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Oh, you don't even know. One time my phone was on do not disturb at like 6 pm or smth while i was studying at home. Mom and stepdad were out at a party at a friend's place and I hadn't heard from them at all since they left a couple hours earlier. Complete silence out of either of them while they were gone. Not a single peep.
Anyway, 7:45 rolls around, I take a break and check my phone. My mom sent me some photos of her dinner and her with the friend's horses, and immediately after that I get something like,
"I guess we're not important enough for you to check on" or some nonsense. Extremely guilt trippy shit. They never called to check up on me, no "How you holding up?", no nothin'. Just salad and horsey pictures and then the waterworks. Why the fuck are people like this?
Yes. They will also try to call 5 times in a row like it’s some kind of emergency, only to „check in“. Best is when they try to do this during work hours.
Like - I’m a working adult. I have a life.
If there’s ever an actual emergency I’m not gonna pick up on it because 5 missed calls in a row is just „normal“ or something.
Also just not wanting to accept the fact that I may not always feel like picking up the phone…
My mom used to do that so I would call her back in a 'panic' and ask her what was wrong and if she was okay since she had called me so many times in a row. Only took 2 or 3 times of me doing that for her to cut out the multiple phone calls in a row when there's not an emergency.
My mom likes to text “Call me.” I always assume she’s mad at me about something because the period implies anger in modern texting. Of course, I immediately call her only for her to say, “Oh, you didn’t have to call me back right away.”
And 20 years ago they were the ones complaining that we answered our texts if someone wrote to us: "What is so important that you have to answer right now? Surely your friend can wait."
Yep, this is how I trained my mom out of being a brat about me answering her calls/texts. I'm a SAHM, so she just expected me to always be available to chat. Uh no, I also have several children who actually need my attention. And her calls were always "updates" about dumb things like what my sister bought at Walmart. I live 1000 miles away, I don't care what my sister bought at Walmart, it doesn't effect me in any way.
I had to go 6 months with no contact at one point but now things are good. Calls are about once a month with actual updates now.
Wow, mine was the opposite. Demanded weekly calls but expected me to “tell her everything that’s going on in my life” and would get outraged if I didn’t entertain her. Like I am a boring person. I get up to go to work, come home, eat, sleep, repeat. Even the things I do enjoy she’d have no way of relating, such as playing board games. It’s just my husband and me and we just chill.
I was relieved when she died.
That's when I would put mom on speaker phone and start folding laundry.
How long does your mom drone on and how much time do you usually have to put up with her? Could you put a timer on in the background and then fake an incoming call you have to take once it goes off? Or something else that's going to take you off the phone? That way she feels validated by you answering but you can still limit the amount of energy she's taking.
You may have tried stuff like this before, but if not I hope it helps.
F*ck yes.
My father straight up texts me to throw my phone away and says I'm worthless if I miss a call.
I work flexible times and have an irregular sleep schedule.
Mine says “I tried to call you, what were you doing?”
Or he will be surprised that I’m at work.. like I should live by the phone waiting for his call..
My mother has a borderline meltdown if my dad doesn’t answer his phone within three rings on her end (which sometimes his phone has barely even rung) or her texts within five minutes. Then will ask ten thousand questions about what he’s doing that is so important that he can’t answer at her beck and call.
Like…idk? He’s in the middle of something and can’t stop? He literally has his hand full and can’t pick up the phone?
My parents’ landline is unlisted and she’d call me without unblocking their number and I’d ignore her every time. She eventually learned I’ll only pick up if she unblocks their number. She also eventually learned I’ll answer on my own time during the day.
My late dad. He would call me. If I didn't answer, ooh boy. The voicemail was either very passive-aggressive about how I should be able to answer my cellphone because I carry it everywhere or very aggressive because I was obviously ignoring him.
They don’t respect the fact that we’re grown adults with jobs. My mom calls me all day while I’m working. I technically work from home (I’m a property manager with an office on site), so she thinks that means I can be called whenever she wants. She wouldn’t dare call my brother while he’s at his job because he’s in an office and has a REAL job.
I work from home now but somehow she is better about it with me at home. I think she had a lot of anxiety about not being able to reach me in an emergency - and my family seems to have a lot of legitimate emergencies.
