I don’t like my mother
Don't tell anybody but... you're ashamed to admit that you don't actually like your mother and you're not sure that she likes you either.
You feel constantly criticised and long ago gave up trying to talk to her about how you feel. These days your conversations are the kind of superficial chats you might have with the postman or a neighbour and you stifle a laugh when you hear people referring to their mothers as their 'best friends'.You often wonder what's so wrong with you to have ended up in such a situation.
Toxic mother daughter relationships
We hear so much about the sanctity of the mother daughter relationship that it can be hard to speak out if we don't feel the same.
But every year as mother's day rolls round again, many women wrestle with the legacy of how they feel about their mothers.
Since it's still such a taboo topic, it's not always one that women feel free to speak about, worrying that they might be judged or ostracised or simply misunderstood.
When you're exposed to messages such as 'you only get one mother', or well meaning comments such as 'I'd give anything to have my mother back' and 'you'll miss her when she's gone' it can feel easier to keep quiet and suffer in silence.
I disagree with this approach because it breeds shame and isolation and perpetuates the idea that mothers cannot be unkind or hurtful which in many cases is simply untrue. We can end up feeling like there is something wrong with us or that we aren't good enough when we don't get support from other women with similar experiences.
Why don't I like my mother?
Many people have good reasons to dislike their mothers.
I commonly hear from women that their mothers:
Dismiss their feelings
Criticise their appearance
Criticise their housekeeping (or lack thereof)
Set unrealistic expectations
Are a constant source of negativity
Judge their parenting
Give unsolicited advice
Stick to superficial topics and don't talk about emotions
These issues can lead to a strained relationship; one which feels empty or leaves one or both parties feeling ignored or dissatisfied. The Mother child relationship can feel flat and stilted which can be confusing for both people.
Relational trauma
It's quite possible to be traumatised without knowing it. Trauma is when we are overwhelmed, upset or scared by a situation or person or feeling.
Relational trauma is trauma that occurred in a relationship and it can be a lot less dramatic than the stereotypical idea that trauma is as a result of war of disasters.
For children, feeling unsafe is traumatic as they often have no other support. So feeling unloved or unimportant is incredibly traumatic to children.
So this relational trauma can apply to both mothers and daughters. Mothers brought up in environments which were cold, judgmental and cruel often become cold, judgmental and cruel to their own daughters without acknowledging the price that is being paid in repeating the damage in the next generation.
Parenting styles
Parenting does not come easily to many mothers (or indeed fathers). It's mostly a luck of the draw type situation whereby if your parents were loving and affectionate, you will tend to be the same with your children. Attachment styles, which are a way of explaining the connection between people, are largely passed down from one generation to the next.
Attachments throughout life are based on our relationships with our parent or parent figures, although it is possible to change these attachment styles with work.
Toxic parents
Toxic parents cause significant damage to their children. Their children experience complex emotions and often physical health issues (which can be linked to frequent stress responses that affect the body), anxiety disorders, unresolved anger over the abuse they experienced and broken relationships or abusive marriage in adulthood.
Parents who were never taught about their emotions, how to manage them, how to communicate and how to connect with other simply won't know how to do it. Nor will they be able to teach you, anymore than they will be able to teach you to speak Spanish if they don't speak it themselves.
This can be confusing when parenting skills are often touted as innate. 'Follow your intuition' you will hear as a parent, but what if you felt unloved as a child? Or lonely or your parents were abusive or neglectful or stiff and cold? In these cases, copying your parents (or following your intuition) is not helpful advice.
A lack of good relationships to draw on for ideas can leave people feeling ashamed, confused, frustrated, resentful and angry. They end up feeling at fault; 'it must be me' they think and bury their feelings deeper.
Generational trauma
Then there's the generational trauma that you might be more familiar with:
Racism, sexism, poverty, queerphobia, undiagnosed additional needs, ableism, economic or political instability, religious persecution or oppression, lack of medical or contraceptive choices.
All of these cause trauma and many women bore the brunt of this oppression which meant they were overwhelmed and ill equipped to parent kindly or from a place of feeling stable.
This is not to dismiss the impact that it had on you if you have a difficult relationship with your mother. But sometimes understanding someone's challenges and background can make the toxic relationship feel less personal. It was less about you and more about the challenges or lack of resources that your mother faced.
It's not your fault
It's (most probably) not your fault if your mother dislikes you.
I say most probably, because of course if we are unkind to our mothers it's important to consider the role that we play in the dynamic.
It's far more common however that your mother had difficulty managing her own feelings and therefore couldn't help you with yours and/or couldn't cope with the requirements of raising a child.
Raising a child can be monotonous, boring, repetitive, frustrating and for many women ended their career prospects or may not even have been their choice.
Faced with a mother who clearly didn't warm to them, many children will draw the conclusion that they are simply bad children rather than they have ill equipped mothers. Feeling like a bad person is often the shame of feeling unloved rather than an accurate representation of being a bad person.
Narcissistic mothers
Of course, it's also true that some mothers are simply cruel, sadistic or unkind and this can be downplayed or ignored in the cult of motherhood.
Some mothers should never have been mothers and you have every right to be angry and grieve the lost relationship. Family relationships are not always supportive despite the images that we are sold and the stigma that occurs when the mother child bond is broken.
Overtly narcissistic mothers are gaining a little more traction on social media so that these are slightly better understood than the more covert type.
Although overt and covert aren't technical terms, they can be useful to differentiate between the loud, bragging, overly confident narcissistic behaviour that people are more familiar with and the sneakier, less obvious approach where there are two different versions of your mother one for you and one for the general public wherby the aim is to save face at all costs.
The second, more covert type, can be particularly tricky since other people might not understand what you experienced as a child or adult, particularly if your mother does nice things for others and is mean to you.
A mother who helps out friends or neighbours or donates to charities whilst ignoring you or repeatedly criticising you is confusing to fathom for a child.
'Negative feelings'
Many women struggle with negative emotions and feel bad that they dislike their mothers. They judge themselves as unkind or uncharitable and consequently struggle with the guilt of feeling sad and angry.
It is normal to dislike someone who treats you badly. It is normal to dislike someone who criticises your appearance, your academic performance, your housekeeping or choice of partner. It's normal to dislike someone who is not willing to listen to you, not interested in changing, doesn't show interest in you or who shuts you down if you try to discuss what wrong. It's normal to feel uncomfortable in a bad relationship, even if that's with your mother.
I feel responsible for my mother
Women who have tried to talk to their mothers about their feelings are frequently accused of being ungrateful or told that the past is the past 'why do they keep bringing it up?' Or perhaps your own mother started crying and you ended up comforting her instead of talking about your own feelings.
Some mother daughter relationships are codependent relationships where there's an unhealthy reliance on the other which passes for closeness or love. In helathy relationships adult children should be encouraged to be separate. It's ok to disagree and each person is accountable for their own feelings.
If your mother is unable to talk about challenging relationships, this is a sign that she cannot manage her own feelings, which although isn't really her fault since she wasn't taught how to do this is her responsibility going forward. You cannot take responsibility for yourself and your mother if you are to make any progress and separate whose feelings are whose. Each person must take responsibility for herself and if your mother won't do this, you cannot make her.
Get help
If you’re tired of dealing with this by yourself, let me help.
I’ve got nearly 15 years experience helping people navigate difficult relationships with their mothers.
See my online course ‘Am I the problem?’
Find out more about individual therapy here