A
female
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes:My boyfriends mother is causing problems in our relationship. We've been together 2 years, we are incredibly happy and never argue as we're so laid back, compatible and very much in love.However.... he has an incredibly controlling mother. She controls his bank accounts, savings, insurance and tries to take over much more. I walked in and overheard her bitching about me last week. I did not want to make a scene so I walked out. since then she has done nothing but make up lies to my boyfriend about me saying that I will get pregnant on purpose for his money (don't even want children), I am using him for his car (pay him a fortune for fuel already), I lied about overhearing her last week and made it all up (his sister has defended me and pointed out that everyone in the room heard her)... and much more. When my own mother was ill last month and my bf was comforting me she made up an illness for herself which has now disappeared since my mother has been on the mend. She drinks every night which nobody in the family will confront her about as she makes their lives a living hell. She goes through phases where she screams at my bf calling him horrendous names and demanding that he moves out. She's made him nervous all his life to even use the phone as she would take it off him and tells him he will mess it up and that he can't do anything, he's useless. In fact he's very intelligent and sick of her bullying, he's worked hard all his life and is more than capable of doing it all himself. He's is NOT some pathetic weakling.Until we can save for a deposit for a house we are both stuck living with our parents. I have a very happy life and wonderful family. BF's mother has caused him a lot of problems over the years in other relationships and when he's single and is generally making him miserable. We've gone through our options and we can't move out yet.Last night, we had a lovely meal at my place (which she was aware of). Just before we were due to leave for the movies late last night, she called BF, upset and hysterical and asked him to come straight away. He did as he was told (much to my annoyance) and left me at my house. He went there and made it back in time to catch the film... but all she wanted was him to look at her TV. Se ruined the night as I cant believe he ran out on me to look at a TV when she knew we had plans. I saw my entire life flash before us of me being left in the middle of the night etc while he rushes off to his mother. I have visions of her interfering when we buy a home, the mortgage, the decoration, cleaning, how I raise my children, how our wedding will be, when i know I am more than capable of sorting this out myself. She has a husband, plenty of money, a nice family, cars, a beautiful home, plenty of friends and a nice job. BF has tried confronting her, shouting back, ignoring her, speaking calmly, he's even recorded her vile temper and played her the recording to shame her in front of her own mother and we're waiting to see if her lies and temper flares up again. You can't mention her drinking alcohol or she goes CRAZY!! Like possessed!!!! We can't move out until next year for sure and we've worked out every option and renting a place would just set us back. She offers to do nice things when she's on good days and kind of lures us in and then throws it in his face a few days later. We've tried so many different tactics and NOTHING is working. We've tried re-assuring her she's not losing her son but the fact is that we're 25 and she's making us miserable. BF is fed up of standing up to her and if i try standing up to her (which I'm more than willing to do), it will cause hell for my BF's life.At the moment we are trying classical conditioning reward/punishment and making a big fuss when she's nice and turning away from her and walking out when she's bad but its early days with this yet so not sure if this will work.Basically.... I'm scared for my own future. I love my BF more than I've ever loved anyone and we fit so perfectly together but I'm scared about my whole life revolving around her moods for the next year until we've saved a house deposit and I'm even more worried she will try and control us forever. My BF wants to stop this behaviour too but we've literally ran out of idea's. There's loads more to this story as I'm sure you can gather. I don't think i could be a better girlfriend for my BF, I work, we're happy and laughing all the time, we help each other, we don't smoke, we've never touched drugs, we have a good social life together and separately, we don't argue. WHY IS THIS WOMAN TRYING TO RUIN MY BF'S LIFE???? I don't think its that she feels too threatened by me as this behavior was long before I came along. She says awful things about most people, she does the same to BF's sister, she taunts them about their weight calling them fat then buys them chocolates, cakes, sugar filled drinks and cooks all food with fat etc. She's cruel about BF's sister's boyfriend too basically saying he has a rough family but his sister will somtimes completely lose her temper at her mum and shout her down, this can go on for DAYS!! But BF is a gentle soul, hates arguing and can never think of the words fast enough to have a full argument with her and he's always shocked when her screaming fits happen. I dont want him to change because I love this about him that arguing is off the cards because i hate it too.I think once we've moved out i will have nooooo problem at all in telling her to get out, tell her when she's out of order and I'm probably quite a good match for her because although I don't like arguing, i'm quite quick with comebacks and can hold my own as I have a tough job. But i dont want it to come to that. I want to resolve it. But how are we supposed to do this when she won't listen, flips at the slightest form of any criticsm and sees absolutely no wrong in her behavior. She threatens to kick him out every time we dont do as she says when she knows we have no other option.any advice would be appreciated, she's making us miserable :(
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reader, anonymous, writes (18 March 2012): I repeat..His mum has plenty of friends,a marriage and job she loves so it seems her problems are purely with her children and she needs to learn to let go her grip and set them free.
