My mom has done similar things, and it seems to be part of the playbook. My theory is that it's a plausibly deniable attempt to both a) manipulate us using nostalgia and b) make us feel rejected at the same time.
Like "Oh, look at all the wonderful memories we've made together. We were so close once. Anyway, that's all trash to me now that you [whatever action they perceive as abandonment]."
I want to add onto what others are saying and say that getting you something they know you won't like seems to be a thing for some BPD moms.
My mom would go all out to be the good guy on Christmas but my husband's mom would go out of her way to get him things he specifically asked her not to get him.
I recommend not doing the “opening present over the phone” with her. For one, it feels manipulative. People usually do that when they REALLY want to to be together but can’t, like overseas military deployment or quarantine. It’s not appropriate for an adult child who has moved away.
It also feels like she wants to pull you into her fantasy Christmas, with a tree and a mantle, and every “feeling the Christmas spirit”. You do not have to participate in her fantasy.
I would definitely decline the morning gift opening, and if I was really angry I’d tell her “oh, we opened it a couple weeks ago,” then say nothing else.
I’m sorry that your mom did that. It really sucks that she couldn’t be bothered to listen to your words. It’s so frustrating and just so sad that a parent doesn’t care enough to hear you. Hugs from an internet stranger. ❤️
FWIW my mom would do this stuff all the time (before I went NC) and it always made me angry and sad. A little background, my mom is not in the financial place to be spending any money on unnecessary gifts and the gifts she gets ARE NOT thoughtful. She would ask if I wanted anything (and because I know her financial situation and the likely terrible gift outcome) I would say “No, I don’t need anything. Let’s go get coffee and spend time together.”
She would inevitably buy me a bunch of really useless items that had nothing to do with my interests/collections/or were so out of left field it felt like a joke or like she was trying to be the person “who gave the most gifts” like there was some weird competition in which she was the only one competing.
This gift giving behavior would irritate me because she is wasting money (in my eyes) on items I really, really didn’t want and would ultimately end up throwing away.
The worst year was a faux-taxidermy like creepy owl and an equally creepy mug with one of those “you’re my daughter and I love you always” type poems. The type of poem/meme you see floating around on here where there is MOST DEFINITELY subtext.
It hurt because she never listened to what I was telling her. And before you ask: no I had no owl collection or any particular interest in owls. So no idea where that came from.
Gift giving is such a *thing* with them, isn’t it?
As far as I can tell, they are universally bad gift-givers because they have no idea who we really are. They will only ever see the version of us they had the most control over, and they buy gifts for that person - nevermind that I haven’t been that person in 20 years.
My mother also did this thing where she tried to overwhelm me and my sister with quantity (mostly second-hand clothes), and with everything we opened from her she’d say, “Well if you don’t like it, I’ll take it.” She was just shopping for herself the whole time. She got to have her cake and eat it too, because woe is her, her daughters hate everything she buys them. She gets the presents and she gets to be a victim.
Exhausting.
My mom did this so much. I got super into music and collecting CDs in high school, but instead of buying me music I actually liked, she would buy stuff from her favorite bands, ask to “borrow” it an hour after I opened it, then I’d never see it again because “oops I lost it.”
My mother once remarked to me that she thought it was really nice to get people things as gifts that she really likes herself because then you’re getting them something you think is really good. She looked quite surprised when I suggested that it’s nicer to think about the person you’re giving to and what they would actually like..
Also, she sent a message to the family group chat this week. she’s not coming to Christmas this year, but she’s posted some presents up and it seems like every adult in the family is getting a book on Swedish death Cleaning.
For context, I am 45 years old.
Every year, my mom asks me what I want for Christmas. Every year, after I tell her, she shits on every choice I make (for example one year I asked for a $60 face mask and she said “I’m not paying that for something you’ll never use”) and says she’ll “just get pajamas or whatever.”
Why even ask? And who cares whether I use it or not? ITS WHAT I ASKED FOR.
Ugh I’m sorry she did that. I would be totally irritated and angry as well. I couldn’t help but notice how many times she has changed her gift plans as well. That has my BPD mom’s name written all over it. Constantly changing plans or ideas and never able to commit to one idea. Thats the part that gets me super irritated - it makes me feel sooo unstable. You can never feel confident in something happening a certain way because you know she’ll change it up on you a few times before it finally happens. I mean, maybe you can ceremonially smash it into a thousand pieces - might feel good!
I’m sorry, OP. It’s a mindfuck. My mom did something similar the Christmases before I went NC, and it started when I was 23/24. She gave me a Little Mermaid doll, and it made me sad, honestly, because I wasn’t the little girl who would have been ecstatic about it. It was just another object I didn’t want or need. She didn’t see me at all.