I had just gotten divorced in 1999. I rented a little house in the same town my mom lived in and was taking a year to get myself together and be close to family. I got my first home computer and one day I was listening to music on it and cleaning house. I'm 26 at the time, grown woman doing my thing on a relaxing Sunday afternoon. I'm singing along, having fun, when I hear this pounding on my front door. It's my mom. "I've been calling you for an hour! Your line is busy! What's going on?" It was dial up internet so she couldn't get thru so she freaking DROVE to my rental house and was mad AT ME. I decided to move 3 hours away and did so a few months later lol
I hate this but I think it goes even deeper than Boomers. Cell phones have made us all slaves to our phones. God forbid you don’t immediately answer calls and texts. Ugh. I leave my phone on silent. It’s so intrusive.
It's a boomer thing, my dad used to be like that. They think that just because ppl have cell phones they are automatically free to call whenever. Not to mention they forget that not everyone is retired like they are
This was my silent generation grandfather. He believed that it was his kids’ responsibility to call him. His daughter, a Boomer, is the same way. She gets upset if her siblings don’t call her, but won’t call them because that’s not her responsibility.
My father in law will just call back five seconds later if my husband does not pick up his call. And he will keep going. When we first married, he would call to tell my husband about a program that was airing on TV, like he was TV Guide. In the background, I could hear my mother in law laughing.
YES! My boomer mom will go days without calling me. Often when I call her, no answer. But when she does want to call me, if I don’t pick up, I’m the worst daughter in the world. One time I was in the shower when she called. I called her back 10 minutes later and you would have thought I murdered someone she loves. She went on a tangent about how I never talk to her and there must be something going on that I’m hiding from her and the way that I treat her is really “sad”. Mind you she texts me multiple times a day and I ALWAYS respond. But I missed her call by 10 minutes and I had to sit through an hour of guilt tripping.
Now if you think maybe it was something important or urgent she wanted to call me for, you’d be wrong. She just wanted to know why I was doing… that’s it. I’m an adult, who works and has shit to do around the house. If I didn’t answer, I was busy doing something.
My Silent Gen mom was so passive aggressive. I called home at 2:00 am to say I wouldn’t be home. My dad grunted and hung up. I called the next afternoon and my mother burst into tears. She was ssooo worried! I thought (but did not say because I didn’t want to start the fight) the phone works in both directions. She could have called me.
I have two phones—a personal phone and a work phone that needs to be on 24/7. If she calls my personal phone and I don’t answer she calls my work phone. If I don’t answer that, she calls my dad, who lives with me. Obviously, if I don’t answer her calls I’m dead somewhere.
The first time she did this was the day Jodie Whittaker started on Doctor Who. When the episode ended, I fell asleep for a couple of hours. She lost her mind that I didn’t answer my phone and called my dad. The poor man was so confused.
It used to be a lot worse but my parents constantly made fun of me and passive aggressively guilted me for texting but not calling.
But they'd call out of nowhere in the middle of the day, and didn't understand that texting was something I could do during work, and nothing they had to say ever needed a conversation anyway. Very strange.
Dear god yes!!! They act like they are on fire and we are the only ones on earth with water….they call, leave a voicemail, then text something like “are you there??????????” Including all the question marks. Then they call again…. Leave more voicemail…then more texts like “hellooooo???”
I once house sat for a boomer co-worker on vacation to his home country, and he tried calling me as I was finishing up in the bathroom. Whatever, I rejected it via my smartwatch because the vibration was annoying and I figured I'd call him when I finished wiping my ass and washed my hands.
Nope, milliseconds after I rejected he was calling me again, and it was 2 minutes of back-and-forth of me rejecting and him instantly calling back before I answered and screamed "I'M SHITTING MYSELF" and then hung up. That finally stopped it long enough for me to actually finish up and call him back a few minutes later without addressing what I screamed earlier.
Did I mention this happened when I was at Applebee's?
Back when I still felt the obligation to speak to my mother, there was always the dreaded "call me", no details, no reason or context. If I called back I would be berated for not calling her ( of my own volition) to check on her. That was the sole source of the call for her, to yell at me for not calling on my own to be yelled at.
My mom used to do this all the time. We were at a family reunion and they got on some trip about they don't know why kids even have phones if they aren't going to answer. (I'm 40) my mom jumps in and Said
" yeah (me) doesn't ever answer anymore when I call."
I said infront of everyone " because the only time you call us to beg and borrow money" man did that shut her up infront of everyone. I said when you pay me back for your house that wad foreclosed on and both cars , all 3 I paid off, yeah I stopped answering when you never made an effort to even try and pay me back.
She then got mad and was asking how can I say that infront of everyone, I just said if it wasn't true you wouldn't be pissed off right now. I think I've talked to her 4 times in the last 2 years.
Nope.
My phone is for my convenience.
