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Author Topic:   When Shame feels Mothering: The Tragedy of Parentified Daughters
elixir
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posted February 02, 2014 04:26 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for elixir     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
When Shame feels Mothering: The Tragedy of Parentified Daughters
Posted on February 1, 2014


The road between a little girl and her mother is supposed to be a one-way street with support flowing consistently from the mother to the daughter. It goes without saying that little girls are totally dependent on their mothers for physical, mental and emotional support. However, one of the many faces of the mother wound is the common dynamic in which the mother inappropriately depends on the daughter to provide her with mental and emotional support. This role-reversal is incredibly damaging to the daughter, having long-range effects on the her self-esteem, confidence and sense of self-worth.

Alice Miller describes this dynamic in “The Drama of the Gifted Child.” The mother, upon having a child may unconsciously feel that finally she has someone to love her unconditionally and begins to use the child to fill her needs that were not met in her own childhood. In this way, the child begins to carry the projection of her mother’s mother. This puts the daughter in an impossible situation to be responsible for her mother’s well-being and happiness.

The young daughter then has to repress her own developmental needs in order to accommodate the emotional needs of the mother. Instead of her getting mirroring from her mother, she is expected to be the one doing the mirroring. Instead of being able to use her mother as a secure, emotional base for exploration, she is expected to be the secure emotional base for her mother.

The daughter is utterly vulnerable and dependent on the mother for survival so she has no choice but to comply and fill the mother’s needs. To some degree, she becomes a prisoner of her mother. She is being used to fill the emotional needs of an adult, which no child is capable of doing.

A daughter is being exploited when her mother gives her adult roles, such as surrogate spouse, best friend or therapist. But a child cannot know that she is being used because it would be devastating. In order to survive, the daughter must believe that the way her mother is treating her is right and natural.

When a daughter is asked to be an emotional prop for her mother, she is unable to rely on her mother enough to get her own developmental needs met.

The parentified daughter unconsciously hopes that: ”If I only take good enough care of mother, one day she will be the mother I need.” or ”If I’m a really, really, good girl (compliant, quiet, without needs) then mother will finally see me and take care of me.” As adult women, we may be projecting this dynamic onto others in our lives. For example, in our relationships: “If only I keep trying to be good enough for him, he will commit to me.” In our careers: “If only I get one more degree, I’ll be good enough to get promoted.”

These mothers set up a competition with their daughter for who gets to be mothered.

The message is there’s not enough mothering or love to go around. Girls grow up believing that love, approval and validation are very scarce and one must work to the bone in order to be worthy of it. Then as adults they attract situations that replicate this pattern over and over. (Many of these dynamics and effects are also true for male children as well.)

Parentified daughters are robbed of their childhood.

The daughter does not receive affirmation for herself as a person, rather she receives affirmation only as result of performing a function (relieving mother of her pain).

Mothers may expect their daughters to listen to their problems and ask them to provide comfort and nurturing to calm her adult fears and worries. The daughter may be expected to bail her mother out of her problems or to clean up her messes, whether physical or emotional ones. She may be regularly called in as the problem-solver or mediator.

What these mothers convey to the daughters is that they, as mothers, are weak, overwhelmed and unable to handle life. It conveys to the daughter that her developmental needs are simply “too much” for the mother and so the child blames herself for even existing. The young girl gets the message that she does not have a right to have needs, does not have a right to be listened to or validated as her own person.

Expressing your own needs = rejection from mother.

As she grows up, the daughter fears the mother would be too “easily shattered” and so the daughter doesn’t express her truth for fear of what it would do to the mother. The mother may play into this by playing victim and causing the daughter to see herself as a perpetrator if she dares to express her own separate reality. This transforms into the unconscious belief in the daughter that “I’m too much. My true self injures others. I’m too big. I need to stay small in order to survive and be loved.”


While these daughters carry the projection of the “good mother” for their mothers they also carry the projection of the negative mother. This can play out when the daughter is ready to separate emotionally from the mother as an adult. The mother may unconsciously see the daughter’s separation as a replication of the rejection by her own mother. The mother may react with overt infantile rage, passive sulking or hostile criticism.

