My mom and I haven't talked in almost a year

*** trigger warnings: abuse, neglect, sexual abuse.***

Sorry this is such a long post. A lot to get off my chest.

I have talked this through with all my loved ones a millions times, but I just feel like no one in my life fully understands. They just haven't experienced the same thing, so I just don't think they can get it. I just feel like some support from people who have had similar experiences might be helpful.

So for some context my (30 female) mom (49 female) had me when she was 18. My mom had a really hard childhood herself. Abusive stepdads, a drug-addicted, alcoholic mother who often would leave her alone for weeks at a time. And 0 family intervention. So when she had me she was truly just a baby having a baby. Yes she had life experiences the average 18 year old didn't have and had to be extremely responsible as a child, but she never gained any emotional maturity. My "dad" was 28 at the time, and I was the product of a one night stand.

My mom met my brothers dad and had him when I was 3. My brothers dad was a serial cheater, who, as my mom would put it, "fucked anything that walked." He was in the navy and wasn't around much, but the one thing I do remember was walking in on him laying on the floor of the bathroom touching himself. When I walked in, instead of responding appropriately, he just carried on and told me "this is how you rub lotion on your p***s." I guess I had told several people of this, and according to my mom, this was one of the final straws that lead to their divorce when I was about 4 or 5.

My mom met her second husband around the same time because they worked together and he quickly moved in. He made decent money, and because of this my mom was able to work part time. He never did anything I can definitively say was wrong, but he did make me uncomfortable. He pushed so hard for me and my brother to see him as our dad.

When I was about 11 her second husband came to me and my brother (about 8 at the time) one night when my mom was out with a friend of hers, and told us that she was cheating on him. Things were a whirlwind after that.

Her and her second husband split and the guy she was cheating with moved in right away. To say that he was not great would be an incredible understatement. He was an alcoholic, bipolar, and epileptic, so he couldn't work. My mom had to start working more, but was still not able to cover all of our expenses and eventually our house was foreclosed on. For more context this house was purchase for my mom, by my great grandma and my mom was supposed to pay her back like a normal mortgage. According to my mom, she kicked us out after 2 missed payments. Which is likely true. My great grandma is the worst.

We went from our stable home, to a hotel for about 2ish weeks, before moving into an old camper. This was a VERY small mobile home. The type with a bed about the cab, and a table and bench that became mine and my brothers beds.

Her 3rd husband was extremely abusive to all of us. He beat my mom, and verbally abused me and my brother.

We moved from this camper to a small apartment in the big city on the other side of the state after about 6 months. During this time he would do things like ground me and my brother for everything under the sun. I was a big reader at the time and I wouldn't even be allowed to read. I was to sit on my bed and contemplate how terrible I was. My brother didn't read much, but he was allowed, even when grounded. I could honestly go on an on about how terribly he treated us all. Calling me a fat, ugly, bitch. Telling me how my mom didn't love me, and if he said the word she would get rid of me. I would call my grandma on my way home from school every day and have a new story of how terrible he was. I never ran out of material to talk about.

One summer when I was 15, my mom sent me and my brother to stay with my grandma for a few weeks in the summer. That summer she finally left him.

Now on to my mom. Throughout my childhood, I was my moms confidant. She would come to me and tell me her problems. I always had to be emotionally available for her to come to. She pitted me and my brother against each other. I was the "smart" good one, but who was moody and mean. My brother was the "dumb" bad one, but who was very even tempered and easy to get along with. When one of us was in trouble my mom and the other one would talk about how bad the other one was. Because of this, we wanted to get the other one in trouble, because if they were then we weren't. We wanted to be on her side.

Even with all of this being said, me and my mom were very close. She was my hero. I thought the sun shined from out her ass. I could come to her with almost anything, as long as it wasn't about her, and she would be there for me. But the second I came to her to tell her she had done something to hurt me, it was pure defensiveness. "Oh you're so sensitive. You're such a child. Grow up." She would laugh and mock me while I cried, until she would send me to my room. An hour or 2 later she would come in and try to play around, and act like everything was back to normal. I would act like everything was normal.

I remember once, around the time I was 16 she had a date with a guy, who was kind of a loser. He was in his 30s, didn't have a license, and if I remember correctly he still lived with his parents. I begged her to not go. Told her I was terrified of her being with another man. And her response was to go on and on about how she "didn't give a fuck about my feelings" and how she was an adult and could do what ever she wanted.

On her drive she called me and gave me a vague apology, but still went.

I had really good grades in early high school because that was when she was still with her second husband, and if I was grounded all I was allowed to do was homework. So I would get really far ahead in school. After he wasn't around my grades dropped drastically. Instead of talking to me about why, she just chalked it up to a moral failing, and grounded me from the one good thing in my life at the time. Church. I'm not at all religious now, but at the time it was the escape I desperately needed.