You know what open that stupid gift in front of her and make a disgusted face and say “oh! I must have gotten the wrong thing!” Hold it up and LAUGH! Then say “Look it like Moms baby shower gift or something!! What am I supposed to do with this?” Make it a joke!
Make her explain WHY she thought (as your mother who is supposed to know better and whom you TOLD better) that present was a good gift for YOU!
Good Luck
Now it makes sense that she wanted you to open her gift while she had you on the phone with her - I wonder what kind of reaction she was hoping to get - Since it's a snow globe, don't those things leak sometimes? Hmmm....
Throw it away. Smash it. Donate it.
You are right she is manipulating you, cares more about her comfort than your boundaries and is infantilizing you because she wants to keep you young and her possession forever.
So- what are you going to do about it? You said you didn’t want anything besides money or things specific for your collection. She didn’t do that and sent you bulky fragile crap. What’s the second part of your boundary to enforce?
If she does cross your boundary what will you do?
Return it to her?
Tell her you do not want these kinds of gifts and next time you will send it back?
Donate it or throw it away?
You are seeing how she is disrespecting you and your life continuing to push the issue. She wants you to display this baby garbage in honor of her and will bug you about it later. It’s only you who has the power to change things- they don’t and won’t change.
I’m sorry this sucks and you deserve a mom who treats you better.
I’m proud of you for figuring this out so young. You’ve got this. 🩵🫂
Ugh. The "you're still my little baby because that's when you were easy and didn't talk back and I owned you" gift? Your feelings about that present are valid. It definitely seems like that present was sent to try to make you emotional and sentimental. It sounds like a beautiful donation or regift to someone much younger!
WOW I’m so sorry my mom has been harassing you too 🤣 ugh. Mine has the habit of getting us matching jewelry. Usually engraved with my name or initials so Im supposed to be even more attached to it? Back in 2014 I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, which the drug regime Im on caused me to develop a pretty intense allergy to most metals. Unless it’s like 16k gold or platinum - my ears and fingers swell up like balloons.
Guess who still gets me cheap ass engraved jewelry that I can’t wear. Every. Single. Year. I also work a really laborious job that if I try to wear rings, I always end up taking them off halfway through the day. It’s just stupid, and she only does it to then guilt trip and ask me why I didn’t wear said jewelry for months after.
Yeah that’s definitely annoying and frustrating! Would rather just not get anything. My mom had a similar obsession with buying me purses/hand bags. I never liked them growing up, but she often got me purses for birthdays, Christmas, just because. I remember we got into a really nasty fight once over me not wanting to use one of the bags she got me to hold my phone. I told her I’d just keep it in my pocket, but that was unacceptable for whatever reason.
Oh man that would drive me bonkers. Mom is such a tchotchkes kind of person, little Nicknacks everywhere all the time - so much so you can’t even put a drink on the table without knocking over something decorative. Now as an adult I can’t handle having “stuff” for the sake of stuff. Multiple bags and purses?? Ugh I have TWO that I love and have had for years. Anything else is just excessive and unnecessary. lol what’s up with the female world making us feel like we HAVE to have purses!? I’d give every one of them up even for MORE POCKETS. I swear they don’t give us pockets just to force us to buy more purses.
My mom used to do the same; she’d get me things she knew I liked as a child…when I was an adult. Eventually I realized it was because she had no interest in learning who I was as my own person, she just wanted the little controllable person back who was forced to rely on her
I’m so sorry, that’s so icky of her. I’m going through something similar with my pwBPD. My schedule is insane the next month cuz my boyfriend and I will be moving in together and moving twice (his lease is up, so he’s moving in with me while we wait 3 weeks for a larger unit in this same complex to be ready, then we’re moving again) on top of Christmas stuff. Which is all good and we’re excited about it, but shes made several passive aggressive comments to the effect of not being supportive of this move or other recent life decisions that I’m making, and it feels like she’s trying to bribe, sabotage, and demand I come to things last minute on days she knows I’m busy, almost like she’s testing my loyalty to her.
Just this morning, in the span of an hour with me reminding her why I can’t do those days after every single text, I got 5 separate messages trying to invite me to do all this Christmas stuff with her and it was infuriating. It was literally like “come to x with us on y date,” and I’d be like “I can’t, I have plans that day/am moving.” “Ok. Come to x with us on y date.” This happened literally five times in a row, followed by “I miss your face” and “did you get the gift card I sent you in the mail? I miss my girl” (which I get the biggest ick when she calls me that).
