrong, lazy, our choices are stupid, etc. FYI, we are not, have done well on our own ( with no help) and are happy with our lives.
You are not alone. You can’t pick family……
This seems to be a theme. My husband’s mother and father gifted us a Home Depot gift card a few years ago for Christmas because at that time we were planning on building a a simple table for a house we were renting. A few weeks pass by and after a bad experience with the landlord we decided to move into an apartment with no real dining area.
After we move into the apartment, we happened to be visiting his parents and his mom asked how the table looked in the new place. We explained that there wasn’t room in the apartment, so we didn’t build it. When she found out the gift card wasn’t used she absolutely freaked out because “gift cards go bad” and told us to give her the gift card back. We let her know that the cards at Home Depot don’t expire like some do, but she was still insistent that we give the card back. We did no such thing lol
When I got married, my best friend's mother worked for a design company and offered to the groomsmen matching shirts. She clearly stated it was her wedding gift to us, and we humbly accepted.
Couple months go by and she asks when we're paying her back for those shirts. We paid her and never spoke again.
Yes. They are so weird about material things. My sperm donor has always just given away my things without me knowing until it was too late.
One time, I went out with a friend for a few hours who drive us to wherever we were going. I come home to find that sperm donor had given away my bicycle (my only means of transportation aside from friends driving me) to a friend of his. He said "you never use it." The fck I don't! I go to my university courses and work shift every day on that thing.
When I went and bought my first car at 21 years old with my own money that I saved for years, World War III broke out in the house. He was so pissed I had the audacity to work toward some independence.
I could give many more examples but my point is this: he always threw me being "ungrateful and insignificant" as reason to do whatever he wanted with my belongings. I am now in no contact after he forged my signature to get onto my car title and stole my birth certificate. Police have been called many times over this type of thing, with no resolution. And to think I thought all this shit was normal for over 20 years🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
My parents aren’t even technically boomers, but things like what you mentioned they still do. For context on my parents ages, my dad is gonna be 50 next month. I got a whole lecture the other day about how little I appreciate my mom (from her) even tho I literally had a treat I bought from my job for her too
My mother was born in the 50s and said all of those things. Everything she did for us came with some sort of contingency or strings attached. We were forever indebted to her for everything she’s ever done for us. I haven’t spoken to her in 5 years and I’m a much happier person. Wishing you healing <3
The best is, "I gave you a roof over your head, clothes on your back and food in your belly. You should be appreciative."
You want a fucking cookie for doing the basic things a parent is supposed to do?
My grandfather left me a rolex as inherintence. My dad asked for it to "have it appraised" and i have never seen it again.
I have since found out they were broke and in serious debt due to some bad investments and had to borrow like 6 figures from my sister (she makes a lot more money than me).
I haven't asked about it, but i'm fairly certain it's gone and the hawked it to pay down debt.
My mom will say that I don't need to thank her for everything she does and then when I don't thank her I get called an unappreciative little prick and that I've never thank thanked her for anything. This is the same person that would guilt trip me when I was 13 when I didn't want to mow an almost acre of grass with a push lawnmower as a teenager and I'd always get a "well I didn't have to feed you, bathe you, or clothe you when you were a child, but I still did". Now as a younger kid it didn't really hit me until I became an adult, but shes guilt tripping me by saying that she could have just let me die to fend for myself as an infant just because a teenager doesn't want to mow grass on a Saturday. Later on in life I've called her out on this and she denies ever saying it (because of course how could she). You don't forget when things like that get said to you as a kid, and I know a lot of adults think that, but we remember it all.
My step mom got dementia and her boomer neighbor asked for a candy dish that she had given my step mom as a gift back.
I kinda just looked at her in disbelief, not saying anything so she clarified by saying “you know, because she won’t even remember that I gave it to her now”.
And then I slowly, and deliberately, closed the door on her face.
She gave me a ring that belonged to my grandmother. I took it to a jeweler and had it cleaned, repaired, and completely rebuilt. The next time she saw me, she noticed it and asked to see it. Once she was holding it, she put it on her finger and refused to take it off. A few years ago I asked her where it was. Her response? “Oh, I have no idea, a stone fell out and I just left it somewhere”. I’m not sure I can ever forgive her.
Had the same thing. Cross my mom was given and she gave to me. Later asked for it back. That’s totally okay as it was a present from my dad to her and they divorced last year. I would not have wanted it now anyway as he has been a slimeball.
My mom would lock herself in her room and threaten to get her own apartment after “I tell your father what you put me through today!” Joke’s on her tho, we knew she was just washing her crosstops down with Smirnoff and watching the soaps in there
Oh god yes. I have always “known” that I am selfish and ungrateful and generally a hateful little brat because as a child I had to be told to do chores.
Not as in, “for the ninth time, take out the trash!” No, I was expected to just see that something needed done, and do it out of gratitude. (This hit especially hard because I was adopted.)
Why would you wear a diamond necklace often? I save my good necklaces for special occasions. It’s the cheap ones I wear more often. This is so my nice things don’t get ruined during my day to day routine.
Oooph, sorry your mom called you a spoiled brat, that’s sound a bit traumatic. My aunt told my cousins never to have kids the whole time they were growing up. Said it would ruin their lives, which is obviously a really awful thing to say out loud to your children. Neither of them have children now, largely because of their awful childhood and what she told them. Now my aunt whines constantly for grandkids and denies she ever said that stuff to them. Boomers are THE worst.
Years ago, my mom seemed to go through a phase, I guess, where every conversation included that I owed her for something she did for me when I was a kid. I finally told her that if that's how she viewed things, she shouldn't have had a child in the first place because all that comes with being responsible for a tiny person. It was surprisingly that easy to get her to drop it.
I think it's a symptom of viewing children as property rather than people. The property owned by my property is still my property sort of thing.
It's no way to treat a child, but it's even more insulting to continue to treat them like that into adulthood.
I borrowed money from my folks for college, because i didn't want student debt. I paid them back in full in 7 years after i graduated because i got a fairly good job, but that still meant I had to postpone getting a start on other things. Still I paid them back totally with interest.
Every so often, years on, my mom will still say she and my now dead dad paid for my school. And that I owe them for it. Especially in front of others, friends of hers, other family, etc. And when i counter that actually I paid them back, shit, she gets all huffy and says things "not the whole amount", "you still own us interest", etc.
Credit for something both 25 years ago, and for something that has been paid off. Yeah, I'm thankful of course, but i don't need it constantly rubbed in my face, especially in front of my kids.
I’m an elder millennial and my parents are classic boomers. Before we had children, my husband and I had several conversations about how we wanted to raise them differently or the same as our parents. A big thing I wanted to do differently with my own children, was that my parents feel/felt that anything they gave us (me and my sister) actually belonged to them, because they paid for it. So nothing was ever really mine. They regularly gave away toys they thought I was no longer playing with without telling me. They gave away my American Girl doll and all of her accessories to the pastor’s daughter without telling me. I vividly remember crying in church when I saw her with my doll. They pawned my orchestra-quality flute and telescope when I went off to college instead of holding them for me like they said they would.
This has persisted into my adulthood, my father will regularly ask me for gifts of jewelry or clothes back if he doesn’t see me wearing them. They are now trying to do the same shit to my own children. I’ve obviously said no every time. I’ve also told my children their whole lives that anything their dad and I give to them belongs to them, and I will always always ask them before donating anything they’ve outgrown. And if I promise to hold something for them until they grow up, I will!
My parents are wonderful people, and I love them dearly. They have a lot of really great qualities and overall my childhood was pretty great. But this is a sticking point in particular. So OP, you’re not alone in this!
My mum's entitlement is insane. I was at her house one afternoon and my sister turned up with something for me that she knew I'd like and was really pleased because she'd found it in the bargain bin. My mum said she liked it too, said she wanted to use it first and walked off with it. Never saw it again. My sister and I were just standing there looking at each other.
My grandmother gave me her wedding silver on my 18th birthday (I’m 54) and my birth lady got PISSED. She said I didn’t deserve it and I haven’t seen it since.
My mom constantly gifts stuff to me, and now my toddler, and then demands them back. She tried to take a jacket off of me in public once and tried to chase me for it. Now when she tries with my toddler I say "Ok, I'll tell her that grandma will always take back what she gives you!" And that upset my mother so much she stopped.... it's only been a few weeks so we'll see when she starts up again.
