User deleted post
THe last time I drove with my mother there was a rainstorm and she was inconsolable. I was a professional driver at the time and was used to driving in all kinds of weather, but she acted like we were driving 120 mph in a Lamborghini. Yelling, grabbing my arm, pointing at things and blocking my view. She made the drive very unsafe with her behavior and I refused to bring her anywhere after that.
My FIL got like this in his final years. Thankfully he stopped driving himself, but we made him sit in the backseat when driving him anywhere because otherwise he would absolutely become a menace with the pointing and freaking out and arguing with the GPS.
Ugh. Arguing with the GPS is peak boomer craziness.
tough choice really, do they go with a Global Positioning System based on satellites blanketing the Earth or their recollection from 1987?
Tbf, when GPS first came out the older generation frequently trusted it enough to drive into bodies of water on a regular basis.
Gotta wash the car somehow.🤣
But the GPS told me to turn here
This is how I got in my first and only car accident! First words out of her mouth were “google maps told me to turn here”
You mean turn left with your right turn signal on after slamming on the breaks on a highway? Ooook.
Good drivers sometimes miss turns or exits. Bad drivers never do.
My wife and I still make Michael Scott GPS jokes whenever our car navigation gets confused because our maps are a bit out of date.
I’m still disappointed that the GPS in my 2010 Prius, when it was out of date, didn’t have “thar be monsters here” when I was driving on a 4 lane road and it was just totally blank.
We went to an out of state wedding 20 years ago with MIL. She had a Tom Tom and that thing was awful. It took us the wrong way on a one way street with no visibility-curving street- and with her confusion I thought I was gonna die! I’m also old enough for the printed Mapquest era! So I understand the anxiety but some people just don’t learn about changing technology.
My in-laws constantly struggled with out-of-date maps on their stupid Tom-Tom, I finally said “you know your phone does this, with up-to-the-minute maps and traffic updates, right?
They will go back to the 1987 memories.
They’re still in 1987
OMG I know this guy who is actually an Elder Gen X’er, but he never married, never moved out of his Boomer parents home and he’s one of those people that REFUSES to accept when anything is changed. Like, still calls certain roads the name they used to be called over 30 years ago and gets pissed when anyone corrects him or is confused.
Lmao that last one I can almost understand... there's a bunch of stuff in my city that has changed names over the years and you can always tell who's a native or who has lived here a while by what they call certain buildings or freeways. 🤐 But I guess the difference is not being crotchety when someone is confused.
Sears Tower has entered the chat
Lmao and Houston has the Transco Tower or whatever fake name they're calling it now. 😅
Elder millennial here, and it will be Transco until the day I die
I'm basically a millennial (barely squeaked into Gen X technically) and same!
OK the one thing I forgive some people for is calling stadiums by their original names and ignoring the new name based on a faceless corporation that bought the naming rights.
Gotta love when the directions to get to your cousin's wedding includes a direction like "turn right onto the old farm road". So knowing the kind of area you're in you're looking for some old gravel road. Then when you finally turn off at a gas station you find out from the clerk that the farm road was paved several years ago and renamed "County Road 15" and is now a 2 lane highway. But the locals still call it "the farm road". At least I made it before they said I Do.
Do we have the same cousin?
My mom drives with her GPS on and my dad being angry about traffic (as a passenger) while trying to give her directions at the same time as the GPS. Gives me fucking anxiety when I get a ride to the airport.
My GPS has “MIL” mode. It say, “not this exit” “not that turn” “slow down, you’re going to miss it”
What! That sounds amazing and really funny. Honestly, I would find that very useful!
It always makes me laugh that when a boomer asks if I know how to get somewhere and I say I'll use GPS, every time they're like, "OK. You take 12 to Smith Road, then take a left..." etc, etc.
I suspect they'd do the same thing if I was like, "Yeah, I've driven that route many times."
They do. You get road names?
"Take 12 out to past where Aunt Rose used to live in the 70s. I've showed you before. The house that was yellow! Anyway, after you make your turn drive oh bout 3, 4 miles and hang a left. Then you'll be on 12 again "
"So why would I leave 12?"
"Well the bridge used to be out"
???
This. I’d say im good with landmark directions as long as I know where the landmarks are. Not telling me where so and so used to live because even if I happen to know that person they haven’t lived there since I was born
OMG! My parents did that when I young. I HATE reference directions. Don’t tell me to turn on the road after where the red barn used to be. I thought that was just how rural folks talked but after living in cities a long time and hearing “turn after (store /restaurant name)” I’ve decided some people just have trouble with direction. I get blank looks when someone asks me and I say “it’s on the southwest corner of First and Cedar.”
Reference directions are fine if they're unique. "Turn left at the white house" Vs. "turn right at the white house that has the giant chicken sculpture by the road"
And yeah, not referencing landmarks that no longer exist or not describing enough for you even though they know what they're talking about.
Lucky for me my boomer father knows he is directionally challenged. On past road trips, he always has me sit right behind him so I can tell him where to turn, what exit to take, etc.
Hi! Late stage Boomer here, I am the person who tells boomers 20+ older than me that we WILL be using gps because I'm unfamiliar with the area (and will bite my tongue that we aren't gonna rely on her sketchy memory)
The sitting in the back seat thing is golden, I have generalized anxiety disorder and sitting in the front seat with others can be stressful.
Me too, I’ve been in multiple car accidents in my life so I get really anxious being in the car for longer than 30 minutes. I just sit in the backseat and read. Luckily, my sister doesn’t mind driving ever, so we have a lovely agreement where she basically never has to pay for her meal whenever we go places, and I never have to drive. Lol
I'm a contractor and some boomers call me and want to describe step by step directions to their house. I'm like just give me the address, I'll put it in my calendar and I'll use my gps. No need for making it difficult
Hey now. Sometimes Google doesn't want me to take side streets so I call it an idiot.
"In 200 feet make a U-turn" - no, I know where I'm going!
Here's one for you about GPS.
I live outside Sacramento, and I have a brother who lives in the Bay Area. My parents live near me, and at the time of this story were in their late '80s. I am obviously the driver when we travel to my brother's house.
My mom is pretty tech savvy for her age, and I'm quite proud of that.
On our way home from this visit, I wanted to make a detour. So I asked her to use her newfound skills on her smartphone to find the best way to the nearest freeway so we could go home. We were not in a hurry, and Dad, in the early stages of dementia, sat in the backseat quietly, just happy to be along for the ride. Everything was great.
So she starts directing me, and we're going along, and every road is very slow and in a residential area. At one point I looked up and realized we were alongside the freeway, but the directions did not tell us to get on the freeway.
My mom had decided she wanted to take the Dumbarton bridge, because well, she likes to do that sometimes and I humor her.
Finally, realizing this was taking far too long, (As is this story, sorry), I told her that we would continue but the first sign of a freeway we found I would take it and we would just go home. She agreed.
That's exactly what happened. I dropped them off at home, and went about my life.
