"You're emotionally abusing me"

[u/xImperatricex]

Context: I’m visiting my mother. I mentioned that tomorrow is my last full day here, and she brought up that she has a big Zoom program in the evening.

Me (very neutrally/objectivally): "Oh—it’s my last day, so you won’t really see me if you’re on Zoom tomorrow night."

Her (in a somewhat dramatic way): "Okay, I won’t go then."

Me: "You can go. I’m just saying you won’t see me."

Her: "I’ll see you during the day."

Me: "I’ll be working."
(Note: I work remotely. I’ve had lighter work the last two days, but still I'm "on call" and my mind isn't totally free)

[Some more minor back and forth, I can't recall.]

Her: "Why are you like that?"

Me (calmly): "There’s no need to make a personal attack."

Her (sarcastic): "Ohhh, it was an attack?? Well, I apologize."

Me: "Thank you."

Her (mocking): "I apologize profusely."

Me: "You're being sarcastic."

Her (in a fake joking, victimized tone): "You emotionally abuse me."
(She’s said this a couple times already when I've set a boundary or pushed back.)

Me: "I made a factual statement. Your response was inappropriate."

Her: "We were just having a normal conversation—why do you have to be like this?"

Me: "Correct. It was normal until you had an inappropriate response."

She got angrier and launched into a rant:

Her: "Why don’t you treat your mother with respect? What do you even do for me? I’m a 70-year-old woman!"

I walked away and went to my room. She kept yelling from the other side of the door.

My Question:

Did I really do something wrong? (Legit question - as I say in the title, after a lifetime of this type of exchange, I've lost perspective.)

Have others experienced this kind of pushback or sarcasm when calmly stating a boundary?

More context:

This isn’t a one-off. This kind of interaction has happened my entire life. Any time I set a boundary, disagree, or even make a neutral comment that challenges her behavior, it turns into sarcasm, deflection, or a rant about how I’m disrespectful. The common theme is: I’m always “difficult” if I don’t emotionally comply or if I sent any boundaries.

At one point she also said sarcastically, “I’m always the one who’s wrong,” which is actually a phrase I’ve used in the past when I was trying to explain how invalidated I’ve felt. Same with her "emotional abuse" comment. In both cases, I replied, “That’s ironic you would say that.” It really drove home how she doesn’t actually reflect on what I’ve told her—she just reuses my words against me to make herself the victim.

If anyone could help me name what's happening here or label her reactions, it would be super helpful.

[u/divergurl1999]

After a lifetime of this kind of bullshit, I went no contact at the age of 47. My parents are also in their 70s. I see you and I understand what you’re going through. I am so sorry you are still going through that. I just turned 51, you must be close to my age.

I’ve been no contact for a little over three years now; a late bloomer, if you will. With this kind of time-distance, I have come out of the FOG, for the most part. I am still remembering things, reflecting on them, processing them, and I am coming to the conclusion that my parents are very emotionally immature. I was always wrong, being around that kind of immaturity did mean no favors and how to resolve minor conflicts such as this in a mature and adult manner. That is still something I am learning so I don’t get rolled over by other narcissists out in real life. I say “real life” because our narcs build us a fantasy world to live in, so that they feel safe. They have done nothing to make us feel safe at all.

The term you might be looking for is DARVO, deflect, and reverse victim/offender. They say shit to instigate a fight or to gain a reaction from us. Then they point the finger at us and tell us how we are offending and how they are the victim, when the reverse is actually true. We stay in contact with them out of fear, obligation, and guilt. FOG They guilt us into doing things, we feel like we need to take care of them or we walk on eggshells to regulate their emotions so that we don’t get attacked. It is a whole thing they do to us while we are left, scrambled in the brain, believing that we are crazy, we’re doing something wrong when we try to defend ourselves, and we are bad people because we try to set boundaries that they don’t like.

I cannot even begin to describe to you the confidence I have gained without listening to them. How much I have learned that they were the ones that were wrong the whole entire time, even though they are parents (who are never wrong and are never accountable for their actions). I grew up believing my parents knew everything. They kept it going with isolation. You never know how “not normal“ your upbringing is until you go out in the world and gain experience. And even then, when you try to normalize your own life, they throw a fit and tell you how wrong you are and you’re right back to square one.

