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50 Pics Of Awful Moms That Are The Prime Example Of How Not To Parent
Interview With Expert
For many people, a relationship with their mother is their very first one. And, although 63% of young adults say their relationship with their parents and especially their mom is excellent or very good, not everyone is so lucky. Some have to deal with a mother's toxicity daily.
Here we have collected the wildest examples of bad parenting done by mothers. Some of these are humorous, others downright cruel and heartbreaking. Yet they have one thing in common: most of these mothers will probably go down in history as the worst parents in the world.
To know more about the difficult topic of toxic mothers, Bored Panda sought the expertise of Ellen I. Carni, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist in private practice in New York City. She told us more about the types of toxic relationship between mothers and their adult children, and gave some recommendations on how to heal from having a difficult mother. Read her expert insights below!
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
My Mother Dearest, Whom My Sister And I Just Let Back Into Our Lives, Talking To My Sister About Her Daughter (My Niece). Behold The Kind Of Person She Is
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
The only appropriate action. Nan-not eff'ed up big time this round with the vile name-calling >:-(
RELATED:
#2
An Insane Mom
#3
Should've Stayed At Home
Penguin Panda Pop 1 year ago
Finally! I'm tired of hearing about secret government plots and labs in Wuhan. We've all know it was this ladies' fault all along. Glad she owned up.
#4
My Friend Hasn't Spoken To His Mother In Months. She Finds Out He's Living With His Girlfriend. He Also Shares Some Exciting News
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
Checked OP on Reddit. He says his friend was 24 at the time of these texts and had graduated college and was completely self-sufficient XD
#5
My Mother-In-Law Gave Us All Covid. Tested Positive And Never Told Us
#6
I'm 25, I Have Schizophrenia, And Have Zero Support From My Mom
Ray Ceeya (RayCeeYa) 1 year ago
Q: What do you call people who believe in the devil? A: Christians.
#7
Extremely Racist Mother Tells Her 5 Year Old Daughter That Her Asian Stepmother Eats Dogs
#8
I Think We Should Make Leashes Mandatory For Everyone Under 15!
#9
A Friend Of Mine Who’s 27 Years Old
Boredest Panda 1 year ago
Imagine going to your GROWN DAUGHTER’s house and being a disgrace to raccoons everywhere.
#10
Just A Cold
#11
My Mom Thought She Found Weed In My Sisters Car
#12
The Nerve Of This Mom
#13
My Mom Just Randomly Texted Me…
Sue Denham 1 year ago
Wishing *you* a simply fabulous day and hoping your deity of choice cures your narrow-mindedness.
#14
Got Shot In An Armed Robbery? Sounds Like A You Problem. In My Day We Just Died
#15
Mom Just Asked Me For 600$ When I Work A Minimum Wage Job Then Tells Me To Stop Spending ???
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Tell birth giver to ask for a discount or cancel it altogether. She should take their own advice and stop spending -_-
#16
My Mother Blames Me For My Sister's Husband Trying To Have S*x With Me When I Was 15
michael Chock 1 year ago
Call the cops. Tell your sister. Emancipated yourself. Find a chosen family.
#17
This B**ch I Used To Go To Church With Made Her Kid Be A Cactus For Trunk Or Treat
I blocked the kids' faces, but believe me when I say that this poor girl looked absolutely miserable.
Boredest Panda 1 year ago
Do people hear themselves? “Hahaha, I love watching my kid do stuff she hates! Oh how I love making her feel uncomfortable!” Like, what?
#18
My Mum Is Abusing Our Brand New Security System
#19
I’m A Horror Artist, It’s A Sculpture
I don’t know what else to say. Sorry if it bothers anyone, I’ve been a horror special effects artist for 15 years and she has no problem when I make werewolves, vampires and other things that eat people.
CanadianDimes 1 year ago
"I'm scared of everything I don't understand, so I'm scared of everything."
#20
My Mom's Response When I Came Out To Her. Haven’t Talked To Them For Two Weeks Now
#21
This Was By Far The Worst Incident. I Was In 2nd Grade, 7-8 Years Old And Just Went Through Some Of The Worst Trauma Of My Life And My Mom Was More Worried About Going To Vegas Then My Health
#22
I Don't Understand How Scientology Came Into Play
#23
Traditional Asian Parents And Mental Health Don’t Usually Align
#24
I Synced My Calendar With My Mum And Forgot I Have My Birth Control Implant Replacement Date Marked 3 Years From Now. She Saw It And Texted Me This While I Was At Work. I’m 20
#25
Random Loving Little Messages From Mother Dearest
For context, my mother is weird about my facial and body hair. Once I was literally in the hospital for an accident that SHE caused and as they were cutting my clothes off me, she was more worried about my leg hair than the fact I, you know, just got beat in the head til I was unrecognizable and was not sure I was gonna make it out alive. Good times!
