<p>well, definitely suggest your friends to unfriend your mom!!!</p>
<p>Very little shocks me on this site, but a mom posting on your roommate’s Facebook pages? Can’t even imagine my kids’ reaction were I to do that. You have my sympathy.</p>
<p>It sounds like you have a good plan going. I don’t see the purpose in dropping out of school, that might be something you regret. If she pulls financial aid (which she probably won’t unless you really anger her), then deal with going to a community college or transferring. It would be good to get scholarship details, just in case. </p>
<p>I definitely second exactly what ucsd<em>ucla</em>dad said. If you continue to call her, make it boring, non-committal, don’t fight, oops gotta go. Withdraw slowly so she barely notices and gets used to it. Call her when you know it’s a bad time for her to talk, if there is a certain time. There is obviously something wrong with her, feel compassion for her problem but decline to engage in arguments or giving her personal information. Realize that this is HER problem, not yours, and figure out how to deal with her so she detaches from you but doesn’t make you crazy. Hopefully in later years her sanity will come back. I saw the same thing happen with my sister (who ended up moving out at 15 and joined the military when she was very young). Luckily I witnessed the insanity and figured out a logical way to deal with it myself.</p>
<p>I have to respectfully disagree to some extent with the majority of the posters. I think your mother sounds like she has zero boundaries and that is a serious problem in my opinion. Her extreme need to control you and be in touch with you at her chosen time each day is not only ridiculous but I think its borderline abusive. You live in a constant state of anxiety because you never know when your mother will fly off the handle at you and threaten your well-being (tuition, room and board) because of her anger. My grandmother did this to my father in a similar fashion when he was young and it screwed him up for life.</p>
<p>I would suggest that you take a strong stand as has been mentioned previously, but I would also like to gently encourage YOU to talk to someone about possibly taking an anti-depressant to help you through this. I sense that your anxiety level is through the roof, and no one should have to live like that, especially a young woman in college. </p>
<p>I am so sorry that you are dealing with such a withholding, mean-spirited parent - but just by thinking about how to get out of it, and asking for help here, you are on your way to finding a solution.</p>
<p>Is your mom the one who works, and consequently ears the money your former household? If not, then inform her politely that she has no right to dangle the money issue in front of your face. You haven’t complained much about your father, so perhaps he’s more lenient? I don’t see how he could possibly be stricter - your mom’s insane.</p>
<p>I have an extremely controlling mother as well, although my situation is a little different, because I am still a senior in hs.</p>
<p>This summer, I finally moved out of my mom’s house and in with another relative.
I lost my car, cell phone, money she was saving of mine just as yours is, and many special belonging, but i cannot stress enough how worth it it was.
I have a job now and buy my own groceries/anything I need, but I am not paying tuition (yet) or dealing with those many added expenses, which would be much, much harder I imagine.
But still, I wish I had moved out sooner, I am SOOOO much happier, and i really think that is what’s important.
I wish you the best of luck. It really gets to me when I hear other stories of controlling mothers, because I have been there, and I know how much of a negative impact it can have on your life/mood/everything.
