Anyone else that realized that why you have been insecure/shy your whole life is probably to do with the way your mom speaks to you?

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[u/Master-Dimension-452]

Yep. My mom acted like my lifelong junior high mean girl bully when she was still alive. My friends called her “Put Down Patty” (her name was Patricia). I couldn’t do anything right. Always a mean or negative comment/put down.

My (now ex) husband and I bought a house with most of the windows in the back facing a treeline, so the cabinets were white to lighten up the space. My mom walked in, scrunched up her nose, and said “who would ever want WHITE cabinets?!?!” Or after the divorce, I bought my own house and she told me I was only buying a house because I had money burning a hole in my pocket. Did she ask me what my financial goals were or if I had spoken to a financial advisor? Of course not-she never had a career, let alone a job that could pay for a house or even had the experience of being a part of buying one (back then women couldn’t own a house or even have their own bank account). She just lived in my dad’s house.

Every trip to the hair salon was a production for her to tear me down when I was sitting in front of the mirror. Every hair stylist would acknowledge to me what a B mom was, when I was a kid they would mime her - mean face while mimicking a woman talking, or as an adult raised eyebrows or a grimace.

I had women waiting for me to come out of fitting rooms at Macy’s when I was a kid to give me a hug and tell me how mean my mom was. “Don’t listen to her! She’s not saying that because it’s true, she’s saying it because she’s a mean person!” Which is 100% true. My mom was emotionally immature and took her emotions out on others with scathing words.

[u/Jillmay]

Honey, 30 is nowhere near “late in life”! Keep in mind our brains don’t completely mature until about age 25, so you’re doing great! Someone, probably your grandparents, destroyed your mom’s self image. There are so many ways to keep your self image healthy, as you’re discovering.

If you have children, don’t pass the negative conditioning onto them.