The mothers that exploit their daughters this way are often the same ones that say to them “Don’t blame me!” or “Stop being so ungrateful!” when the daughter expresses discontent about the relationship or seeks a discussion on the matter. After the daughters have been robbed of their childhood via the invasive needs of their mothers, they are then attacked for having the audacity to propose a discussion about the dynamics of the relationship.

These mothers are unwilling to see their role in the daughter’s pain because it’s too painful for them. And they are likely in denial of how their relationships with their own mothers have impacted them. “Don’t blame your mother” is a way to instill shame and silence daughters from speaking the truth of the pain they’ve endured. This statement keeps daughters compliant, ignorant of their power and easy to control.

If we are to claim our power as women, we must be willing to see the ways in which our mothers truly are to blame for our pain.

If as a mother, you dismissively say to your daughter who seeks to discuss her feelings about your relationship “You’re just ungrateful” or “You’re blaming your mother,” you are using the weapon of silence that has oppressed women for centuries. You have become a mouthpiece of the patriarchy that seeks to maintain its power at all costs because the truth of your own actions is just too much pain for you to bear.

Part of being powerful is the ability to create harm, whether intentionally or unintentionally. If mothers shy away from that knowledge of how they have harmed their daughters, then they are shirking their responsibility in a most egregious way. Although these mothers are victims of patriarchy themselves, that doesn’t mean that their concurrent roles as perpetrators should be overlooked. Daughters must own the legitimacy of their pain and how their mothers were the cause of it. If they don’t, no true healing can occur. They will continue to sabotage themselves and limit their ability to thrive and flourish in the world.


Patriarchy has deprived women to such a degree that when they become mothers, they often turn to the love of their young daughters starving and ravenous for validation, approval and recognition. A hunger that a daughter could never possibly satisfy. Yet generation after generation of innocent daughters have been offering themselves up, willingly sacrificing themselves on the altar of their mother’s suffering and starvation, with the hope that one day they will finally “be good enough” for her. There is a childlike hope that by “feeding the mother” with love and affirmation, the mother will eventually be able to feed the daughter. That meal never comes. You get the “meal” your soul has been longing for by engaging in the process of healing the mother wound and owning your life and your worth.

We have to stop sacrificing ourselves for our mothers because ultimately, our sacrifice doesn’t feed them. What will feed your mother is the transformation that is on the other side of her own pain and grief that she must reckon with on her own. Your mother’s pain is her responsibility, not yours.

When we refuse to acknowledge the ways our mothers are to blame for our suffering, we continue through life feeling there is something wrong with us, that we are somehow bad or deficient. This is because it’s easier to feel shame than it is to face the pain of realizing the truth of how we were abandoned or exploited by our mothers. Thus, shame is a protective buffer from the pain of the truth.

The little girl within us would rather feel shame and self-hate because it preserves the illusion of the good mother.

(We hold onto shame as a way of holding onto mother. In this way, shaming ourselves functions as a way to feel mothered.)

In order to finally let go of self-hate and self-sabotage, we have to assist our inner child with understanding that no matter how loyal she is to mother by continuing to be small and attenuated, it will never cause her mother to change into the mother she longs for.

We must have the courage to hand back to our mothers the pain they asked us to carry for them. We hand back the pain when we can put responsibility where the responsibility truly lies, with the dynamics that were present with the adult in the situation, which was the mother, not the child. As children, we were not responsible for the choices and behavior of the adults around us.

Why it’s hard to face how your mother was a perpetrator:

As little girls we were culturally conditioned to be caretakers and to not advocate for our own needs
Children are hard-wired biologically for unwavering loyalty to mother no matter what she does. Mother love is critical for survival.
Having the same gender identification as your mother; the implication that she is on your team
Seeing your mother as a victim of her own unresolved trauma and a culture of patriarchy
The religious and cultural taboos of “Honor thy father and mother” and the “holy mother” that instill guilt and silence children about their feelings.
Why is self-sabotage a manifestation of the mother wound?

