Are you still trying to figure out the relationship with your mother?

How our relationship with our mothers shapes us as adults

The first chapter of your life story probably influences the way you love, fight, and trust in relationships today. This blog post will look specifically at your relationship with your mother and how it can impact you today. If you find yourself with a voice in your head, or doubting yourself because you’re worried about what she might think, say or do, this could help unpack some of that.  

How does your early relationship with your mother show up now?

You might be pretty happy, settled and doing well in life. But you can’t help feel like you’re ‘doing it wrong’ even though you can’t actually put your finger on what ‘it’ is. You’re smiling in photos, putting your best foot forward, but can’t help but feel like it’s all a bit of a performance? But you have always done that – you might feel like it’s what you were taught to do. 

You might feel super confident, settled in yourself, with your mother’s voice in the back of your head, one that was loving, kind, and encouraging. Perhaps the memories of childhood remind you of how she was there, engaged, stable, calm and patient. On the other hand, you might find yourself anxious, feeling as though you’re not good enough, with memories of feeling constantly criticised, told off and as though you had to be on your best behaviour at every turn. 

You might even feel confused. Your mother was always there, always present and still is, but you feel unable to pull away; you may feel pressure to be constantly available to her and whatever she may need from you. It might feel like you can’t go off and live your own life. 

If your mother was absent, unavailable or simply distracted, you may have felt alone, unable to lean on her or even a sense of lacking love. This might show up in your life now in a variety of ways, such as finding it hard to truly trust people or feel close to others. You could feel frustrated in wanting to feel loved in relationships, but not quite able to let your guard down. 

Every mothering relationship is different

There are all kinds of relationships with mothers, and each has a different impact on different people. The effects of your relationship will be unique to you and how you feel about them. The way in which your early relationships create blueprints and patterns of relating and feeling safe in relationships is often something we don’t truly notice until we get older and see them for ourselves, or notice differences in our relationships, peer friendships, and families. Those moments when you feel – ah, this isn’t quite the same for me. 

Those patterns aren’t locked in for life, though. You can make changes, starting with noticing what is and isn’t working for you, and often therapy can be a place where people talk through these things and figure out for themselves what exactly it is that’s going on and how they want things to be.

What does it look like if you’re still trying to figure out the relationship with your mother?

If you’re trying to figure out the relationship with your mum, it might be that you’ve started to notice that there are differences between your relationship and those of the people close to you, or that you maybe don’t have much of a relationship. 

For many women, you might get into adulthood and have a vision of a mum and daughter relationship you’d like in your head. When you try, though, you feel like it’s not possible for you, or find that you try to move towards a friendship and come across difficulties trying to transition to a more adult relationship with your mum. 

As a man, you might also have had expectations of what your relationship looked like once you were no longer her little boy, but might be met with frustration at not feeling able to grow up, or discomfort around introducing partners, getting on with your life. You might find yourself feeling unable to lead your life without feeling as though you’re somehow letting your mum down because it’s not what she wanted for you. 

So many people get into adulthood and realise that they have mixed feelings or guilt about the feelings they hold regarding the relationship they have with their mothers. And it makes sense, particularly when, often, you get taught to respect your elders, that one day you’ll be able to look after your parents. There are so many different stories woven into the fabric of how we feel we should and shouldn’t behave, feel or think.

How do relationships with mothers show up in therapy?

Clients often turn up wanting to talk about feeling anxious, or struggling in their relationships – it’s not often that you think, “I’m going to go to therapy to figure out the relationship with my mother”. But quite often, those early relationships do get discussed! Even when that wasn’t top of your list! 

Sometimes, it’s in talking through the other things that are impacting your life, like a subconscious need to keep everything tidy and perfect, and not quite being able to understand why you’re feeling this pressure that brings something else to light. As you start to discuss the immense feeling of stress that you have that your house isn’t perfectly tidy, and that your partner can’t understand why you feel so anxious about the shoes left in the hallway, it dawns on you – you were never allowed to leave anything in a mess. 

In talking about early experiences, how you were treated, the expectations of you, you often uncover the root cause of the feelings you have now – and that often enables you to pick apart helpful and unhelpful patterns that you carry with you. 

Signs that your relationship with your mother is impacting your day-to-day life:

• You find yourself irritated, anxious or worried based on what your mother has said, or what you think she might say or do
• You struggle to make decisions for yourself, or to relax and relate this to your relationship or the influence of your mother specifically. 
• You feel unable to enjoy close relationships, feel unworthy of love and link this to your experience with your mother.
• The way your mother treated you as a child often feels like an influence in your adult life.
• You lack confidence in yourself, feel ill-equipped to express yourself, your needs, opinions or emotions because this wasn’t encouraged, or your mother spoke or still speaks for you.
• Your own mother struggled with her relationship with her parents, and you aren’t sure what a healthy mother-adult child relationship could look like

There are many more ways in which it could show up, and this is different for everyone, but this list gives some examples of ways in which there could be signs that your relationship with your mother could be showing up in your life. You might find that you relate to some of these or that it’s given you something to think about. 

Is an unhealthy relationship with your mother affecting your relationships?

Only you can really answer this – and honestly, as a human being, I’d hazard a guess that most people’s relationships are impacted by the ones they have with their parents in some way! But I guess that if you are looking for answers or seeking therapy, or possible reassurance somewhere, you may feel that there’s more to it. 

Is it possible to change your relationship with your mother, or how it affects you?

Yes – to both of these. It can look different for everyone, and for some, it’s a relatively straightforward process of making changes to how they communicate and show up in relationships (this can also come with pushback, resistance and take time), and for others, they work on themselves and how they feel about the relationship, and how they react and respond to different things. 

There can’t be a concrete promise that you’ll definitely figure out your relationship with your mother. Or that it will all be smooth sailing, but therapy sessions can give you a space to feel heard, to voice your feelings and experiences without judgement, and start to make sense of what is going on in your life. In time, through sharing and developing a relationship where you can trust, you can come out the other side knowing what you want and need, and how you can get there – whatever that looks like for you. 

If you’ve considered therapy before but are worried about what it might look like, you might want to read the post titled “Therapy isn’t about fixing you” – for a little more info on how the process actually works!

What to do now?

It can be hard to know how to change or build on relationships that you’re finding difficult to navigate. You’re not alone in that. You may just want to spend some time reflecting on how you feel, or you might find yourself thinking that you’d like to talk to someone about it. You know what’s right for you. 

If you think you’d like to talk to me, I offer a free 15-minute discovery call. You can get in touch here. 

Hannah Campbell is a psychotherapist based in Southend-on-Sea, working online and in person. She specialises in trauma and childhood emotional neglect.