I went to 3 middle schools in 7th grade because of us losing our house. While I was at the second school me and a couple of girls stole a bunch of clothes from a department store and got caught. Instead of my mom asking questions and trying to find out why I would do something so out of character. She just told me she was so disappointed in me. As a punishment she made me walk about 2 mile to and from school in the middle of January. My walk to school was on the main street of the town and it was dark out. I was terrified.

My brother told me recently that one day he told her that he wanted to be a dentist when he grew up and she told him that that took a lot a school and he wasn't good at school.

As an adult we have had a rocky relationship. We have often gotten in big fights with her being nasty to me.

One time we were on the topic of childhood sexual abuse and we talked about what happened with me and I don't remember the specifics of the conversation, but I remember thinking that she had confirmed that it was more than just that one incident. In another one maybe a year later she said no nothing else happened, just that. Which made me feel crazy.

Our relationship went in a cycle of us playing nice, having a big blow up, not talking for a while, and then her apologizing, saying she would work on things. And then it would start over. Nothing ever changed.

Current context:

Me and my husband planned to get married on our 10th anniversary. We decided we wanted to elope in another state that we want to move to as soon as we can. My mom hated the idea. She insinuated that no one was gonna be able to come (mind you, my whole family already lives in another state from me. They would have had to travel no matter what). She suggested that we have it in a city a couple hours from her. My brother is also engaged and in a conversation not too long after, he suggested that him and his fiancé want to get married in another country on and island. And my mom loved the idea.

I later told my mom that this hurt my feelings and she blew it off and said that my brother and his fiancé are too broke to do that anyways, so she went along with it. My brother and his fiancé actually do pretty well financially. If they wanted to make that happen they could with some overtime.

I went to visit my family a month or two after all of this, and while I was there I told my brother and his fiancé (lets call her E) about the conversation I had with my mom and they were upset. E was pretty stand offish with my mom after that. We were all hanging out later that day and my mom (while drunk) tells me and my brother " ugh why is E being such a bitch. E is scary"

They were both super upset about this, but my brother decided to play nice the rest of the trip because he didn't want to ruin my trip. He came over to my moms on my second to last day without E and my mom asked why E wasn't there. He gave some vague excuse. A moment later I got up to grab something from the room I was staying in at my moms and my mom followed me in there. She asked why E didn't come and I said "because you called her a bitch the other night." She got annoyed and said "well it's pretty fucked up that he would tell her that." And I said "well you shouldn't have said it." She stormed out and then loudly complained to her husband about what happened. We all decided to pretend like nothing happened for the rest of the night.

He hasn't talked to my mom since.

About a month later my mom sent me a text basically saying that she didn't feel like she was a part of my wedding at all. That when she got married the most recent time she made me a bridesmaid, and that I just told her where to be and didn't invite her to be a part of things. Mind you that's not true. I asked her to walk me down the aisle. She asked if I even wanted her to be there, because she is "done inserting herself in the lives of people who don't really want her around."

I responded saying that she should be grateful to even be invited with how unsupportive she had been about the whole thing. And that I was tired of her playing the victim like she always does. That I think she hates the fact that both me and my brother are adults and she doesn't have any control over us anymore. I told her that I was frustrated about the situation with E and that its not ok for her to treat her like that. That I was scared that if she was there, there would be needless drama, because we couldn't even go the 4 days I was at her house with their being drama. I told her that I knew she had been talking shit about my wedding (my brother told me). I told her I was tired of her being the victim in every situation. That she needs to stop talking shit about E and stop trying to control our lives.

She responded saying she wasn't going to respond to my text because most of it was "lies and crap" and that I seem to think that because she is my mother I can talk to her how ever I want. That was may of last year. I haven't talked to her since.

She didn't come to my wedding. Never said she wasn't coming, just didn't come. Never said congrats. Never said anything. The first time I have heard from her since may was in January when she said "are you never talking to me again? Are we done?" I didn't respond. She sent the same thing to my brother the day before.

A couple days ago she texted my brother "I love and miss you. I don't know why your not talking to me but I want to figure it out." She only texted him this.

Sometimes I feel like I am being too hard on her. Like things maybe weren't actually that bad. But these texts are a reminder that it was bad. She has no intention of taking any responsibility. She doesn't think she has done anything wrong. The time leading up to my wedding I kept thinking surely one of these days she will reach out and try to fix things. She wouldn't actually miss my wedding. But she did.

I really feel like there is no fixing this. I don't honestly know what it would take for me to ever talk to her again. Our relationship feels unfixable. And yet it makes me so sad. I grieve, not for her, but for the mother me and my brother never got to have. I grieve not getting to tell her when I get accepted to nursing school, not getting to celebrate with her when I graduate.

I have such a hard time understanding why she is the way she is. Yes she had it hard when she was young. But she's has been in a stable marriage, stable housing, and a stable job, for the last 10ish years. I don't understand how she still has the emotional intelligence of a potato. Why she doesn't want to work on herself.

If you made it this long thank you so much for reading. Sorry it was so long. I have a hard time deciding what is important context so I probably added more than what was necessary.