#26
My Dog Ran Out While I Was At A Friend's House. This Is What Happened
#27
My Mother, After She Kicked Me Out When She Found Letters My Girlfriend Wrote For Me (We're Both Girls)
Penguin Panda Pop 1 year ago
What the fork are the cups gonna do? Spoon me? I've got enough on my plate already.
#28
Apparently I’m Not Using The Right Essential Oils
michael Chock 1 year ago
Plant extracts and oils can treat or even cure VERY SPECIFIC things. They cannot cure bad parenting or being a teenager.
#29
My Mom’s Bats**t Insane Racist Tangent
Penguin Panda Pop 1 year ago
Asians are immortal? My wife never told me that she's gonna live forever. We'll have to have a long talk about this when I get home.
#30
Not Mine. Found It On Facebook
#31
I’m Going To An Iron Maiden Concert. I’m Also Almost 30
Gavin Johnson 1 year ago
And Nicko McBrain (the drummer) is a born again Christian, he’s serious about his faith. Their imagery is very provocative but if you actually care enough to listen to their lyrics they aren’t promoting satanism, but hey, don’t let that get in the way of your pearl clutching.
#32
Let's Hope He Didn't Get His PC With His Own Savings
#33
Trying Her Hardest To K*ll Her Kids
#34
Welp, I’ve Officially Blocked Her On Everything…
And she’s spiraling. This is honestly…so unhinged.
#35
I Literally Did All My Chores When I Was Asked And I Was Still Grounded, I Actually Can’t Anymore
#36
She Has A Son Who’s So Well-Behaved, She’s Going To Punish Him For A Pack Of Ramen… That He Cooked Himself
#37
Kicked Out At 17 And My Mom Withheld Financial Aid Documents So I Would Have To Drop Out Without Her
After my Mom physically attacked me and I actually stood up for myself, the police got involved and my Mom kicked me out. Luckily, a friend’s family took me in before I went to college. She refused to give me a doc for the military financial aid and continued to provide ultimatums up until her death the following year.
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Far be it from me to wish ill upon the dead, but I hope she left this mortal coil alone and cold. That's the least she deserves for her actions to OP.
#38
My Mom Didn’t Want Me Go See A Doctor
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Please make that the final update and final time you ever contact your sh*t excuse of a birth giver, OP.
#39
My Friend Just Sent Me This. Her Stepmom Took Her Stepsister To Get Food Without Her, And Then When She Went To Go Get Food By Herself She Grounded Her
#40
When You Call Them Out For Wanting Sympathy For Avoiding Their Texts
For context, the text was the only thing my Mother did for my birthday since I’m very LC due to how she treats me. I let the message sit UNTIL my cousin contacted me saying she was telling people that she was sad that I never responded to her. You want drama? I’ll give you drama.
Falicity Humdinger 1 year ago
At least you got that! It was my birthday Saturday just gone and not even a text from my mother! I grew up with a very toxic, alcohol mother, so you could say the relationship is fragile but we have been in touch for 6 years now and very amicable.
#41
I, Bi And Closeted To My Family, Went To New York With My Boyfriend And My Mother Had Some Concerns
#42
I Guess Some People Never Learn That Their Kids Are Separate People Who Deserve Autonomy Smh
Lyone Fein 1 year ago
Just don't give your child a phone if you don't want them to use it like a phone.
#43
Tough Love, For Sale
The saga continues. Our son refuses to put clothes away so we sold his dresser. He won't make his bed? Getting rid of the bed. Please don't message me about how cruel I am this is called tough love, Love & Logic style. Actually, it turns out the joke will probably be on me since it doesn't appear he's learning a lesson... Anyway, this nowhere-near-new bedframe is no longer available in this color so get it while it's hot! Website pics for reference, bedroom pics for color.
#44
They Are In Their Fifties
I have a one and a half year old son. I’m a 30+ year old stay at home mom.
They called me shortly after this demanding I do something. I told them there were out of their minds if they want me to bring a violent drunk around my son. They’ve been doing this for years. I had to drop out of college to take care of my sisters because of them. I have went NC before and wanted to give them a chance to be around their grandson, but no I’m done.
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
About time the siblings took some responsibility for their birth giver. Please cut them off entirely and permanently, OP.
#45
Breaking A 7-Year-Old's Heart On Christmas
#46
I’m 29 And Have My Own House
We were talking about me coming to grab some stuff from her house. I don’t even know. Yes, she’s paid for a lot of it as it’s partly a Christmas present, but this is another level.