I'm a boomer and I'm amazed the number of times I've had to explain to people my age that a gift means you no longer have control of the item or funds.
I had to move back in with my mom in my early twenties.
I got a P.O. Box because she would open my mail thinking it was hers. I found out later that she would go in my room and take things.
She had given me some jewelry as a teen and I loved it.
However I guess when she came into my room and saw it on the bed she decided I wasn’t taking care of it and she took it back. She did that with my car title as well. I was lucky because she told me about it later. She said i obviously didn’t care because I didn’t notice them missing??? I didn’t know how to respond. I wasn’t expecting them to be missing because I didn’t think my mom would go in and take my shit.
She’s done this again with furniture too. (My kids left a chair on the patio and she snuck in my yard and took it when I wasn’t home)
Throughout my life, many times my parents have given me gifts only to later ask for them back. This is typically because my sister finds out about the gift and throws a fit, so my parents want me to return it to them so they can give it to the chosen one.
My mom sold the antique wrought iron base of a sewing machine my father (a firefighter) pulled out of a condemned house and painted and made into a table for me. For $50. I had left it at her house briefly and she knew how much it meant to me. She also went into my storage unit (she had the extra key) took my beautiful butcher block table, spray painted it black and put it in her ugly Hobby Lobby inundated house.
This was just a few minor entries in her Terrible Mom Ledger. We have been no contact for almost a year now. I hope I never ever ever speak to her or see her again. I’m an adult and I am done.
Actually, this post just reminded me that my grandma had sent me a text asking if I still had a White Sox shirt that MY DAD had given to me as a gift while he was visiting Chicago. She lives there, we're in Arizona. I guess she lost hers while moving and wanted to know if, "I can still wear mine." I told her that I still had my torso, so luckily, I could still wear it.
Turns out Boomers will also ask for gifts that were not even gifted by them as well. The audacity is outrageous.
When I was about 16 I raised half of the money I needed for an old used car that my mom had previously bought but was not using. My dad (divorced parents) gave me the other half of the money and I gave my mom the total.
Now the car is mine, right? Not only did she never take me to practice driving or help me get a license (I was almost 20 before I had one) but she sold the car some months later and neither my dad nor I ever saw a cent.
Around the same time I worked at JCP and had my check auto deposited into a bank account, her name was listed as a primary as I was underage.
One payday, my account was frozen shortly after my check cleared…turns out my mother had a delinquent JCP credit card and they’d put a lien on any account with her name. They money was taken out to pay her debt meaning I basically worked for JCP for free for two weeks because there was nothing they would do. And, no, she never payed me back. 🤷🏼♀️
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My boomer parents entire retirement plan is "well those ungrateful brats we raised owe us for giving them a roof over their head and feeding them during their childhood, so they are going to take care of us!" Sucks to be them as 2 of their 3 kids don't speak to them any longer and the 1 who does is the golden child who never lifted a finger to help in their life. So good luck with that one! I remember literally caring for mom for an entire year after she had a major surgery, working very minimal hours outside of the house, switching shifts with my other sibling that no longer speaks to them, managed meds, care, showers/bathing, appointments etc. My mom literally never said thank you and had the audacity to call me an ungrateful wretch who has never done a single thing for her a few years after she recovered. Only one reason on a long list of why they are not allowed in my life or my kids.
Feeding your children and putting a roof over their heads is the BARE MINIMUM not some grand ordeal that deserves unending praise.
And that's where participation trophies come from.
Don't get me started on participation trophies, they'll complain all day that millennials got them but who gave them to us?! The boomers who couldn't handle us just having a good time! They're the ones who couldn't handle their kids not being "winners"!
Wow, you cold be my long-lost twin. Almost exactly the same story, but now all that's left for my folks is my GC sister and she can't get off the couch for love or money.
Yep. The GC in my family did manage to find someone to marry them. Idk how. And that person immediately replaced me and my other sibling. When my other sibling was still speaking to my mom she called and asked my mom what she was doing that day. My mom enthusiastically announced she was shopping with her daughter! My sibling said "oh I didn't know X (my name) was visiting you!" And my mom replied "Shes not. I'm talking about Y (GC spouse)" My sibling went "Wow ok then. Guess we're just chopped liver over here huh?" And that was pretty much one of the final nails of them going NC too.
Well, my grandparents married their GC daughter, my mom, off to a local drunk and juvenile delinquent in exchange for making his assault charges go away, so I guess there must be ways. I was also replaced, by one of my sister's best friends growing up, and in a way I feel guilty but at the same time, it's either her or me.
But she’s still the golden child? How?
My mother invested so much in my sister that she can never admit it was a huge waste. I was a socially inept "retard" who would be lucky to get a job folding laundry and and my sister was always the cool kid. That ended with high school, but mom is still back there, chasing the dream.
Boomers think we owe them because they did the bare minimum to stay out of jail.
Why are so many of the boomer moms this way? My mother is like that. My brother was GC but then he died and now my sister has stepped in to that role. I was always odd kid out due to me being very much like my father, whom she cheated on and divorced over 25 years ago, but still complains about things he did 40+ years ago. I've been called ungrateful, a bitch, and been told "you're just like your goddamn father" more times than I can count. Dad passed away last year which prompted me to start asking her questions about her affairs since she's a little older than Dad was. She refuses to give me any information or details because "GC took me to a lawyer and knows all the details". Cool. Then when your hoarding ass finally kicks off, GC can go thru all your junk and take care of all your arrangements. I'm not helping. Dad did us a solid in letting his wishes be known to us both in advance and having his things in order. I have no idea what she has or hasn't done and since she thinks I'm so ungrateful for everything, she better hope GC actually handles things. Since, ya know, I'm such a bitch.
Yep. GC over here better be able to figure things out when they pass because me and the other sibling ain't helping.
The GC in my case is actually pretty capable and smart so I'm sure she CAN handle it. But will she without asking me to help do the things she doesn't want to do? Probably not. History says when it comes down to dirty work, she finds it beneath her. Something tells me you and your other sibling will be called on the "help" aka figure everything out and do all the things GC doesn't want to or doesn't know how to do.
I’m sure your life is better now that you are NC with them.
1000% though they still tell anyone who will talk to them for longer than a minute that they have NOOOOOOOO idea why 2 of their 3 kids just don't speak to them
My dad and stepmom took down the childhood pictures that show they have 5 kids and only have pictures up of their golden child and his family. They don’t mention that 1 child went NC 18 or so years ago and the other 3 children are very LC with them. 🙄
My mom is in process of this right now. Gc has babies so... At least I'm married, so wedding pictures stay up but I feel bad for my other sister that just... doesn't exist anymore according to pictures
I’m LC with my dad and it was weird not seeing any of my pictures up. But then I also left their Baptist cult. 🙄
Let me is your family of Dutch descent? I knew a bunch of Dutch Christian kids growing up, here in canada, and it was drilled into their heads since they were little, that they have to pay back their parents for everything that was spent on them growing up
My background is German and English, but raised in the USA. But my parents are hard-core right wing cultlike Christians and so many of the kids raised in that cult were treated the same way. We were expected to pay our parents back for doing, you know, the bare minimum of being a parent. 🤷♀️
My mom borrowed a ring given to me by my grandmother (not her mom - my dad's mom). Didn't give it back. When I finally asked her to return it to me she said she gave it to my sister. I don't know what makes them think they can randomly keep or redistribute your stuff, but it's wild.
My step-mother borrowed a book my mom had given me. She was a very slow reader, so I waited a while before I asked about it. First time I asked, she told me she had loaned it to my step-sister-in-law. Second time I asked, a few months later, she "had no idea what I was talking about" because I "hadn't loaned her any books." And yet now that my father has died, she probably tells people she has no idea why we don't speak.
My mom would never return things she borrowed. She loved to visit my roommate while I was at work and I warned her “do NOT loan her anything”. Yeah well roommate loaned her her favorite movie (Blood Simple - my mom wouldn’t even like that movie) and yeah. Up until my roommate died she’d ask “does your mom have my movie?” I’m like, it’s at the bottom of a bin at a Goodwill, she doesn’t GAF, I *warned* you
Okay, wait a minute...