She called me at work the next day and told me she had gone into the Verizon store to ask about her phone. Imagine her surprise when they looked at her settings and found that her GPS had been set that we were on a bicycle!
No wonder it didn't put us on a freeway!
We all got a good laugh, but late that night as I was thinking about it, I realized that Google doesn't really care about us.
I would imagine that Google would have been more concerned that we were driving 30 or 40 mph on city streets on a bicycle!
I’m an older Millennial (ie i should be tech savvy). Before the time of GPS on the phone, I had a mounted one. I took my friend around Seattle for the day and set it to pedestrian mode. We got back to the car and I got directions home. Made a turn and thought ‘this doesn’t look right’ and was immediately yelled at by a person poking out of a two story window. Turns out I had forgotten to take it off pedestrian mode and turned down a one-way street. Luckily it was a side road and no one was coming, but boy did I feel like an idiot!
Last time I looked, google didn’t make it obvious how to toggle between the three modes
Imagine not knowing there are 3 modes, and finding out on a looong trip. That was a challenging day to be married...
I experienced this as well peppered in with a few grabbing of the wheel. He refused to sit in the backseat due to his bad behavior and so he stopped going places and expected everyone to cater to him and his needs since he can’t drive anywhere we need to get him everything under the sun the second he requested and if we didn’t then he would throw a toddler fit. For example, he would request a Starbucks coffee(that’s fine, I usually get a coffee anyway), then when we would bring it back to him he’d say he is hungry and wants McDonald’s. In our town McDonald’s was right next to Starbucks. That request would always be a no or tell him if he wanted food too then he needed to tell us or call us on our cell phones while we are out, not wait until we walk in the door and request us to turn right around and go get something else. We didn’t let him go hungry we would offer to make something at home or door dash, but his excuse was the food is bland and he doesn’t want some crackhead delivery his food and scoping out the house to come back and rob later. sigh
My mum is such a backseat driver to my dad...who was a police office...a police officer that specialised in high speed pursuits including advanced tactics and obtained the highest qualification he could get. But sure, he still needs to be screamed at that the car in front is breaking 100 meters away
WHY DO THEY DO THIS?????? My mother gasps and grits her teeth every time I even think about the brake pedal.
But when I let HER drive (which I have not gotten into a car with her behind the wheel for years, thank god), she will literally turn her head to the backseat to talk to someone while she’s driving. Or try to make sustained eye contact with me in the passenger seat. Watch the fucking road!!!!!!
My mom will do anything she can while driving. She thinks about a sticky note in her purse that needs something added to it? Needs to dig for it while she is driving. She texts whiles driving and she is one of those that loses all awareness when she texts. Mouth agape and just blindly staring as she types. Looking everywhere and talking non stop. She drives thousands of miles a week too. One of these days shes going to have a bad wreck.
One time I straight up told me Nmom “YOU are the reason my driving is unsafe” and went on to explain that her clutching my arm, pointing across my line of sight, and pointing at parked cars saying “watch that one!” is the sole reason we’re going to crash. She shut up until we got to the restaurant, then acted like it never happened.
I'm with you on this. My mother (70) was in a life changing car accident as a passenger before she had me so learning to drive was constant gasps, cringing, bracing for impact. It's better these days as a 36 year old with a clean driving record but she still has moments. She's ironically not the greatest driver, always a new scratch or ding.
The one thing I will say about this which is something to just try and be sensitive to because it happens to all of us is how the myelin in our brains/spines deteriates over time. Kind of like how if a wire loses its insulation/ages it becomes less effective at conducting electricity. That's what's happening in their brains, and as it slows things down while the world stays the same it makes things feel like they're happening faster for them. Ever see an old man white knuckling it down the road while doing 30 in a 50? That's what that is. I imagine as a passenger with all that going on, toss in some vision and hearing loss that feelings disorienting/scary.
last time i was with my mother and i tried to drive in a rainstorm she tried to physcially stop me from leaving
i was going to a place about 10 minutes away
i've driven the length of the united states of america, twice
she just has an anxiety disorder
My dad has passenger rage of someone does something stupid while I'm driving. Lately, someone cut me off coming off a roundabout, so he's trying to press the horn as I'm straightening the wheel to get off the roundabout, almost made me crash by being ragey, arms got entangled, so inwhacked his hands away and told him to stuff it. He was also trying to send or read a text at the same time as trying to press the horn.... old fool!
Nope nope nope to all that. Put him in the child seat in the back.
Dog restraints/cage in the boot 😅
My mom thinks I drive too fast and corner too quickly. She just holds the "Holy shit handle" when she gets nervous though lol
The last time I rode with my mom she listed every fatal car crash she had ever witnessed in great detail. I'm talking human heads in the road. We were about to pull onto the highway and I asked her to stop talking about it because it was giving me anxiety. She laughed and continued.
I was driving my dad to the airport, which was in the city I lived in for a decade, 45 minutes away from his house. After he reached over and tried to adjust my windshield wipers (not raining), lights, and accidentally set off my hazard lights, I pulled over and gave him the keys and asked him to drive if he wasn’t comfortable with me doing so. We didn’t talk for almost a month after that.
I drove my biological grandmother home one time, and stopped on the side of the highway when she kept yelling at me about crashing. I was going the speed limit on the far right lane, and had never gotten into an accident. She’s gotten into several in her massive truck.
Yelled that I was going to have her walk home if she keeps risking the safety of my kids because she can’t get over being a terrified control freak. She shut up, but god, it was so unnecessary.
What's with the freaking out in cars? My mom does that. I've never been a speeder, never had a ticket, and I'm in my 40s. When I take my mom to the store I've had her literally gasp and put her hands in front of her face like she thought we were going to crash. We were just driving down the road at the correct speed. No reason at all for the reaction. Everything is so overly dramatized.
Mine refuses to wear her glasses and her depth perception is non existent…. Brake lights blocks ahead and the squealing starts
My work is connected to an optometry practice. The number of boomers out there that think they “see fine” but shouldn’t be on the road (with or without glasses) scares the crap out of me.
There have been numerous attempts to test the elderly to keep the car keys. Every time AARP lobbyists descend on Congress like flying monkeys. As we have more and more blind and addled Boomers causing horrific accidents maybe things will change.
My grandma kept her keys way longer then she needed to. She once drove on the wrong side of the road towards incoming traffic at night with me and my cousin in the car when we were teens until we yelled what she was doing. My aunt took her keys away at that point.
Wait is that what causes that? My wife does the same thing and only wears glasses driving at night. Maybe they need to be part of her passenger princess outfit too?
Can be. Without good depth perception, everything looks like it's right in front of you. It's pretty scary.
Yeah, my mom clings to the door handle and winces during turns. The rest of the time she’s going “ahhhhh!” when we go over 30mph.
Pretty much my mum when anyone else is driving
If she's driving? 70 everywhere and leans across to grab something from dash.
Ridiculous
Mine does the exact same thing!
