I keep coming back to this. It made me go OH NO! First of all sorry you were so sick and expecting a nice care package from your mom only to find yourself hurt and having a hard time with what was sent.

I was raised by a Nmom and she handed my stuff off to me years ago. I was okay with it, thought it was the circle of life, what happened. After many years it is reduced to a very small box of what is really important to me.

To her credit it was clear that’s what was coming when she gave it to me. I was glad to sort thru it myself because that meant I got to determine what was important to me (she was extremely controlling). And the things were mementos from my childhood. She was always throwing things away in childhood so I was glad to have somethings.

I had a lot of my kids childhood keepsakes tucked into corners and had been telling them for years they would get them someday. A couple years ago after my Dad died and my daughter moved to another state. It was time to send them to my kids. I told them I was doing it and wanted them to be the ones to decide what was important to keep and what got tossed.

I never considered that it could have been hurtful to send those things to them. After reading this post I called my son to check in with him about it. He expressed he thought these things might have been important to me and he wished I’d done the tossing and not sent so much. It all was and is still important. But is seemed good they have those things too. I apologized if it caused him any pain. If this helps one of the things I told him as you get older you have to let go of things. You can’t keep it all. Next I’ll check in with my daughter.

I don’t know if any of this helps. Thank you for the post. I hope you got some support in therapy. And you are never wrong in anyway you think or feel. That’s what gets so distorted growing up with NP/ss. A thought is just a thought. You can change it when ever YOU want to- not when your Mother tells you too.