'She believes I inflicted trauma on her': Mother hides daughter's college acceptance and scholarship from her, accuses her of traumatizing her for being angry about it

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Emmy Pratt • Senior Editor
Mar 11, 2024 6:00 PM EDT

"Trauma" can be a dime a dozen these days. There are a lot of people out there who will use traumatic experiences as an excuse for acting badly instead of doing to hard thing of working through said trauma. I think that's one of the biggest problems with our modern conception of mental health. Identifying an event as traumatic should be the beginning of a larger journey towards healing, not a way to halt criticism from anyone calling you out for bad behavior.

Not everybody who evokes "trauma" is doing so with good faith. One teenager recently went viral for chewing her mom out after she discovered she hid her college acceptances and scholarships from her. Her mom accused her of "traumatizing her" because she used such harsh language upon this realization. She even claimed that her therapist thinks that her daughter was traumatizing her, when clearly it is the other way around. 

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  • 01
    02.0 r/AmltheAsshole u/Immediate_Land_4171 21h · AITA for telling my mom i can up and leave and she's the worst thing that ever happened to me? Not the
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 02
    ok, so, i've had a lott of fights with my mom over the years. i'm 17, ill be 18 soon and for me, it's college time. i've been getting into fights with her about college since i was 14 (mainly her telling me i wasn't going and me telling her i was). it was never a financial thing, but she felt i didn't have the personality to go to college.
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  • 03
    we keep having fights about this to this day. apparently, a little while ago, i got into one of my dream unis. i had been dreaming about this uni for years. and i got in on a scholarship, (not full-ride, but i had a lot of tuition off) and with the amount i was awarded, i could have paid for college myself (housing was free).
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 04
    she hid it from me. i have lost access to my email for a while, so i was relying on using her account to check for responses. but for a while, she wouldnt let me check, and she just said i didn't get any responses yet, and i believed her.
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 05
    the other day, she went to the washroom, i got into her phone and i saw the email. i yelled more than i ever had, i swore at her for the first time in my life, and i told her i'd pay for college myself, she's the worst thing that ever happened to me and once i was gone, i would never be speaking to her again.
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 06
    my mom isn't talking to me anymore. my dad is travelling. my sister is in college. i cant speak to anyone, but apparently my mother spoke to her therapist and believes i inflicted trauma creating words on her purely out of teenage angst.
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 07
    i dont think it was angst, i genuinely can't express the anger i feel rn. but i do wanna know if i gave my mom trauma? AITA?
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171
  • 08
    NTA- KryoChamber • 21h Certified Proctologist [21] Im a mom myself. She purposefully hid an acceptance letter and lied when she was asked about it. She quite literally could've diminished your future success had you not found out about her weird need to keep it from you. Also, i have LARGE doubts that she told the whole truth about that situation in order to garner some sympathy. In no way is it teenage angst. It was quite reasonable to be upset, frustrated, mad, etc. From the fact she blatantly
    via u/KryoChamber
  • 09
    Immediate_Land_4171 OP 21h Hope you do well in college!!! ● thank you !!! this means a lot coming from a mother 43.8K 3.8k
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  • 10
    sugarlump858 20h. Partassipant [1] No way she told the therapist the whole truth. Or your mom just made up the therapist's response. Someone who would do what she did to you will have no problem lying to manipulate you even further. NTA. 4 2.4k ↓
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  • 11
    LingonberryPrior6896 19h Partassipant [2] Not unless she has a REALLY bad therapist ... 574
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  • 12
    ijustcantwithit . 20h If you have a way to open your own email, I would also do this and contact the school. Let them know you plan on attending and your mom is trying to not let you despite you reaching majority but the time you would be attending. Most schools understand this and will help work with you on a plan of action. You won't be the first this happens to nor the last. If you get a personal email open, then change all contact preferences to that email. If you have access to a public/sch
    via u/ijustcantwithit
  • 13
    redeyesdeaddragon 20h Partassipant [1] Hijacking this thread, because you need to know that your mother is abusing you. ● Sabotaging opportunities that could improve your life is abuse. Controlling and limiting your access to information about your own educational career is abuse. Trying to keep you from making choices about your own life when you're about to be a legal adult is abuse. I hope when you are able to, you run as fast as you can and don't look back. And get yourself into therapy with
    via u/redeyesdeaddragon
  • 14
    TAforScranton • 20h Dont forget to accept the scholarship and let them know that you do, in fact, plan on attending the university. Usually a scholarship is an offer with an expiration date. If they don't hear back from you there is a chance that you'll lose the scholarship. Create a new email with a password that your mother does not have access to. Get in contact with the admissions department at the university and make sure that from this moment forward, they only communicate with you through
    via u/TAforScranton
  • 15
    Negative-Muffin-3650 - 21h NTA. You seem to have handled the situation pretty maturely so far, and then she went and hid a life changing email from you. That is something no mother should ever dream of doing. She has not suffered 'trauma inflicting words' because of you getting rightfully angry, I promise you that. I don't know how she was expecting you to react, but you were understandably angry. She owes you a sincere apology. She needs to realise that you are very nearly an adult, and you mak
    via u/Negative-Muffin-3650
  • 16
    Immediate_Land_4171 OP · 21h thank you, i was feeling bad about the trauma ! 4711 ...
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  • 17
    delinaX 20h My mother pulled this hiding from me. She hid my depression medicine from me, my passport so I couldn't travel or leave home and much more. You're 100% right, whether you want to or not, getting out of an abusive household that your narcissistic parent lives in will eventually make you see how actually awful it was (it becomes clearer when you get out) once you move out. Whether you want to or not, there will be distance and little to no contact. Abusive narcissistic parents are exce
    via u/delinaX
  • 18
    Immediate_Land_4171 OP 13h i dunno if anyone's reading this but: i made a new email, when i go to school tmrw ill ask my counsellor to speak with my colleges for me and inform them of the change ... Reply 60
    via u/Immediate_Land_4171

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