Nigella Lawson says her mother didn't like her and hit her brother

[TheGrimReader]

Agree with prior observations re: approaches to parenting, but the key words in this sentence are "As her mother lay dying..." As I understand it, the cocktail of drugs administered in the UK to ease the suffering of the terminally would fell an ox, so perhaps her mom did arrange for a lethal dose. Jacqueline Onassis did that, shortly after her brain cancer diagnosis was announced. It wasn't spoken about until some time had passed and never referred to as suicide, but it was understood that she didn't want her illness to become a painful, lengthy sideshow, made her goodbyes to her family and friends while she was coherent and in control of herself and that was that. Mrs L's comments sound more like gallows' humor, to me. Had she said to her young children "i'm waiting until you grow up to kill yourself," now that would be effed up. The corporal punishment was sad to read about, however. Odd that NL would talk about that in an interview.

[yanna]

I wonder if there isn't this level of intimacy there that some moms think they can say the things most people think but never say aloud to their children? As in they think their child is still, like an infant, still an extension of themselves somehow? I don't know; my own mother, whom I love very much, once said to me, "You see connections that other people don't see. Watch that. It can get a person killed." It seemed like very odd advice from a mother to a daughter at a young age.

I don't know... My mother shared a lot of things with me that I truly never wanted to know and that wounded me deeply. It took many years to figure out that not everyone's mother was like that. There was never any physical abuse but the verbal abuse and the manipulation and guilt-tripping was constant.

I know a mother and daughter who have made a pact that neither will kill herself for the other's sake. Ok, that's totally fucked up.