My mom has done this my entire life but gotten worse with age. When I was practicing for my license, we'd be on top of a hill about 1/4-1/2 mile away from the bottom/valley where there's a raccoon. She would scream bloody murder every time "GET OUT OF THE ROAD!!! MOVE!! GET OUT OF THE WAY!!" without ever telling me she saw anything- just immediately into screaming. We always had plenty of room to fully stop before nearing any animal, but she'd act like I was about to run down her own mother in the road. And even now, with me and my partner who's almost 30 (and literally has almost a decade of experience in various driving jobs including transporting seniors to and from the nursing home to wherever they needed to go so he was VERY experience with boomers) my mom still shouts "DEER! THERES A DEER!!!" and acts surprised we already see it and are not in mortal terror over the deer standing in the field next to the road.
Mine does that too. I feel bad, last time we drove I yelled at her to stop because she was making me, a normally fairly calm driver, super anxious driving through heavy traffic. Like, the car bounces next to us going over a bump and she screams like we just hit something. Drives me up the wall.
It sounds like you should stop driving your mom around for your own sake
Yep, I won't do it anymore.
Because my mom is like that too and I hated it, I promised myself I would never do that to my kid, and I have kept my promise, I think it will make them better drivers, because this lack of confidence our parents showed us can’t be good.
"This lack of confidence our parents showed us can't be good"
Seriously. Not a driving story, but definitely lack of confidence.
Had friends decide to end their romantic ties... we still love them both and agreed to help the one move.
Well, friend that was moving also enlisted the help of his mom. She is lovely and she brought a whole trailer of furniture for him.. including a huge heavy wardrobe. He is moving to the second floor.
So my dude is above and friend is below, wardrobe in between. They are taking it slow and steady a few step at a time. No reason to rush.
His mom is standing behind at the bottom of the stairs. She starts whimpering. I see friend's face start to tense.
"Aren't you worried?!" she asks me.
"NOPE! They got this!!!"I cheered
Friend turned and gave me a big smile, and they got it the rest of the way up.
Why are they so dramatic in a passive aggressive way???
I personally suspect it’s about control. By freaking out like that, they’re making it all about themselves. They are making everyone else around them have to stop, accommodate them and their fear, calm them down, and still do whatever it is needs doing that caused them to freak out in the first place. Remember, the original name for Boomers was “the Me Generation.” They can’t handle the fact that they aren’t the ones in control of a given situation and thus have to make it everyone else’s problem.
This is so true!
Same here. My mom never had any confidence in me, reacted like OP's mom for everything. Over dramatic. Still like that. Now in my 30s, I have no self esteem and my confidence is nonexistent. I won't do that to my son, man, it destroyed my entire life. I cant make even a small decision without worrying that I am over or under reacting. I have no confidence in anything I do. I cant let my kid experience the same thing. I hold it all in until he is asleep and then I have anxiety and freak outs.
This is why my stepdad taught us kids how to drive and not my mom.
I’m the oldest. Mom tried with me a few times and both of us were just like “I cant do this.”
I’m only 26 now, so not much time has passed in the grand scheme of things. But mom has since stopped freaking out in the car if one of us kids is driving.
I can’t speak for your mother, but mine is a control freak and I think she just spazzes out in cars when she’s not in control. The thing I always found annoying about it was, whenever the two of them traveled or we traveled as a family, my stepdad drove everywhere and she freaked out, constantly. Like, she knows how to drive, so maybe if she hates other people’s driving, she should just drive everywhere?
Aging humans can feel the decrease in their control over their own lives and the world in general. This is especially true when poor health and/or frailty enters the picture. They become acutely sensitive and reactive to potential dangers while simultaneously losing brain processing speed and the ability to think while taking in information. Growing old and slowly dying is a scary and humbling process. Thank goodness my parents were lovely, kind boomers who gave and earned compassion and caring even when they were at the peak of health and personal power/impact.
As my boomer parents aged and health with chronic illnesses and cancers treatments, we learned to let them drive to their health appointments so they felt more control over their Healthcare, even when this meant leaving far earlier than we would on our own and taking routes that we wouldn't have chosen. We usually drove back, following our parent's chosen route and driving as if we had an open aquarium in the back seat that could spill. My Mom especially appreciated me narrating my actions as I drove so she could anticipate the stops and starts.
F#ck cancer.
It's the anniversary of my brother's death from cancer. I'll second the f#ck cancer!
Hugs. I hope you are comforted by doing something to pay tribute to your brother. We focus on food- eat banana Popsicles to honor Mom, beans and cornbread to honor Dad.
That is so sweet. Hugs to you, too.
I'm a Gen X parent. Something happened to me some years ago, and somehow, I ended up having this huge anxiety problem with driving or riding in a car. Sometimes, it's worse than other times.
I've annoyed my son a few times by freaking out, but most of the time, I can mask the anxiety so that he doesn't notice.
It's 100% not my son's driving that's the problem. I actually have a lot of faith in him as a driver. Traffic gives me anxiety, and sometimes the feeling of the car being on an incline or curve gives me feelings of vertigo, and like we're on the verge of rolling the car.
I'm not sure what caused this. I used to have a love of driving and felt totally confident as a driver and as a passenger. Now, the thought of driving also freaks me out, and I can't stop thinking about my odds on the road. My father used to tell me before he died that my luck was going to run out, and the odds would catch up with me on the road.
When I was 19 and 20, I lived with an alcoholic uncle who liked to drive drunk in terrible road conditions to terrify me and my cousin. He had DUIs and a car, but no license. He would make one of us drive him, and then he would take over the car fully loaded. Sometimes, he would take over on the super windy lake roads that were notorious for claiming lives. Other times, he would do donuts in an icy parking lot late at night while so drunk he barely knew who he was.
It seems almost like my brain sat on that trauma and didn't let it affect me for about 15 years. Then, somehow, it got triggered, and I now struggle to undo it.
When this anxiety triggered, I was driving us in the mountains of Colorado, and I kept feeling like we were going to just fall right off the mountain.
I don't know you guys' moms/parents. I don't know if they're being overly dramatic or trying to manipulate you with their reactions to your driving. Or maybe they also started having some kind of anxiety problem with being in a vehicle like I did. If so, the gasps and clutching handles is probably not actually related to how you're driving at all. The mind just creates the worst scenarios over and over. Every bumper seems like it's going to collide. Every sharp turn feels like the tires are leaving the road.
Wow, this comment is so comforting and familiar to me, right down to driving in Colorado triggering the driving anxiety! Was it The Million Dollar Highway? So beautiful, but so scary! It sucks because my husband and I used to love going on long drives and exploring. Now, it’s just too stressful for me. And, I can’t just close my eyes, because any sudden movement or braking, etc. will have the same panicked reaction from me.
When I was learning to drive, my mom was a fan of the piercing scream directly into my ear. I don't know why she thought it made stressful situations any less stressful, or if she actively wanted me to jerk the steering wheel while I was trying to get away from the godawful noise she was producing.