Hope all ends well for you</p>
<p>I recommend talking with someone at your college counseling center. I think you will need some strategies to help you deal with your mom in a non-confrontational way. And it could be therapeutic for you to discuss this difficult relationship with a professional. You have been given some good suggestions here about getting your own phone and a campus job (and don’t tell your parents – they can’t object if they don’t know.) I highly recommend staying in school and trying your best to detach from the drama. You do have a lot of freedom in college and your mother will never know about the things you don’t tell her.</p>
<p>Wow. I think there are several positive things you can do. One, read “Toxic Parents” by Susan Forward. It is an excellent book about the many ways parents can be poisonous and has some pragmatic ways to look at things without surrendering your soul to the situation. </p>
<p>Two, do a quick survey of pals and ask how often they call their mums. Report this to your mom. If 20 out of 20 say “once a week” then politely let your mom know that. </p>
<p>Three, let the dorm official know that your mom has boundary issues and politely ask for support. Be pro-active. You know that next time you don’t call on schedule that your mom will be reaching out to the staff just as she did before. If you have been proactive about discussing the boundary issues, the staff may be more willing to say “Mrs X, I know I saw your daughter today and she was looking just fine. Students are very busy with mid-terms/finals/papers and very few have much free time right now.” Non threatening, but also firm. </p>
<p>Seek counseling. Seek it for yourself so that you are not sad or overwhelmed. Your college may very well have a counselor who has lots of experience with parents like yours and may have an entire bag of advice/techniques/ways of thinking that are helpful. </p>
<p>Use “I” statements – as in “I feel like a puppet on a string because I am not in charge of the money I earned” rather than “you meanie” statements. </p>
<p>Show leadership. This works in relationships/friendships as well. If you want some one to give you a compliment occasionally (like a boyfriend!), then make sure you seed the way by regularly giving compliments yourself to him. Same goes with mom. You can say "I would like a warmer relationship with you. I am going to work to make sure that you know the things I appreciate about you. I want you to know . . . " A few warm fuzzies her way may give her the ability to open her hands a bit. This technique takes awhile to work – give it six months of really trying and then evaluate. </p>
<p>Lastly, get to know her as an adult. Ask her what her current projects are – and encourage them. Let her know what other parents are doing. If she’s spent 19 years closely parenting you, she may literally not know what to do with the time that is on her hands – so she keeps on parenting. Tell her that many parents launch into new activities now that the little bird is out of the nest. What would she like for Christmas to celebrate her new self? Art supplies? How to write a novel? Gardening tools?<br>
Good luck!</p>
<p>I didn’t have a chance to read all the posts in detail, so maybe its already been suggested…but family therapy? </p>
<p>The good news is your mom was somehwat flexible about letting you move away. It’s a start, and it suggests she has the ‘right intentions’ but doesn’t have a clue how to relate to you or let go. At some level she too knows her controlling behavior is over the top, but she keeps going back to it because it’s the only thing that reduces her anxiety. You hate it; but she probably hates it too. She, you, dad, everyone would be so much healthier and happier if you could seek counselling together to undo some of this dynamic and give your mom a better way to relate to you. </p>
<p>While it might not work to approach it around HER having a problem that needs fix, would they consider if you were feeling depressed and needed to go into therapy with them? Through that process, this dynamic is likely to rise to the surface and the therapist can help you all work through it. I realize you are a state away which makes it challenging, but you could start by seeing someone on campus and seeking their advice about how to involve your family in counselling for when you are home.</p>
<p>Just stop calling her. Don’t take her phone calls if she calls your dorm. Threaten to kill yourself unless she stops her absurd behavior or do something else that’s dramatic. Not even a 5 year old should be treated that way.</p>
<p>My advice is to make a counseling appointment at your college counseling center. If you get into counseling there and have a relationship with that counselor, you can start to work through these issues with your mom. This isn’t something that will go away–she will always want to control you and you’ll really be helped by a professional helping you work through how to set boundaries with her. I went to counseling in college over parental issues and it helped me a lot. </p>
<p>Please stay in college and let your parents pay for it. Just get counseling, get a part-time job so you can have your own phone and your own money, and try to work around your mom as long as you can. I had to pay for the last two years of college because my parents cut me off, and it was really hard financially. It led to an unwise early marriage that I now regret.</p>
<p>And think ahead about the summer. Maybe you can find a job as a nanny or camp counselor and then you won’t have to live at home.</p>
<p>Adults on social networking sites at all is weird, but actually contacting your friends on it? Have them remove her. It isn’t their job to tell her how you are doing anyway. I’m in my mid-20’s and even I’m considering deleting my account because I feel weird being a part of a website that so many high school kids (and even middle schoolers who lie about their age!) are flocking to in droves.</p>