Never mind money,savings, HE needs to move out - with or without you - take a stance,he's 25 not 17. He could get into a 'houseshare' with other people his age,which is alot less than paying rent alone.Two of mine do this and love it. If his mum demands he moves out when angry, then am sure she won't mind too much.
A
female
reader, PerhapsNot  +, writes (17 March 2012):
 You mention that she drinks and that she gets very defensive/crazy when her alcohol consumption is brought up. Is she a functional alcoholic? If she is an alcoholic, all her negativity, her hatred and the way she behaves could very well be a direct result, or at least a major contributor to her behavior. If she continues to drink, she will never change.
Additionally your boyfriend sounds and behaves like a sap. He is too passive and lacks control. If he had any type of control over his life, she wouldn't be controlling his money and everything in between. He caters to her with his subservience and she will continue to abuse this weakness. He is not only a willing participant in a dysfunctional relationship, but by allowing her to do all these things, he is enabling her to continue her behavior, which not only impacts the two of them, but also you.
I don't understand why it's so important to have a house. You're 25. I don't know too many 25, or 26 year olds that have a house. You two can rent an apartment, can't you? You really want to put yourself through mental hell because you want to save for a future home? What is more important to you, owning a home with your boyfriend or having a peace of mind?
I don't see your situation improving if your boyfriend is unwilling or incapable of setting boundaries/rules with his mother and REACTING when those boundaries are crossed. Nor will it get any better if he continues to live with her. She is a functional alcoholic and will never change, unless she goes for treatment. I don't think your boyfriend will ever escape her reach, even if you two live in a house and are miles away, if he cannot stand up for himself. He will be ruled by her until he changes into a more responsible, assertive man.
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A
male
reader, honestman  +, writes (16 March 2012):
Girl, please check the following link right now:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borderline_personality_disorderAlso make your boyfriend reads it. Read it from top to bottom, don't miss anything out.As you describe her, she seems to have Borderline Personality Disorder. This disorder naves no treatment. She will act this childish for the rest of her life.The best your BF can do is GTFO [get the f**k out] of there, immediately . She won't change, and she will make his and your life miserable all your lives. You simply need to STOP contact when possible, or at least, don't let her enough space to try to control the situation.You know, these kind of persons HAVE NO EMPATHY for anyone, and they lack of moral values.I can talk you about this without hesitation since I have a BPD [borderline] sister, and my girlfriend haves a BPD mother and sister [Her father is narcissistic].We are on the same situation you are. She wants to get out of her home mostly because of her crazy mother. We can't be together until we have enough funds to rent a department where she can live.My parents are also narcissistic, but they treat me better than her parents, and I have managed, through a lot of therapy, pain , and suffering, to manage them appropriately.I was just like your boyfriend, terrified of her mother, but I learned rise my vice, set healthy limits, and call her crap off. Your BF needs therapy. HE needs a good shrink to help him manage this situation with her mother. He needs to set limits, he needs to put his needs first. Your BF sounds like a good guy, he just needs the right encouragement to stop being a coward with his mother."But i dont want it to come to that. I want to resolve it."Please, DO NOT ATTEMPT TO FIX THINGS. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO RESOLVE THIS. This is NOT your problem. Also, YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO FIX IT, since BPD is a serious disorder that CAN'T be cured.If you have further questions, you can contact me anytime.
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A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (16 March 2012): "Mother-in-law!!!!!!!!!!! HELP! The woman is insane!!!!"
Correction: she's not your mother-in-law as you are not her son's lawfully-wedded wife. Be thankful you aren't married.
"any advice would be appreciated, she's making us miserable :("
Correction: she's making YOU miserable. Boyfriend's used to his mother and allows her to treat him as a child who does her bidding as she tells him. As long as boyfriend won't/can't/doesn't want to alter existing family dynamics, nothing will change.