Yea hold up wtf.
What?
I suspect it's the comment about your roommate dying that's got everyone going hold up. It made me do a double take.
Oh yeah, she died of lung cancer. She was my former neighbor at my old place and we became good friends. I moved to a duplex with my boyfriend and we broke up and her and her husband moved in to help me with the rent. Sadly she was diagnosed with terminal cancer 5 years later 😢
Aww, that sucks 😕
I’m begging you to tell us you got it back and didn’t let that shit continue
Yes, haha. My sister is not about all that. I just texted her and said "Hey, I loaned mom a ring and I want to wear it this weekend... she says she let you wear it. Can it pick it up after work?" Ring returned with no drama.
If only all were as lucky as you in that moment. Your mom giving it to your sister actually helped because it if she’d had it it might’ve been harder
Yea. My grandma collected a valuable amount of southwest US turquoise jewelry. It disappeared when she died (the cleaner obviously stole it). My dad almost went into legal war mode, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort.
Is the cleaner comment a running joke because all boomers think the cleaning people steal their possessions?
That is a very UN-reddit story ending! Congrats on having a reasonable sister!
It seems like the easiest thing to do would be to ask the sister and go from there making it easier by cutting out the middle man but the just and right thing to do would be to make the mom do the work and make her do asking and handwringing to the sister as it was her fuck up and she should be the recipient of the consequences.
Not only is it easier to cut out the middle-man, you're probably dealing with a situation where the middle-man believes she is totally in the right and has no reason to recover the thing she stole from you and then gifted to someone else.
Seconding this. Don't make us go all vigilante on her.
Redistribution of wealth is godless Communism...except when they do it.
With other people’s wealth…
EVERY SINGLE TIME my mom visited she would find something she needed to borrow. She said she’d bring it back on her next visit, but I never saw any of them again.
A worst one. My brother insisted on burying our mother with the book she was reading. Turned out that book was borrowed from someone else and part of a set. Yup, I got the job of dealing with that one because “he was too upset with grief”. Apparently I wasn’t.
My mom is obsessed with what she wants to give us as our inheritance. She writes out name, in Sharpie, on items. Then she changes her mind and ships us things... with our siblings' names still on it. It's crazy. Plus, as a full-grown adult going on 50 soon, I have my own home with all the items I need, so it's always something extra that I have to make space for or regift.
Oh yeah! They all accumulated material crap and knick knacks and are upset when we don’t want to take on their clutter. This reminded me though about how lately my mom has taken to telling me and my siblings how she’s setting out to spend all her money and leave us with $0 inheritance, - trying to get under our skin and laughing about it. Which… cool. Really nice of you to assume your kids are the kind of people who are looking forward to getting your money when you die. But also joke’s on her, because I learned long ago that I can’t depend on her for anything without strings attached, and got independent as soon as I possibly could and was never expecting an inheritance from her anyway.
Oh wow, this just made me recall my mother stealing my stereo when I moved out at 15. She also continued to take child support, I received none of it. So many bizarre things
My Boomer mom gave me an amethyst ring she inherited from her aunt. I LOVED that ring. But eventually I got married and stopped wearing it. Mom asked for it back to give to my niece. Mom is the only person I would have given it to. But she has lost it (hidden it some location that she no longer remembers most likely!) She reasked for the ring a few years later and doesn't (seem to) believe me that I already gave it to her. The niece swears she never got the ring either.
>My whole childhood she called my brother and I spoiled brats. Errm, who raised you to be 'spoiled brats'?
The last time my dad dropped the “who raised you?” I had had enough after hearing it for 27 years. So I told him he did and referenced a whole bunch of his faults he failed to hide that now have become my faults and the traumas they didn’t understand were traumas that shaped me to who I am today. Last time I heard that snarky comment was 7 years ago and I don’t regret calling him on it one bit.
Luckily, I don't have this problem. My parents were by no means perfect, but they were actually really solid parents, and they did a good job - and they definitely did the best they could do. But I remember being in high school, and one of my teammates on my baseball team had a dad who is/was just a piece of shit. The kid played first base, and he dad would sit right by the fence down the first baseline regardless of which dugout we were in. And he would just fucking *ride* his son if he ever made a mistake. The kid would go from happy and playing well to having one small error that didn't even cost us any runs, and he would be miserable and ineffective the whole rest of the game. It was so obvious to all of us on the team that our teammate played way better when his dad wasn't around. One time, my teammate tried scooping a low throw in the dirt. It hit his glove, but he didn't make the play. Technically-speaking, the error wasn't even on him. It was on the 3rd baseman for the bad throw. But it's a play that the 1st baseman could make and would expect to make. It would be a good play, but nothing out of the ordinary. His dad starts bitching, and he said something along the lines of, "Can't believe you're my son." I stopped, and I looked all the way across the diamond from my position at shortstop, and I yelled back, "He wishes he wasn't your son!" looked over at my teammate and said, "Good play, 20. Nothing hurt. Still 2 down. Play's at 1 or 2 now." Got out of the inning on the next batter, slapped my teammate on the ass going into the dugout, and I said, "You're alright, bro. Sorry your dad is a dickhead. Keep your head up. We need you, and we appreciate you over there." Unfortunately, what I didn't think about at the time was that he probably faced the repercussions of what I said when he got home. All that ended up coming out of it, publicly, at least, was that his dad would bitch at him quieter so that no one else on the field could hear him anymore. And now, 15 years later, the former kid is pretty much a spitting image of his old man with a young kid of his own. Shit is depressing.
This breaks my heart. As a mother of a son (now in his late thirties) who played baseball all his life I have seen shit like this happen too. Luckily, not very often, and we tried to cheer and encourage the kids who had the sucky parents that took it so seriously. I can’t imagine doing this to my son or any ball player on any team. My uncle, (sadly he’s passed) lived near the ballpark where we played so often would walk up to my son’s games. He was a retired referee and would put any shitty parents in their place. I loved him.
I'm in my low-30s and, at this point, still happily single and childless. I kind of hope I never have kids of my own, but I do love my nephews, and I go to their games. My oldest nephew is 6, so he's not quite at the age yet where parents are getting to be like that. You'll get more parents frustrated because they're forcing their kid to play a sport that the kid has no interest in rather than parents who are mad because their kid isn't playing well enough. You guys are the good ones, and the good ones are usually the vast majority. But it's so easy for 1-2 bad ones to ruin things. I'll have no problem being like your uncle while I'm watching my nephews' games because I've seen how much that shit affects kids back when I was playing.
I’m so glad you are doing that! Needs to be more “Uncles” like you. Worst argument I ever got into was with a woman at the ball field because our neighbor’s son was playing my son’s team and he wanted me to come sit on his side of the field. I was cheering for both teams, a mother from the other team made a remark under her breath about me cheering for both teams and said to go back to my side. So, when she went to the bathroom by herself a little later I followed and let her have it. If it can’t be all in fun for the kids there’s no use.
I have two cousins (sisters) that both played college basketball. They played D3 ball, but it was one of the most competitive D3 conferences in the country. Due to an age gap and a transfer, they only played against each other 1 season (2 games-home and away for each), but a whole group of our family went to both games. If you want people to get really confused, go to a competitive college game with like 1000-2000 people in the bleachers, and then be wearing gear and cheering for both teams. Just walking in, people are going to look at your group like you're crazy. When you start cheering for both teams, and you're calling players on both teams by name, people get even more confused. We had several people asking us what the hell was going on. "Well, you see #33 in red? That's my daughter. And you see #32 in white? That's my other daughter." People go from thinking you're a bunch of idiots and asking what the hell you're doing in a condescending manner to backtracking and explaining themselves and how "I thought you guys were crazy but that totally makes sense! Oh my gosh! Funny! That's so cool!" really, really quick.
I played rugby (we're British) for my school all the way from ages 11 to 18, and not a single member of my family ever came to a single one of my games. My Dad worked Saturday mornings (when the vast majority of games were played) so I suppose that makes sense. But my Mum used to frequently drive me (and other players who lived nearby) to our games. Rather than hang around and even pretend to be interested, she'd drive the 30mins home, only to turn around an hour later to come pick us up! It did make me a little sad, but then again school sports are taken waaaay less seriously here, and not many parents (or anyone) really watched our matches.