As a parentified daughter, the mother-bond (love, comfort and safety) was forged in an environment of self-suppression. (Being small = being loved)
Thus, there’s a subconscious link between mother-love and self-attenuation.
While your conscious mind may want success, happiness, love and confidence–the subconscious mind remembers the dangers of early childhood in which being big, spontaneous or authentic caused painful rejection from the mother.
To the sub-conscious mind: rejection by mother = death.
To the sub-conscious mind: self-sabotage (being small) = safety (survival).
That’s why it can feel so hard to love ourselves, because letting go of shame, self-sabotage and guilt feels like letting go of mother.

Healing the mother wound is about re-claiming your life from dysfunctional patterns set in place through the early relationship with your mother.

It’s about honestly reflecting on the pain of your relationship with your mother for the sake of your own healing and transformation, which is every woman’s birthright. It’s about doing the work within yourself so that you can be free to be the woman you are meant to be. It’s not about expecting your mother to change or to finally fill a need she couldn’t fill when you were a child. Quite the opposite. Until we face and accept our mother’s limitations and all the ways she truly harmed us, we remain stuck in a limbo of waiting for her approval and keep our lives perpetually on hold as a result.

Healing the mother wound is a form of integrity and taking responsibility for one’s own life.

One reader recently commented on how she has been healing her mother wound for over 20 years and although she had to distance herself from her own mother, she’s done enormous healing that has resulted in a healthy relationship with her young daughter. She captured it beautifully when said about her daughter, ’I can be her rock of support because I’m not using her as an emotional crutch.’

While there may be conflict or discomfort in the process of healing the mother wound, it is necessary for the sake of healing to take place so that you can confidently move into your truth and power. If we stick with the process, we eventually come to a place of authentic compassion not just for ourselves as daughters, but for our mothers, for all women throughout time and for all human beings.

Yet on that road to compassion, we must first hand back to our mothers their own pain, their pain that we absorbed into ourselves when we were very young.

The true abdication of responsibility is when the mother makes the daughter feel responsible for her unprocessed pain and blames her when she takes into account how she has suffered because of it. Our mothers may never take full responsibility for the pain they unconsciously placed in us in order to relieve themselves of the responsibility for their own lives. But the most important thing is that YOU, as a daughter, fully own the legitimacy of your pain so that you can feel empathy for your inner child, freeing you to finally heal and move on to a life that you love and deserve.

Deb S

© Bethany Webster 2014
http://womboflight.com/2014/02/01/when-shame-is-mother-the-tragedy-of-parentified- daughters/

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12muddy
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posted February 02, 2014 07:11 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for 12muddy     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Sounds a bit like the relationship between my mother and I. My maternal grandmother treated her the same way. Her life was hard, and I guess she was too stressed by other stuff to try n sort out things with me.

I knew that she was suffering too. But yeah when I was younger I liked to believe that she should have been more supportive despite everything - "She's the mother, she's supposed to love me". I was "lost" in my own pain n didn't really want to acknowledge hers. It wasn't until I started to live away from her that I had time to think things through n wanted to patch things up with her n really tried to "know" her story.

Now our relationship still feels somewhat tense n there are spats every now and then, but yeah we now have an understanding.

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Ami Anne
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posted February 02, 2014 11:26 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Ami Anne     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Thank you both for sharing. I can relate!

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Catalina
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posted February 02, 2014 01:50 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Catalina     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
The "key" here that stands out to me is:

Accepting that your mother is who she is, and probably hurting too, but unconscious

It is a two-way street...I remember my then 40 year old sister venting about our mother, who was suffering from a debilitating terminal illness, and saying "I just want her to be a mother"...my response was that we were grownups now, ie, there comes a time when one needs to mother oneself and realize your mothers job is over in that sense.

Too much analyzing can create complexes all by itself...the "harm done" and "blame" laid on the mother are beside the point for me. My own mother was near death when she realized how much her bitterness over her mother's early death (my mother was 7 at the time) had caused her to underappreciate the several mother figures who loved her, nurtured and protectef her. At least she realized this before she died, more than some people ever achieve...

I do understand how hard it is to see this dynamic, but I have found blaming the parent, either one, is failing to see that they are human too. As with my mother, resentment snd regret only hinder healing...


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Ami Anne
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posted February 02, 2014 03:22 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Ami Anne     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Cata
I know you and I have had this discussion a million times. You make good points. You really do but a person may not be there and wishing it to be so does not make it happen.

