'AITA for telling my mom I did not want her there when I got home from deployment?' UPDATED (2024)

Telling her that she wouldn’t speak to her, let the girls go places, and she had to know so she could take days off work. My wife gave her a week range of my leave (a couple weeks after I get back) so that she could request off. Well, my mom texted me today telling me that she would be here for the welcome home when our plane lands.

I asked if she cleared this with my wife, seeing as she apparently planned to stay with us in our 1 bedroom apartment, and she said no. I asked if the girls knew and were coming, and she said no. My mom has done a few things that presses between my wife and I, so I lost it on her. Told her I wouldn’t be giving her the date that I fly in, that if I wanted her there I would want my sisters there as well.

I stopped there until she started complaining that she was a single mom who raised me on her own, and that I should want to see her first. That’s when I told her I didn’t want her in my house at all when I first get home. I am a married, grown man now, I don’t need my mom, I want to see and spend time with my wife first and foremost.

She pressed further saying “I’ve been here for u since before u were born, she’s been here for 4 years.” Eventually trash talking my wife, saying she doesn’t even have a real job and doesn’t contribute. My wife is a nanny while she is in school, and she gets paid well, so she absolutely does contribute more than enough.

This is where I may be the AH. I told my mom that I was tired of her badgering, that I wanted to come home to my wife and be alone in our home with our pets. My wife and I would not want to host her, and we wanted the house to ourselves so that we can have s-x wherever and whenever we please because we haven’t seen each other in so long. My mom cried.

She’s sending me long paragraph texts every few hours about how she doesn’t know where her caring son went, about how I need to let my wife go because I use her for her body, about how all I care about is my own pleasure, and I have no care for my family at all. So Reddit, AITA? I haven’t responded to the messages my mother is sending, but if I get ideas from the possible comments, I might.

People had a lot to say in response.

nerd_is_a_verb wrote:

Good job finally standing up to her. Stop giving her info and stop talking to her. “Mom until you learn to act like an adult and stop trash talking my wife to me, I will not be communicating with you. I am very disappointed in you and how incredibly selfish and immature you are acting.” Don’t make your wife deal with this jerk.

OP responded:

I haven’t given her info. She told me she was coming for my plane to land and she didn’t even know when that date was. The only info she got was from my wife, and was quite literally worded as “he will likely have leave within these few weeks, but those weeks could change.”

notkadan wrote:

NTA.

Your mom is guilt-tripping you. You don't owe her anything. She had the choice to raise you, she wasn't forced to --- so for her to say.

"I’ve been here for u since before u were born, she’s been here for 4 years"

Is crazy to me.

She's an example of a manipulative parent. Here's a paragraph from a article about manipulative parents, and their signs: "Parents using emotional blackmail will often threaten to withdraw their love or approval if the child does not comply with their wishes."

"This can manifest as guilt-tripping the child, making them feel responsible for the parent’s happiness, or expressing extreme disappointment when the child does not meet their expectations."

OP responded:

That paragraph fits what she’s been doing to a tee. What confuses me is none of my mom’s behavior like this started until we got married. Before, when she was my gf, she always wanted her around, joked about trading me and my wife, invited her everywhere my family went, now it bothers her when we spend time together and she isn’t invited when she thinks she should/can be.

See Also

'AITA for kicking out my MIL in the middle of the night and threatening to call the cops?' UPDATED'AITA for telling my former MIL that I'm not obligated to provide her grandchild a home?'

bkwormtricia wrote:

NTA. At least she stopped trying to get into your home when you got more specific on how you and your wife would be greeting each other!

OP responded:

Well, these paragraphs she’s sending aren’t what I would consider as stopping.

Feels more like guilt tripping.

MsLead wrote:

NTA - Many (30+) years ago I worked with a woman whose husband had been in the army. She told me about the “Hail and Farewell” ceremonies that were held with respect to deployments. When soldiers returned, ONLY THE WIVES were encouraged to attend the ceremony to greet their husbands, and make other arrangements for their children.

The point was that the husband/wife relationship should be re-established first. I’m not sure of the time frame - maybe 20 minutes, maybe more than an hour. I have no idea. After that, the soldier would be reunited with his kids, while his wife was present. This was the family being reunited.

No soldier’s mother, siblings, etc. were part of that ceremony. Your mom needs to stop this immediately. Enjoy your time together again. When you’re both ready for company, your mom can find a hotel.