You already know enough to know boyfriend and mother are a package deal, she's not going anywhere and she's not going to change because it's very unlikely boyfriend is going to overninght magically transforn into an emotionally healthy adult son of a loving stable functional mother.
Get out now. No win situation. If you marry him then you marry her. If that isn't incentive enough for you to bail out now, then you're even crazier than she is.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (16 March 2012): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionWow! Thanks for the responses! I really appreciate it. I think you're all basically confirming what I know and its nice to have this reassurance.
We live at home as we need to save large sums of money for any hope at getting a mortgage in England so I've moved home to my parents from renting in order to save. He has no financial problems but just before we met he initially agreed with his mum that she would keep his bank card so he wasn't tempted to dip into his savings. Since then she has become obsessed with his money and if he approaches her to sort out getting his card back, world war 3 breaks out and she accuses him of all sorts. We both pay our way and pay rent to our parents, we both work but the deposit for a house seems so out of reach and the plan is next year. If we rent now we'll be destroying our chances of owning our own home as rent is so expensive. Our finances are fine, this is absolutely not an issue. I just pay towards fuel as we keep everything equal and he drives as us both having a car would set our savings back further. I don't need transport for work but he does. Damn this recession!!!
I know it's easy to say for him to get a back bone and stand up to her but after 25 years of abuse, i think he's given up trying. Moving in with my family wouldn't work as there's literally no space for another person and there's nowhere else for him to go, not without major financial implications on us both for the future. She's got us over a barrel right now and she knows it.
I really like the response from chocoholic forever, so thank you for that. I was thinking the same that it must be strict and consistent ignoring of her bad behavior, as she gets her kicks out of literally any reaction or response from people at all, so BF must really really stick to this or he's just wasting time.
I will stand up to her that's for sure but that's a really good point made that I'd just take over as dominant female in his life and I NEVER EVER want to end up like that woman!!!! I'm not dominant now and never want to be, I like everyone to be equal and to do their fair share and for adults and children to make their own mistakes and learn. it's such an unhappy argumentative and stressed household, and it breaks my heart that she can't see how she makes people feel.
We've agreed next steps are to get his bank info back from her and try consistently not responding to her crazy outbreaks and see where this gets us. it's not going to be easy that's for sure!!!!! :/ Thanks for the responses, they are all really helpful xxx
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A
female
reader, fishdish +, writes (16 March 2012):
 Why can't your bf move in with you to your family's house in the meantime and separate his accounts from hers?
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A
female
reader, YouWish +, writes (16 March 2012):
 There's something else that's off here. He's living with her and she's controlling his account. Currently, he "can't" leave home because she's always threatening to kick him out, a threat which would be powerless if he didn't desperately need her in the first place.
I'm wondering that because if you're giving him a lot of money to pay for gas, why isn't he paying for his own gas?? Don't you drive? Are you constantly filling his gas tank, or are you going in half?
Is his credit bad?? Is he hoping to need your credit to secure a rental and leave home?? If so, DON'T DO IT! You'll end up flushing your own credit down the toilet!
Something's really off, and I smell a serious financial red flag in your future. The kind that includes bankruptcies, evictions, and denied employment based on rotten credit scores.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (16 March 2012): Hi. Your partner and his mother sound co dependent. You say she is a drinker and she certainly sounds as if she is not above being emotionally abusive to him. Has it always been that way? If so, your partner might need therapy to help him disengage from his mother and stand on his own two feet.
Take care you dont fight his corner for him, only to `win` and find yourself being the next dominant woman in his life, while he remains `laid back` and leaves everything up to you instead of his mum!
You cant change her because she doesnt want to change. It is your partner that needs to change if he is to evolve into a confident man that can stand up for himself. If or when that happens, his mother will no longer have any influence over him.
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A
female
reader, eyeswideopen +, writes (16 March 2012):
 The only way to remove her "leverage" is for your boyfriend to leave her house ASAP. Not under her roof - not under her control. It's up to him to decide whether he wants to wait to buy a house or just get the hell out and rent for a few years. I know what I would choose. She is a very unhappy person and most likely will always be, sad really.
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A
female
reader, YouWish +, writes (16 March 2012):
Why does she control his bank account at age 25?? Why is he letting her do this?? Is this guy self-sufficient i.e. making his own money, paying his own bills, and living his own life? You mentioned that she has money. Is he a "trust fund baby" meaning, is he making an income based on remittances from a relative's inheritance that the mom is the executor of??