My dad does this too. He's been in 4 accidents in as many years. I've been in 3 in the 30ish years I've been driving. I've never even had a speeding ticket. He thinks that the speed limit is too high and does 55 in a 75. I said that's a good way to die and to cause more accidents. He said that then they shouldn't be driving if they can't handle him doing the optional speed. I said that 20 miles below the speed limit isn't but he sold it was for gas. I gave up. Seriously they need to have yearly driving tests for senior citizens.
We literally had to hire a teacher for me to learn how to drive a car because 1) My mother is such a horrible teacher in the first place that literally the only skill I think she's ever actually taught me was how to tie my shoes, and 2) She completely flips out when I'm driving. Even now that I know how to drive, she will actively flinch, scream, and one time grabbed and yanked the steering wheel while I was driving. I'm fully willing to admit I'm not a particularly good driver, I find it tedious and boring and wouldn't do it if I didn't have to, but I'm not that bad.
My grandmother used to do that. When I was new driver it really made me anxious. She was the greatest gen, so I don’t think it’s a boomer thing, I think it’s a getting older and not having control thing.
This sounds like my Mom! Every time my family is around her we get absolutely grilled with questions like she’s the FBI. If you’re there for five days you’ll have had probably 10 minutes of silence. Every single drop of air is filled with her chit chat and questions. We try not to go out to eat because of the rude questions she asks staff.
My ex boyfriend’s mom was so rude to restaurant staff! On a couple of occasions when she was particularly moody, I’d sneak off to the bathroom when I saw the server coming towards our table because I was embarrassed to seemingly condone her behavior. I’d slip extra tip $ on the table as we were leaving, too. My apology for having to put up with us 🫣
You’re describing my boomer stepfather!! lol
I always make sure to bring extra cash with me when our family goes out to eat together — I do the same thing! I drop an extra $15-20 on the table as we are leaving.
Their rudeness is soooo embarrassing!
Why are they SO uncomfortable with silence???
Dude i don’t know. My mom is a CONSTANT talker. I mean from the moment she wakes up to the moment she passes out from sheer exhaustion its a CONSTANT stream of consciousness coming out of her mouth. I told her one time that ‘im just not in the mood for much conversation right now’ when i was feeling i’ll and she treated me like absolute shit for the rest of the day and night.
My friends mom is like this. My friend is like me and very prone to migraines and her mother will not stop talking to her while she needs silence and rest. Like fully standing in her bedroom door with a cup of coffee in hand talking about her horse while my friend is sweating bullets and holding a bucket for dear life.
I use to get horrible migraines too. Im talking suicidal from how bad they were. I once told my mom i needed silence and she just could not stop talking. I asked her to PLEASE stop! But she just cannot do it. Its impossible for her to not speak. Then of course im the AH when i get upset.
I was literally recovering from a migraine as I wrote that comment. I’ve been at my friends and her mother has literally been the trigger of migraines in the past. Talks like a video game machine gun with infinite ammo. And gets super offended if she’s asked to lower her voice or maybe just give my friend and I 1 on 1 time. Just totally unaware of her behaviour and it’s impact on others.
Edit:
Added to say, I’m sorry you had those experiences with your mom. It’s exhausting.
Its beyond exhausting. I just don’t understand how they don’t have the self awareness to think ‘maybe im being annoying or maybe i do need to tone it down for a while?’ Or that they don’t understand that other people can have differing personalities like introverted tendencies rather than extroverted.
I’ve told my mom so many times I don’t feel like talking or just need quiet and she’ll be like “Oh. Okay okay” and I can see her sitting trying so hard to stay quiet and watch the show etc for a few minutes and then it’s like she physically can’t hold it in and suddenly she’s like “So okay…today my colleague Karen….blah blah”. Ugh so frustrating. The constant talking is super overwhelming to me tbh and it makes me anxious so I sort of internally retreat…which makes her talk more or chase me more as she’s so desperate for connection …vicious cycle.
Dude my mom wakes me up talking
She comes in my room and looms over the bed petting the cat, 'whispering' at it, which of course wakes me up so TIME TO TALK. And if the 'whispering' doesn't, the way she shakes the bed when she pets the cat does
It's infuriating. But I'm the one who 'can't talk like a Normal person'
My mom does this thing where she will yell my name to wake me up if she feels i need to be awake to talk about something. Then start talking in a normal voice. Which the yelling my name startles me awake, raises my heart rate instantly being woken up in a panic and wonders why id be upset when she does this. It happens often and i fucking hate it.
I'm convinced I'm so quiet, introverted, and awkward with groups because my mother never allowed me to develop conversation skills. For 18 years of my life I spent just listening to someone as I nodded not expected to contribute.
You are not part of the conversation. You sit there as she rambles for, no joke, up to two hours straight without interruption. If you do manage to speak she will not acknowledge it, say "that's nice", and continue her detailed update of my fifth cousin twice removed that she swears I know and remember.
To me learning conversation was sitting there quietly while someone overpowers you verbally, or watching strangers become deeply uncomfortable and annoyed. So now I associate speaking to people as bothering them.
That gets me irritated to no end. Constantly telling me stories or interactions between her and people i have not a single clue about like i know them too. She also has a problem with blabbering about anyones personal life to anyone thats around her. I have asked my mother to stop this my entire life and she just wont. So i stopped telling her anything and she tried bow to question me about everything to get any info she can.
I had no idea other people had this issue with their mothers. It drives me crazy. I don’t let my mom visit unless my husband is here too so I can have a break. Otherwise she follows me around the house chatting or just making weird noises. It’s infuriating. Even at the movies!!
Honestly don’t understand it. And then she has the audacity to tell me she’s a INFP like me - like no way you’re an introvert mom. Honestly wonder why they’re like this? It seems somehow anxiety related in my moms case.
My mom is the same. My son is 5 and had speech delay so he still needs a moment to reply, to think of the words, and she gives him no space to respond before badgering him with more questions or filling in the answer for him. I have scolded her many times over it. "Give him a chance to answer!!"
This is my dad
She loudly gasps and clutches my arm every time she thinks we’re going to crash. I have my kids in the car, I didn’t even break 50km/h or get near anyone the entire trip.
My mother would grab my arm and scream, "Look out!" like that. At least she used to. I started slamming on the brakes (face to windshield hard) and excitedly asking, "What is it?!?" She'd ask why I stopped so quick and I'd tell her I was just taking her alarm seriously. It only took 3 rides for it to stop
PS of course I do it when no other cars are near.
This is just perfect. What a triumph
Genius call their bluff I like it
If she’s going to constantly touch/grab you while you drive, she needs to sit in the back from now on. Back passenger side. As far away from the driver as possible. She’s too dangerous to have in the car otherwise.
I have PTSD from an accident and I can’t always control myself so I sit in the back. I’m less annoying that way.
I probably do too and accidentally react violently sometimes when people try to grab towards me suddenly like that.
Agreed!!
