I love my mother dearly. Really, I do. But she insists that I get things I don’t need, want, or have space for.
Yes, I sleep on an airbed. I like it, it’s comfortable, and also I’ve moved seven times and am done with heavy furniture. Honestly, with the amount of people I know who have gotten bedbugs, I’d rather not have something so easy to infest. I do not need a “real bed.”. My mother believes otherwise- apparently I’m not a real adult without real furniture.
And cooking? Of course I can’t get by with a pot and a pan! The big George Foreman grill that turned up in the mail when I don’t grill things? Hilarious. I don’t have room for it and I’ll never use it, but apparently cooking requires gadgets. After the two discussions on why I need a Keurig despite owning a perfectly good French press, I’m sure that will be next. Once again, no space, no need, no desire to have it. Especially given that you’re then forced to purchase expensive coffee in their proprietary format.
Weak, I know, but every conversation is becoming an endless reiteration of “I don’t need that. No, really. Yes, you can be an adult despite not owning fancy stuff. Yes, I am happy with the way I live.”. It’s like she refuses to listen and thinks that showers of unnecessary stuff will change me into the middle class shopper she wants her daughter to be.
You should have figured out by now that clutterbugs can’t stand a minimalist. They see all of that extra space in your life and they compulsively have to fill it.
In other words, it’s not about you. It’s momma’s addiction.
So, what do you do with the stuff you don’t want and don’t need, yet she keeps sending you? After you’ve made it perfectly clear you’re not interested, I’d donate the stuff to charity, and not be shy about telling her where it went if she asks.
My mother is the same way. I’ve gone so far as to throw out new things she’s gotten for me, making sure she sees it in the trash. I really do appreciate the thought and desire to help me, but it reaches a point where it’s rude and demeaning.
The grill I returned, having correctly guessed where she bought it, and used the store credit to buy something I actually needed. She got upset and said I’m too frugal.
Maybe you can turn her compulsion to buy stuff for you into a good thing? Get her to buy you food you like but generally won’t get yourself because its something hard to find or perhaps a bit too pricey for you buy without any guilt. Of course then you’ll get fat and then she will get a you a treadmill
One year, when I was in my 30’s, my mother gave me a ruby and diamond ring for Christmas. I like jewelry, but am quite picky as jewelry is a very personal thing. I hadn’t really wanted a ring and she’d chosen gold. I wear pretty much only silver. (Every now and then I trot the thing out and wear it, just so it doesn’t get jealous of all the silver rings that get worn all the time.) I asked her what possessed her to buy me a piece of jewelry like that.
“Well, you don’t have a husband, but you need good jewelry. I guess I’ll have to buy it for you.”
Erm, what? Why do I need “good” jewelry? What’s wrong with my cheap, silver crap?
Oh, that. My dad insisted on buying me a pair of heavy, solid gold bangles, because, as he said, “Every adult Indian woman has a set”. Um, ok. I mean, I’m Indian, sure, but I’m not very Indian-ish, and don’t wear saris and have pretty much quit wearing salwar-kameez except for special occasions. I prefer costume jewelry anyway. If I lose it or break it, nobigdeal, right? But he insisted, so I said “Ok”. At least he let me pick out a set I liked.
Oh man, I’m jealous. I actually am not at all a jewelry person, and seldom wear more than my wedding rings and a pair of earrings. But I’m a pushover for solid gold anything. I wish my Dad had insisted on such a thing!
Maybe that’s why I don’t have much jewelry. The only thing I really like is 24K gold.
I love it, too, or really, 22K carat, since 24K is so soft (and I don’t really think western dealers have 24K). But I’ll certainly settle for lesser. I’d prefer a chain or a pair of earrings, but he was really firm that I needed the bangles.
She’s lost that battle so far- I still sleep on my comfy air bed and she just nags me about it. Come to think of it, though, she is a clutterbug. Always has qvc on and buys all sorts of stuff from it, stuff on every surface, my childhood bedroom as storage. The house I grew up in is a duplex. After four years as landlords, they swore never to do it again. That whole other half of the duplex is… Well… Stuff. Between the childhood clutter and the seven moves in the last nine and a half years, I was downright gleeful when I was able to move using only a rolling cart.
I’m nowhere near the 100 item challenge, but less stuff is less hassle. It’s just… I grew up around the clutter, and choose not to embrace it.
Ha ha. Several years ago, I asked my friend who was traveling to Bangladesh (her then-husband’s home country) to buy me a sari there. Her mother-in-law insisted on sending along a pair of bangles as well. Apparently a sari is not complete without them?
One of the sari/salwar sites I browse when I need fabric or a new set of sawar kameez automatically send along a hairclip, bangles and a pair of earrings with the package. I prefer to pick out my jewelry in person, and I don’t wear normal earrings since I gauged my ears to 12 gauge earrings.
Is that cultural? Because every special occasion (and sometimes not for special occasions), my husband’s family gives me jewelry. They also give my (two year old) daughter jewelry. I have a lockbox at the bank specifically for our jewelry because I don’t feel comfortable having it in the house.
YES. Gold is only given to family and loved ones and means you are part of the family. Hell, I’m super American and plan to give my niece, whenever I have one, a gold chain when she is born and for most of her major milestones (along with regular gifts).
My Mum’s the same, OP. It doesn’t seem to occur to her that if there’s something we don’t have, it’s because we don’t want it, rather than can’t afford it - she has it in her head that we’re poor struggling newly-weds, when we’re actually quite well-off and more than capable of meeting our own needs.
Christmas was particularly fun - she stayed with us, and insisted on cooking Christmas dinner as I’m heavily pregnant:
Mum: Where’d you keep your serving spoons?
Me: We don’t have serving spoons.
Mum: So what do you use to serve food?!
Me: …spoons…
Apparently not good enough - she went to the January sales and came back with serving spoons for us.
Or:
Mum: Where’s your gravy boat?
Me: We don’t have one, just use the jug.
Mum, in a deeply disapproving tone: I’m getting you a gravy boat.
No Mother, please don’t. It really isn’t worth it for the four times a year I serve a meal with gravy - usually only to my husband, who’s only gravy concern is that there’s plenty of it. And you know what we do need, what’s really at a premium in our house? SPACE!
Before the dementia set in, my mom was always buying me gadgety stuff, usually the As Seen on TV type.
To top it all off, my SIL/BFF, who is a gadget person too, kept buying all kinds of kitchen gadgets for me long after I transitioned to a one bedroom apartment. It took about ten years to convince her that, even if I had the room, I tended toward the Alton Brown philosophy of NO UNITASKERS! Because I actually know she likes that kind of stuff, I satisfy any gadget buying urges that strike me to buy for her.
