6 Why Do Young Children Often Want the Same Book Read to Them Over and Over Again
Source: Iakov Filimonov/Shutterstock
It's true enough that all daughters of unloving and unattuned mothers have common experiences. The lack of maternal warmth and validation warps their sense of self, makes them lack confidence in or be wary of shut emotional connection, and shapes them in ways that are both seen and unseen.
What are they missing? I volition quote Judith Viorst considering her description of what an attuned mother communicates through gaze, gesture, and discussion is pitch-perfect:
"You are what y'all are. You are what you lot are feeling. Allowing u.s.a. to believe in our own reality. Persuading us that it is safe to expose our early fragile showtime-to-grow true self."
The unloved daughter hears something very different and takes away another lesson entirely. Unlike the daughter of an attuned mother who grows in reflected light, the unloved daughter is macerated past the connectedness.
Even so, despite the broad strokes of this shared and painful feel, the pattern of connection—how the female parent interacts with her girl—varies significantly from one pair to another. These different behaviors impact daughters in specific ways. I've compiled a list of these patterns, drawn from my own experiences and those of the many daughters I've spoken to over the years since I commencement began researching Mean Mothers. Since I'm neither a therapist nor a psychologist, the names I've given them aren't scientific only chosen for clarity. Still differentiating these patterns in wide terms tin assistance daughters recognize, sympathize, sort through, and ultimately begin to manage these very problematic and painful interactions. These behaviors aren't mutually sectional, of course; my own mother was dismissive, combative, unreliable, and self-involved past turns.
1. Dismissive.
"My female parent ignored me," Gwen, 47, confides. "If I did something that I thought would brand her proud, she would either dismiss information technology as insignificant or undercut information technology in some other fashion. And I believed her for the longest fourth dimension." Daughters raised past dismissive mothers dubiousness the validity of their own emotional needs. They feel unworthy of attention and experience deep, gut-wrenching cocky-uncertainty, all the while feeling intense longing for love and validation.
Here's how one daughter described information technology:
"My mother literally didn't listen to me or hear me. She'd inquire if I were hungry and if I said I wasn't, she'd put food in front of me as if I'd said nothing. She would ask what I wanted to do over the weekend or summer, ignore my reply, and and so make plans for me. What clothes did I want? The same matter. But that wasn't the cardinal role: she never asked me how I was feeling or what I was thinking. She fabricated it articulate that I was largely irrelevant to her."
Dismissive behavior, as reported by daughters, occurs across a spectrum, and can become combative if the female parent actively and aggressively turns dismissal into rejection. Human being offspring are hardwired to need and seek proximity to their mothers, and therein lies the problem: the daughter'south demand for her mother's attending and beloved isn't macerated by the mother'due south dismissal. In fact, from my own personal experience, I know that information technology can amp up the need, thrusting the girl into an agile design of demand ("Why don't y'all care nigh me/ dear me, Mom?" or "Why do you lot ignore me?") or a plan to "fix" the situation ("I'll get all A's in school or win a prize, so she'll love me for certain!"). The response, alas, is inevitably the mother'southward further withdrawal, often accompanied past complete denial well-nigh what took place.
2. Controlling.
In many ways, this is some other grade of the dismissive interaction although it presents very differently; the cardinal link is that the controlling mother doesn't acknowledge her daughter whatsoever more than than the dismissive one does. These mothers micromanage their daughters, actively refuse to admit the validity of their words or choices, and instill a sense of insecurity and helplessness in their offspring. Most of this behavior is done nether the guise of beingness for the child'due south "own good;" the message is, effectively, that the girl is inadequate, cannot be trusted to practice proficient judgment, and would simply flounder and fail without her mother'south guidance.
3. Unavailable.
Emotionally unavailable mothers, those who actively withdraw at a daughter's approach or who withhold love from one child while granting it to some other, inflict a dissimilar kind of harm. Be mindful that all children are hardwired to rely on their mothers, cheers to evolution.
