Turning Into Your Mother Is A Terrifying Prospect For Women Who Grew Up With Mean Moms

Once you get to a certain age we all end up saying it: ”Oh no, I’m turning into my mother.” Usually it’s followed by a feigned look of terror when doing something like calling our kids the wrong names, asking who Taylor Quick is, or saying, ”That’s okay I’ll pick up your mess, I have nothing better to do!” sarcastically.

But for someone who was raised by a mother who wasn’t the best, ”becoming my mother” takes on a far more serious tone. And when I became a mother myself, not being like her was more of a directive than a silly unpleasantry I’d bump into when searching my brain for my kid’s name.

It’s a tricky thing coming out to say your mother wasn’t the best. It’s even trickier to admit she was downright awful. You’ll just have to trust me when I say that my mother was reminiscent of the evil stepmother in your garden variety fairy tale book. My life with her inspired a persistent question that came up for me when I had kids: How do I become a good mother when she was my only role model?

This was never a fear of mine before I had kids. But then, my children arrived. I had babysat a lot of kids in my life and worked at a preschool, but I had never met a child like my daughter. Here’s the thing, the girl did NOT want to be nurtured. Still to this day at 8 years old, she wants affection only on her terms. In my pre-motherhood dreams I’d have a baby and we’d bond and share a bed and I’d look at her lovingly while I held her as she fell asleep. In reality this girl would not sleep unless she was in her own space, would literally get FURIOUS if I tried to rock her to sleep for a nap, and really seemed to not like me. A year in I would know that not to be true, and that she is just a stoic girl by nature who is fiercely independent and ALSO loves me. But as a new mom who was having difficulty bonding with my daughter, the fear that I was like my mother began to seep in. What if this is what my mother felt? What if I was like her, I just didn’t know it until it was revealed to me through having my own child? My mother (by her own admission) conditionally loved me. She only loved me if I abided by her vision of what she wanted me to be. So was I like her? Did I only love my daughter if she showed me affection back?

It was a scary time as I sorted through those feelings, but I soon found out that it was not true at all. Yes, it was harder to bond at first. And I do feel some shame that we didn’t bond immediately like I thought we would. But I was dominated by hormones, my daughter had acid reflux so she was upset a LOT and she didn’t want me to comfort her with affection. Yes, it made it harder to bond. But unlike my mother, I didn’t dismiss her full throttle and give up, declaring I didn’t love her. Our relationship didn’t look like I thought it would, but I worked on it with her and we came out stronger because of it. That’s not what my mother did.

As she got older there were different challenges. (I think that might be called parenting.) But my daughter is a wonderful spitfire, who does not understand why anyone should have authority over her. She is definitely not easy. She expresses herself through anger when things don’t go her way, and she tests us more than a school prepping for the Common Core. When we recently made the decision to move she angrily said to me, ”This should have been a FAMILY decision. No one consulted ME!” She was seven. It broke my heart to see how clearly she needed to be in control, but it didn’t make me angry the way it would have my mother. She was having issues handling her emotions because she is a (very smart, opinionated, willful) CHILD. This kind of empathy is something my mother did not have.

But then there are the times where I DO have terrible thoughts. Thoughts I know she had. When both kids are tantruming at the same time or when my daughter is screaming at me, I do think the thoughts I never want to admit. ”What if I had never had kids? What would I be doing right now?”

One day my daughter was hissing at me and I thought, ”I don’t LIKE her.” I hate admitting that. It passed quickly and I never would say it out loud to her. But being raised by someone who truly did not like me ”” and voiced it ”” leaves me scared to the core just thinking such thoughts. I worried I was a cold hearted person who wasn’t meant to mother. But simply being aware that those thoughts are just that — thoughts”” is the big difference that separates my mom and me. And when I feel like I’m failing I seek help and advice on how to handle it better; if I yell I apologize and take responsibility. I’m not perfect, but I try to admit my mistakes.

The knowledge that we are indeed different has brought me relief. Then the strangest thing happened: I gained empathy for my mom After having ”one of those days: with my kids, it hit me. We did have similar feelings at times. There are ways I am like her. But she was living in a different time, where women didn’t have the support we do now. It doesn’t make up for how she handled raising me, but still I feel sad that she was often at the end of her rope and didn’t know how to deal with it. With that realization it made it so I can be less fearful of becoming her and more grateful that I have the tools to deal with the negative ways we are similar. Shockingly, there are even some similarities I share with my mom that I like.

Now if only someone could tell me who Taylor Quick is.