My mother was like that. My cousin had a house on Lake George, and he and his wife invited the extended family for a week. I was tasked with bringing my mother. Faced with the prospect of driving for five hours while having one long, continuous panic attack, I got desperate.
I made up a fictitious circle of friends from when I was in the Navy, and claimed that they were all meeting up in Albany the weekend my mother and I were supposed to make the trip. I actually drove to Albany and spent the night in a hotel in order to sell the story. My other cousin ended up giving my mother a ride.
I stayed overnight in Albany once. Hotel was hosting a nurses convention. One of the best memories of my life.
I agree with the other commenter, you two need a heart to heart about this situation
That being understood, I know what you mean. My mom has ADHD, anxiety, and (potentially, they’re in the middle of running tests) autism. She is always late because she insists that she is ready to go until everyone else is— but then we learn that she isn’t and she’ll sprint through the house locating/losing all her crap while doing random chores that don’t need to be done. All the while she is constantly screaming at everyone to hurry up/we’re late and always ends up blaming her lateness on someone else (god forbid you run inside one time, even if your still ready before her she’ll blame the lateness on you) imagine this effect amplified 1000% when traveling. I don’t think my family has ever left within 2 hours of being on time because my mom will not pack until it’s time to leave then have a meltdown about all the shit she can’t find as she packs more and more unnecessary junk until the back of the car instead of packing her own stuff.
She also has zero patience, sometimes she wouldn’t even be able to finish telling me what she wanted me to do before she got frustrated and did it herself. She would also give commands rapid fire and expect you to due them in reverse order since the last thing she said is “on her mind last.” (Keep in mind, she would almost never finish her full sentence when giving an order before making a new one, which itself was usually contradictory) or she would get impatient and throw a fit. Also When she is waiting for me to make a choice she did the same thing your mom did. If she was doing nothing, she would pester you constantly without even a second to think then snap because we’re taking too long.
She couldn’t multitask at all. Just yesterday I asked her to call AAA on my phone to cancel a roadside assistance (which is urgent so I don’t get billed) because I was driving. When she tried to she immediately panicked because my dad called her at the same time (on her own phone) and instead of hanging up and calling AAA anyways or picking up dads call she threw a meltdown because she didn’t know what to do and demanded I pull off on the side of the highway because she “couldn’t think while we are driving” (and then she proceeded to rearrange my car on the side of the highway as I called AAA and got the map to the next destination open)
She also did the repeating thing, unless you loudly verbally acknowledged what she was saying then held a conversation with her about it she would repeat the same line over and over again.
During all of this her body language would be similar to Tweak from South Park. Her body language was extremely neurotic and anxiety inducing on its own.
Being around her growing up was like watching someone have the largest panic attack the moment they needed to do anything at all. There was never doing anything calmly. The moment you asked something she would panic. It’s hard to describe to someone just how negatively it affects me because each incident is small, but it’s every second of every day spent with her you have to step around a mountain of eggshells to not trigger a breakdown.
It sucks balls
(Note: my mom is gen X, but a similar enough situation. DM me if you want to talk more about it)
That sounds so stressful. Also, your mother desperately needs tools to help her.
This sounds just like my friend! I love her to death but the anxiety is palpable and just kicks mine into overdrive as well. The last time I was with her I told her she’s anxieting all over the place and driving me crazy!
I couldn’t deal with this shit.
fuck, I feel like having a panic attack just from reading this. I'm sorry you had to deal with all of this =/
This sounds very comparable to my own mother. My mother is early Gen X. I empathize with how it's shaped you over time and as an adult. It's exhausting, even when you're not in their presence and even when you go longer periods without seeing them. The long term effects of being raised by a parent like this are so insidious and covert. Sending you strength and positive vibes.
oh my God, this is my mom. I grew up thinking life was an endless panicked speed run until I got older.
Yeah, for me my first “adult surprise” m was learning just how easy many of the things my mom freaked out over were. All it really took was a moment to sort tasks and take a chill pill then everything usually turned out to be easy / took half the time I expected.
Son? Ok I am an old genz too and although not quite the shitshow I have to say i wish Reddit had been around many an eon ago as I read through things sometimes and when you look at it from the outside, at least for me it collides. I don’t want my son posting on any internet page what a freaking walking disaster he has for a mom. I am so thankful despite it all we managed to raise a wonderful decent man whom still loves and tolerates his hot mess of parentage.
Btw…can’t drive with my 80 yr mom either oh god!
You described my mom basically to the habit. I give you a lot of credit for still interfacing with her so regularly - I live a thousand miles from mine to keep my peace .
Sounds so much like my mother. Drives me nuts. Nothing is her fault, sees no reason to get therapy or even attempt to address her behavior. Absolutely refuses to do any self reflection and generally makes my already neuro spicy brain want to explode.
This is the part that kills me.
I’ve told my mom- there are things that can make your life easier and help you deal with the world and she REFUSES.
Just, what?!?
Fine. Suffer. But you’ll have to do it without me because JFC, it’s too much.
SAME. Except it’s my MIL. She semi-accepts she has an issue on occasion, but is convinced she can pray it away or take new vitamin to fix it. And I feel so bad for her, because her panic is just over the top.
The empathy part is so hard and my major struggle. I've had to work on and been given so much shit for the same traits. It's frustrating to deal with someone who won't even do the bare minimum.
Oh, you are right on. I say here I feel bad for her, because I do (anxiety is terrible; I have it too!) What I didn’t say is how often I’m pissed off at her for more or less choosing to live this way. Like, sure, pray for healing, but if you believe in God, don’t you believe they sent doctors and made science? It’s HUGELY frustrating!
Husband and I had that convo with my MIL last summer bc she was behaving almost exactly like your mother. The result was that she spent the rest of the summer endlessly complaining about me to her son for having an opinion on how poorly she had been treating both of us since her husband died.
Eventually I told her we probably just shouldn’t interact anymore and she agreed. Well, now I’m pregnant with her first grandchild and it’s finally motivated her to take more control of her mental health… all I can say at this point is thank goodness for lithium lol
I wouldn’t let her around my kids personally. The functioning alcoholic part is already a hard no.
Same.
His kids don't benefit from this kind of exposure.
At least she doesn’t drive. One of the few that recognizes that she’s a danger behind the wheel. Usually they are too bullheaded to stop driving.
We have a grandparent like this. Won’t let the kids think for themselves. They have to give an IMMEDIATE answer. I always stop her and say to my child “you can take your time and pick what you really want buddy” and then she’ll start in again and I’m like NO let them think and choose!
Because it’s not what your kid wants, it’s what the grandparent thinks your kid needs.
Absolutely! She’s from the generation that sees children as an extension of themselves and not as their own person. And I’m the absolute opposite. My spouse and I want them to be independent and form their own opinions and it’s a constant battle with her.
This is textbook alcoholic behavior, not limited to boomers. A lot of boomers were/are alcoholics, but it’s definitely more indicative of not-so-functional alcoholism. I have dealt with alcoholics in my family, none of whom were boomers, and this is exactly how car rides and outings would go.