As I mature a bit, I realize you have to accept people where they are and that acceptance allows them to grow, not shaming them when they are not there.

I am not saying you are shaming anyone because you are not, at all.

I feel your genuine heart in your sharing.

I have to say that my small amount of maturity is from several factors. Being accepted when I was really hurting and that was from a few people on here particularly Randall, IQ and Lalalinda, having my own business and the trials and rewards of that and knowing that God loves me with all my flaws, which would be the most important!

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Catalina
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posted February 02, 2014 05:13 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Catalina     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
As I said, it is hard to see in action. Not lectiring anyone except perhaps those who seek to blame the parent who after all is no more able to see what they are doing than the child.

Everyone has their own experiences leading to awakening, but I don't find it helpful for professionals to support the onesided view that the perpetrator is evil and the victim helpless. We all need help coming to consciousness, so I am glad you don'tthink I'm shaming anyone. I am just saying that this is not only surmountable but understandable...most of our parents had less than ideal childhoods too, and in as much as we stay unconscious we pass pur own mistakes down thru the generations.

In fact sometimes we try so hard not to make the same "errors" that we harm our children in diffwrent but equally crippling ways.

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PixieJane
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posted February 02, 2014 09:42 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for PixieJane     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I can see it true sometimes, but some of those things just struck me wrong. As an easy example, thinking that females automatically stick together and therefore your mother is automatically on your side (and does that mean your father is against you?) doesn't seem right. Females are generally very competitive socially (in school some boys thought it was insane how girls tore each other down) and harshly criticizing of each other, more so than males (or at least males don't take the competitive spirit as personally--or not as likely to anyway), and it seems to me daughters are more likely to bond with fathers and sons with mothers...and when I was growing up the one sure way to get a boy to fight was to say something about his mother. (Heck, I understand even as adults men tend to hate it when their wives criticize his mother.)

And btw, to my horror I learned one boy was raised by the woman who adopted him with intense guilt ("I took you when no one else would, and this is how you treat your mother") and even put a gun to her head right in front of him to make him do what she wanted! And worse, the adopted father went alone with it and told the little boy HE was responsible for his mother's actions! I suppose it should be no surprise he's so damaged today and torn apart by both love and hatred for his now dead parents, and feeling guilt or self-disgust by BOTH emotions.

Another example:

quote:
In order to survive, the daughter must believe that the way her mother is treating her is right and natural.

Actually, quite a few kids despise their parents, including daughters against mothers. They have no need to believe they're being treated well, and even kids who aren't mistreated may express hostility and accusations of unfairness ("Ashley's mother lets her wear makeup! Why are you treating me this way!?"). Kids are very quick to blame parents for all sorts of problems growing up, and the entertainment aimed at kids often show adults (including parents) as incompetent and clueless bumblers at best. And kids relate.

I'm not even going to touch where she equates the tyranny of mothers with "patriarchy" other than it makes me think this was directed to a niche audience (at least for those who read the entire article rather than giving it a skim and latching onto what they want while forgetting the rest as "inconsequential").

And I'm reminded of something a Jungian psychologist in training told me: that many get into psychology to deal with their own dysfunctional childhoods yet fail to overcome them and so project their own issues into everyone around them which can cause a lot of damage to those who come to them for help. I think that's what this author is doing, and she needs to resolve her own issues before trying to project them into any who would pay her for therapy. How she grew up is tragic, but so is the damage a misguided therapist can do upon others.

And finally, the article doesn't say how blaming your mother helps. To put it simply, when milk is spilled what good does it do to focus on who spilled the milk in the first place? To me it wasn't about escaping an abusive relationship (as say someone fleeing a spouse), or even to realize mommy was sick (so don't blame yourself, yes that's a a component but she veers off into blame), but comes off as trying to justify using a wound as a crutch, and thus ironically perpetuate something similar that was done to them in reverse. Is it "taking responsibility" or is it absolving yourself of it? IMO, she should be clearer at what she intends other than saying "blame your mother, it's the compassionate thing to do, cruel to be kind." (And maybe she wants you to pay her to get those details.)