OP responded:

Yeah, this welcome home thing is for soldiers families (spouses and kids.) There isn’t anything that directly says “no parents” or anything like that, but it is for the people who have been living with someone gone from their every day lives, rather than family that just gets visits otherwise.

HotCheeks_PCT wrote:

NTA.

There's a Facebook group your mom needs an invite to.

It's called 'The Boy Moms are Getting Weird and Inc-sty Again"

OP responded:

My wife’s a part of that group. Pretty sure she’s posted about these kinds of things a time or two :)

foacadoama wrote:

NTA. Your mom is a mess. I get her wanting to see you when you get back, but this is just too much. Obviously you are going to want to see your wife. Any mom with healthy boundaries would want you to be closer with your wife than with your mom.

OP responded:

She’s tried causing several problems. She’s made clear that she wasn’t ready for me to be an adult.

Abject_Donut5152 wrote:

OMG, you need to go either NC or very LC with your mom. JFC, wow, that's just...wow... been there...mom was the last thing I thought about when I got back from deployment. I mean God forbid you get stationed overseas. What will she do then f-ing move in? You need to nip that in the bud now.

OP responded:

I already don’t contact her much outside of for my sisters and neither does my wife. Our plan when my contact ends is to move to a base even farther from home, where we would have to fly for visits.

That would take our amount of visits down a lot because we travel with our pets, but they’re both large dogs and we don’t want to put them under a plane, and plane tickets on top of pet boarding is expensive. If people would want to see us, they would have to come to us. Oh and my mom refuses to get on a plane ;)

Two days later, OP shared an update.

A few people asked to stay updated, so here is the first one. Spoiler alert, it’s not necessarily a fun one. Unfortunately, because of another wife sharing our flight date all over Facebook, our return has been pushed back an entire month.

I called my wife to let her know, and we are both devastated. I only had enough time for one phone call, so I asked my wife to let family and friends know, including my mother. Yes, I know many people might not be happy about that, but again. She didn’t receive a date, my wife’s text to her was just that I would not be returning until a month later, or more.

My mother’s reaction to that news has truly solidified what many comments were telling me. I was raised by a narcissist.

Her text back to my wife was “Oh, that’s great! That is actually is much better timing for me!”

My wife’s response to my mother was: “Do not say that to (my name). He is devastated that he will be gone longer, and he has been talking about wanting to be home asap since just a few months in."

"I wish you wouldn’t have even said it to me, as I’m devastated by his return being delayed as well. It is extremely selfish for you to be glad he is away from home for even longer simply because it works better for you. I have never in my life heard of a mother being glad that her child will be overseas longer than what was planned.”

After that, she blocked my mom. Her shiny spine is really developing! I have not reached out to my mother, and I will not be doing so. I won’t block her, as with my sisters being minors, I would like for one of us, my wife or I, to have at least some line of communication in case of some family emergency.

However, I will not be texting or calling, and any of her texts or calls will not be answered unless I consider them an emergency. There were a few questions and deeper explanations from my original post, so I figured I would go into them deeper here. My father passed away when I was 6.

Ever since then, my mom has sort of relied on me when it came to raising my sisters. Even with them being high school aged, it continued. When I went into the military, my mom got upset, saying things at home would be just terrible with me gone, that she didn’t know how she would handle my sisters on her own, and that life would seem more pointless without her son in it every single day.

When my wife and I got married and moved to my first duty station, she begged to trade my sisters off, sending one of them to stay with us every few weeks, where they would stay in our living room. She even told us we would need to purchase a hide-a-bed couch for it to work out.

Obviously, that had never happened as I told her my sisters were my sisters, and her kids. It was not my responsibility to raise them. My mom and I were very close when I was growing up. I considered her one of my best friends, and someone I could always go to. That changed when I got married. I also realized that some of the things she did were not healthy or good parenting moments.

My mom started purchasing rubbers for me when I was only 12. She was very open about s-x with me, and was not one to shy away from it. She was completely fine with me having s-x at such a young age, which did lead me to being a bit of a man-wh-re. Before my wife, I constantly snuck girls in, snuck out to hang out with girls, and whatever else.

My wife was the first girl that I brought to my house during the day, introduced to my family, invited her for dinner. My wife was also very strict with her views on s-x when we started dating. We were friends before, so she knew I was a bit of a player. Where I viewed s-x as something fun, she viewed it as something that should only be between two people who truly love each other.

She was not down for it until a few months into us dating, and I was willing to wait for her. We still snuck around, but when she snuck me in, we quite literally played Mario cart, watched movies, and hung out all night. When this part of me changed, it changed something about my mom for some reason.