1) anxiety and over-reactions during the car ride 2) insisting on last minute changes of plans (usually adding a stop or insisting on a specific place to stop) 3) hyper focusing on said stop 4) perceiving there’s plenty of time even when you need to be somewhere else 5) not waiting for responses to a question, or not processing the response and asking again and again (multiple choices of shoes without waiting for response) 6) topics of conversation are stuck on repeat: says the same thing over and over, loudly, and any attempt at conversation is met with a short pause, then repeating same argument in a different way as if your response didn’t address their concern.
Are you sure it's just the alcohol? My mother cannot drink alcohol (religious reasons) and she has done all of this.
Maybe the alcohol is sometimes an attempt to self-medicate? I have family like this who are alcoholics and some who never drank.
Good point! Some of these behaviors are classic anxiety symptoms, while others are symptoms of not processing information or conversation in a typical manner. When a person displays these symptoms after not previously having them to this degree, it’s worth looking at why.
Alcoholism is connected to anxiety, either a symptom of or reaction to it, or the alcoholism leads to anxiety symptoms. All these symptoms together consistently seems to indicate alcoholism. While you said your mom “has done all of these” I’m curious if she does them all at the same time or has done each of them separately or a few behaviors together. Another commenter said these are similar to their mom’s menopause symptoms.
These behaviors are therefore typical in alcoholics
"functioning alcoholic" is never fully true.
Riight?? It’s only “functional” because people don’t always connect the erratic behavior to alcoholism.
Yeh this read she’d had too much to drink to me. Drunk people act like this
This sounds like it might be more about her being an alcoholic than a boomer. She really needs help, mate, even if she is “functioning”. A functioning alcoholic is still an alcoholic.
It won’t be a miracle fix obviously but it may make experiences like these less severe and even less frequent.
People can get very annoying and childlike when they are drunk, and completely unable to take others reactions to them into account. I consider myself a pretty irritating person to be around when I drink lol one of the many reasons I do not drink anymore
A "functioning" alcoholic who is doing damage to OP's family...look what she did to that poor little boy!
OP needs help to learn how to protect his family from this fuckery. Can you imagine the outcome if she spooked him while driving and he loss control with his two little kids in the car?
Adult Children of Alcoholics. Look it up, OP. Get yourself some help before you allow her to hurt you young family further.
This isn't a boomer problem. This is an alcoholic problem. You need to act, OP.
Yes - exactly this. It’s common for alcoholism to read like anxiety and childlike decision making. Well said, PetGhost!
Go to an ACA meeting.
🙌
She’s a “functioning alcoholic”. Does that mean she was under the influence during this time with her? If so, that has a lot more to do with her behavior rather than her age.
they are fucked in the head. That's what is wrong with this generation.
Trauma, poor mental health, Long-Term substance use, and Lead poisoning. 90% of children born in the U.S. between 1950 and 1981 had blood-lead levels higher than the CDC threshold.
This episode of cosmos tells you about the discovery of the age of the Earth but also about the lead The entire world was exposed to in the 20th century. It's a worthwhile watch. Cosmos: the Clean Room
My mom used to do the whole gasp in the car thing. I finally had to actually blow up at her. She wouldn't stop otherwise. I mean, I feel bad that I went nuclear, but her gasping (like full on :we are going to crash ohmygodohmygod!!!!: gasp) was giving me anxiety while driving and caused me to slam the brakes a couple of times. I finally yelled at her and went full on NO!! THATS ENOUGH YOU ARE GOING TO CAUSE AN ACCIDENT!!!!! THIS STOPS RIGHT NOW!!!
:shrug: and I'm not a bad driver, never been in an accident I obey traffic laws and keep my speed where it should be :shrug: she does this to my dad too 🙄
This reminds me of when in 2016, I drove with my alcoholic mother from Connecticut to South Carolina for my paternal grandmother’s funeral. I was 36 and perfectly capable of making the drive myself but my dad (divorced from my mom since I was 3 and unnecessarily worried about me making the drive solo) went behind my back and had my mom invite herself along for the trip, under the guise of “wanting to pay her respects”. Neither he, nor I, knew just how bad her alcoholism was at the time.
Friends, it was 5 days of pure Hell. She delayed our departure by 24 hours (I was about to just leave without her but somehow she was miraculously “ready” right then). She refused to put her stinky-ass boxed White Zinfandel in the trunk, even though I told her that I would be screwed legally if I got pulled over, even with zero alcohol in my system. She was like “don’t worry, I’ll just put it in the back seat and cover it with my jacket” (cuz cops have NEVER seen that trick before). She was drinking the “wine” from a 16 oz uncovered tumbler meant for iced tea or lemonade and kept putting the cup in the center console cup holder, which was very much within my reach. I asked her to use the cup holder just behind the passenger seat, she refused because it was “too hard to reach”. My car reeked of “wine”. To this day, the smell of White Zinfandel turns my stomach.
She made every aspect of the trip a pain in the ass. She fucked with my stereo and climate control. If a song came on that wasn’t her style, she would use her phone to blast a song of her choice without ear buds. Somewhere near Baltimore, she was so drunk that she shit herself on her way into a rest stop. I called my dad and my husband when we finally got to a hotel (thankfully she paid for that) and was crying hysterical tears the whole time I talked to them. Meanwhile, she kept posting on Facebook about how great it was to be spending time with her “awesome daughter” and “riding in her wicked cool car” (2015 VW GTI 2-door, 6 speed manual). Her FB posts made it sound like we were Thelma and friggin’ Louise instead of going to bury my Grandma.
Her friends knew how bad she was and knew that she would be accompanying me on the trip for nearly 2 days before I picked her up. They all knew how to contact me. None of them had the courtesy to warn me about what I was getting into. The only reason I wasn’t aware of how bad she was is because I didn’t see her much (I live in Maine and rarely went to CT; she never came to visit us the whole 8 years we lived away from her before she died). She would ignore my phone calls when she was drunk/high and only called me back in the early morning hours when she was semi-sober.
I’m sorry for the long post, but I could write a book about all that happened on that trip. A lot more occurred than what I’ve described. Once the funeral was over, I left South Carolina and drove back to Connecticut without stopping. By the time I got home to Maine, I had been on the road for 24 hours without stopping for sleep or rest. I only stopped for food, drinks, gas, or the bathroom. I just wanted to get her the Hell away from me before I throttled her.
I knew after spending that time with her that she would be dead within a year or two. I was right.
I always thought my mom was a very anxious person, but reading some of these stories/responses makes me realize she's not that bad. At least I've become accustomed to her usual panics.
she loudly gasps and clutches my arm every time she thinks we’re going to crash
Why in the hell would anybody with half a brain grab the driver’s ARM?!
She just lost all rights to sit in the front seat. If there isn’t enough room in the back because of kids, then guess what, she doesn’t get to go.
