I'm glad you had a better weekend - how's things going with the W?
Yes I do feel a little betrayed about my mother, but mainly I am scared of her getting her paws into my M and ruining it (like the last time) and emotionally abusing me.
She is really good at emotional abuse and sophisticated mind games.
I am even more scared that she will do the same to my dd's and cause them psychological harm. I have never seen genuine love from the woman. That is why I insisted that H supervise the contact. He says he will not leave her alone with them.
It's always been like that with her because she had a terrible childhood (raped at age 5 by a neighbour, beaten by her father etc) and she is controlling in the extreme sense.
When I was a kid she never let me go out anywhere. I asked to go to typing class, she said no. I was allowed to a Disco once a week but with her there beside me. She wouldn't let me do the ironing in case I burnt myself, wouldn't let me wash pots in case I smashed them, wouldn't let me go to the dr alone. Walked in on me when I was in the bath (still tried to do this when I was 26 - she has few physical boundaries).
When I met H she told me I had to choose between her or him and if I chose him I was out, so I chose him and she threw me out of home at age 16. I slept round at H's mother's until we found our own house.
When I got pregnant, although my dad was happy, she was not and she kept sending these abusive letters (pages long about what a crap person I am and all the reasons why she hates me and thinks I would be a crap mother). She'd ring up at 11pm to shout at me down the phone about having an abortion.
H used to come in from university and find me in floods of tears after another nasty phone call.
After the baby was born it got worse. She found out we were bringing her up as vegetarian and because she wouldn't do that with her own kids, she reported us CPS for 'child abuse' and we had to have social workers visit our house and our baby. They of course told us we were doing great and that it was a hate call.
The letters continued (same malicious style, but more about the baby, 'you're doing this wrong, you're doing that wrong, you're hurting the baby' etc).
So we went to an attorney and got a non-molestation order which forbade her to contact us for 6 months. It was 14 months before we spoke again.
She carried on the same after, putting sugar on their breakfast and accusing me of being 'boring' and a bad mother for not letting them have sugar. For the births, she said I had to have a caesarean because I would never be able to give birth and that 'H should have been sterilized at birth'.
She bad-mouthed my H whenever his back was turned. Then when we split up after years of putting up with this and H unsuccessfully trying to protect me, she reported us to CPS again saying that H had 'messed' with our dd3 who was then only 2 (not true, of course).
Again, CPS said it was a hate call. She turned me away when I went to her for help after H left and on the times she did see me, would ask me questions about my SL and whether H forced me.
She got married and I was not invited to the wedding. My sister apparently got married but I didn't find out till months later. All Christmases, birthdays etc I was not invited to post-separation. She said 'I don't want you ruining my Christmas'.
Her new H just encourages her behaviour.
Then, when I was going through court to try and keep my baby and get custody of the others, she wrote a letter to the judge saying I was mentally disturbed and a 'sexual deviant' and that I neglected dd4 and that H had sexually abused dd1, dd2 and dd3 and she wanted them put in foster care so she could see them whenever she wanted.
You can imagine what I was going through. I was going through a custody battle, I was terrified of losing my precious baby, I was hurting and scared etc and my own MOTHER did that, to the judge!!!
Luckily, they knew the history, the previous letters, the non-molestation order etc. It was evidence to back up my case.
She is 70% of the reason we split up - you have to be really strong to withstand that.
I wrote and told her afterwards that I would never call her mother again.
You can imagine why I am not terribly happy with her having contact with the kids, but H was attacked by her also so I think he knows what he is dealing with and I trust that he can handle it - I am just not having an R with her again.
Thanks for the comments re ILY, that helps. I did wonder whether it was because sex is emotional anyway, but I'm pretty sure he's serious as he hasn't said it in 3 years.
