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AIBU?

To be fed up of my mum's constant whinging and moaning?

73 replies

CiderBomb · 30/09/2013 13:15

My mum has always had a tendency to nag, but I've noticed over the past couple of years she gotten worse, to the point that she literally never ever stops moaning and complaining.

I feel a bit mean saying this, but it's relentless and I find being around so bloody draining because she never seems to stop for air. I wouldn't even mind if she actually had something going on in her life to moan about but she doesn't. She is semi retired and only works three mornings a week, owns her home and is mortgage free, has several holidays a year (I'm not kidding, she is always on fucking holiday!) and is in pretty good health for her age but it's like it's not enough and she never bloody stops fucking whinging and I'm finding it so hard not to just tell her to STFU!

I'd be here all day if I posted everything she whinges about, but I can give a few examples. Her house is apparently a dump, but it's not and people are always complimenting her on it. My dad and brother don't help enough around the house, but I can cast some light on that. Whenever they do help out they do it wrong and it's not good enough ( no one can do it as well as her) and I once spent an afternoon listening to her whinge about how my dad had emptied the dishwasher and put things back in the wrong places. The can't win basically. She is always stressed apparently, and moaning that she "needs a holiday" but she has more than Judith Chalmers! Christ I've not been on holiday for four years because I can't afford it!

Now she has a cold and I know that I'm going to have to listen to her complain about terrible she feels, like she had the Black Death rather than a splutter. Honestly I know people with awful things going on in their lives (terminal illness, bereavement, financial hardship) and they don't ever moan like she does!

AIBU to just wished she'd shut the fuck up?!

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Shellywelly1973 · 30/09/2013 13:44

Yanbu...

She sounds like hard work. Although it appears she doesn't want for anything, there is obviously a reason for her 'moaning'. If she was happy she wouldn't always be moaning.

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CiderBomb · 30/09/2013 13:53

I think she just likes moaning personally. I've suggested before that she takes up a hobby or does a course in something but she's just not interested.

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CaptainSweatPants · 30/09/2013 13:55

Do you talk to her everyday? I'd minimise contact if it's getting you down

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Gerragrippe · 30/09/2013 13:57

Maybe she is stressed and not happy...?

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urtwistingmymelonman · 30/09/2013 13:59

I cant stand this either.
im a get on with it person and cant feckin deal with whingers.
I have a couple of people like this in my life.

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CiderBomb · 30/09/2013 14:05

Captain, yes I do talk to her everyday. I just find her to be so negative, I can be in a great mood and then she'll drag me down with her moaning.

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EldritchCleavage · 30/09/2013 14:31

Have you ever asked her about it? In a gentle, but direct way?

These things shouldn't bother her so much. And constant negativity does suggest some underlying unhappiness or issue.

What does she say if you ever pull her up on it?

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CaptainSweatPants · 30/09/2013 14:34

Don't phone her every day
Life's too short

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DesperatelySeekingSedatives · 30/09/2013 14:40

She sounds deeply unhappy with her lot for some reason but yes it must be draining especially when her life is a lot easier than your own on paper at least. I'm quite ruthless and avoid people who moan all the time about sod all. I do talk to them (can only avoid my mother for so long!)

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CiderBomb · 30/09/2013 14:44

I don't ask about it because I know I'd only get my head bitten off if I did. If she is unhappy about something I've no idea why? I have noticed that she is prone to jealousy though, she has a chip on her shoulder about certain people she knows who apparently have "better houses" than her. Not quite sure what she means because as I've said, her house is very nice and more importantly it's her own house!

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sonlypuppyfat · 30/09/2013 14:48

I love my mum so very much, but, she hates and loathes Christmas I don't know why she only puts cash in a card for my 3 DCs and has to come round for her dinner but she goes on about it and I find that its all so negative when I've got young kids and we love it.

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ExcuseTypos · 30/09/2013 14:50

It sounds very draining for you she is either unhappy for a reason or just a bit of a 'everyone is better off than me and its not faaaaaair' type of person.

Could you gently ask her if she is ok as she quite often sounds unhappy with her life?

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ivykaty44 · 30/09/2013 15:54

I work with someone who is only happy if she has something to moan about, I think it must be awful for her family and she never mentions friends.

One day I offered her a solution to her particular moan that day and that stopped her in her tracks she was most upset!