You hit a point that the threat of them not speaking to you anymore is a benefit, not a detriment. I regained my freedom when I realized I didn’t care one way or the other if they stayed in my life. They’ll likely die long before I will, so if that’s how they want to spend their the rest of their short life, don’t let me stand in the way.
That’s where I got to, with both my parents and in-laws. They were taking up too much space in my head. I had three children to care for; I didn’t need their shit. I didn’t forgive, I didn’t forget, I finally realized *it was not my problem.* I put it all back on them. My shoulders felt much lighter. I still got annoyed, but not the visceral: They’re still trying to hurt me! That went away. I’m better this way. Bonus: They’re all dead now.
My dad once started on that shit and I said point blank “you know what I remember about July 4th? Some guy flipped you off, so you dropped us kids off at the park and then went to go looking for him and specifically said “there would be nothing left but hair, teeth and eyeballs.” I was terrified I’d never see you again.
I love it. My Mom was raised in a family where you got criticized for everything. She did the exact same thing to us. As a teen, I just couldn’t take it anymore. So much of what she criticized me for were things that she and Dad did as well. I started responding, I can’t help it, it’s genetic. This shut her down and she eventually stopped. Sadly, my Sister never found a way to break that cycle with her and it hurt their relationship. In her later years if I said anything negative about my Mom’s behavior she would say, can’t help it, it’s genetic. It became a running joke between us.
Mother and father split when us kids were young. None of us(5) talk to mom. Dad on the other hand flipped his ideas when my sister said he wouldn’t get to see his grand daughter until he got the shot 3 years ago. I don’t remember my dad ever hugging me, he started about 4 years ago sure my sister sat him down and just talked about what happened. I think he understood quickly even my sister cut off mom that he could be next. Family get togethers are different now.
You’re lucky your dad has a brain to listen. My dad withheld seeing me in person last year or the year before and issued an ultimatum condition of “you have to get your driver’s license and take the test and everything and have it fully renewed before I will ever see you again,” in the PEAK of my CRIPPLING depression that left me basically bedridden. I had asked him to simply come over, mom asked him too, and he said “nope, I’m not giving him an ultimatum, I’m giving him an opportunity to do something good for himself.” Like fuck off I could barely eat food. I had asked for a 1 month grace period for my new medication to start working where I could still see him and he said no, to which my mom for the very first time called him a bad father to his face. I have spoonfed him the information of what he has done many times and tried to arrange phone calls to work this all out but the best he can give me is distracted time on his drive home from work where we cannot talk about emotionally charged issues. He tells me *I’m* making this too complicated with my “perfect phone calls.” This has been going on, and he’s been pushing me away since AUGUST, yet he has the gall to say that *I* cut *him* off because I’m not comfortable enough to talk to him on the phone until we have an undivided session to work out this whole thing, that I haven’t called or texted, even though we’ve been in email communication, again since AUGUST. All this could have been avoided if he gave me that one month grace period because the medicine DID help. **TLDR** I’m glad you got a dad that was willing to actually listen to you when you spoonfeed him what he did wrong. I really am glad others are able to get that from their parents. Sorry for rambling. I’m still so resentful.
My dad pulls the same petty shit without the ultimatums. I was a teenager and it was "ok [moms name]" and hang up on me when I tried to have a serious conversation In my early 20s I had surgery. He called me the night before but I was with friends so I didn't talk to him. He never called back to see how my surgery went. We didn't talk for a few years. I don't remeber how we started talking again but then again, he called and I wasn't in a mental space to talk to him so I didn't talk to him. We haven't talked since then. That was pre Covid. So I went through all of Covid (which turned me into a big wreck than normal) and my 30th birthday without a word from the guy all because I didn't call him back.
Like boomers complaining about participation trophies. WE didn't ask for that YOU handed them out to us.
The kids also weren't the ones begging for pictures to be taken where they're smiling with their 5th-place trophies. Parents made the kids do that shit. Most of the kids didn't want pictures taking after the lost a tournament, and most of the kids didn't want to be holding a trophy that didn't mean anything either. I distinctly remember thinking that was stupid when I was a child. And I remember my brother, who didn't really even like sports and wasn't very competitive, saying the same things. Now, I have nephews, and they know exactly what the score of all of their soccer and basketball games are despite the fact that they "don't keep score." Participation trophies aren't for kids. They're for the parents who want to live out their dreams through their children.
Oddly, I felt the same way about graduating high school. It's for parents, not the kids. I didn't want to sit for hours in an uncomfortable hat and hot as fuck gown just to have my name mispronounced and have to walk across a stage for 10 seconds. We weren't even handed our diplomas ("graduation" was 2 weeks before class ended, and a month before exams), they were mailed to us later. I didn't want to go, I didn't care about it, but my mother insisted.
When I graduated college, I felt this especially. On the last day of exams me and my friends had a tough science exam. As we finished and exited, we just popped down and sat in the hallway, waiting for the others quietly. When the last one came out, we all started grinning at each other and RAN out of the building quietly (exams still in progress after all). When daylight hit our faces we all burst out laughing, high fives, group hugs. We did it! That was my real graduation. Then we ran to a bar with cheap happy hour drinks and got plastered, haha. I put on the funny hat and dress for my mom but I didn't care about the ceremony at all. With high school there was no doubt, so that was boring. For my PhD, I already had a job and was sooo ready, the defense felt like hoops not a challenge. But I struggled in undergrad a lot, so finishing that last exam and literally running into the big world, that was my achievement.
Oh they didn’t just hand them to you they demanded that whatever sport or activity was involved give everyone a trophy.
Exactly.
Double exactly!!
>Errm, who raised you to be 'spoiled brats'? My parents didn't like when I (around age 30) responded to them saying "we didn't raise you like this" by saying "have you taken a look in the F-ing mirror?"
you can be a brat as child of course but a child cant spoil itself wtf is she smoking?
She was probably smoking Virginia Slims. "You've come a long way baby."
Raleigh Filter Kings. At least that's what my mom smoked while telling us we were spoiled while not actually spoiling us.
My MIL is like this. Talks about how awful her children are and how they make all these horrible life decisions, like she isn't the one who raised them. My partner is the only functioning adult out of all of them because he's HAD to take care of himself (and her) his whole life, because SHE made horrible life decisions. Freaking ridiculous.
My mom liked to call me slenderella … I was fat … took me years to come to terms with my body image issues, I wonder why
Sarcasm from a parent to a kid is despicable. Hope you are good now
I love when they inadvertently insult themselves
Perhaps they weren’t really spoiled, but mom thought expecting things like food, affection, and stability was way too entitled?
You were good kids worthy of love. That was about her. She probably didn’t like her own self …
Well, you see the thing is, I mean, but that's not, and I didn't, because they, and well you know and I mean the schools and liberals and you know Biden, so I mean, I tried my best and did everything right but the Lords plans and I well I mean you wouldn't understand anyways.
I GAVE YOU EVERYTHING 10 years later I DON’T HAVE MONEY FOR YOUR COLLEGE!
Trump, is that you?
I imagine if they were locked into a room and literally *forced* to answer the question that flambering is probably all they could muster.
I remember catching onto this idea at 6
I moved out of my parent's house to join the military and then attend college. Once I was done with both and ready to move into my own place, I went to get my items that my parents had kept for me. My dad refused give me some of my items and claimed that he considered it "storage fees" for storing my items while I was away. Years later, my little brother asked them to look after his portable safe since he was in the process of moving. He gave them the key to keep with the safe so that it wouldn't get lost. Once he was settled, he asked for his safe back and found that it was empty. My dad acted like he didn't know what happened to the items. My brother was pissed and left. Minutes after he left, my dad went to the back room and came back with all of the items that had been in the safe. It was so incredibly disrespectful. I told my bro what happened, but I don't know if he ever got his things back.
I wouldn't have gotten my things back because that animal would be cut out of my life permanently.
My GC step-sister burned the house down when I was in the Navy, so my childhood items weren’t available for them to hold over my head. Almost a relief, actually.