Still, I do remember one time a girl (underage minor) said in an interview she wanted to have a baby so someone could love her unconditionally. No one told her it was supposed to be the opposite. Did make me wonder why she didn't feel loved by her own mother (assuming she had one), however, and perhaps is doomed to repeat an unfortunate cycle.

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PixieJane
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posted February 03, 2014 02:17 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for PixieJane     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
My mom gave me up almost right away to her mom to take care of but took me back just to hurt her mom shortly before I turned 5. I do think being allowed over 4 years with Granny first (along with some summers after and several months during a divorce) helped me a lot, but so did certain experiences like successfully making my own breakfast with cleverness (since I was too scared to wake the 'rents as I got knocked across the room the last time I'd tried that) which filled me with pride of doing it myself and thinking that no matter how capricious and confusing the world of adults were, I could take care of myself, and perhaps that was a critical factor in why I retained a sense of confidence and self-worth, especially after I escaped and grew up.

Still, it was a struggle. She and dad were terrible dysfunctional drunks, and I did have to take care of many things. Why should they clean up the puke or clogged drain or deal with the dishes when the drunks could order me to do it? And I saw Dad "fall asleep" (more like pass out) with a lit cigarette in hand that I was too scared to take away and had nightmares of fires chasing me everywhere (to this day I sometimes dream of running from fire, or fighting it, and I keep my fire extinguishers current).

That aside, they were more neglectful than abusive once I learned to stay out of their way (I got to be an expert at reading moods), though it was still criminal and not "benign neglect" or "apathy" but the kind that made me realize I was on my own, and I had to create strategies to feed myself sometimes. I saw a lot of violence between them that shook me up and learning to hide fast, and there were times I thought one was going to kill the other, or me (literally).

After the divorce Mom forced me to live with her so she could get child support for her booze & smokes. And of course the courts have the dumb ass idea that the mother is automatically the best place for a child no matter what the child has to say.

Once things calmed down it got very dreary and depressing. Mom's beloved beauty was fading and she had nothing left really, she spent most of her time in her room drinking, sleeping, and listening to music, sometimes the same song over and over. I can't hear Father Figure by George Michael or Candle in the Wind by Elton John without flashing back to those days. She'd talk to me sometimes, usually calling me into her room where she was lonely and often drunk, and talk about her old modeling career (and why I could never be a model myself because of my height, teeth, freckles, whatever, the last thing a teen girl adjusting to a changing body needs to hear even if I had no interest in being a model, and in retrospect I think she hated what I was gaining even as she was losing it) or conspiracy theories about Marilyn Monroe (seems many models admire her, along with singers who still write songs in tribute to her to this day). I often pitied her even then (while hating her for forcing me to live with her) but didn't dare show it. Of course she never showed any interest in me...but when she'd pass out drunk I'd steal her brandy to trade for food (she got it with child support meant for me after all, so I felt justified). Naturally I had to care for her (when I was around, but I left home without permission a lot to stay with friends, often taking the stolen brandy with me), fix her meals, clean up after her (including when she got sick), and sometimes figure out how to feed myself as well as her (I did share a little of the food I got for the brandy with her).

And the article is wrong about a child being completely dependent on the mother for things like emotional support (at least generally speaking). I had friends for that, as well as an extended family (for awhile anyway). Granted, I got some terrible advice from friends at times that Granny (or a good parent) would've saved me from had I been allowed access to her but nobody's perfect. And I sure didn't get a sense of safety from home, I knew I was on my own (though I did go to friends for help and sometimes got it). Of course most people put strings on their love and affirm only when expectations are met, be they friends, school, or parents, that's a sad fact of life (OTOH, standards can be good...). But some were worth it, others were not (but school and home I was forced to put up with though both did more harm than good to me and I instinctively realized it even back then).

I did feel like a prisoner in a sense (though I blamed the courts as much as Mom), but not to the extent that article paints it. And I never thought what she did was right or natural, nor did I think I could change her, and knowing she was weak I resolved even as a child to not be like her. I was actually less forgiving of her then than I am now. Nor did I blame myself for existing (like most kids, I blamed my parents as I never asked to be born ), and I found validation through other people for better and for worse as well as from fiction I found inspiring (Pippi Longstocking and Dorrie the Little Witch when I was a small child, and others as I got older).

