my moms (f60) believes in Buddhism and in reincarnation, and she thinks I am her mother reincarnated.
Her mother, let’s call her G died of cancer a year or so before I was born, and when they consulted a master, he told her that G would be rebirthed to someone close to the family.
I was supposed to be born in late March but I was born at 24 weeks in December. My chance of survival was slim but I pulled through. One moment I’ve heard a lot about ever since I was little was when I was about 1 and my mom had me in her arms showing off family photos to an old friend and I pointed to a photo of G and said “me!” A few times. She also says I am very similar to G personality wise.
The thing is my moms relationship with G wasn’t that great, G wasn’t a very attentive mother and really let her kids do whatever they wanted, my mom never had much of a relationship with G but still very much idolizes her. In order to combat the emotionally distant parenting of her youth my mom always makes an effort to talk to me and always be there when I need her.
She’s my best friend. When I was little I loved the idea of being her mom I thought it was the coolest thing, but now I’m older I can recognize her behavior as harmful. She would sit me down and tell me stories about G pushing me to remember things they did together, or she would tell me the things she wished she could of said to G before she died. She relies on me for a lot of emotional labor, helping her with her friends issues or her relationship with my father.
I’m someone she views as a confident she can go to with her problems; again as I kid I loved this, I felt good having grown up conversations and I felt accomplished being able to engage with an adult that treated me as if we were on equal standings, I even encouraged her to talk to me when I knew she was mad so I could help figure things out for her.
I mean she literally thinks I’m her mom. She gets nervous when I do things she sees as “repeating Gs mistakes” and can becoming very controlling of my life in that regard. I think she clearly has unresolved trauma in regards to her and Gs relationship and maybe their was a point where I was willing to be the bridge between them but I don’t think I can do this anymore.
She talks about how G had all this potential and slowly wasted it all as she aged and became dependent on her husband, she becomes very upset and nervous whenever she thinks I’m doing the same thing like when I get a bad grade or want to go to a different college then what she wants for me.