My mother did this all the time, never had a licence but man, what a backseat driver
So I was diagnosed autistic at age 30. I've never had a driver's license. However, I still can't tell if I was unable to be taught to drive because I was 100% too bad at driving, or if it was because it takes extreme diligence and focus for me to learn something new, and my mom kept gasping, grabbing me, yelling things, etc.
The last time I tried to drive, I was about 25. My mom had me practice by driving to the craft store. It was supposed to be a calm, easy drive. She gasped and white-knuckle gripped her door handle the entire time. When I asked her what was wrong, she said, 'You're too close to the white line! You're too close!' So I gently steered slightly to the right. She gasped again. 'You're too close to the curb!' I was literally in the middle of the lane.
I pulled over, in tears, and told her I was done.
Try again, with a professional instructor.
Or even someone else.
Idk, whenever I've drove with other family members when I was younger I did fine. When I drove with her, anxiety.
You need to get better at telling your mom "No" and sticking to it.
This is going to sound harsh, but it's because I have a similarly abusive mom. You have to prioritize your kids here. Your mom knows she has a problem. She could get herself help if she wanted to.
You weren't planning on taking her shoe shopping, and every parent knows how much shoe shopping sucks with small kids, so why did you go? What would have been the actual consequences of saying "no, we're not going shoe shopping today. If you need new shoes, I can take you shopping another time - how about X day?"
Would she have been upset? Cried? Yelled at you?
Probably. So instead of dealing with a grown adult having a meltdown, you let her push your young son into a panicked crying fit. And she wouldn't stop her bad behavior even when he was crying.
But hey, at least she didn't make a scene, right?
I'm sure your kids also enjoyed their lunch with Grandma, watching her mess with your food and yell rude insults about the wait staff. They probably had so much fun watching their Grandma bully their dad. I bet that made them feel so safe.
(Sarcasm, to be clear.)
Look, you can't force your mom to change. You can encourage her to get help, especially with her alcoholism. But you can't make her.
What you can do is protect your kids. Grandma should have had consequences for her bad behavior. She won't stop grabbing your arm and distracting you as the driver? Then she either sits in the back or you take her back home, since she's obviously so uncomfortable being driven around by you.
She hounds your kid in the store and overloads him with choices? You give her one warning to back off and give him space to think. If she does it again, you leave. Tell her, "You're upsetting my kid, and that is not acceptable. We can try shopping another time when you're ready to behave like an adult." Free shoes aren't worth the trauma she's inflicting on your son.
If she keeps up her bad behavior throughout a family excursion? Take her home, ffs. Spend time with her without the kids, if you're worried about her being lonely. Your kids are not her emotional support animals. If you want to put yourself in that position, go for it, but don't let her traumatize your kids to assuage your conscience.
Honestly, man, this sounds a lot more like symptoms of menopause and anxiety buried under the symptoms of alcoholism. I'm sure she's also annoying AF, but I worked in mental health with people her age who had substance use issues, and she sounds pretty typical. I bet if you could get her to a doctor to talk about the menopause and the anxiety, meds would make a world of difference. I'm in early menopause and it's making me stupid and anxious and paranoid and mean and dramatic - does that sound familiar?
Then, when she doesn't take the meds because "only lower class people do things like that" come back and post because that's pure Boomer, lol
Please don’t expose your children more often than you have to because I can’t imagine it’s fun for them
And maybe if you want to do something with her, just send her the money to Uber there and back so that you won’t have to put up with her in the car
Nightmare mom it sounds.
If she bitches about stuff, I think you’re within your rights to mention her alcoholism every time the subject comes up
MENTAL DECLINE
Theyre all aging and getting dementia, and your moms alcohol use is not helping.
As someone with an anxious mother in that age bracket, I think part of it is that generation still believes mental health issues are not to be talked about, not to be treated, and seen as shameful. I was an anxious child, and when I became an adult, I started learning about anxiety and have gone to therapy over a few stretches of time in my life. I can internally monitor my anxiety and either talk about it out loud, or comfort myself.
Because that generation (typically) did not acknowledge or treat their depression, anxiety, anger, addictions, etc., the generations after them can SEE the mental health issues, and also recognize how annoying and disturbing it is, while being frustrated that they expect the rest of us to just deal with them, because "that's just how I am."
One of the most important tools I have learned in therapy is setting boundaries, and the more I do it, the better I get at it. When someone acts in a way that is uncomfortable to me, or rude, demanding, and so on, I can now say, "Don't do that." It may not change how they act next time, but for myself, it's an important step in taking care of myself by being clear to someone who's treating me poorly.
My mom is so dependent on her Xanax that when she runs out a few days early it's like dealing with an anxious toddler with no grip on reality.
My son is currently in D.C with his safety patrol group. In the months leading up to this trip, she's made a complete fool out of herself. Crying and carrying on about the "state" of D.C. and how unsafe it was because of the Free Palestine rallies. She was crying to the trip leader about her "baby" going that far with everything going on. 🙄 She embarrassed the hell out of me and my son.
Don't even get me started on how she'll argue that the end is nigh because of everything happening.
I exposed my kids to this and unfortunately my daughter picked it up.
My mom would do the car craziness untill we figure out she could be watch waze on her tablet and not watch the road.
Ugh! I can relate. My dad isn't quite this bad but just yesterday I told him about planning to borrow his ryobi mower (they're currently up north for the summer so it's not like he's using it) and he said that he didn't know about that and I asked why and he spluttered..."but you haven't read the owners manual! Are there any rocks? You could ruin the blades!" I had to remind him that I'm a fully functioning 50 something year old responsible adult and I will hop online and consult the manual on starting and operating it before I operate it. I have never given him reason to suspect I can't take care of things, especially other people's things. His first reaction to anything though is anxiety and doubt. Even things that literally don't involve him or his things (he always shits on any of my ideas for myself because he only sees the flaws in things - it's really discouraging and irritating.)
This is my mom. Jumps to the negative immediately about everything and wonders why their friends don’t reach out as much anymore.
My mom finds that my husband drives very fast (he's going the correct speed limit) and doesn't stop commenting on it from the back seat the whole ride. I eventually told her to just close her eyes if she's nervous and to stop backseat driving cause it's extremely distracting.
Meanwhile, when she drives she's literally constantly on the line taking up two lanes, makes painfully slow, overly wide turns (into oncoming traffic lanes), doesn't put on turning signals, and drives in the left lane significantly under the speed limit.
Zero self awareness.
My dad does this to me while I drive and one time it got so bad that I just pulled over and told him that if he can't be a respectful passenger that he'd have to drive to for the rest of the day. He finally piped down and let us get to our destination but I made him drive home because I "didn't want him to feel uncomfortable or unsafe". Straight up gentle parenting my own father 🙃
Try Al-Anon. It saved my life. Seriously.
