My mom's and I's caothic gaslighting dinamic

[Guest]

For the past 5 or so months my mental health has been in a slippery slope, to the point where I recognized there was an underlying problem that was affecting my personal hygiene, academic performance, and relationships with family and friends. My mom started to realize about this behaviour some time ago, it was mainly because one of my teachers emailed her about some missing assignments and she LOST it. She was very pissed, and confronted me about it. From that time, she started to notice I've been sadder and crying more often. Whenever she would find me crying, she'd try to brush it off and try to get me calm. She would sometimes ask what was wrong and follow it after a speech of how I could improve my mental health by exercising and staying more active. I understand the production of endorphins makes you feel better, but I think it's a very superficial advise since exercising wouldn't solve the main issue, which is my decaying mental health.

It all gets us to today. I was doing some school project of painting a road sign and listening to YouTube videos. About an hour after my mom arrives from her job she told me to stop watching videos since she "thought" I wasn't making any progress. I thought it was kind of silly, since I was pretty advanced and followed in a reluctant tone with: "It's just a podcast mom, I'm just listening to it" and she started to talk in a very agressive manner to me, saying that she was my mother and that if she said I had to put it down, I'd do it immediately. After that heated response I closed the computer and started working on my project with tears in my eyes. Nobody noticed but I was feeling terrible, I also had the worst gut feeling. After everybody left the kitchen, my mom said to fix my face and to stop with the tantrums as I was holding my tears from hours ago. Since she usually takes my phone around 10 PM, she mentioned I had to give it to her at that time. Right before she took my phone, I started crying badly. I didn't want her to see me so I told my sister to drop my phone off at her room. Since I didn't go, she knew something was off and called me to lecture me. She started going about how I was losing the chance to improve my mental health, and that I should start exercising. That she knew how being depressed felt, but that if I wasn't depressed I wouldn't go out with my friends (mind you, for the past 3 months I've been out with my friends about 4 times), that she was also feeling depressed yet she was still going to work and following her obligations, and lastly that I have to stop crying for everything, that I'm an adult an should act as one. I felt terrible, I told her that I really wanted her to understand my situation, that I don't control my emotions and that I really wanted this aggresiveness to stop. She got so pissed and said that she'll be more agressive then, since it wasn't a deal breker for her as it was for me. I really tried to come off as polite when telling her this, but she completely disregarded my feelings and desires. After that, I had a very intense panic attack where I couldn't breathe properly. I had to be quiet while going through it, because if she were to hear me she would've been pissed at me.

I shouldn't feel guilty for feeling this way, I'm really trying to improve my mental health lately. I just got into therapy and started to overall do some more stuff that motivates me, and I just want my mom's support in this journey

[2NDFLOOR]

Glad you reached out to us. Sounds like you are having a bit of a tough time, sorry to hear that. Glad to hear that you are in therapy and have the professional support. I get that you feel lonely while your struggling with your mental health but often times depression can intensify these feelings whether they are true or not. It does seems that your mom cares and is trying but maybe her delivery isn’t helpful or sensitive to what you are feeling at that moment. So a couple of things, parents are not perfect and maybe she struggles with healthy communication with you and maybe you are hurting so anything she says might come across as being insensitive, another thing is right now try your best to focus on the things your mom is saying, like I get how depression can feel and that she is encouraging you to exercise which is a coping skill that is proven to be effective with helping depression (so she is right with this). All I mean is sometimes parents don’t realize how they are coming across but that doesn’t mean she isn’t trying to support you, besides you can’t control her response but you do have the power to change how you react. Maybe talk this over with your therapist and maybe you could bring your mom in for a session eventually. You can write a letter to your mom as well about what you are feeling , this is a way to communicate without having to be face to face. I hope this helps and if you want to chat further please reach out to us anytime by texting or calling at 888-222-2228.