When my best friend decided to run away from home I decided I'd go with her because I loved my friend and she loved me, but my parents didn't (and I couldn't go to Granny's, especially not with her, the courts saw to that). Then my best friend died and I was terrified into running back home by a psycho stalker and I'd missed my 16th birthday as I was still on the streets but she didn't ask me anything or wish me a belated happy birthday when I showed up. I asked her what Dad said about me being gone and he said he didn't know, and that she couldn't tell anyone I'd run off as she'd lose her child support! And I found out years later that Granny called but Mom lied to her about me not wanting to talk to her anymore (and Granny believed her whereas I thought Granny didn't call anymore as she stopped caring) so that she could keep Granny from finding out I was on the streets as a runaway. I believe she told my school I'd gone back to live with Granny again.

School put me in an Adaptive Behavior Class after I came back and I stayed there a few months until almost the end of the school year but when they threatened to return me to a teen gulag (and what I call an "outpost of Hell on Earth") I changed my appearance and assumed a new name to run away...my plan had been to get to Los Angeles where I knew some runaways I'd met had gone off to but it didn't work out the way I intended (for the best).

I didn't return to visit family until I was nearly 22. Mom still didn't care much about me. I found out Dad continued to pay child support until I was 18, he only found out I'd left home when I told him...and he was angry at me for being so selfish as to not tell him so he could stop paying child support when I left (but then Mom WOULD report me). Dad didn't ask how I survived either, and it wasn't because he didn't want to hear stories of pain, he simply didn't care. I kinda find it funny he had the gall to call me selfish. As for Mom, she didn't play the martyr (much), she had a tendency to brag about evil she did and if I bothered to complain about it I guess she'd say why she thought I deserved it (just as everyone deserved her cruelty). I carry my scars from those times, but I am not wounded, and I resent when people assume I must be damaged.

Though I think one of the best things I did for myself was self-hypnosis where I met my inner child (as my continual nightmares reflected a child's reality, like doors couldn't lock, guns didn't work, etc) and helped "her" feel more in control and imagined herself growing into me. After a time the nightmares changed so I wasn't so childlike helpless and I noticed a change in myself overall, too. Perhaps that was me healing. Glad I didn't have to pay $200 (possibly a month for years) for that.

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Ami Anne
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posted February 03, 2014 08:15 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Ami Anne     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Cata
I think and I have both matured a lot from our days on here 4 years ago. I wish I could get to your level of maturity on my mother. That would be my desire.
I may and I may not. I have layers of defenses to shed. Defenses keep you from going insane. That is why God put them there.
I shed them as I learn that I can have a personal power in life and most importantly, that God loves me in my flawed state.
I have a little Book club on my website. We are reading the book Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. It is based on the story of Hosea and Gomer from the OT. It is really a story of how God loves the prostitute who hates herself so much. It is amazing. This is kind of the transformation I need. I would say it is coming but I may never get there, but then again, I may

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Catalina
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posted February 03, 2014 11:37 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Catalina     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I hope you don't think I am lecturing here, nor am I speaking of you personally...I was irked by the tone of the piece. Alice Miller was a pioneer in many ways, and v insightful; a lot of the dynamic she describes above is very real.

But as the years go by I realize how traumatized many parents have also been. A large percentage of this country is descended from victims of war, persecution and natural disaster...so we carry ancestral or personal trauma in our genes, so to speak.

I don'tean to excuse the bad parents either, although in many cases they were only doing the best they can in their current stage of development, I firmly believe that many people should NEVER have kids, they aren't aware enough.

But they do (and shaming young women who would abort is one reason)...and we are left to grow ourselves up, sooner or later.

I just think Miller was being simplistic here in presenting the dynamic as Victim and Perpetrator...any mother who truly WANTS to hurt her child is obviously unconscious and twisted from her own hurting too.

I don't expect anyone to see my post and go change their way of life or healing! But if my take on it sheds a slightly different light on people's approach, that is great. It took me years of Practice to consciously change my attitude, which very much changed the way I saw my mother, and myself.