Was recently driving with my mom as well, coming up to a stoplight, I see the cars in front of me braking. I’m in the middle of saying something to her and without any hesitation she gasps super loud and throws her arms up in an X shape like I’m about to slam into the person in front of me w no regard for anything. Caught me so off guard that all I could say is I’m never taking her anywhere again if she’s going to treat me like a brand new, 15 YO driver. I’m 27… idk why but it irked me so fucking bad. As if I’m the bad driver between the two of us 🤦🏻♂️
She didn't wanna buy your kids sandals, she wanted to make it seem like you were all shopping so she couldn't be called selfish for making everyone make that unnecessary stop.
She didn't wanna get anything at the burger place because it was something she didn't decide to stop for, so she's not gonna participate. So she can act like you all were making an unnecessary stop. That's why she sat there and tried to ruin it the entire time.
Your mom sounds like a deeply depressed person who needs help. In the meantime, I hope you keep your kids at a distance from her, because they don't deserve to have their happiness compromised by someone who seems to only want everyone to share her misery.
Omg this is my MIL. She isn’t an alcoholic but she worries. ABOUT EVERYTHING.
I can’t even share anything with her because she’ll state a worry/concern/unsolicited advice
It’s so exhausting
Your first mistake was giving in to your mother’s demand to go shoe shopping You had both kids in movies mode and instead went to a store?? Sorry but you need to learn to say no to her demands.
Why are you taking her out anywhere? Especially exposing your kids to that to the point that one of them breaks down?! Leave her home and let her cause problems there
Im 66 and I have no trouble sleeping when my daughter drives, we take vacations together, live together and chat at home for hours. She expecting her first baby and I’ll miss her terribly when she and her fiancé find a place of their own. Also both my sons have said I can live with them when the time comes to downsize. Not all of us are awful.
I live on the coast, horrible storms that flood roads & down branches & such sometimes. I stfu & let my husband drive. I navigate if need be, but other than that, I leave the man alone. I never understand people touching the driver & freaking out.
I’ve been watching the Holistic Pyschologist (or therapist idk) on yt and she talks a lot about traumatic behavior and how they affect the children.
For example, she dissects people, usually mothers, who never learned to self sooth and regulate their emotions, people who let their anxieties control their lives — I think about this a lot.
Especially when I see my mother acting a fool like this. She’s gotten better (I think?) on the driving aspect I don’t drive with her much because she can’t get into my Jeep easily) but I live in an adu across the way from her and I can hear her loud emotional freak outs/fights with my dad. I can’t stand it.
But learning about these deregulated emotional responses have helped me to understand and recognize my own trauma responses — mine is emotional numbness. I have a distinct lack of reaction in stressful situations which can be a good thing but a lot of times I feel like I should be responding with more emotion. When I do I have to act overtly in the correct emotion. It doesn’t help I’m undiagnosed adhd and I’m 90% sure she is too, and probably autistic.
They’re perpetually panicked of something at every moment. Every choice is extremely consequential. If you don’t match their energy, they get irritated…like you’re the one being unreasonable. The sad thing is once they go down that path of being so high strung and detached from reality, there’s no going back.
My mum is a similar passenger, won't drive but criticises dads driving constantly whilst holding onto the Jesus bar with one hand and the seat with the other (they're both in their 70s). We're also not allowed to have the radio on in the car, something I only discovered half an hour into an 8 hour drive that had to be split between 2 days.
Whenever we go out to eat we always have to change tables for some unknown reason, usually moments after everyone has gotten comfortable. Then she'll comment on the appearance of staff and the furniture, whilst reminiscing on her last poor dining experience and how she can't find a nice danish pastry anywhere.
I had to grab the FILs steering wheel after he started to turn the wrong way down a divided street. I was yelling at him "Wong way! Wrong way! Hit the breaks! Stop!" as cars were barreling at us while he attempted to turn into them.
He said "what are you being so hysterical about?!" While accelerating into oncoming traffic. Finally one of those cars hit the horn, and he said "assholes! Oh, I didn't see them there"
What was he looking at?! His head was up! Could he not see??? He refused to check his eyes after, so I have to assume he's losing his mind and refuse to be in a car with him driving ever again.
But when he rides with me on a short trip to the store? He's flinging his arm across me at every standard intersection when I so much as think about touching the brakes and screaming "watch out" if cars get anywhere near us.
they are a fucking nightmare, my mom does the same shit and tries to compensate by buying people shit they didn't even ask for.
Although I agree she was being a bit much it does sound like some of her rubbed off on you. I say this because of your reaction to the burger. Why not just open it and use a knife to take some mayo off?
I’m not saying that to be mean but rather to point out that her overreacting to some things may have rubbed off on you in different ways and it’s hard to see that.
Lord knows some of my mom’s bad behaviours which I hated also rubbed off on me.
My boomer mother acts like this in the car. She also tries to slam on the brakes by hitting an imaginary pedal on the passenger side of the car if she thinks we’re too close to rear ending another car.
Put her in the back seat. That will help.
Making her walk would help more.
My mom as well as she drives like a goddamn maniac
Is she treated for her anxiety disorder? We finally got my dad on meds when he was 85. The difference was profound. He was also an alcoholic.
She was likely raised to believe all mental health is in your head and only weak people need help. It’s a tough thing to overcome.
I so wish my mom would’ve gotten onto anti anxiety meds and have gone into treatment for her alcoholism but that never happened and now she’s 70. I’m hardly ever around her now on purpose because she’s historically been so anxiety inducing to be around for reasons similar to what others posted here.
She’s horrible to be in the car with if you’re driving due to her being super worried about everything all the time and constantly expressing that in a dramatic fashion, for instance. If she’s driving, it’s scary for you because she drives as anxiously as she seems to feel, but that comes out as driving erratically (which makes zero fucking sense for someone who is terrified of crashing when they’re a passenger) 😑🤦🏽♀️
It’s really unfortunate how many of these highly neurotic and super stubborn people are Boomers, that we had to have for parents. Then they sit there and play dumb as to why we struggle so much like Jesus fucking Christ are you able to self reflect at all?!
Both of my parents are old ass Boomers who emotionally are children (and always have been). For some reason these people think procreating is the answer 🤨
It’s one thing to have a lot of psychological issues and to acknowledge that, get treatment, and work on developing coping skills. It’s another to have psychological issues and show that in every way you act and how you treat others- yet insist that you are fine. I’m sure those of you who were brought into the world by these train wrecks of humans, can relate when I say the end result of being a child of said humans is pure exhaustion.
This thread is causing me anxiety
My mom will drink and drive down curvy, hilly, backcountry roads going over the speed limit. But gasp and grab the handle or put her arm in front of me to hold me back, as if she’s stronger than a seatbelt, when I’m driving. I haven’t had a ticket in 17 years and I’ve never been in a crash that was my fault. 🤦🏻♀️
Sigh....as a 72 yr old woman there is a reason why I don't socialise with my own generation. Most are entitled or just plain crazy. My social circle is generally much younger than me. They are more fun and and are appreciative of me and my attitude.
Remember to report submissions that violate the rules! Harassment and encouraging violence are not allowed.
Enjoying the subreddit? Consider joining our discord server: https://discord.gg/v8z8jNwJs6
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.