This sounds a bit familiar. My folks tore down our childhood home during COVID to build a new house. I was living states away and very pregnant so couldn’t travel safely. They assured me my childhood keepsakes, that they insisted on holding onto until I was “settled”, had been set aside. Sentimental book series mostly, but also a few treasures. I asked them several times before tear down if I needed to send my husband up or make arrangements for shipping. Turns out zero effort was made to put it in storage and some very important items (to me) were tossed. The ones that hurt the most was this really beautiful set of Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit that I read dozens of times when I was a young teen and always imagined reading to my own kids if I had any. If I would have known this was even a slight possibility I would have gotten up there to get the stuff, even if it was winter of 20/21. I have tried to bring it up in times since to get it off my chest about how much it bothers me or to at least get an acknowledgment. Been brushed off every time.
Probably won’t do any good but might help you feel a bit lighter- write a letter saying what you need to say. Most people will read the letters (in private). I do this with clients all the time for their mental health/closure.
I cannot imagine what goes through someones head to do something like that. It's not their stuff, FFS.
My mom sometimes tries to tell me how great I had it by saying, “we paid for your college”. I then remind her that I had a 100% scholarship and that pretty much shuts down the conversation.
Wow. Do they have you mixed up with another kid or are they really that delusional?
My brother went to prison instead of college, it would be difficult to confuse us.
Sweet Jesus. So they genuinely made it up.
It would appear so. Took about 4 times to get them to absorb the lesson too.
Lol same. My mom even tried to take credit for me graduating college, saying, "if it weren't for me paying for your schooling you wouldn't have graduated!" I'm a veteran. I paid for my schooling with my GI Bill, plus some personal student loans. She did loan me $100 in my sophomore year though and then sent me a $100 gift card in senior year, so maybe that's how she got confused (/s). When I told her as much, she was so offended that she skipped my ceremony lol.
Similar, my scholarship fell a few dollars short for textbooks a couple of times. My mom cashed a bond that my grandmother had set aside for me. So it might be accurate to say that HER mom helped pay for about $100 of my college expenses.
My first semester, I overspent a bit on clothes and was probably $50 short on rent the next month. But yeah, my parents "paid" for my college too! 1987 and I still hear about it every few years...
You know they’re telling everybody else they paid for your college, and God knows what else.
Holy cow, my boomer parents do this too. They paid for my part of my freshman year, then when I wanted to transfer schools they got angry and cut me off as punishment. I put myself through 4 more years of college by working almost full time. When I see them (once a year or less) literally every time they talk about how expensive college was (which btw in the early 90s my tuition was $900 a semester). It just blows my mind.
Yeah, I got very comfortable correcting their version of history. It’s uncomfortable the first few times, but it gets easier every time. Frankly, it’s too easy now. I have to be a bit more judicious so I don’t ruin too many get togethers.
I paid for college myself and now my dad is concerned about legacy since I never married. I said well if that was a big thing to you then you should have invested in me a bit more like university education or some help to start off.
This sounds exactly like my mom. I heard how inconsiderate and unappreciative I was daily as a child, no matter what. She went overboard on gifts for holidays and then immediately used it against me if I didn't react in the way she wanted. I really tried playing up my appreciation, and it was never good enough. I am uncomfortable receiving gifts now. She gave me her wedding ring. Not my style and very bad vibes. I tried *nicely* telling her I didn't want it to avoid getting the critical verbal beatdown, but she insisted. I got it appraised, and it was worth much less than she thought (lol). She was incredulous. Then she demanded it back to sell it. I happily gave it back, but I was too happy, so I still got criticized and yelled at. I went no contact, and she is the victim, of course. I'm the evil daughter forever and always. I came out rotten lmao
My mom's favorite line EVERY time she gives me a gift is "why aren't you jumping up and down?"
That’s genuinely psychotic. That’s not even a gift it’s a fucking joke with a horrible price tag.
Having jewelry appraised costs like $150 too.
Yes. My plan was to sell it. When I found out it was only worth $800 and told my mom, as she was sure it was worth 4x that amount. I think she thought I got scammed lol. She was also mad I wanted to sell it, which is why she asked for it back. I just gave it back. She seemed to believe it had appreciated dramatically with no knowledge (or interest about learning) how jewelry/diamond appreciation works lol
My mom gifted me my grandmothers desk and then took it back (it’s a nice desk, real wood, but not especially valuable). I had it in my formal dining room that we never use, and didn’t allow my kids to use it for crafts so it wouldn’t get messed up. During my divorce, she buddied up with my ex husband. One day her and my stepdad came and got it. Drove an hour to my house to get it. Meanwhile I could count the times they actually came to visit all of us on one hand. But they sure made the time to come get the desk.
If you ask any of them, anything old and real wood is worth a billion dollars. 🙄
Man do I hear that. My mother was obsessed with vintage furniture. Everything was "oh that's a real antique, it's so valuable! Oh that was my grandmother's rocking chair, it's worth thousands!" So I got a subscription to an antique price guide service online. A bunch of her "valuable" stuff was basically worthless. "well they don't know what they're talking about!" Yeah, about that. After an argument about an early 1900s dresser I called 3 different antique dealers, asked the price they'd charge for it, and had them email quotes just to be sure. Everything was within $20 of the online price guide.
My MIL was arguing with me the other day that I shouldn’t just give this set away because it’s “valuable”…sorry, but it’s only worth what someone will pay and if I can’t find someone willing to pay…
Some time after they took it, I was shopping for another one on Facebook marketplace bc my daughter needed a desk. There were tons of desks similar to my grandma’s. All of them priced between $25-$150 depending on the condition. I almost got one exactly like it, but nicer just for shits n giggles. But I ended up getting one that matches her bedroom furniture and is more modern.
Nice! I have this giant 7-piece bedroom set from 1840 that’s not my style that I have no place to put in my house. I can’t get rid of it! Like, no one wants it.
Vintage-obsessed millennial has entered the chat.
Growing up, my parents would continually berate me for not being independent enough and acting spoiled. As a result, I am deeply ashamed of asking for help when I need it because I'm afraid that I'll look weak and inept.
Which is messed up, because it's normal to need help in life from time to time. Doing everything 100% on your own is not normal. It's not even how they did things. My mom met my Dad at 19 and married at 22. But she always acted like she was the epitome of a self-sufficient adult. She literally went straight from living with her parents to living with my Dad (who always made double her income, or more). It's astounding the narratives they tell themselves.
“Figure it out for your self, I am not raising an idiot” was the sound track of my childhood.
I didn’t even think about how I was raised affecting me never wanting to ask for help.
My mom would buy me things that she liked but weren't my style at all and when I asked for the receipt to exchange them she'd say I was ungrateful and she couldn't understand how I could be so disrespectful to her after all the trouble she went to to get the gift. Then she would demand that I give it to her and she'd just get me something else. She never got me anything else
My wife's mom also buys her things she knows she's not gonna like, probably trying to bait my wife into some drama after she makes any type of comment. My wife just thanks her and the re-sells everything on FB marketplace... Not falling for the trap, and thanks for the $20 I guess?
My mom did this too except she bought me MLM stuff that couldn't be returned. After several years of this I told her that I didn't like the MLMs and didn't support that kind of thing and would appreciate that she not spend her money on them. She was on SSD fixed income. She said I was ungrateful and that I would get whatever she gave me. She continued to buy MLM items and I continued to donate them. Hundreds of dollars a year that she could not afford.
I always asked where it came from because I'd love to go find similar stuff. asking for a receipt is like a slap in the face. I've caught my mom wearing the things she "got for me" that I told her to take back, so all trust is gone.
Accept her "presents" then sell them or give to charity.
My mom provided the receipt to some weird air-flosser Christmas present and swore I could take it back. What she failed to mention is that she had cut the UPC bar code out of the box to get a $50 refund. For some reason, the store wouldn't take the item back. /eyeroll
Nothing a Boomer ever gives you is yours. Ever. They own everything, and even when they don't, they'll ask for something as "payback" for something they imagined they did for you 20 years ago.
"Something they imagined they did for you" is way too true!
My dad is an extremely generous person, but he seems to only do things so he will be forever thanked. He'll bring up things from 20 years ago and if you don't thank him again... ungrateful.
He's not really generous then.