#47
Mom That Kicked Me Out And Filed Police Report On Me Found My Email Address
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
OP on Reddit says "What's so f*****g funny is I'm a trans man who's had a hysterectomy and I'm about to get bottom surgery here soon so the fact she's projecting me being pregnant (because I'm now the age she got pregnant with me) is pitiful."
#48
Imagine Posting This And Being Proud Of The Anger That You Just Took Out On This Kid's Form Of Entertainment
#49
And Here I Was Thinking We Were Gonna Have A Good Day
#50
My Mom Thinks Im On Drugs Because I Left The Toilet Seat Up And Got A C In One Class
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
In other comments on Reddit, OP stated they were 13 at the time they posted this. Not sure if that's true.
#51
My Mom Is Withholding My Unemployment And Took The Grant The Cares Act Gave Out To The Students (I’m Staying With A Friend Rn)
#52
I Apparently Didn’t Respond To Enough Texts
For reference, I’m 25, had just moved out, and this came after I had few responses due to being very sick
#53
My Mom Blew Up On Me Because I Couldn’t Pick Up My Father From Work, While She Was At Home Not Doing Anything
#54
Mother Impersonated Me To Bofa To Remove $1500 From My Account Of My Awarded Scholarship Money As Punishment For Her Ex Husband Not Paying For Her Vacation
#55
My Mom Started The Day Asking For Help After Going No Contact For A Month
And ended it having to email us after being blocked on everything else, threatening a restraining order when we checks notes screenshotted and posted her own words to us on social media. I guess it was just that easy to get her to leave us alone
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
So the toxin flushed itself out of the system without prompting. If only all of it were that way.
#56
My Mother’s Reaction To Me Getting A Job
We are struggling. My fiancé lost his job. I genuinely thought she’d be happy for me. I was wrong. It was an opportunity to make me feel worse.
DC 1 year ago
No job? "Your a parasitical bidge!" Job? "Your abandamning your children!". One would consider a halftime job might please her, but that's just both offenses... In such peoples' book, you do wrong because you ... you do wrong because ... because ... be ... cause ... uh .......... yeah, just as much - they know, too.
#57
I Came Out As Bi To Her 6 Years Ago. I Thought We Were Finally About To Have A Productive Conversation. Silly Me
#58
How Dare People Spend Their Own Money On Things?
#59
My Fiance's Mom When We First Started Dating
#60
I Don’t Think I’m Going Home After School Today
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
From OP on Reddit: Context: I stupidly let my mother “borrow” money from me again and she said that she’d pay me back today and that even help buy something I needed for my Halloween costume this year. I stupidly agreed to it, today comes, she doesn’t buy the 2 items I specifically needed for this costume and instead buys 3 items that are clearly for her. I got upset, vented online and I think some dumbass shared it with this waste of breath air, and now I’m here. I’m broke because of her and I don’t have my wallet and card on me right now, but at least on the streets I could die a less painful death than one I could face at home.
#61
My Mother Thought She Was The Spider I Was Talking About And Then Assumed I Was My Father
So basically I caught a spider a while ago, and she assumed that she has control over my phone which she isn’t even paying for and that she didn’t even buy
StarCrossedFriday 1 year ago
I’m so confused, and yet from the tone it’s clear something is very wrong with this person.
#62
When Your Mom (62) Gets Mad Because You Won't Go Buy Her Cokes At 9pm And You Tell Her To Drink Water
#63
Kicked Out Because I Got My 3rd Tattoo
Earonn - 1 year ago
"I was out on my own at 20" - yes, and OP's grandparents sighed with relief...Why do so many (US American I suppose) parents see it as something good to be kicked out or to kick out their child? "Oh, so yeah, she was homeless, got raped and killed, but at least we gave her tough love"?
#64
For Context: I Didn't Want To Go Over To My Dad's House Because I Had Overtime At Work. Then My Stepmom Had To 'Interfere'
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
Ooo my sister does this! If you don't answer her texts within 30 seconds, she copy-pastes the text and sends it over and over and over again (or sends "???????" or "HELLO??????" over and over.) Then again, my sister is a clone of my toxic narcissist of a mother, so I suppose it's not surprising she's as bad as the bad moms on this list XD
#65
I Moved To Get Away From My Jehovah's Witness Mom, She Found My New Address. I Made An Instagram That Didn’t Have My Name, And She Found Me. I Can’t Get Away
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Seriously OP, two words: Restraining Order. I hope she did at least try for one.