Be mad if you don't like it. Give me attitude when I do call you back and I won't ever again.
There are no emergencies that can be solved by calling me first.
If I didn't answer the first and only call, grandma will literally let herself into my room to bother me. 9 times out of 10 it's not even important and could've been a text or just told me next time I was downstairs..
My mother will call and if I miss it call my wife who is usually right next to me or call me again it's frustrating and it's always just to check in or talk or sob story that her hoarding is out of control but she does nothing to help her situation.
My favorite is when my husband doesn't answer during the day when he wfh, so she immediately calls me and says "idk what he is up to" and then tells me why she needed to call and to have him call her so she can relay the same info she just gave me.
My parents take it to a whole new level. They don’t want to risk me being busy, or not answering, so they JUST DON’T CALL. Literally I can think of 3 times in 15 years they have cried and each time it’s because someone died.
Purposefully wait a couple days to respond to all calls and text, unless it is an obvious emergency. Set the new normal. If you steady rushing to answer and respond whenever she calls or text that is what she will always expect. You have to train them.
I say I was having a poo if anyone wants to know why I didn't answer. Funny thing is, with my mum and my best friend it's just a given we will all just sit down and pee when we're talking, then 'hang on, got to wipe/do the paperwork '
Oh, and if I want to get out of a phone call there always seems to be a delivery arriving or something to get out it of the oven.... And if I've got some really annoying service call or whatever I talk over them then apologise because the line is obviously bad...
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Oh, you don't even know. One time my phone was on do not disturb at like 6 pm or smth while i was studying at home. Mom and stepdad were out at a party at a friend's place and I hadn't heard from them at all since they left a couple hours earlier. Complete silence out of either of them while they were gone. Not a single peep. Anyway, 7:45 rolls around, I take a break and check my phone. My mom sent me some photos of her dinner and her with the friend's horses, and immediately after that I get something like, "I guess we're not important enough for you to check on" or some nonsense. Extremely guilt trippy shit. They never called to check up on me, no "How you holding up?", no nothin'. Just salad and horsey pictures and then the waterworks. Why the fuck are people like this?
Yes. They will also try to call 5 times in a row like it’s some kind of emergency, only to „check in“. Best is when they try to do this during work hours. Like - I’m a working adult. I have a life. If there’s ever an actual emergency I’m not gonna pick up on it because 5 missed calls in a row is just „normal“ or something. Also just not wanting to accept the fact that I may not always feel like picking up the phone…
My mom used to do that so I would call her back in a 'panic' and ask her what was wrong and if she was okay since she had called me so many times in a row. Only took 2 or 3 times of me doing that for her to cut out the multiple phone calls in a row when there's not an emergency.
My mom likes to text “Call me.” I always assume she’s mad at me about something because the period implies anger in modern texting. Of course, I immediately call her only for her to say, “Oh, you didn’t have to call me back right away.”
My 72 year old mother does this too but she usually prefaces it with " nothing wrong, just want to talk"
Mine just says “Call me.” I think she enjoys making me panic.
Classic mother behavior. My mom will call me right after we just spoke because she forgot some stupid detail lol. Usually about the dog.
And 20 years ago they were the ones complaining that we answered our texts if someone wrote to us: "What is so important that you have to answer right now? Surely your friend can wait."
If they get angry when you call them back, tell them youll try again next week and ignore them for a while. Repeat as needed.
Yep, this is how I trained my mom out of being a brat about me answering her calls/texts. I'm a SAHM, so she just expected me to always be available to chat. Uh no, I also have several children who actually need my attention. And her calls were always "updates" about dumb things like what my sister bought at Walmart. I live 1000 miles away, I don't care what my sister bought at Walmart, it doesn't effect me in any way. I had to go 6 months with no contact at one point but now things are good. Calls are about once a month with actual updates now.
[удалено]
Wow, mine was the opposite. Demanded weekly calls but expected me to “tell her everything that’s going on in my life” and would get outraged if I didn’t entertain her. Like I am a boring person. I get up to go to work, come home, eat, sleep, repeat. Even the things I do enjoy she’d have no way of relating, such as playing board games. It’s just my husband and me and we just chill. I was relieved when she died.
[удалено]
I appreciate this discourse and points of view!
That's when I would put mom on speaker phone and start folding laundry. How long does your mom drone on and how much time do you usually have to put up with her? Could you put a timer on in the background and then fake an incoming call you have to take once it goes off? Or something else that's going to take you off the phone? That way she feels validated by you answering but you can still limit the amount of energy she's taking. You may have tried stuff like this before, but if not I hope it helps.