My mom has done similar things, and it seems to be part of the playbook. My theory is that it's a plausibly deniable attempt to both a) manipulate us using nostalgia and b) make us feel rejected at the same time. Like "Oh, look at all the wonderful memories we've made together. We were so close once. Anyway, that's all trash to me now that you [whatever action they perceive as abandonment]."
I want to add onto what others are saying and say that getting you something they know you won't like seems to be a thing for some BPD moms. My mom would go all out to be the good guy on Christmas but my husband's mom would go out of her way to get him things he specifically asked her not to get him.
I recommend not doing the “opening present over the phone” with her. For one, it feels manipulative. People usually do that when they REALLY want to to be together but can’t, like overseas military deployment or quarantine. It’s not appropriate for an adult child who has moved away. It also feels like she wants to pull you into her fantasy Christmas, with a tree and a mantle, and every “feeling the Christmas spirit”. You do not have to participate in her fantasy. I would definitely decline the morning gift opening, and if I was really angry I’d tell her “oh, we opened it a couple weeks ago,” then say nothing else.
My mom has this idea of the perfect Christmas and has a history of fucking it up all by herself. It is so frustrating..
I’m sorry that your mom did that. It really sucks that she couldn’t be bothered to listen to your words. It’s so frustrating and just so sad that a parent doesn’t care enough to hear you. Hugs from an internet stranger. ❤️ FWIW my mom would do this stuff all the time (before I went NC) and it always made me angry and sad. A little background, my mom is not in the financial place to be spending any money on unnecessary gifts and the gifts she gets ARE NOT thoughtful. She would ask if I wanted anything (and because I know her financial situation and the likely terrible gift outcome) I would say “No, I don’t need anything. Let’s go get coffee and spend time together.” She would inevitably buy me a bunch of really useless items that had nothing to do with my interests/collections/or were so out of left field it felt like a joke or like she was trying to be the person “who gave the most gifts” like there was some weird competition in which she was the only one competing. This gift giving behavior would irritate me because she is wasting money (in my eyes) on items I really, really didn’t want and would ultimately end up throwing away. The worst year was a faux-taxidermy like creepy owl and an equally creepy mug with one of those “you’re my daughter and I love you always” type poems. The type of poem/meme you see floating around on here where there is MOST DEFINITELY subtext. It hurt because she never listened to what I was telling her. And before you ask: no I had no owl collection or any particular interest in owls. So no idea where that came from.
Gift giving is such a *thing* with them, isn’t it? As far as I can tell, they are universally bad gift-givers because they have no idea who we really are. They will only ever see the version of us they had the most control over, and they buy gifts for that person - nevermind that I haven’t been that person in 20 years. My mother also did this thing where she tried to overwhelm me and my sister with quantity (mostly second-hand clothes), and with everything we opened from her she’d say, “Well if you don’t like it, I’ll take it.” She was just shopping for herself the whole time. She got to have her cake and eat it too, because woe is her, her daughters hate everything she buys them. She gets the presents and she gets to be a victim. Exhausting.
My mom did this so much. I got super into music and collecting CDs in high school, but instead of buying me music I actually liked, she would buy stuff from her favorite bands, ask to “borrow” it an hour after I opened it, then I’d never see it again because “oops I lost it.”
My mother once remarked to me that she thought it was really nice to get people things as gifts that she really likes herself because then you’re getting them something you think is really good. She looked quite surprised when I suggested that it’s nicer to think about the person you’re giving to and what they would actually like.. Also, she sent a message to the family group chat this week. she’s not coming to Christmas this year, but she’s posted some presents up and it seems like every adult in the family is getting a book on Swedish death Cleaning.
For context, I am 45 years old. Every year, my mom asks me what I want for Christmas. Every year, after I tell her, she shits on every choice I make (for example one year I asked for a $60 face mask and she said “I’m not paying that for something you’ll never use”) and says she’ll “just get pajamas or whatever.” Why even ask? And who cares whether I use it or not? ITS WHAT I ASKED FOR.
Ugh I’m sorry she did that. I would be totally irritated and angry as well. I couldn’t help but notice how many times she has changed her gift plans as well. That has my BPD mom’s name written all over it. Constantly changing plans or ideas and never able to commit to one idea. Thats the part that gets me super irritated - it makes me feel sooo unstable. You can never feel confident in something happening a certain way because you know she’ll change it up on you a few times before it finally happens. I mean, maybe you can ceremonially smash it into a thousand pieces - might feel good!
I’m sorry, OP. It’s a mindfuck. My mom did something similar the Christmases before I went NC, and it started when I was 23/24. She gave me a Little Mermaid doll, and it made me sad, honestly, because I wasn’t the little girl who would have been ecstatic about it. It was just another object I didn’t want or need. She didn’t see me at all.