"My mother wasn't mean," one daughter writes. "But she was emotionally disconnected from me and still is." These behaviors can include lack of physical contact (no hugging, no comforting); unresponsiveness to a child'south cries or displays of emotion, and her articulated needs as she gets older; and, of grade, literal abandonment.
Literal abandonment leaves its own special scars, especially in a culture that believes in the automated nature of mother dearest and instinctual behavior. In addition to being excruciatingly painful, information technology is also bewildering.
That was truthful for Eileen, 39, who has sorted through many of these issues and, as a mother herself, at present has limited contact with her mother. Eileen'due south parents divorced when she was four and she lived with her mother until she was half dozen when her mother decided that her begetter was the "appropriate" parent afterward all. It was devastating for the 6-year-onetime, particularly since her male parent remarried and had already had a beginning child in his new marriage. At that place would be ii more. But the large question for Eileen was this: "I could never understand why my Mom didn't want to be around. I felt a huge office was missing in my life and that only my Mom could fill information technology."
All of these behaviors leave daughters emotionally hungry and sometimes desperately needy. The luckiest daughters will find some other family member—a father, a grandparent, an aunt, or an uncle—to step into the emotional breach which helps but doesn't heal; many don't. These insecurely attached daughters oftentimes become clingy in adult relationships, needing abiding reassurance, from friends and lovers alike.
iv. Enmeshed.
While the starting time two types of behaviors describe mothers who distance themselves from their children, enmeshment is the opposite: these mothers practice non acknowledge whatsoever kind of boundary between them, their definition of cocky, and their children. In this case, the daughter's demand for beloved and attention facilitates a maternal chokehold, exploiting human nature in the service of another goal. These women are classic "stage mothers" and live through their children'south achievements, which they both demand and encourage; while they accept a long history—the mothers of Gypsy Rose Lee, Judy Garland, and Frances Farmer come immediately to mind—they now have especial renown (and no shame) thanks to reality tv set. Vivian Gornick'southward memoir, Fierce Attachments, should be required reading for whatsoever daughter who grew up with a mother like this.
While the daughter of a dismissive or unavailable female parent "disappears" because of inattention and under-parenting, the enmeshed daughter'southward sense of self is swallowed whole. Untangling enmeshment—the term alone conveys the difficulty—is another road entirely considering of the absence of boundaries. A healthy and attuned maternal relationship offers security and liberty to roam at once—the infant is released from her mother's arms to clamber, the adolescent counseled but listened to and respected—and this pattern does not. That'due south all missing in the enmeshed human relationship.
5. Combative.
"Open up" warfare characterizes this kind of interaction, though I accept put "open" in quotation marks for a reason. These mothers never acknowledge their behaviors, and they are usually quite careful nigh displaying them in public. Included in this group are the mothers who actively denigrate their daughters, are hypercritical, intensely jealous of, or competitive with their offspring. Yes, this is mean mother territory; the mother takes advantage of the ability play. I know—the words "ability play" and "mother" seem incongruous combined in a single sentence—just I leave you in the capable easily of Deborah Tannen, with a quotation I use often because I simply can't phrase information technology better or with her authority:
"This, in the finish, may be the crux of a parent'south power over a child: not just to create the world the child lives in but as well to dictate how that world is to exist interpreted."
A child is no friction match for this warrior queen and, more dangerously, will internalize the messages communicated by her. Many daughters report that the pain of feeling responsible somehow—the belief that they "made' their mothers react, or that they are unworthy—is as crippling as the lack of maternal love. Blame and shame were usually this mother's weapons of option.
The combative mother uses verbal and emotional abuse to "win" merely can resort to physical force also. She rationalizes her behaviors every bit being necessary because of defects in her daughter's graphic symbol or behavior. This is dangerous territory.
half dozen. Unreliable.