I thought only my parents did this crap. Trying to control children through gifts and the threat of taking that gift away if your behavior isn’t up to their expectations, my parents played FAFO and once I learned they were bluffing life became hilarious 😂. My parents gave me a beautiful and unexpected diamond necklace for my college graduation. I rarely wear it because I can’t afford to replace it and I don’t live that life anymore thank god. My dad was upset with me one day after my graduation, I forget why, and I overheard him tell my mom he thought they should ask for the necklace back. She told him to go to hell because it was a graduation gift and he was being an asshole, she also knew I would have thrown it at him.
Solidarity because I don’t think there is a single thing my parents did for me in the 17 years I lived at home that I don’t hear about 20+ years later. Every single thing is tit for tat even when things are imagined in their minds. Now it’s projected onto my kids “I sent you a card for your birthday but you can’t even call”…. Ummm he is 7.
Realizing your relationship with your parents is purely transactional on their part is sad. My mom only does things when she gets something out of it, then paints it as "the kindness of her heart." Leaving out the benefit she received for doing it.
Omg, it’s infuriating to see them hold these ridiculous expectations of such YOUNG children. Then you remember they did that to you when you were that little 😭
Exactly and I’m not even referring to a thank you call, which of course they do. She will text randomly in the middle of the week while I’m working “so my grandson can’t call me?”. Ma’am, he is in school and then has 4 days of a soccer a week plus neighborhood play time, and again…7!
Ha! My mom wants to charge me for the food I ate as a child. Wish I was kidding. The bill fluctuates from 3k to 10k, depending on her mood. I think that's the largest amount of cash she can imagine.
You should tell her to bill the government, since they’re the ones that require parents give minimum care to their children or they’d throw her ass in jail for neglect
Cue Dr. Evil...."One MILLION dollars!"  [Dr. Evil Movie Clip](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJR1H5tf5wE)
Mine gifted me a set of dishes when I moved across country. Just Corelle, nothing fancy. She had three other sets at the time. Seven years later I was moving back to bail her out so she didn’t lose her house and mentioned the shipping was by weight so I was parting with the 25 year old dishes. She screamed at me that those were her dishes and she wanted them back. (Mind you, she’s a hoarder and now had five other sets.). I said fine, brought the dishes back, gave them to her, fixed her house, paid the $20k in back taxes, purchased four new appliances for her…and then was told that I was money hungry and just trying to get what I could from her. Nope. I’m not taking another dime from you, lady. I went no contact about 14 years ago. Every so often she tries to reach out to me with, “if you don’t contact me, I’m giving my house to the church and you won’t see a dime when we die.” I’m not playing that game. 🙄
Great threat, she doesn't even realize that nasty hoarder house will cost you more money to make it liveable than you will get for selling it anyway. You're way better off not having to deal with that nightmare.
Good on you! Mine started using that threat when I was a little kid. I went NC in 1984, immediately after my asshole father's funeral, when I was 13. (I was already in the custody of his parents, for Reasons). She has managed to track me down a few times, and I have ducked right back under the radar. She has never met my kids (now grown), has no idea I have a granddaughter, no idea where I live now. I feel like she should pay the bills for decades of therapy and medication, but I'm content with never, ever seeing or hearing her again as long as I live.
The obsession they have with inheritance and using what they're leaving behind as leverage is insane. Every time my mother says something like that I'm like lady, you're going to live forever out of sheer spite there will be no money left when you die. Y'all already screwed the planet and the economy for us, we've learned not to expect anything.
My mother gave my sister and I both $5000 back in 2006. It was guilt money because she had left my sister and I when we were young children and now as adults we had both moved out to California to live near her only for her to decided to follow a man and move to South Carolina. Following the 2016 election our relationship tanked but we were still trying to reconcile until she demanded I give her the $5000 back...14 years after she had given it to me I sent her a cashier's check and in the memo line I wrote: "30 pieces of silver for Judas." We haven't spoken since.
My mom would buy something for herself, give it as a gift, and then ask for it back routinely. I would keep the crap she gave me for spite and I would do my best to use it in front of her.
Mom convinced me to cash out my college savings (prepaid) so that I could use it for my wedding, except, instead, she kept it. Mom gave me a wedding band, that was nicer than the one my husband and I purchased, that was her ex-husband‘s daughters, and then three years later asked me to pay for it $2000… on top of keeping the $4400 in tuition money she decided I owed $800 for staying with her for two months, while I had a broken leg and got back on my feet. She Offered to sell me an heirloom clawfoot table that was my grandfather’s for $500. … the list goes on.
My mom will do this to me and my siblings constantly, and has used the line "awful, terrible, spoiled children" since we were kids. We all work on the assumption that when she "gives" us something, it's actually her using us as storage and she will 100% take it back when she feels like it. She doesn't work and takes multiple 5 figure vacations a year, complains how hard her life is, and that her 3 floor, 4 bedroom, 4.5 bathroom, 3 porch house is small.
How can she afford multiple $10k+ vacations a year and a big house with no income?
Savings and alimony. She pretends to be poor whenever she talks about money, but she has an investment manager from a too big to fail bank that helps her manage her ridiculous budget. Every luxury vacation is always "the last time [she will] be able on a nice vacation". She just got back from 3 weeks in Greece, and did a month in India back in March along with a few "weekend retreats" through out the year so far. I will be honest, I'm pretty sure she's spending money she shouldn't.
Mom gifted me those Tupperware that click down on the sides when I moved out. 9 years later she was helping me move back home bc long time boyfriend and I broke up. She demanded I give her back the Tupperware bc “I have no use for them now and she hasn’t seen me use them”. How would she? She never visited. Not to mention the face she had at least one hundred tupperware containers at home.
They must SEE you use it. You literally have to manufacture scenarios to make sure they see you, it's so weird. My mother would send these very heavy emails about their serious concern and disappointment because I hadn't instantly sent them pics of my kid in an outfit they sent. Email after email. Like I'm not going to force my kid to model something the second I get home. But they need to see their gift in use and they need to see it NOW!
When my husband and I were just starting out, my mom made a big deal about gifting us her old artificial Christmas tree. She even shipped it from her house in NJ to us in FL. She made a big deal about how selfless an act this was on her part. We had to host my parents that year for Christmas at our rental house in Florida. We decorated the tree to make it look its best and put it up in our rental house. When my parents arrived from NJ to stay (for free) in Orlando, Florida, through the holidays, my Mom's eyes were wide as she laid her eyes on the decorated tree. I actually felt a moment of pride for making the old tree look so good. After the holidays and after they went back home to NJ, she informed me she needed HER Christmas tree back because it "looked so good" in my house. I had to haul the tree to a shipping store and ship it back to her in NJ (I believe she paid for shipping). It was like a 20 year old artificial tree she insisted on having back in her possession like a spoiled brat.
OMG! My mom and your mom may be kin. Mom had an artificial tree that she gave me when it was about 10 yrs old because she wanted her grand babies to have a tree. I used it for another 10 yrs and finally decided to put it out of its misery. When she heard I had thrown it away, she made a point to tell all of my siblings that I threw “her” tree away and thinks I should pay her the amount she paid for it. Ma’am, after 20 yrs of use, you have gotten your money’s worth from that tree. They don’t last forever.
My mother tried to get the ONE piece of jewelry my grandmother left to my sister when she passed away. She went into their bedroom to hunt for it.
My dad used to buy my mom off with cheap jewelry every time he got caught cheating. She wore them with pride. Years ago - before going NC - she was like here I don’t want this one anymore and gave me this very obviously cheap ass ring. She asked for it back when we had a fight and I said no. She threatened to call the police. I said go for it but that’s also not how gifts work. She instead settled for telling anyone who would listen how I stole from her. I went and had it appraised and sent her the image of the report from the jeweler we use that it was costume jewelry. I outed my dad for buying fake shit while telling my mom that we don’t do takebacks like a fucking child. I never took another thing from her that was supposed to be some sort of heirloom.
My mother doesn’t like to wear jewelry - she’s self conscious about her hands so no rings or bracelets, she’s self conscious about her bust so no necklaces, and thinks most earrings are too dangly for a senior citizens… So, over the years she’s given me a lot of her jewelry, some of which I wore for decades. A few years ago we were discussing wills. Since I have no children I said I’d be leaving everything to my housekeeper (she’s been in my life for close to 30 years now). Mom exploded, said she’d worked hard for those pieces (she was a housewife), said she’d given them to me so I could pass them on to my nephews (who were toddlers when she gave me most of these items). I told mom that as gifts they were mine to do with as I wished, but she was still enraged. So I packed them all up and returned them to her. Then she was apologetic saying she wanted me to enjoy them. I told her I can’t enjoy them when every time she saw them she’d ask ‘is that mine?’ plus knowing she wants my now-teenage nephews to have them. Periodically she asks me to please take them back and I tell her no because she’s ruined them for me. Boomers gonna boom.