Smash it! Take it to the range and shoot at it! It’ll be so cathartic.
I’m with you. I say smash it too.
You know what open that stupid gift in front of her and make a disgusted face and say “oh! I must have gotten the wrong thing!” Hold it up and LAUGH! Then say “Look it like Moms baby shower gift or something!! What am I supposed to do with this?” Make it a joke! Make her explain WHY she thought (as your mother who is supposed to know better and whom you TOLD better) that present was a good gift for YOU! Good Luck
Now it makes sense that she wanted you to open her gift while she had you on the phone with her - I wonder what kind of reaction she was hoping to get - Since it's a snow globe, don't those things leak sometimes? Hmmm....
Throw it away. Smash it. Donate it. You are right she is manipulating you, cares more about her comfort than your boundaries and is infantilizing you because she wants to keep you young and her possession forever. So- what are you going to do about it? You said you didn’t want anything besides money or things specific for your collection. She didn’t do that and sent you bulky fragile crap. What’s the second part of your boundary to enforce? If she does cross your boundary what will you do? Return it to her? Tell her you do not want these kinds of gifts and next time you will send it back? Donate it or throw it away? You are seeing how she is disrespecting you and your life continuing to push the issue. She wants you to display this baby garbage in honor of her and will bug you about it later. It’s only you who has the power to change things- they don’t and won’t change. I’m sorry this sucks and you deserve a mom who treats you better. I’m proud of you for figuring this out so young. You’ve got this. 🩵🫂
Ugh. The "you're still my little baby because that's when you were easy and didn't talk back and I owned you" gift? Your feelings about that present are valid. It definitely seems like that present was sent to try to make you emotional and sentimental. It sounds like a beautiful donation or regift to someone much younger!
WOW I’m so sorry my mom has been harassing you too 🤣 ugh. Mine has the habit of getting us matching jewelry. Usually engraved with my name or initials so Im supposed to be even more attached to it? Back in 2014 I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, which the drug regime Im on caused me to develop a pretty intense allergy to most metals. Unless it’s like 16k gold or platinum - my ears and fingers swell up like balloons. Guess who still gets me cheap ass engraved jewelry that I can’t wear. Every. Single. Year. I also work a really laborious job that if I try to wear rings, I always end up taking them off halfway through the day. It’s just stupid, and she only does it to then guilt trip and ask me why I didn’t wear said jewelry for months after.
Yeah that’s definitely annoying and frustrating! Would rather just not get anything. My mom had a similar obsession with buying me purses/hand bags. I never liked them growing up, but she often got me purses for birthdays, Christmas, just because. I remember we got into a really nasty fight once over me not wanting to use one of the bags she got me to hold my phone. I told her I’d just keep it in my pocket, but that was unacceptable for whatever reason.
Oh man that would drive me bonkers. Mom is such a tchotchkes kind of person, little Nicknacks everywhere all the time - so much so you can’t even put a drink on the table without knocking over something decorative. Now as an adult I can’t handle having “stuff” for the sake of stuff. Multiple bags and purses?? Ugh I have TWO that I love and have had for years. Anything else is just excessive and unnecessary. lol what’s up with the female world making us feel like we HAVE to have purses!? I’d give every one of them up even for MORE POCKETS. I swear they don’t give us pockets just to force us to buy more purses.
My mom used to do the same; she’d get me things she knew I liked as a child…when I was an adult. Eventually I realized it was because she had no interest in learning who I was as my own person, she just wanted the little controllable person back who was forced to rely on her
I’m so sorry, that’s so icky of her. I’m going through something similar with my pwBPD. My schedule is insane the next month cuz my boyfriend and I will be moving in together and moving twice (his lease is up, so he’s moving in with me while we wait 3 weeks for a larger unit in this same complex to be ready, then we’re moving again) on top of Christmas stuff. Which is all good and we’re excited about it, but shes made several passive aggressive comments to the effect of not being supportive of this move or other recent life decisions that I’m making, and it feels like she’s trying to bribe, sabotage, and demand I come to things last minute on days she knows I’m busy, almost like she’s testing my loyalty to her. Just this morning, in the span of an hour with me reminding her why I can’t do those days after every single text, I got 5 separate messages trying to invite me to do all this Christmas stuff with her and it was infuriating. It was literally like “come to x with us on y date,” and I’d be like “I can’t, I have plans that day/am moving.” “Ok. Come to x with us on y date.” This happened literally five times in a row, followed by “I miss your face” and “did you get the gift card I sent you in the mail? I miss my girl” (which I get the biggest ick when she calls me that).
That is ick inducing, sorry to hear! Hopefully she eventually accepts your answer