Mother rant

You should look into the counseling. Do you have any friends or family who would let you sleep on their couch for a bit? What she is doing to you will have long-term effects on you. The sooner you get away from her, the better. You need to take control of how and when you spend time with her. She'll try to guilt and manipulate you, but think about how she is making you feel. Think about how she has made you feel all of those times in the past. Do you really think that she didn't know that she was hurting you, manipulating you, and interfering with your goals for yourself? She does. Her behavior is not appropriate, and if you continue to let her treat you that way then you will have more and more difficulty with overcoming it. She doesn't deserve your guilt. She should feel guilty for treating you this way.

I've been keeping my weight-loss and exercise habits secret from my mother since she's just... :grumble:. I try to avoid going out with her even though I am heavily dependent on her and love her. She's just very supportive-ly abusive. For an example, we will go out shopping for "2 hours", but it is in actuality a full-day's worth of boring, looking at the same things over and over, shopping. Hence, I don't get to eat. So, when I do finally convince her to eat and she picks a place we'll sit down to be served (FYI she believes in eating ONE meal a day whereas, I've been eating 6 SMALL meals a day - so going out with her messes my eating schedule up and yes I bring snacks, but I eat them when she's not looking). If she does see me eating my snack then she want them (or she'll eat them all in one go and there's none left for me :ohwell: ) and will get mad if I tell her that they're my allotment for today.

This is when the trap starts. She'll ask what I'm getting and it doesn't matter if I say I'm getting the BBQ Texas burger or the House Salad with grilled chicken; she will always mention how fat I am and how I should get *insert another meal*. I've learned to just ignore her, but then I have to put up with her condescending glances at me while I'm eating. Quite frankly it's stressful and now that I'm of age I've been thinking about ordering shots of whatever they've got. However, I won't let my myself sink that far and there's no way in hell I'll let her drive my car (did that once and she smashed front end to front end with another car not a minute from the house. Granted it wasn't my car, my car, but it was given to me to use by my grandpa to keep. So, technically mine.

Now imagine that every time I go into the kitchen to get something to eat or drink. It drives me up the wall. I am also a science major; so, I'm already stressed out to the max.:explode: When I defend myself and we get into rows she always threatens to kick me out and yesterday she demanded that I give her 45% of my paycheck (I really don't make that much to be able to split it). Any advice on how to handle it other than ignoring her like I have been? I'm looking for a second job (night shift at a hospital near me);so, that I can be A, away from her, and B, more financially independent and hopefully able to rent a place near my college. However, I'm worried with working night shifts her being passive aggressive and purposefully wanting to go out early in the morning and such. I'm really motivated to get this weight off and I want a healthy lifestyle (and less stress). I'm tired of excuses and I'm close to telling her the next time she kicks me out "fine" and sleeping in my car. I've started packing my stuff once before and she came up once she realized what I was doing crying and saying she was sorry. I stopped, but next time I won't.

@Cynthia I do "pay rent", but it's in the form of basically being her PA, cleaning the house, and other household mandatory stuff. I do set boundaries, but she will keep on calling me or knocking on my door (she actually broke down my door 2 months ago due to me not answering my door quick enough >.< I was just about to open the door too) until I do what she wants me to do. The only thing to do is to not be home to avoid her. And yes I am a grown adult, 21 years old, but I rely on my parents for car insurance, college, phone bill, housing, and etc. I bought my own car and I pay my own gasoline. Since that was always a power struggle.

@seltzermint I do have a 15 year plan, long and short. I can't get a good job with my degree until 2 years from now where I know I would be completely financially independent. Sometimes I feel like it, but no I would drive up to live with my sister whose about 9 hours away. I've already being making my pro's and con's list of what are good plans and bad plans. I can reasonably get another job right now which I plan to save money up in and if she did try to pull anything I would be able to rent a place with the saved up money. Also, the job that I'm looking at I can afford being independent. I just want to make sure my savings are in place before I make a high risk move like that.