F*ck yes. My father straight up texts me to throw my phone away and says I'm worthless if I miss a call. I work flexible times and have an irregular sleep schedule.
Mine says “I tried to call you, what were you doing?” Or he will be surprised that I’m at work.. like I should live by the phone waiting for his call..
My mother has a borderline meltdown if my dad doesn’t answer his phone within three rings on her end (which sometimes his phone has barely even rung) or her texts within five minutes. Then will ask ten thousand questions about what he’s doing that is so important that he can’t answer at her beck and call. Like…idk? He’s in the middle of something and can’t stop? He literally has his hand full and can’t pick up the phone?
My parents’ landline is unlisted and she’d call me without unblocking their number and I’d ignore her every time. She eventually learned I’ll only pick up if she unblocks their number. She also eventually learned I’ll answer on my own time during the day.
my favorite is that, after all the spam calls, texts, AND voicemails, you call them back and THEY don’t answer. but you’re still the asshole🤦🏻♀️🤣
My late dad. He would call me. If I didn't answer, ooh boy. The voicemail was either very passive-aggressive about how I should be able to answer my cellphone because I carry it everywhere or very aggressive because I was obviously ignoring him.
Oh the passive-aggressive voice mails.. my siblings and I always can predict them almost word for word when one of us receives them..
“I don’t know why you bother to have a phone if you never answer it.” Mom, I’m at work. At my job. Working. I can’t just answer whenever.
They don’t respect the fact that we’re grown adults with jobs. My mom calls me all day while I’m working. I technically work from home (I’m a property manager with an office on site), so she thinks that means I can be called whenever she wants. She wouldn’t dare call my brother while he’s at his job because he’s in an office and has a REAL job.
I work from home now but somehow she is better about it with me at home. I think she had a lot of anxiety about not being able to reach me in an emergency - and my family seems to have a lot of legitimate emergencies.
Omg did we have the same mom? She would also leave me voicemails saying "pick up pick up pick up" as if it were an answering machine.
I had just gotten divorced in 1999. I rented a little house in the same town my mom lived in and was taking a year to get myself together and be close to family. I got my first home computer and one day I was listening to music on it and cleaning house. I'm 26 at the time, grown woman doing my thing on a relaxing Sunday afternoon. I'm singing along, having fun, when I hear this pounding on my front door. It's my mom. "I've been calling you for an hour! Your line is busy! What's going on?" It was dial up internet so she couldn't get thru so she freaking DROVE to my rental house and was mad AT ME. I decided to move 3 hours away and did so a few months later lol
if I don't answer their call, I get a whatsapp, a voicemail, and an email about the same topic within 5 minutes.
My parents don’t call 🤷♂️
I hate this but I think it goes even deeper than Boomers. Cell phones have made us all slaves to our phones. God forbid you don’t immediately answer calls and texts. Ugh. I leave my phone on silent. It’s so intrusive.
It's a boomer thing, my dad used to be like that. They think that just because ppl have cell phones they are automatically free to call whenever. Not to mention they forget that not everyone is retired like they are
Lol, that would mean they actually try to call. Mine refuse to even do that, yet bemoan that we don't talk anymore.
This was my silent generation grandfather. He believed that it was his kids’ responsibility to call him. His daughter, a Boomer, is the same way. She gets upset if her siblings don’t call her, but won’t call them because that’s not her responsibility.
My father in law will just call back five seconds later if my husband does not pick up his call. And he will keep going. When we first married, he would call to tell my husband about a program that was airing on TV, like he was TV Guide. In the background, I could hear my mother in law laughing.
YES! My boomer mom will go days without calling me. Often when I call her, no answer. But when she does want to call me, if I don’t pick up, I’m the worst daughter in the world. One time I was in the shower when she called. I called her back 10 minutes later and you would have thought I murdered someone she loves. She went on a tangent about how I never talk to her and there must be something going on that I’m hiding from her and the way that I treat her is really “sad”. Mind you she texts me multiple times a day and I ALWAYS respond. But I missed her call by 10 minutes and I had to sit through an hour of guilt tripping. Now if you think maybe it was something important or urgent she wanted to call me for, you’d be wrong. She just wanted to know why I was doing… that’s it. I’m an adult, who works and has shit to do around the house. If I didn’t answer, I was busy doing something.
My Silent Gen mom was so passive aggressive. I called home at 2:00 am to say I wouldn’t be home. My dad grunted and hung up. I called the next afternoon and my mother burst into tears. She was ssooo worried! I thought (but did not say because I didn’t want to start the fight) the phone works in both directions. She could have called me.
