Does anyone have an issue with their 83 year old mother showing favoritism to a sibling?

Let mother and her Golden Child live happily ever after together while you vanish from their lives to a brighter future w/o them. Your mother is never going to magically morph into Donna Reed, and you need to accept that this is the hand you were dealt. You don't have to like it, but you have to stop expecting things to be different. You just choose not to be involved with the dysfunction and ugliness anymore. Allow yourself to heal by staying away from the toxic duo.

Your mother and brother are both mentally sick people, and obviously have a very dysfunctional co-dependency on each other, and it is now in your best interest to stay as far away from them as possible.
Why you would have moved back in with your mother to begin with is beyond me.
For your own mental health's sake, please stay away from both of them and get yourself into some much needed therapy.
You at this point in your life owe your mother and brother NOTHING, and neither will ever change, so quit holding out hope. Time to be realistic and know that the only person you can change is yourself, so start today by cutting your ties from your dysfunctional family and move forward towards a more healthy you and life.

I will leave you with one of my very favorite sayings....."Never be a prisoner of your past. It was just a lesson, not a life sentence."

Classic abuse Involving a narcissist . The Golden child and the Black sheep or scape goat . Stay away from these people . No One deserves to be screamed at . This is Really a form of Bullying and to make you Powerless as their target . I wouldn't give them any More energy or Power . Delete them out of your life - it isn't worth your time or energy to figure out idiots . Cut ties and Move forward . These people are Toxic .

I agree, you need to stay away from these people. Brother is the favorite so let him care for her. She will not change. She foes not know what love is. They feed off of each other.

Your mother is not going to change, she’s a narcissist. Your brother? Same. What you need to do is resolve to live your life without them. Find your strength, your self-esteem - keep your friends close and your enemies far.

My Mom favored my brother over me since birth, I'm the eldest and he is the middle child My Mom herself was a middle child, and was brought up to revere the males in the family. My brother was the only son.)

This is what worked for me:
1) Put a lot of distance between you and your Mom and brother. Physical distance. Make a life of your own, be financially stable and proud of it, and don't seek affirmation from them. Don't request or expect financial or emotional assistance from them, now or in the future.

2) When they want you to see you or you see them, thoroughly vet out the reasons before agreeing to anything they say. If you have to hang up on them, do. If your instincts say "no" then believe your instincts. Don't offer your home if they come to visit. Don't let them manipulate you into providing them anything.

3) Seek help of a therapist.

My Mom used to pit my brother and sister against me. She threatened to dis-inherit me. I said "please do." She did, and I didn't care. I went "no contact" for awhile with her and visited my Dad separately from her.

After my Dad died, I later went to "limited contact." When she came to see me, we couldn't be in the same room for more than 2 hours without her irritating me. My brother kept on telling her to stop being such a bully. She denied being a bully. When I was in her city, I never stayed at her house, never took anything she offered, always paid for my own meals, as everything she provided had "strings attached". I never knew when or in what form, the payment would be. I made sure she never used the guilt trip on me. I couldn't even throw trash away in her trash can, as she would dig it out and try to use it against me.

My brother did his time with her during her retirement years. He watched over her, took her places, fixed things around the house, etc. I kept in touch with my mother via my brother. In the meantime, I've built up my finances and my education and totally could give a damn less about her. Whenever she visited, I was always anxious around her and couldn't wait for her to leave.

Yes, my brother got numerous things from my mother. She paid for his car insurance, down payments on real estate, gas money, monthly allowance (yes, he was married), etc. She would throw it in my face. I did not react positively or negatively.

In her early 90s, we had a big "blowup" and I told her that if she didn't respect my rules while she was in my house, then she was no longer welcome. She called my brother and got no sympathy from him. However, her behavior did change toward me to be more respectful.

In her late 90s, beginning of dementia (although we didn't know it at the time), I'm the only one she trusts with her health and finances. I ended up being her primary caregiver for the last 5 years of her life.

So, my advice to you is to quit trying to get affirmation from your Mom or your brother. Do what you can do to become completely independent from them. Be an upstanding member of the community.

You can do it!

Set strong boundaries for yourself. There is a manner in which you can distance yourself without estrangement altogether. Seek joy for yourself and optimize your own last third as I call it as I am also 59: in pursuing anything that makes you know peace and do not feel guilty about it. I call siblings and even parents extended family once we attain a certain age as adults ourselves. Letting go of needing your mom’s approval may be a first step. I wish you well in your healing journey and then that you thrive! jah

I’m alittle confused .
Your profile says you care for 92 yo Elbie. ???
You say Mom is 83 and takes care of herself and the family is dysfuctional , she shows favoritism for your brother since you were a child and now she and your brother are violent .

I am happy that you left her home .
Stay away and seek help from a therapist for your mental health. You can start by getting a check up from your PCP . Maybe they can recommend a therapist .

Favortism can happen at any age .
Stay away from abusive family . You can learn to live a better life without them.
Good luck .

In order to turn your life around and be the person you where ment to be and not the person that others around you want you to be, takes work .

Read melody Beatties books, about codependency

It may be 2 steps forward and one step back, but continue to move forward.

Letting go of old habits is so hard, letting go of people you care about is even harder, just remember as much as you care about them, they can't care about you. It's just not in there DNA, I guess you could say. Most of the time there is no good reason and you did nothing wrong. The only thing you did wrong was being there for people that will never be there for you. Blood or no blood

You have years of brain washing to over come. You can't just over come it with our help. Today you made the first step in getting that help. So keep stepping forward.

One of the things that was hard for me when I started therapy was admitting I was mentally abused. I don't know why, because it shouldn't be, but you can't turn your life around without admitting it . The other thing that's been hard for me was asking for help. Admitting you need help, because so many times in my life I was disappointed because the people I thought cared where not the ones that would help me. So I learned not to ask for help, I didn't feel like anyone would be there for me.

But we are here for you. Take the suggestion that people have given you that you like and ask more anytime.

Best of luck to you my friend

I know how that goes. I was the eldest child, daughter. My mother always seemed to favor my younger sister, and although that sister was the only adult child living nearest my Mom, she did the least to help Mom, now a widow. I lived 350 miles away and most of the time I lived overseas. My younger brother lived in another state. When I asked my mother why she catered to that sister when she lived so close (4-5 blocks away) but the sister didn't help my Mom, Mom said, she loved that sister the most since she was the only child (4th) they had made out of love. That was a very hard pill to swallow since I am the eldest of 5, and I suspected but never found out, if they HAD to get married, and I was probably the one who caused that to happen. I asked several times, but Mom always said, no, they didn't have to get married, at the time, both 16 & 17. I'm 84 now and over that, but I'm still not close to that sister. Seems she knows more than I, does less with her life than I did, and got away with a lot we other kids couldn't or be punished. When I left home after marriage, I lived far away, and decided I would not return to that town except to visit once in a while. I did more with my life than that sister, but when Mom would visit, Mom would praise her but just say to me, how can you stand living overseas instead of the US. My answer, "cause I married a soldier and he took me " 'round the world". They all thought that was a terrible thing to do, live overseas. I loved it. Got my dream to come true. Only went back home to visit Mom, but not often, even paid her way overseas to do some sightseeing, something she never got from that daughter, but mostly no help at all, despite living just a few miles from Mom. Oh, well, what's 4.000 miles away. I had to go home to houseclean, paint, etc. But other daughter, no help. I'm okay with that now, but then, it hurt, especially to be told "your sister was the only one made out of love". There were 5 of us children. Hurtful!!!