#66
Just Sent My Mom An Article Of A Celebrity Wearing A Coat I Liked
It’s always hurts when I get these types of reactions to things. Sue me for trying to have a conversation…
#67
Mom Has Always Been Weirdly Obsessed With My S*x Life
This was just one of many times she said this. She also used to ask me who I was sleeping with and when I was doing it before I was married, and assumed I was sleeping with multiple partners when I was dating my husband. Not that it even matters, but I’ve been with two people ever, one of them being my husband, the other being a long term boyfriend that I dated before I met my spouse. Anyways, I finally just stopped responding to her or trying to deny anything because it didn’t matter what I said, and eventually she quit asking
#68
This Is The Third Time I’ve Had To Say This
#69
Jesus Take The Wheel
#70
My Birthday Was Yesterday. So Her “Birth Day” Was Yesterday Too
Jan Moore 1 year ago
I started sending my mom flowers on my birthday with a Happy Mother's Day card. I'm so grateful that neither of my parents were anything like the ones on this site. I did some stupid things growing up but they still supported me. The only thing my dad did was threaten to shoot any boy I brought around. I introduced them to my boyfriend when they were traveling and came by my Uni. My dad brought out his pistol to discuss guns with him and when I was dating my husband, dad made a point to be cleaning his gun once when he came to pick me up. I am so sorry these OP's had parents like this, there should be some kind of test that future parents have to take before having children and I really can't fathom the "Golden Child" parents.
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LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
Attached is a photo of my birthday cake from when I was 9. My mom thought it was funny and said it was a "joke". I did not find it funny and spent the rest of the day crying. I'm adopted, and my mother always made it VERY clear that she only adopted me because she didn't want her biological daughter to be an "only child", and that I should be "grateful" to have been adopted because otherwise I'd be "gutter white trash" like my bio parents. I'm a second-class citizen in my mother's opinion. She also beat me/cut me with knives regularly during my childhood, and once pressed a gun to my throat (I was 6) and said she would kill me if my dad went on a business trip. She was very abusive towards him too (physically, mentally, emotionally, verbally.) Unsurprisingly, my sister, her bio daughter, was never even spanked in her entire life. Fortunately my dad was a wonderful, fabulous dad and treated me like what I was - his DAUGHTER. cake-6736f...facc32.jpg 
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
^ for anyone who wonders why there's a PHOTO of said cake, my dad told me years later that he took a picture of it to prove that my mother is a terrible person. He said he had chosen the cake's theme (dinosaurs) because he knew I loved dinosaurs, and apparently it was supposed to just say "Happy Birthday, Crystal" on it, but my mom called in and changed it - which is why it says "my" and not "ours". My dad was not in on the "joke" and was apparently VERY p!ssed off about it.
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Lyone Fein 1 year ago
This was very painful. So many of these women are either idiots or crazy or simply over the top narcissists I guess. My own mother is in this latter category, and many of these stories hit a familiar chord. I am lucky to have taken a lot of psychology classes, and studied Buddhism, and done over a decade of therapy. I hope the offspring in these stories have also managed to find avenues of assistance.
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Some people ought to be screened before they pro-create and if found unfit, should be recommended for sterilization altogether. The amount of nutbag "mothers" here is enough to fill a colosseum-sized variety pack -_-"
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
Attached is a photo of my birthday cake from when I was 9. My mom thought it was funny and said it was a "joke". I did not find it funny and spent the rest of the day crying. I'm adopted, and my mother always made it VERY clear that she only adopted me because she didn't want her biological daughter to be an "only child", and that I should be "grateful" to have been adopted because otherwise I'd be "gutter white trash" like my bio parents. I'm a second-class citizen in my mother's opinion. She also beat me/cut me with knives regularly during my childhood, and once pressed a gun to my throat (I was 6) and said she would kill me if my dad went on a business trip. She was very abusive towards him too (physically, mentally, emotionally, verbally.) Unsurprisingly, my sister, her bio daughter, was never even spanked in her entire life. Fortunately my dad was a wonderful, fabulous dad and treated me like what I was - his DAUGHTER. cake-6736f...facc32.jpg
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 year ago
^ for anyone who wonders why there's a PHOTO of said cake, my dad told me years later that he took a picture of it to prove that my mother is a terrible person. He said he had chosen the cake's theme (dinosaurs) because he knew I loved dinosaurs, and apparently it was supposed to just say "Happy Birthday, Crystal" on it, but my mom called in and changed it - which is why it says "my" and not "ours". My dad was not in on the "joke" and was apparently VERY p!ssed off about it.
Load More Replies... Lyone Fein 1 year ago
This was very painful. So many of these women are either idiots or crazy or simply over the top narcissists I guess. My own mother is in this latter category, and many of these stories hit a familiar chord. I am lucky to have taken a lot of psychology classes, and studied Buddhism, and done over a decade of therapy. I hope the offspring in these stories have also managed to find avenues of assistance.
SheamusFanFrom1987 1 year ago
Some people ought to be screened before they pro-create and if found unfit, should be recommended for sterilization altogether. The amount of nutbag "mothers" here is enough to fill a colosseum-sized variety pack -_-"
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