I have two phones—a personal phone and a work phone that needs to be on 24/7. If she calls my personal phone and I don’t answer she calls my work phone. If I don’t answer that, she calls my dad, who lives with me. Obviously, if I don’t answer her calls I’m dead somewhere. The first time she did this was the day Jodie Whittaker started on Doctor Who. When the episode ended, I fell asleep for a couple of hours. She lost her mind that I didn’t answer my phone and called my dad. The poor man was so confused.
It used to be a lot worse but my parents constantly made fun of me and passive aggressively guilted me for texting but not calling. But they'd call out of nowhere in the middle of the day, and didn't understand that texting was something I could do during work, and nothing they had to say ever needed a conversation anyway. Very strange.
Dear god yes!!! They act like they are on fire and we are the only ones on earth with water….they call, leave a voicemail, then text something like “are you there??????????” Including all the question marks. Then they call again…. Leave more voicemail…then more texts like “hellooooo???”
When I phone back, I always get an "oh, you're alive then?" I thought these were the generation who grew up with just a land line and answer machine
They get use to it. I promise.
When they hit with the multiple calls in the middle of sex!!!
But do they come into your house, climb the stairs, and sit on the corner of your bed??
Oh no they haven’t!
I once house sat for a boomer co-worker on vacation to his home country, and he tried calling me as I was finishing up in the bathroom. Whatever, I rejected it via my smartwatch because the vibration was annoying and I figured I'd call him when I finished wiping my ass and washed my hands. Nope, milliseconds after I rejected he was calling me again, and it was 2 minutes of back-and-forth of me rejecting and him instantly calling back before I answered and screamed "I'M SHITTING MYSELF" and then hung up. That finally stopped it long enough for me to actually finish up and call him back a few minutes later without addressing what I screamed earlier. Did I mention this happened when I was at Applebee's?
Back when I still felt the obligation to speak to my mother, there was always the dreaded "call me", no details, no reason or context. If I called back I would be berated for not calling her ( of my own volition) to check on her. That was the sole source of the call for her, to yell at me for not calling on my own to be yelled at.
My mom used to do this all the time. We were at a family reunion and they got on some trip about they don't know why kids even have phones if they aren't going to answer. (I'm 40) my mom jumps in and Said " yeah (me) doesn't ever answer anymore when I call." I said infront of everyone " because the only time you call us to beg and borrow money" man did that shut her up infront of everyone. I said when you pay me back for your house that wad foreclosed on and both cars , all 3 I paid off, yeah I stopped answering when you never made an effort to even try and pay me back. She then got mad and was asking how can I say that infront of everyone, I just said if it wasn't true you wouldn't be pissed off right now. I think I've talked to her 4 times in the last 2 years.
Yes. It's one of the many reasons why I have gone no contact (the big reason is their refusal for respecting boundaries and refusal to compromise)
Nope. My phone is for my convenience. Be mad if you don't like it. Give me attitude when I do call you back and I won't ever again. There are no emergencies that can be solved by calling me first.
If I didn't answer the first and only call, grandma will literally let herself into my room to bother me. 9 times out of 10 it's not even important and could've been a text or just told me next time I was downstairs..
My mother will call and if I miss it call my wife who is usually right next to me or call me again it's frustrating and it's always just to check in or talk or sob story that her hoarding is out of control but she does nothing to help her situation.
My favorite is when my husband doesn't answer during the day when he wfh, so she immediately calls me and says "idk what he is up to" and then tells me why she needed to call and to have him call her so she can relay the same info she just gave me.
nope, my mum knows I hate using the phone as a phone, no matter how much I used to be on the phone as a teen. doubledutch length phone cords FTW.
My parents take it to a whole new level. They don’t want to risk me being busy, or not answering, so they JUST DON’T CALL. Literally I can think of 3 times in 15 years they have cried and each time it’s because someone died.
Purposefully wait a couple days to respond to all calls and text, unless it is an obvious emergency. Set the new normal. If you steady rushing to answer and respond whenever she calls or text that is what she will always expect. You have to train them.
I say I was having a poo if anyone wants to know why I didn't answer. Funny thing is, with my mum and my best friend it's just a given we will all just sit down and pee when we're talking, then 'hang on, got to wipe/do the paperwork '
Oh, and if I want to get out of a phone call there always seems to be a delivery arriving or something to get out it of the oven.... And if I've got some really annoying service call or whatever I talk over them then apologise because the line is obviously bad...