I would take the Micky to your mums face and see if you can shame it out of her

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ivykaty44 · 30/09/2013 15:57

Some people strive to be happy even if a few thing go wrong they stay happy

Others are miserable if a few things go wrong and don't understand it happens to all of us to some degree

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HopeClearwater · 30/09/2013 16:24

YANBU. Sometimes people like this just get into a habit of moaning. Their brains run along the same lines all the time. Try being relentlessly cheerful and positive in answer to everything she says.

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redexpat · 30/09/2013 16:29

Or just tell her to say something positive or shut the fuck up.

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ithaka · 30/09/2013 16:31

My MIL is like this. Her life has been blessed, really, but she is a miserable old whingebag. I can't stand the woman and unsurprisingly, she has few friends and her family just tolerate her. I sometimes wonder why she exists, as it seems to bring her so little joy.

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ithaka · 30/09/2013 16:32

I should add, my MIL's existence brings herself and those around her little joy. She is a waste of oxygen. I am so sorry your mum is like this - I always pity my SIL having such a dreadful mum (SIL is lovely).

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Lazysuzanne · 30/09/2013 16:49

I think I'd try minimizing or limiting contact with her and when she gets into complaining mode try not to engage with the subject matter, just make a few non committal noises and then change the subject.

I appreciate it's not easy if you have gotten into a pattern of interaction where she starts moaning and then your blood starts to boil but if you can manage the way you respond you might be able to nudge her out of the rut?

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woozlebear · 30/09/2013 17:12

My mother is like this - she is a very unhappy person, but she has refused all offers of help for 30 years, and has NEVER done a single thing, or taken a single opportunity to change anything. I am now at a point of having absolutely zero sympathy.

She has 3 lovely holidays a year (about 7 weeks in total) and spends the rest of the time moaning about how she needs a rest. She doesn't work, and has a cleaner. She has no real hobbies or anything that takes up any time or energy, but is constantly moaning about how exhausted she is. She doesn't do a single thing other than garden and (with no discernable results) tidy the huge amounts of clutter in her house. Every time I ring her she spends 5 minutes telling me how she's been 'working' sooooo hard.


She has a large, beatiful house in a lovely location stuffed with beautiful things she loves but is always so jealous of what other people have and always wanting more. She has moaned about hating the house for 20 years but always finds excuses for not actually moving.

She wants for nothing, has lived an incredibly sheltered life but moans constantly about how awful the world and everyone in it is. She sees nothing but the negative in almost everything.

She spends about 23 hours a day criticising everything my father says and does. He either doesn't do what she wants, apparently, or does it wrong.

I know she's unhappy - she must be - but no one can do anything. It seems to go way beyond being unhappy - she seems to actively delight in being negative about everything.

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fluffyraggies · 30/09/2013 17:16

......... waiting for the first ''be glad you still have a mother'' post .........

Sympathies OP.

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CiderBomb · 30/09/2013 17:28

I know my dad thinks that she nags him, he's told me as much. So it's not just me who has to put up with it. My dad isn't perfect by any means, but he's hard working and a good husband and dad. She could have been married to a wife beating serial cheater FFS.

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Finola1step · 30/09/2013 17:32

Wow ithaka describing someone as "a waste of oxygen" is really quite cruel.

Cider it does sound like that your mother is a glass half empty kind of person. For some people, being in good health and being financially secure is not enough. Maybe she has a secret yearning for something that she never got to do. Maybe your mother's life didn't turn out as she had hoped. There are no end of possibilities for the frustration she may feel. But you can't change it or control it.

I suspect you will have to switch off more. I go through similar times with my sister. I am trying really hard to bounce back the moaning and tales of woe. I try cutting her off mid sentence with a question such as "so what are you going to do about it then?" Or "So why are you telling me?". It's slowly beginning to work, I think.

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JustinBsMum · 30/09/2013 17:40

I would sympathise very loudly and longly whenever you are with her in a very exaggerated way whenever she says anything, in the end she will probably get fed up listening to you and either keep away from you or stop moaning.

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ithaka · 30/09/2013 17:45

Wow ithaka describing someone as "a waste of oxygen" is really quite cruel.

Yes, it is. But when your own (ridiculously easy and prosperous life) brings you nothing but misery which you leach out to all unfortunate enough to be in your orbit like a dementor, you do have to question why someone even breathes when it brings us all, the person included, such woe.

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