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Ami Anne
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posted February 03, 2014 12:00 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Ami Anne     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Cata
You are very right. If you have gotten to this level of maturity, I applaud you. I have not and I may never while I am on this earth. I hope I do. I will try but I may never get there. Thanks for your posts, here, and in the Asteroid Forum

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elixir
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posted February 24, 2014 12:01 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for elixir     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
@Catalina are you referring to the article I posted? It was not written by Alice Miller. I found it on www.womboflight.com which deals with healing the feminine and the "mother wound." I don't feel that anyone is over analyzing or blaming. The only way you can overcome these things is to recognize them and learn to love and heal yourself. The author says we need to acknowledge the own limitations our mother had in their understanding and upbringing. It is passed down through the generations. It it does not serve us to limit ourselves because of guilt or the duty we feel we have.

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Sibyl
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posted February 24, 2014 12:18 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sibyl     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Thank you so much for this post, elixir. I was parentified as a child as well. Still am, actually. I was the best friend and therapist both, even during my parents' divorce! So unfair. The best friend dynamic I have managed to lay to rest somewhat, but I am still my parents' therapist. It doesn't help that I have 6 planets in capricorn and was therefore "born old".

My mother doesn't really understand how I can be so emotionally balanced. I don't really have the ups and downs that many people do, but would rather characterize my life as a pleasant ride. She doesn't understand that I had to become this way in order to balance out her moodiness and roller-coaster attitude.

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Ami Anne
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From: Pluto/house next to NickiG
Registered: Sep 2010

posted February 24, 2014 12:49 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Ami Anne     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
In which house(s) is your Cappy stellium?

------------------
Want To Ask Any Question About Bible Prophecy? Go For it. It is Free, of course.


http://www.mychristianpsychic.com/

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Sibyl
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posted February 24, 2014 01:07 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sibyl     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Ami Anne:
In which house(s) is your Cappy stellium?


Mercury and Venus in the 6th House,
Mars, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune in the 5th House.

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YoursTrulyAlways
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posted February 24, 2014 02:20 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for YoursTrulyAlways     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Well, I'm presently undergoing issues with a parentified son, if that is of any relevance.

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Sibyl
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posted February 24, 2014 06:25 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sibyl     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by YoursTrulyAlways:
Well, I'm presently undergoing issues with a parentified son, if that is of any relevance.

How so, YoursTrulyAlways? By his mother, or the both of you? What is the difficulty?

I know my parents have difficulty with me because I criticize them and question their actions. Because of their past actions they have also lost the right to question me. Frankly, I don't trust their decision-making. I have, after all, proved to be the more reliable person. This means that I don't really listen to them much.

I know my mother finds it difficult that I always criticize her. I told her that if she wanted me to accept her choices that she should make better ones. Unfortunately she has surrounded herself with people who never question her. Hence this falls to me. It is unfortunate for our relationship, but thankfully she can't "quit" me as I'm her child. She really can't complain either as I don't make bad choices (haven't yet, anyway). It places us in a reverse child-parent relationship where I lecture her and she has to listen.

Not the most ideal situation perhaps, but it is what it is. I'm a big believer in "tough love" and personal development. I will not accept any less than the best from my parents, so I'm "raising them" to be great people.

Of course they ARE the parents and have raised me by teaching me about the world, about myself and given me values... But by treating me as their own best friend and personal therapist too often they have inadvertently given me permission to question them.

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YoursTrulyAlways
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posted February 25, 2014 11:18 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for YoursTrulyAlways     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Sibyl:
How so, YoursTrulyAlways? By his mother, or the both of you? What is the difficulty?


Sorry I misconstrued the topic as something else. This is not applicable in my case. Mine is more that of a new adult who is desperately clinging on to adolescence, which is the direct opposite.

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Sibyl
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posted February 25, 2014 07:21 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sibyl     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by YoursTrulyAlways:
Sorry I misconstrued the topic as something else. This is not applicable in my case. Mine is more that of a new adult who is desperately clinging on to adolescence, which is the direct opposite.

I see. Perhaps you are parenting him too much then? You sound like such good parents. I can hear your love and concern for your son whenever you mention him.

Besides... If you can't make him grow up, maybe a girl can.

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