1.) move out
2.) ignore her
3.) find a way to pay her so she can't threaten you any more (although she sounds like she would anyway- which brings us back to ...)
4.) move out

@ladyblue I do tell her to leave me alone about my weight and that I'm working on it. She's also very heavyset herself; so, usually to end the conversation I'll ask her what she's doing about her weight. That's not healthy though and I don't believe in hurting others even if they've hurt you.

@Cynthia I do "pay rent", but it's in the form of basically being her PA, cleaning the house, and other household mandatory stuff. I do set boundaries, but she will keep on calling me or knocking on my door (she actually broke down my door 2 months ago due to me not answering my door quick enough >.< I was just about to open the door too) until I do what she wants me to do. The only thing to do is to not be home to avoid her. And yes I am a grown adult, 21 years old, but I rely on my parents for car insurance, college, phone bill, housing, and etc. I bought my own car and I pay my own gasoline. Since that was always a power struggle.

@rmdaly I've tried that, but then they want to get authorities involved and such which would only make it worst since she's not really that bad, but when it comes to weight/food/exercise she is. I do talk to my siblings (whom all moved out and lost weight), but they live 9 hours away. Problem is with doing counseling with my mother is that she is a therapist herself (not licensed, but she knows everything involving it) and can easily flip it around or make you seem like the one at fault.

@seltzermint I do have a 15 year plan, long and short. I can't get a good job with my degree until 2 years from now where I know I would be completely financially independent. Sometimes I feel like it, but no I would drive up to live with my sister whose about 9 hours away. I've already being making my pro's and con's list of what are good plans and bad plans. I can reasonably get another job right now which I plan to save money up in and if she did try to pull anything I would be able to rent a place with the saved up money. Also, the job that I'm looking at I can afford being independent. I just want to make sure my savings are in place before I make a high risk move like that.

You should look into the counseling. Do you have any friends or family who would let you sleep on their couch for a bit? What she is doing to you will have long-term effects on you. The sooner you get away from her, the better. You need to take control of how and when you spend time with her. She'll try to guilt and manipulate you, but think about how she is making you feel. Think about how she has made you feel all of those times in the past. Do you really think that she didn't know that she was hurting you, manipulating you, and interfering with your goals for yourself? She does. Her behavior is not appropriate, and if you continue to let her treat you that way then you will have more and more difficulty with overcoming it. She doesn't deserve your guilt. She should feel guilty for treating you this way.

I agree with 90% of the above. However, I honestly believe it is possible that the OP's mom does NOT know she's hurting her daughter, manipulating her, and interfering with her goals. I think it is highly possible that OP's mom simply fails to see her "child" as an adult with goals and plans and dreams of her own, and instead is tied to a very small vision SHE has for her daughter's future with somehow involves (among other things, I'd assume) weight loss via eating 1 meal per day of foods that she believes are fat burning, healthy, etc. It's horrible yes...and maybe I am naïve for believing this...but I don't necessarily think OP's mom is downright evil. Just toxic!

You're right seltzermint, that's why I haven't "taken the money and ran" so to speak. The problem is that I've been an adult since I was 8 years old where she was taking me to business conferences and conventions for networking and such. I learned business etiquette and dress at that age and following it. (She very much wants me to be a lawyer though, but I don't like law and prefer the medical aspect of things) So, this has messed up my view point of what I should be doing and I think it has also messed up the way she sees me. I think to her I'm very much still in the dependent/childhood world with her and I've been reading up on different tactics and been trying them out, but the only way I see this resolving is either moving out or being gone all the time (out of sight/out of mind method). I agree my emotional/physical well being is not worth it and I was in a slump for the past 2 years where I got depressed/unmotivated and gained 90lbs. My mom's wonderful and is always going out of her way to help others, but she seems to forget to help those closest to her. I've read up on this a little and it helped me come to terms with how she acts with me vs my siblings/strangers. I live at home and thus she doesn't "see" me is how various sources described it. It's very accurate though! And I've resolved my bitterness over it. I'm an adult not a child. My life is in my hands, but I am a bit afraid to leave my mother since I've always been there for her (I see her more as a sister than a mother too, but one that I respect a lot). I've also come to realize that she doesn't need me like I previously had conceived in my head. She's an adult too and can take care of herself.