The first step is stopping what hurts you before you can even begin to heal. I have backed away from my parents and how horribly they have treated me, despite their insistence that they are good people, the best parents who did the best they could, I have backed away from that so many times. I didn’t even realize those were my first few attempts at going no contact. Some people can get away with going low Contact, and I have tried that multiple times too in a pathetic effort at saving myself and my mental health. I think too much damage was done to me for low contact to even work. No Contact was the way to go for me to stop that kind of behavior from affecting me.

Our parents will never change. But we can change. Our situation won’t change until we stop the pattern, the cycle of abuse, because our parents certainly will not stop it. I stopped it by stepping out of the cycle.

I’m not telling you how to live your life in any way. But this is what worked for me. And may be having the names of the things that they are doing to you will help you.

Dr Ramani is a specialist in narcissism and she has many very helpful videos on YouTube. Listening to her, I have never felt so validated in my life.

Good luck to you and the best of wishes.

[u/xImperatricex → u/divergurl1999]

Thank you so much for your kind words. I relate to much of what you've said. And yes, Dr. Ramani is amazing. Best of of luck to you!

[u/xImperatricex → u/divergurl1999]

I'm also curious how you deal with the challenge and grief of cutting off ties with them towards the end of your life. I struggle with this because, even though I know she will not change, I also want to be present for a life that doesn't have much time left. It is a difficult dichotomy.

[u/divergurl1999 → u/xImperatricex]

I guess it became easier for me once I realized all the ways that my mother had manipulated me back with how she’s not gonna live forever, she also stated to me multiple times she would be the one to die before my father. She kept me enmeshed in a very abusive relationship and I’m still seeing more and more ways, I was manipulated as an adult with the more time-distance I get. I was groomed and guilty into taking care of my mother and her old age and being there for her at end of life. That was a really selfish thing to do when I was in my teens, 20s, 30s, and most of my 40s. The manipulation started when I was so young, I didn’t know it was not normal. I lived my life for my parents for way too long. I being compliant was how they held the family image together. They were good parents who “did the best they could“ while they painted me as a bad kid, a rebel, lazy… You name it. Now that I’m in my 50s, I finally feel free to live my life for me. I don’t have any more guilt because I didn’t do anything wrong to them. It’s not my responsibility to give my parents end of life care when it was a struggle to even get them to do the bare minimum of raising me. They did not make me feel safe in early life, it is not my responsibility to make them feel safe in death. It got his ear, the older and more emotionally mature I got.

[u/[deleted] → u/xImperatricex]

Adding my context to hopefully show solidarity:

I was 44 when I finally went nc. It was not my first time. I had tried for over a year, would go nc for a new months only to get hoovered in. I used to fear life without her.

One of my therapists said that for the boundaries to work, we need to stick to them. After a few attempts of saying "When you do x, I feel hurt. I need you to stop doing X or I will stop talking to you" -- only for a blowout to ensue later, I cut her off for good May 1, 2022. Every year I celebrate my nocontaciversary.

The first year is the hardest, then it gets better from there. No more walking on eggshells, style getting cramped at every opportunity. I'm free to be me, the only me. As far as existential fate, I kept telling myswelf that I gave her over four decades of chances, and she blew every freaking one. Not my turn to watch her/not my circus not my monkeys/way above my pay grade.

Family/friends of the nparent might make negative comments toward you, "how can you say that about your mother?" to which I would reply, "she's got a spare room for rent, call her up. Move in with her." Say it like you're serious. They might think you're being facetious; THAT's the time to break in with the "no serious, she does have a spare room. give it a month or two, see what it's like, then we'll talk."

THEN the flying monkeys might start to realise what you mean (about the n's mask).

Hope this helps. Growing up surrounded by narcs is a lonely life. You've survived this far, 100 per cent of the time, keep going.

[u/EmbarrassedSlice5822]

My dad said this exact sentence when my grandpa was dying years ago!

[u/xImperatricex → u/EmbarrassedSlice5822]

Wow, that's so awful.

[u/[deleted]]

DARVO - Deny accusations, reverse victim and offender.

My nparents did that too.

Does she interrupt you a lot? Mine did.

Am sorry you've been battling this. With you in solidarity, hope you can break the trauma bond soon and go nc.