When Shame Tastes Like Parenting: The Tragedy Of Parenting Daughters

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Author: Bettany Webster Source: 9journal.com.ua

The flow between the little girl and her mother must be one-way, constantly channeling support from mother to daughter. It goes without saying that girls are completely dependent on the physical, mental and emotional support of their mothers. However, one of the many facets of a mother's wound is a general dynamic in which the mother is inadequately dependent on the mental and emotional support that her daughter provides. This role reversal is extremely detrimental to her daughter, having a lasting effect on her self-esteem, confidence, and self-worth.

Alice Miller describes this dynamic in The Gifted Child Drama. A mother, having given birth to a child, may unconsciously feel as if she finally has someone who will unconditionally love her, and begin to use the child to satisfy her own needs, which have remained unsatisfied since her childhood.

Thus, the projection of the mother to his mother is superimposed on the child. This puts the daughter in an intolerable situation for her, where the responsibility for the well-being and happiness of her mother is hung on her. And then the young daughter has to suppress her own needs arising in the process of her development in order to satisfy the emotional needs of the mother. Instead of relying on the mother as a reliable emotional base for research, the daughter is expected to be such a base for her mother herself. The daughter is vulnerable and dependent on her mother for survival, so she has little choice:

either to obey and meet the needs of the mother, or to some extent rebel against her. When a mother employs her daughter in adult roles such as alternate partner, best friend, or therapist, she is exploiting her daughter.

When a daughter is asked to act as an emotional support for her mother, she can no longer rely on her mother to the extent necessary to meet her own age-related needs.

There are several options for how a daughter might react to this dynamic:

“If I’m really very good (obedient, quiet, without my own needs), then my mother will still see me and take care of me” or “If I am strong and protect my mother, she will see me” or “If I give my mother what she wants, she will stop using me,”and so on.

In adulthood, we can project this dynamic onto other people as well. For example, on my relationship: "If I keep trying to be good enough for him, he will be in a relationship with me." Or to work: "If I get another degree, I'll be good enough for a promotion."

In this case, mothers compete with their daughters for the right to receive maternal custody. Thus, they broadcast the belief that there is not enough maternal care or love for everyone. Girls grow up with the belief that there is very little love, approval and recognition, and to earn this, you need to work hard. Later, already in adulthood, they attract situations into their lives that play this pattern over and over again. (Many of these dynamics affect sons as well.)

Daughters who have been assigned parental functions are deprived of childhood.

In this case, the daughter does not receive the approval of herself as a person, she receives this only as a result of performing a certain function (relieving the mother of her pain).

Mothers can expect their daughters to listen to their concerns, and even ask their daughters for comfort and concern to cope with their adult fears and worries. They can expect their daughters to help them out of problems, deal with the clutter in their lives or their emotional distress. The daughter may be constantly involved as a mediator or problem solver.

Such mothers broadcast to their daughters that they are like mothers - weak, overwhelmed and unable to cope with life. For the daughter, this means that her needs, arising in the process of her development, overload the mother excessively, so the child begins to blame himself for the very fact of his existence. The girl thus gains the conviction that she has no right to her own needs, has no right to be listened to or approved as she is.

Daughters who have been pinned down to parenting may cling to that role in adulthood due to a variety of secondary benefits. For example, a daughter may receive approval or praise only when she plays the role of a warrior in a mother's life or a mother's savior. Asserting your own needs can threaten the mother with rejection or aggression.

As a daughter grows up, she may fear that her mother is too easily unsettled, and this fear may therefore hide the truth about her own needs from her mother. The mother can play on this by falling into the victim role and making her daughter think of herself as a villain if she dares to claim her own separate reality. Because of this, the daughter may develop an unconscious belief “I am too much. My true self hurts other people. I'm too big. I need to stay small in order to survive and to be loved."

While these daughters may receive a “good mother” projection from their mothers, sometimes the image of a bad mother may also be projected onto them. For example, this can happen when the daughter is about to emotionally separate from her mother as an adult. The mother may unknowingly perceive the separation of her daughter as a repetition of her own mother's rejection.

And then the mother can react with outright childish rage, passive resentment, or hostile criticism.

Often from mothers who exploit their daughters in such a way, you can hear "It's not my fault!" or “Stop being so ungrateful!” if the daughter expresses displeasure with their relationship or tries to discuss the topic. This is the case when a daughter's childhood was stolen, imposed on the obligation to satisfy the aggressive needs of her mother, and then the daughter is attacked because she had the audacity to offer a discussion of the dynamics of the relationship with the mother.

The mother may simply not want to see her contribution to her daughter's pain because it is too painful for herself. Often these mothers also refuse to acknowledge how they have been influenced by their relationship with their own mothers. The phrase “Don't blame your mother” can be used to shame your daughter and keep her silent about the truth of her pain.

If we, as women, are truly willing to assert our strength, we need to see how our mothers actually were to blame for our childhood pain. And as grown women, we ourselves are fully responsible for healing our traumas. Someone with the power can do harm, whether on purpose or not. Regardless of whether mothers are aware of the harm they have done and whether they want to see it, they are still responsible for it.