<p>Re checking in, can you explain that you are really busy for 2wice a day talks and ask if you can just check in twice a day via text? Just looking for a small improvement on the obligation</p>
<p>I want to second the recommendations to read Toxic Parents and to seek a counselor. I also think you should <em>proactively</em> bring up that your time will be limited as you look ahead to midterms and finals and will only be calling one time a day. After that, maybe you’ll go home for Christmas break and, by the time you get back in Jan, it will have been months that you haven’t called home more than once a day. Hopefully, this will ease the transition to once a day. </p>
<p>Your mother <em>is</em> controlling. My suspicion is that your father is passive because that’s how he copes with her so I doubt you’ll get too much help from him. Please get support for yourself because this stuff has deeper ramifications than it seems. If you don’t live with trust, it becomes hard to trust yourself and you may end up making bad decisions because you trust people you shouldn’t. In other words, your mom doesn’t respect your boundaries so it becomes hard to recognize when people don’t either. You need to be smart about how you set up boundaries with her because you need to get through school. You can’t fix all her problems but you may be able to buy yourself some space.</p>
<p>I think your mom’s threats to cut off your tuition are just empty threats. I doubt she’d follow thru with them. If you called her bluff, she’d likely fold like a cheap tent. Next time she threatens you, tell her that you were thinking of quitting school anyway to join the army. (Tell her the military will pay all your expenses…LOL)</p>
<p>Are you sure that you could get good scholarship money at this point? The best scholarships are for “incoming freshmen” and you’re not an incoming freshman.</p>
<p>BTW…your friends need to “defriend” her on Facebook.</p>
<p>If you don’t want to begin a big facebook fight, have you and your friends assign your mother to a limited profile, you can then limit what she can see and she may not really notice.</p>
<p>I was about to respond when I read the post#35 by mom2collegekids. I agree. The threat to pull tuition seems like a bluff, and if it isn’t a bluff, you know what, perhaps you should still let her yank it anyway. The military option doesn’t sound that much worse than living according your crazy controlling mom’s rules.</p>
<p>Do not threaten to kill yourself. But I do think you should stop calling her twice a day if you don’t want to. That is a very unreasonable demand.</p>
<p>I’m with bookiemom on this
although you could do some research on and then talk enthusiastically about ROTC and ROTC funding, so she knows that you are an adult and that you have other options for funding college. It could give you something to talk about during all of those phone calls…</p>
<p>Get your friends to defriend your mom. That’s just plain creepy and intrusive. The fact that your mother tried to get to you through your roommates, to me, makes it clear that she is less concerned about your social life/general happiness as she is her desire to control and play puppetmaster. A desire to control is usually due to having little to no control – I assume she had some sort of power struggle issues growing up? Or perhaps she is just extraordinarily overprotective? </p>
<p>At this point it’s pure speculation either way, so counseling is a definite must. Get everything out there in the open and address the roots of the problems here. She clearly sees things differently than you do, and taking a rather aggressive stance may cause irreparable damage to your relationship with your mother. Coming to a mutually-agreed upon solution in counseling will probably be a lot smoother, and you won’t have to play these “call her bluff” games. It’s possible that she’ll back off and still pay for tuition. </p>
<p>Either way, however, I’d still advise getting a part time job, even if just to have extra spending money for yourself. If, for whatever reason, you take a reasonable approach to the situation and she still threatens to pull the tuition, let her. Take out the loans… not having to feel bound to your parents will probably be well worth it. Loans aren’t absurdly expensive to pay back either, especially if your school is moderately priced.</p>
<p>I’d use those phone calls to talk your mother into going to counseling together.</p>
<p>I agree with most of the advice here. Several posters suggested good interim solutions to gradually ease her off your back. </p>
<p>On the long run, one way or the other, you do need to eventually let your mom know how her behavior is impacting you and how you feel about it, and what you would like as a new parameter for a relationship as an adult to adult.</p>
<p>I suggest that you write a long, thoughtful letter, when the time is right, rather than doing it over the phone or in person. Your mother will certainly feel threatened by your desire and initiative to take back control of your own life and to assert your independence as an adult. If she is forced to face this without warning and respond on the spot, she probably will overreact, act defensively, and do or say things that are very damaging to the relationship for some time to come.</p>
<p>A letter allows her to understand where your are coming from without the pressure to react immediately, defend herself, and have it flare up as a total confrontation. You can then follow up with a face to face or phone conversation. This will give her a plenty of time to think about the issue and have a chance to reflect upon her own behavior and your needs, and the ensuing conversation may be far less fraught with tension.</p>
<p>When I want to communicate with my kids on something that requires a thoughtful reflection on their part without the pressure to react and respond on the spot, I write a long email to them. Not only it gives them a plenty of room to reflect on the content in a thought manner, it also allows me to put my thought together in a calm and measure manner. </p>
<p>Just a thought.</p>