Kate (not her real name) was never there therapy when he appeared in my office. She had never felt the need or desire to confide in anyone outside of her immediate circle of friends and family. A happy, emotionally healthy woman in her mid-40s, Kate was in my office to talk about a problem she couldn’t talk about with anyone in her life. As it turns out, the problem that Kate couldn’t talk about is also the problem that many women experience that women hide and never talk about outside of a therapeutic space (which is why she allowed me to write about it).
The indisputable, indisputable truth was this: Kate loved her child, but he didn’t like he is very He was totally devoted to her, he would do anything for her, but he didn’t really enjoy being with her.
When she confessed her feelings to her best friend, her friend immediately explained to Kate why everything she was “complaining” about and didn’t like was age-appropriate behavior. teenager. She told Kate that she didn’t like the way she felt about her daughter, but about parts of herself that she didn’t like, and that she needed to get over it and blame her child for her problems. She asked Kate if she ever “wanted” to give her daughter a chance. She also reminded Kate (as if she didn’t think about it every day) how painful it must be for her daughter to find out her mother doesn’t like her. But all roads lead back to the same place: such were Kate’s feelings she fault and they implied that there was something wrong with her and that she was a bad mother. It certainly wasn’t good to feel what he felt.
When Kate tried to share her experience with her husband (the girl’s father), he became angry and angry. She defended their daughter, reminding Kate like her friend that anything she didn’t like was normal teenage behavior. She also echoed the sentiment that Kate’s feelings are Kate’s problem, possibly stemming from herself. childhood and parents she took He immediately put on his judge-and-jury hood, making the giant leap from Kate’s inexplicable feelings to accusations that she was considering abandoning their daughter. In minutes, Kate’s twisted confession turns her into a cold-hearted quitter she girl (because, she clearly said that she never have similar feelings).
Kate realized that there was no safe space to hear about this particular experience, no place where her ambivalence could be accepted without judgment and harsh rejection. It seemed that no matter who she talked to, her feelings were against her, making her feel guilty, ashamed, and pathological. It was only forbidden for a woman to love her child, but not as her child personality.
Society’s expectations and mother’s identity
The truth was that Kate’s feelings were clashing with one of the most extreme female insults. They challenged what is the strongest belief we have: that a good mother should experience endless love, pleasure, and enjoyment. gratitudeand endless desire to spend time with his children. She expects her children to be loved as people, regardless of who they are, and to be naturally and completely fulfilled care. Any deviation from this ideal is considered a moral failure. In the end, motherly love must destroy her subjectivity. These beliefs, shared by both women and men, have been hard-wired into our system from the beginning.
No matter how widespread it is, women are often ashamed to say that they don’t always love their children or want to spend time with them. Motherhood is idealized to leave no room for conflicting feelings or ambivalence. But the hidden truth is that ambivalence in motherhood is remarkably common and may even be the norm. However, when a woman feels boredomresentment, hatred, or even loneliness I don’t like it Sometimes the child experiences these feelings not as a normal human reaction, but as evidence that he is flawed, guilty, and even dangerous.
In my decades as a therapist, I have heard countless mothers talk about conflicting, difficult, and complex feelings for their children. This feeling is normal in motherhood, a part of the mothering process. To change the idealized, all-or-nothing, unacceptable expectations of what mothers should feel like, women must first release the judgments they make about themselves and against each other. Before anything systemic develops, women need to stop to embarrass and blame themselves for the perfectly natural emotions that ebb and flow and that too can change. By allowing herself to feel all her emotions, even for her children, a woman becomes a real human being, not just an idealized cartoon mother who cannot exist without a series of strict prohibitions to hold her back.
It is rare for women to find a safe space enough to talk about their relationship with their children, if it does not look and sound a certain way. But when we can become that safe space for ourselves; when there can be a space for everything, all truth, independent of its content, then we discover a security that is irreversible and infinite. A safe space that includes everything and excludes nothing, that can hold all the wonder and disaster that we are. We find ourselves as our true safe harbor and true home, a place where we are all always welcome.