This is, in many ways, the hardest beliefs for a daughter to cope with considering she never knows if the "good mommy" or the "bad mommy" will show up. All children form mental images of what relationships in the real globe look similar based on their connections to their mothers; these daughters understand emotional connection to be fraught, precarious, and even dangerous. In an interview for my book, Mean Mothers, "Jeanne" (a pseudonym) said:
"I trace my ain lack of self-conviction back to my mother. She was emotionally unreliable—horribly critical of me one twenty-four hour period, dismissive the next, and then, out of nowhere, smiling and fussing over me. I now realize that the smiley mom thing commonly happened in front end of other people who were her audience. Anyhow, I never knew what to expect. She could be intolerably nowadays, inexplicably absent-minded, and then playing a part. I assumed I'd done something to brand her treat me the way she did. Now, I know she did what she felt like, without any idea of me, only I nonetheless hear her phonation in my head peculiarly when life gets difficult or I experience insecure."
seven. Cocky-involved.
Phone call her a narcissist if yous wish. This mother sees her daughter—if she sees her at all—as an extension of herself and nada more. Unlike the enmeshed female parent who is attentively and smotheringly focused on her kid, this mother carefully controls her interest every bit information technology suits her own self-reflection. A power role player, she's incapable of empathy; instead, very concerned with appearances and the opinions of others. Her emotional connection to her daughter is superficial—although she would fiercely deny that if y'all asked—because her focus is on herself. The tactics she uses to dispense and control her daughter let her to self-aggrandize and feel expert nearly herself.
These mothers often look great from the exterior—they are usually attractive and charming when y'all meet them, take great intendance of their homes, and may take beauteous talents and careers—which serves to misfile and isolate the unloved daughter even more. It is, alas, easier to recognize that you are playing the role of Cinderella (and it was an evil mom, not a stepmother until the Grimm Brothers cleaned up the tale) when you are living in the cellar and everyone knows your female parent is a hag.
8. Part-reversed.
Anecdotally, this is the pattern of maternal interaction I hear near the least—the scenario in which the daughter, fifty-fifty at a immature age, becomes the helper, the caretaker, or even "the mother" to her own mother. Sometimes, this pattern emerges when the mother has children very young and more of them than she can actually handle. That was true for Jenna, at present in her tardily thirties, who reported:
"By the time my Mom was 26, she had iv kids, little coin, and no back up. I was the oldest and by the time I was five, I was her helper. I learned to cook, do laundry, and clean. As I got older, the dynamic stayed the aforementioned, but more and so. She called me her 'rock' but she never paid attention to me, just to my younger siblings. Now that I'm an adult, she still doesn't female parent me merely acts more than like a very disquisitional, older friend. I call back she robbed me of my childhood."
More than famously, but in the same vein, Mary Karr'southward memoir The Liar's Order depicts both Mary and her older sister stepping in to female parent themselves or their mother.
Daughters of alcoholic mothers or those who suffer from untreated depression may as well find themselves in the flagman role, regardless of their age. That may include mothering non just their mothers but their siblings, as well. There are "fragile" mothers who too collaborate in this mode, claiming wellness or other issues. Ironically, these mothers may love their daughters but lack the capacity to act on their feelings. While these behaviors are hurtful, with therapy or intervention, many daughters report reconciliation in adulthood equally well as understanding.
Source: Copyright 2015 Monika Kocladja/Used with permission.
A Few Thoughts
Despite what we adopt to believe, the female of our species isn't hardwired to beloved her offspring; information technology is the child, not the mother, whom evolution has equipped with a powerful need as an assistance to survival. Information technology's estimated that half of us, plus or minus, hitting the jackpot and accept mothers who range from "keen" to "good plenty." This is non to say that these mothers are "perfect"—human being beings, by definition, make mistakes—or that they don't sometimes, at one moment or some other, exhibit any of these kinds of interaction. It happens, but it doesn't plant a pattern.
Simply for those of us who didn't fare equally well in the lottery, there is hope and healing. To those who have problem understanding, please listen and don't put these daughters on trial because they challenge what you would like to believe near mothering and motherhood.
Please exhibit the trait these mothers lack. It'southward called empathy.
Copyright © Peg Streep 2015
Facebook paradigm: Iakov Filimonov/Shutterstock
Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/tech-support/201502/8-toxic-patterns-in-mother-daughter-relationships