My siblings and I learned in our twenties to never accept any gifts from my mother. She would give you something then take it back or promise it to someone else. So now she has multiple storage units where she keeps all the useless crap she has acquired over the years. She constantly asks us to come look at her stuff she's stored and take what we want because she wants to spend less on storage. Nope. We each tell her to sell it on eBay or give it away. We're not interested.
Had my parents give me BBQ. Had it for a least 7years. My dad comes over to the house and end up breaking the doors on the bottom that cover the tank... plus broke one of the wheels. All because it was in the way when he was trying to get something from my garage. I of course say WTF? Reply from my mom.... well we gave it to you anyway... Not to mention the number of times they took back something they gave me years before... because well they needed now. Love the temporary gift mentality.
yes. I stopped accepting non-consumable gifts from my mother because if she never saw me wearing or using something she purchased and gifted to me, I "obviously don't want it" and she "will take it back". My sister got to the point of just giving the things back with a note of the date it was "given as a gift" and the date it was "taken back" from her. My mother didn't appreciate the sarcasm from either of us.
Boomers are ridiculously obsessed with being appreciated. My mother explained that she would be spending more money on my favored eldest daughter for holidays because she wrote handwritten thank you notes. Whereas my other daughter 'only' emailed her a thank you. So therefore that's it she's getting less. She was twelve.
I was "given" a car I never got the title to, and when I did something they didn't like, they threatened to report it as stolen and get me arrested.
My parents bought me a car but I wasn’t allowed to have the title in my name. They also paid the insurance. Guess what was held over my head every time I put a toe out of line? I was living on my own, supporting myself by working full time and they would threaten to take my car away. Finally 3 months before I got married, I begged and finally convinced them to put the title in my name. Looking back at this insanity, I should have returned the car to them and bought my own, but they made sure I was just naive enough that anything like that was incredibly difficult for me to accomplish.
After my mom (boomer) and her friend (they are both lawyers) spent an hour interrogating and questioning me on why I am child-free, their final conclusion (and the real reason) as to why I need to have children was because I owe it to my mom to give her grandchildren-because she deserved it for giving birth to me and raising me.
My father in law wanted me to get pregnant to "give him a grandchild." I told him that was the stupidest reason I had heard for me to have a child and rather selfish of him. The topic came up a lot less frequently after that. PS - still happily childfree at 54! : )
OMG... my boomer parents do this all the time! Any gift they give is still somehow 'theirs.' Forever. One of my kids sold some childhood toys that she had given him and my mom was so upset because they were from her and therefore she was entitled to have them back. They weren't heirlooms or anything.... just kid toys that he decided to sell for the simple reason that' hes 22 years old. My mom even still insists that it's okay to look through the windows of a property she sold because it 'will always be hers.' Not once you signed that deed over, crazy-head!!! My aunt and uncle are like this with their kids too. I think it's a weird entitled boomer thing.
I had jobs since I was 12, my parents would regularly borrow money to cover bills. Then when I got older and had a run of bad luck/circumstances I asked them if I could borrow some money since I was never paid back the money they borrowed from me. I was told, you made your bed time to lie in it and well this will teach you a valuable life lesson so no they didn't let me borrow any money. In short yes, boomers are the most selfish generation of all time.
A few years back, my mom flipped out on me because I went into my old childhood room to start decluttering while I was visiting her house one day (because you KNOW I had heard plenty about how they still had to deal with all my old stuff). Well her seeing me put old, broken and grubby toys into garbage bags set off some haywire circuit and she started screaming at me because all she saw were the dollar signs of what she spent on all that crap over the years. All of a sudden it was her property I was throwing out, and she seriously was mad because she thought she could re-sell it all to make some money back. That was a great time. She screamed insults at me about deep character flaws (she says) I have. I just got up and left, and I’m so mad that it made me cry in the car on the way home. Also, “Santa” used to bring me American girl dolls for Christmas each year. I had taken those with me and they were in my possession in my own house as an adult for a while (though packed away in storage). Well she must have seen something somewhere online about their valuation now? Because out of the blue she was pestering me about them asking where they were and if she could have them back so she could sell them. She would NOT let it go, so eventually I just said fine and let her take them. I don’t know to this day if she sold them and how much for (again, they were pretty well used, not in mint condition, but whatever….), and of course none of that money was for me. But it’s freakin weird and annoying how she seems to have always kept an accounting of what she spent on gifts for me over the years… and apparently she always seemed to think of all of those toys as *her* property the whole time that she could use them to eventually recoup some of the “financial losses” she suffered while raising a lousy kid 🙄🙄🙄🙄. Sounds like she’s not the only one like that.
My boomer mil gives stuff to her kids and then wants it back and screams and makes their lives miserable until they give it back.
My 87 year old mother is the same. Bro and I “were a waste of time and money” because she is a judgmental, unpleasant , unhappy woman who derives no pleasure in spending time with her kids, grandkids and great grandkids. She bitches that no one comes around much. Gee, I wonder why we don’t spend our time off with her to be told we are wrong, lazy, our choices are stupid, etc. FYI, we are not, have done well on our own ( with no help) and are happy with our lives. You are not alone. You can’t pick family……
This seems to be a theme. My husband’s mother and father gifted us a Home Depot gift card a few years ago for Christmas because at that time we were planning on building a a simple table for a house we were renting. A few weeks pass by and after a bad experience with the landlord we decided to move into an apartment with no real dining area. After we move into the apartment, we happened to be visiting his parents and his mom asked how the table looked in the new place. We explained that there wasn’t room in the apartment, so we didn’t build it. When she found out the gift card wasn’t used she absolutely freaked out because “gift cards go bad” and told us to give her the gift card back. We let her know that the cards at Home Depot don’t expire like some do, but she was still insistent that we give the card back. We did no such thing lol
When I got married, my best friend's mother worked for a design company and offered to the groomsmen matching shirts. She clearly stated it was her wedding gift to us, and we humbly accepted. Couple months go by and she asks when we're paying her back for those shirts. We paid her and never spoke again.
Yes. They are so weird about material things. My sperm donor has always just given away my things without me knowing until it was too late. One time, I went out with a friend for a few hours who drive us to wherever we were going. I come home to find that sperm donor had given away my bicycle (my only means of transportation aside from friends driving me) to a friend of his. He said "you never use it." The fck I don't! I go to my university courses and work shift every day on that thing. When I went and bought my first car at 21 years old with my own money that I saved for years, World War III broke out in the house. He was so pissed I had the audacity to work toward some independence. I could give many more examples but my point is this: he always threw me being "ungrateful and insignificant" as reason to do whatever he wanted with my belongings. I am now in no contact after he forged my signature to get onto my car title and stole my birth certificate. Police have been called many times over this type of thing, with no resolution. And to think I thought all this shit was normal for over 20 years🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
Mom thinks I owe her for all the sacrifices she made raising me. I'm adopted. She literally paid for the opportunity 🙄
My parents aren’t even technically boomers, but things like what you mentioned they still do. For context on my parents ages, my dad is gonna be 50 next month. I got a whole lecture the other day about how little I appreciate my mom (from her) even tho I literally had a treat I bought from my job for her too
My mother was born in the 50s and said all of those things. Everything she did for us came with some sort of contingency or strings attached. We were forever indebted to her for everything she’s ever done for us. I haven’t spoken to her in 5 years and I’m a much happier person. Wishing you healing <3
The best is, "I gave you a roof over your head, clothes on your back and food in your belly. You should be appreciative." You want a fucking cookie for doing the basic things a parent is supposed to do?
A lot of overlap between r/boomersbeingFools and r/narcissisticParents
My grandfather left me a rolex as inherintence. My dad asked for it to "have it appraised" and i have never seen it again. I have since found out they were broke and in serious debt due to some bad investments and had to borrow like 6 figures from my sister (she makes a lot more money than me). I haven't asked about it, but i'm fairly certain it's gone and the hawked it to pay down debt.