Daughters need to know that they have a right to feel and voice pain. Otherwise, true healing will not happen. And they will continue to sabotage themselves and limit their ability to thrive and thrive in life.

Patriarchy infringed on women so much that when they had children, they, hungry and hungry for self-affirmation, approval and recognition, sought love from their young daughters. The daughter can never satisfy this hunger. And yet, many generations of innocent daughters voluntarily sacrifice themselves, put themselves on the altar of maternal suffering and hunger in the hope that one day they will become "good enough" for their mothers. They live in the childish hope that if they can “feed the mother,” the mother will eventually be able to feed her daughter. This moment will never come. Satisfying your soul's hunger can only be done by beginning the process of healing your mother's trauma and defending your life and your worth.

We need to stop sacrificing ourselves for our mothers, because ultimately our sacrifice will not satisfy them. The mother can only be fed by transformation, which is on the other side of her pain and grief, which she needs to deal with herself.

Your mother's pain is her responsibility, not yours.

When we refuse to admit how our mothers can be to blame for our suffering, we continue to live with the feeling that something is wrong with us, that we are somehow bad or flawed. Because it is easier to feel shame than to put it aside and face your pain at the realization of the truth about how we were abandoned or used by our mothers. So shame in this case is just a protection against pain.

Our inner little girl will prefer shame and self-deprecation because it maintains the illusion of a good mother. (Holding on to shame is a way for us to hold on to our mother. In this way, shame takes on the function of feeling maternal custody.)

In order to finally let go of self-loathing and self-sabotage, you need to help your inner child understand that no matter how faithful he remains to his mother, remaining small and weak, the mother will not change from this and will not become what the child expects. We need to find the courage to give our mothers their pain, which they asked us to bear for them. We give up pain when we place the responsibility on those who really owe it, that is, given the dynamics of the situation, the adult - the mother, not the child. In childhood, we were not responsible for the choice and behavior of the adults around us. When we truly understand this, we can take full responsibility for working through this trauma, recognizing how it has impacted our lives so that

we were able to act differently, according to our deepest nature.

Many women try to skip this step and go straight to forgiveness and mercy, which they can get stuck on. You can't really leave the past behind if you don't know what exactly needs to be left behind. Why it's so hard to admit how your mother was guilty: When we were little girls, we were culturally conditioned to care for others while forgetting our own needs. In children, at the biological level, there is an unshakable loyalty to the mother, no matter what she does. A mother's love is essential for their survival. Identical gender identification with your mother suggests that she is on your side. It's hard to see your mother as a victim of her own unhealed trauma and patriarchal culture. There are religious and cultural taboos “Honor thy father and thy mother” and “holy mother”, which instill guilt and oblige children to remain silent about their feelings.

Why is self-sabotage a manifestation of maternal trauma?

For daughters who were assigned a parental role, the connection with the mother (love, comfort, and safety) was formed in conditions of self-suppression. (To be small = to be loved) Therefore, there is a subconscious connection between motherly love and self-depletion. And although on a conscious level you may want success, happiness, love and confidence, the subconscious mind remembers the dangers of early childhood, when being big, spontaneous or natural became the cause of painful rejection on the part of the mother.

For the subconscious: rejection by the mother = death.

For the subconscious: self-sabotage (staying small) = security (survival). This is why it can be so hard to love yourself. Because letting go of your shame, guilt and self-sabotage feels like letting go of your mother. Healing maternal trauma is about recognizing your right to live without dysfunctional patterns inherent in early childhood in communication with your mother.

It's about honestly reflecting on the pain in your relationship with your mother for the sake of healing and transformation that every woman has a right to.

This is about the inner work on yourself in order to free yourself and become the woman you are meant to be.

This is not at all about the expectation that the mother will finally change or satisfy the need that she could not satisfy when you were a child.

Just the opposite. Until we look directly and accept our mother's limitations and how she harmed us, we are stuck in purgatory waiting for her approval and as a result constantly pause our lives.

Healing maternal trauma is a way to be whole and take on

responsibility for your life. Recently, one reader left a comment about how she healed her maternal trauma for over 20 years, and although she had to distance herself from her own mother, her tremendous progress in healing allowed her to build a healthy relationship with her young daughter. She summed it up beautifully when she said of her daughter: “I can be a solid support for her because I don’t use her as an emotional crutch.” Although conflicts and discomfort can arise in the process of healing a mother's trauma, in order to heal happened, you need to confidently go to your truth and strength. By adhering to this path, we will eventually come to a feeling of natural mercy not only for ourselves as daughters, but also for our mothers, for all women at all times and for all living beings.

But on this path to mercy, you first need to give mothers their pain, which we absorbed in childhood. When a mother holds her daughter accountable for her own unworked pain and blames her for admitting her suffering because of it, that is a true disclaimer. Our mothers may never take full responsibility for the pain they unknowingly put into us to relieve their burden and take responsibility for their lives, but most importantly, YOU, as a daughter, fully acknowledge your pain and its relevance. so that you feel compassion for your inner child. It frees and opens the way to healing and the ability to live the way you love and deserve.

Bettany Webster - Writer, Transformation Coach, International

speaker. She helps women heal their mother's trauma.