Sigmund Freud posed the question “What do women want?” Although I make no claim that I can answer that question for all women, I have some ideas, based on my work with them. Women want to feel fully alive and creative. They want to have loving connections, but at the same time, to function as independent, whole, unique individuals. Women want to feel comfortable with their longings and vulnerabilities, as well as with their knowledge and power. They want the courage and confidence to be themselves and enjoy others as equals, without being driven by an overwhelming need to please or rebel against them. And women want to be recognized for all of these complexities. Becoming this woman is a life long journey and there are many routes to achieve this goal.
One path involves re-negotiating the mother-daughter relationship. In this article I would like to share some thoughts about this process. For many women, their relationship with their mother is encumbered by feelings that are restrictive or by interactions that bind in unproductive, unhealthy ways. These dynamics can interfere with a woman developing her full potential. Oftentimes, for women to reclaim lost or dormant parts of themselves, they need to explore their past relationship with their mother. This may mean calling forth painful, as well as pleasant memories, of their mother, and examining negative and positive messages that they received from her. As women go through this review, they can understand more fully who they are and how they came to be in terms of their relationship with their mother. Many women come to realize that they are currently relating to their mother in the same ways that they related to her when they were girls; and that this pattern feels inhibiting, rather than growth producing.
As Boynton and Deli (1995) point out in Goodbye Mother Hello Woman, a key factor in whether a woman can change how she relates to her mother is her ability to shift her perception of her mother. Specifically, adult daughters need to view their mothers as “equal,” rather than as “mother.” Typically, women are not ready to equalize the power in their relationship with their mothers until they are in their 30s and 40s. This rethinking means releasing mother from the job of parenting and recognizing that she is a person with all the limitations that go along with being a person and that she will never be a perfect mother. Equalizing the relationship also involves the task of daughters learning to mother themselves, rather than relying on their mothers. Such self care involves a woman being loving, loyal, kind, compassionate, forgiving, and generous to herself.
Although the 30s and 40s are a time for reassessing one’s life, this process is life long and can be done whether or not one’s mother is still living. It is a soul searching process that offers women an opportunity to know themselves more deeply and to live more fully.