The mom is not the major problem here. Your boyfriend is. He should be on his own, managing his own resources, his own money, his own living arrangements. Has he gone to college? Is he in a career? These are the true things you should be asking, more than his mom's influences.
However, his mom is still an issue. This is massive baggage that will not go away as long as she draws breath. Most guys know how to draw the boundary, but your boyfriend won't.
Are you living on your own or with parents?? You didn't mention, but reading between the lines, I'd say that if you are, your number one goal is to make YOURSELF self-sufficient, which will give you options. Do not rely on this guy, because his mom will have her mitts in YOUR bank account as well. Don't think she won't, because if you get married to this guy and he can't refuse her, you will be broken down to keep the peace.
He needs to make the break and prepare to live on his own. The key is to drop the mom's influence on him. Right now, she holds it over his head which makes him come running like a 7-year old.
He needs to not rely on you to prop him up any more than he relies on his mom. If his "salvation" is to make plans to move with you, that's way too much on you. He's not grown up, and that will get old fast.
Besides, the two of you should not commit to buying as long as the mom is part of his finances. You two should rent to see what life is like first.
The other thing -- why are you paying him for fuel?? Do you not have a car?? Something isn't adding up.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (16 March 2012): I know its his Mum, but really, controlling his bank account and savings - when he's 25? That alone sounds rediculous.Does he not have any balls - she really cannot take control of these without his say so.
If it was me...I would move to rented accomodation asap, never mind saving for a house. Peace of mind and a distance between him and his mother is the only way forward.The only way for him to become an independant functioning adult with a life of his own.
And at 25 you have both been living at home more than long enough.
His mum has plenty of friends,a marriage and career so it seems her problems are purely with her children and she needs to learn to let go her grip and set them free.
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A
female
reader, chocoholicforever +, writes (16 March 2012):
your boyfriend's mother sounds really dysfunctional, and as a result the entire family system is dysfunctional because everyone else's behavior revolves around hers.
Doing reward/punishment conditioning will not work if her behavior is self-reinforcing, i.e. you can ignore her all you want yet she is still experiencing some reward, for example by getting satisfaction from having lashed out, or if OTHER people come running to coddle her.
The reason that everything your bf has tried doesn't work - calmly trying to reason, shouting back, ignoring - is because these are all attempts by him to control her back. He is essentially trying to get her to stop behaving as she is. This is a natural first line of defense and a natural reaction for anyone in his position but at the end of the day it doesn't work because he is trying to get her to change her behavior, but she's already the master at controlling people, you can't win at her own game.
The only thing you can do is to completely disengage and ignore her in order to protect your sanity. Your bf should stop trying to get her to change her ways, and instead focus on what he can do that does not depend on HER doing anything different. simply detaching from the situation and ignoring her (not as a way to try to make her stop, but more to set boundaries with her and not allow himself to get dragged down by her) is I think going to be more effective.
but it has to be consistent and this is the truly difficult part. Initially she will react to being ignored by upping the ante and this could be when you or your bf's resolve to ignore her finally fails your bf finally caves in by engaging with her once again even if it's shouting at her or some other negative or doing what she wants just to shut her up, but all of those things are still rewarding to her and are reinforcing her dysfunctional behavior. What's even worse is that intermittent reinforcement strengthens behavior even more than continuous reinforcement - what this means is that responding to her some of the time but ignoring her other times, can actually be causing her to become ever more persistent because she experiences that periods of being ignored won't last if only she ups the ante and does something even more outrageous. In other words, if you're going to ignore her, you have to go all the way and never back down.
thus your bf has to ignore her consistently no matter how big a tantrum she throws or how outrageous a stunt she pulls. She will only cut back on her control attempts if SHE and she alone decides it's not worth her time and energy anymore because it never gets her what she wants anymore. But as you can imagine, this is going to take a very long time of consistently ignoring before she comes to this conclusion because this pattern has been ingrained for so many years as the way this family operates. You might more realistically be better off simply sucking it up for one year (however long before you can move out), and then once you can move out, move far away from her to lessen her influence.
Unfortunately dysfunctional families can and often do have a lifelong impact on the members of the family. It's very possible that she will never stop being controlling, so you might be looking at a lifetime of a combination of coping, managing the situation such as choosing to live far away from her and minimizing contact, or if it becomes extreme your bf may at some point just have to cut off all contact with her (but only he can decide to do that and determine when it has come to that).
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