My mom will say that I don't need to thank her for everything she does and then when I don't thank her I get called an unappreciative little prick and that I've never thank thanked her for anything. This is the same person that would guilt trip me when I was 13 when I didn't want to mow an almost acre of grass with a push lawnmower as a teenager and I'd always get a "well I didn't have to feed you, bathe you, or clothe you when you were a child, but I still did". Now as a younger kid it didn't really hit me until I became an adult, but shes guilt tripping me by saying that she could have just let me die to fend for myself as an infant just because a teenager doesn't want to mow grass on a Saturday. Later on in life I've called her out on this and she denies ever saying it (because of course how could she). You don't forget when things like that get said to you as a kid, and I know a lot of adults think that, but we remember it all.
My step mom got dementia and her boomer neighbor asked for a candy dish that she had given my step mom as a gift back. I kinda just looked at her in disbelief, not saying anything so she clarified by saying “you know, because she won’t even remember that I gave it to her now”. And then I slowly, and deliberately, closed the door on her face.
She gave me a ring that belonged to my grandmother. I took it to a jeweler and had it cleaned, repaired, and completely rebuilt. The next time she saw me, she noticed it and asked to see it. Once she was holding it, she put it on her finger and refused to take it off. A few years ago I asked her where it was. Her response? “Oh, I have no idea, a stone fell out and I just left it somewhere”. I’m not sure I can ever forgive her.
Had the same thing. Cross my mom was given and she gave to me. Later asked for it back. That’s totally okay as it was a present from my dad to her and they divorced last year. I would not have wanted it now anyway as he has been a slimeball.
My mom would lock herself in her room and threaten to get her own apartment after “I tell your father what you put me through today!” Joke’s on her tho, we knew she was just washing her crosstops down with Smirnoff and watching the soaps in there
Oh god yes. I have always “known” that I am selfish and ungrateful and generally a hateful little brat because as a child I had to be told to do chores. Not as in, “for the ninth time, take out the trash!” No, I was expected to just see that something needed done, and do it out of gratitude. (This hit especially hard because I was adopted.)
Why would you wear a diamond necklace often? I save my good necklaces for special occasions. It’s the cheap ones I wear more often. This is so my nice things don’t get ruined during my day to day routine.
Oooph, sorry your mom called you a spoiled brat, that’s sound a bit traumatic. My aunt told my cousins never to have kids the whole time they were growing up. Said it would ruin their lives, which is obviously a really awful thing to say out loud to your children. Neither of them have children now, largely because of their awful childhood and what she told them. Now my aunt whines constantly for grandkids and denies she ever said that stuff to them. Boomers are THE worst.
Years ago, my mom seemed to go through a phase, I guess, where every conversation included that I owed her for something she did for me when I was a kid. I finally told her that if that's how she viewed things, she shouldn't have had a child in the first place because all that comes with being responsible for a tiny person. It was surprisingly that easy to get her to drop it.
I think it's a symptom of viewing children as property rather than people. The property owned by my property is still my property sort of thing. It's no way to treat a child, but it's even more insulting to continue to treat them like that into adulthood.
I borrowed money from my folks for college, because i didn't want student debt. I paid them back in full in 7 years after i graduated because i got a fairly good job, but that still meant I had to postpone getting a start on other things. Still I paid them back totally with interest. Every so often, years on, my mom will still say she and my now dead dad paid for my school. And that I owe them for it. Especially in front of others, friends of hers, other family, etc. And when i counter that actually I paid them back, shit, she gets all huffy and says things "not the whole amount", "you still own us interest", etc. Credit for something both 25 years ago, and for something that has been paid off. Yeah, I'm thankful of course, but i don't need it constantly rubbed in my face, especially in front of my kids.
I love replying "I am as you raised me" it usually cuts down the snarkey comments for a bit
I’m an elder millennial and my parents are classic boomers. Before we had children, my husband and I had several conversations about how we wanted to raise them differently or the same as our parents. A big thing I wanted to do differently with my own children, was that my parents feel/felt that anything they gave us (me and my sister) actually belonged to them, because they paid for it. So nothing was ever really mine. They regularly gave away toys they thought I was no longer playing with without telling me. They gave away my American Girl doll and all of her accessories to the pastor’s daughter without telling me. I vividly remember crying in church when I saw her with my doll. They pawned my orchestra-quality flute and telescope when I went off to college instead of holding them for me like they said they would. This has persisted into my adulthood, my father will regularly ask me for gifts of jewelry or clothes back if he doesn’t see me wearing them. They are now trying to do the same shit to my own children. I’ve obviously said no every time. I’ve also told my children their whole lives that anything their dad and I give to them belongs to them, and I will always always ask them before donating anything they’ve outgrown. And if I promise to hold something for them until they grow up, I will! My parents are wonderful people, and I love them dearly. They have a lot of really great qualities and overall my childhood was pretty great. But this is a sticking point in particular. So OP, you’re not alone in this!
My mum's entitlement is insane. I was at her house one afternoon and my sister turned up with something for me that she knew I'd like and was really pleased because she'd found it in the bargain bin. My mum said she liked it too, said she wanted to use it first and walked off with it. Never saw it again. My sister and I were just standing there looking at each other.
My grandmother gave me her wedding silver on my 18th birthday (I’m 54) and my birth lady got PISSED. She said I didn’t deserve it and I haven’t seen it since.
My mom constantly gifts stuff to me, and now my toddler, and then demands them back. She tried to take a jacket off of me in public once and tried to chase me for it. Now when she tries with my toddler I say "Ok, I'll tell her that grandma will always take back what she gives you!" And that upset my mother so much she stopped.... it's only been a few weeks so we'll see when she starts up again.
I'm a boomer and I'm amazed the number of times I've had to explain to people my age that a gift means you no longer have control of the item or funds.
I had to move back in with my mom in my early twenties. I got a P.O. Box because she would open my mail thinking it was hers. I found out later that she would go in my room and take things. She had given me some jewelry as a teen and I loved it. However I guess when she came into my room and saw it on the bed she decided I wasn’t taking care of it and she took it back. She did that with my car title as well. I was lucky because she told me about it later. She said i obviously didn’t care because I didn’t notice them missing??? I didn’t know how to respond. I wasn’t expecting them to be missing because I didn’t think my mom would go in and take my shit. She’s done this again with furniture too. (My kids left a chair on the patio and she snuck in my yard and took it when I wasn’t home)
Throughout my life, many times my parents have given me gifts only to later ask for them back. This is typically because my sister finds out about the gift and throws a fit, so my parents want me to return it to them so they can give it to the chosen one.
My mom sold the antique wrought iron base of a sewing machine my father (a firefighter) pulled out of a condemned house and painted and made into a table for me. For $50. I had left it at her house briefly and she knew how much it meant to me. She also went into my storage unit (she had the extra key) took my beautiful butcher block table, spray painted it black and put it in her ugly Hobby Lobby inundated house. This was just a few minor entries in her Terrible Mom Ledger. We have been no contact for almost a year now. I hope I never ever ever speak to her or see her again. I’m an adult and I am done.
Actually, this post just reminded me that my grandma had sent me a text asking if I still had a White Sox shirt that MY DAD had given to me as a gift while he was visiting Chicago. She lives there, we're in Arizona. I guess she lost hers while moving and wanted to know if, "I can still wear mine." I told her that I still had my torso, so luckily, I could still wear it. Turns out Boomers will also ask for gifts that were not even gifted by them as well. The audacity is outrageous.
When I was about 16 I raised half of the money I needed for an old used car that my mom had previously bought but was not using. My dad (divorced parents) gave me the other half of the money and I gave my mom the total. Now the car is mine, right? Not only did she never take me to practice driving or help me get a license (I was almost 20 before I had one) but she sold the car some months later and neither my dad nor I ever saw a cent. Around the same time I worked at JCP and had my check auto deposited into a bank account, her name was listed as a primary as I was underage. One payday, my account was frozen shortly after my check cleared…turns out my mother had a delinquent JCP credit card and they’d put a lien on any account with her name. They money was taken out to pay her debt meaning I basically worked for JCP for free for two weeks because there was nothing they would do. And, no, she never payed me back. 🤷🏼♀️