She did used to ask about girls I was sleeping with when I was in high school, but when she asked about my wife when we started dating, and I told her we weren’t doing anything like that, she got frustrated about me “lying.” She stopped buying me rubber, which I was fine with because I didn’t need them in the beginning and when I did, I was 18 and completely fine buying them myself.

Before my wife and I ever did have s-x, she would come in my room and scream about how she didn’t want me having s-x under her roof. I thought that she just realized that encouraging a minor to have s-x wasn’t ok. My mom also liked my wife when she was just my girlfriend. This always confused me until I read people’s comments.

Her going from loving her, inviting her to everything, asking where she was when she wasn’t with me, to trash talking her didn’t make sense to me until people in the comments of my last post clarified that it was the fact that she was my wife. Her being permanent is what my mother doesn’t like. And as far as “co*ck blocking” my mom has happily done that since we’ve been married.

She screeched and hid her face when I kissed my wife at our wedding, she begged us to sleep on a pallet in her living room on our wedding night (we didn’t), she tried calling 3 times a day when we first moved (once around the time I usually got off work, once either during or after dinner, and once at night.

Sometimes while my wife were mid tango, sometimes when we were already asleep.) it was very rare that I actually answered these calls, and when she realized her calls were muted they faded away.

She Facetimed seemingly once an hour on our 1st wedding anniversary, again, I didn’t answer. Her wanting us to host her when I first got back was not her being clueless. She knew what she was trying to do. Now that I have a new return date, my mother will not even know the possible weeks I might have leave.

She won’t need to, I do not plan on seeing her outside of maybe going out to eat with her, my wife, and the rest of my family. My wife will be organizing it, and will be able to ask my sisters about days my mother is off work. That’s all I have as far as an update right now. I may post more before returning just based on how things go. I can imagine I will have plenty of an update when I do actually return.

Commenters had a lot to say in response.

wildpeaches05 wrote:

You need to tell your mother, "YOU ARE NOT HER HUSBAND, YOU ARE NOT YOUR SISTERS FATHER." It was her choice to stay single. You would have been happy for her to find a man to make her happy after your father passed. To have a man to make her happy and be a father to your sisters, that man is not you. You have your own life, and you started your own family.

If she doesn't respect your wife and the family you're creating, then there will not be room for her. You love her, but she is creating this situation where enough is enough. Tell her that the guilt trips and manipulations will not work anymore. You're a grown adult with your own life that doesn't revolve around her. If she doesn't want to lose you forever, then this has to stop.

Another thing keep contact with your sisters and prepare once they turn of age to help them get the heck out of your mom's house and grasp. Instead of texts, do hidden email accounts because your mother probably goes through their phones. Good luck, get back home safe to your wife!

schmeepschmorp wrote:

My dad was in the military so I’ve been on the family side of extended deployments because of people talking about it on Facebook. That s-t sucks and I’m sorry that happened. It’s bad enough being family but I can’t imagine how it feels actually being the one deployed. I’m glad you’ve got your wife to support you, she sounds awesome. Hope you make it home safe man.

Somebodystolethecake wrote:

I hope you realize OP that your mother is guilty of emotional inc-st. She views you as a replacement husband after your father passed. Even if she doesn't actually realize that, that's what this is. She views you as "her man." That's why she's so offended you would rather be with your wife than with her.

frag-hag311 wrote:

NTA: Your Mother is all kinds of emotionally and mentally unwell. Her interest in your s-x life AS A CHILD is beyond concerning. It's weird how things seem normal when we're young and used to it but when we get older and gain outside perspective, it's like watching a horror movie from the front row. Good luck, mate. Stand firm against your Mom's craziness and firmly by your wife. She deserves your loyalty.

canyonemoon wrote:

I'm so, so sorry that your mother has never gotten therapy for her covert incest and that you have suffered from that. I'm really glad, though, that you have your wife and that you both are working towards strengthening your spines and not letting that woman control you anymore.

I'm sorry your return date got pushed back, for you and your wife, but I hope that when you do return, it'll be very peaceful, and I wish you both luck with the move you were talking about in your last post. That'll be very healthy for you.

jmc4297 wrote:

Absolutely bonkers of your mom. She needs serious help, cause it sounds like some kind of oedipus complex she has going on. Also, I'm not familiar with how things work in the military, so pardon my ignorance, but why does a wife posting about return dates cause a huge delay? I'm assuming it's a security issue. In which case, that person's wife is an idiot and I hope there was some consequences there.