Freud Was Right: Mean Mothers Scar for Life
Some Children Mired in the Past, But Others Learn to Move
on and Forgive Abusive Moms
By SUSAN DONALDSON JAMES
May 7, 2010—
Leslie was never allowed to call her mother mom.
"We had to call her by her first name and when we were kids, if we tried
to climb on her lap, she would move her legs and not let us -- there
was no affection whatsoever," said the now-grown Oregon mother of two.
"She
spanked us without warning and pitted my sister
and I against each other," said the 45-year-old, who now works in a
recording studio. "She was very clever at using emotional abuse to get
my sister and I to do what she wanted. The two emotions I remember
growing up were fear and obligation."
Leslie said she tries not to "embellish" the numerous dark incidents of
her childhood, but she is convinced her mother "just liked to take the
joy away -- to be mean."
As
Mother's Day approaches, not all have warm and
fuzzy memories of maternal love. Some adults say they never escaped the
scarring clutches of
mommy
dearest, while others learned to forgive, move on and raise their
own children in a far-different way.
Psychiatrists say that good mothering is critical to healthy development
and that children carry her voice, good or bad, throughout their adult
lives, sometimes repeating the trauma upon their own children.
An estimated 56 percent of all abusers -- physical, mental and sexual --
are women, according to the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (ed note: These are 2007 data, the most recent available. A finer breakdown can be obtained here going back several years and other countries. I note with interest ABC News made the data hard to find in their article by not providing a direct link.) through The
most common form is psychological.
"It happens a lot," said
Dr. Philip R. Muskin, professor of clinical
psychiatry at Columbia University. "Neglect and emotional abuse are
every bit as damaging as sexual abuse."
Abuse can include name calling; threatening to kill the victim's family
or pet; controlling access to finances; isolating the victim from family
and friends; coercing the victim to perform degrading, humiliating or
illegal acts; interfering with job, medical or educational
opportunities; or making the victim feel powerless and ashamed.
Numerous studies have shown that
maternal behaviors like constant criticism,
withholding affection or humiliation can take a toll on children,
adversely affecting their academic achievement, social growth and
self-worth.
"
Mother's Day has always been tough for me as I
always just wanted a normal Mom," said one middle-aged Missouri woman
whose mother was a verbal tyrant. The most vulnerable years are when a child is in infancy and a toddler,
when the mother is usually the chief nurturer.
"
Freud was right in attributing a major
responsibility to mothers in the culture as he knew it," said
Robert
E. Simmons, clinical psychologist from Alexandria, Va. "This of
course includes fathers and any others who are caretakers for the child.
The fundamental question is whether the child experiences an
environment that is predictable and not chaotic and feels emotionally
and physically safe."
"Freud did not sufficiently emphasize the importance of innate
temperament, biological vulnerabilities or the quality of the attachment
between child and primary caretaker," said Simmons. "But he was
reasonably on the mark that very important developmental processes are
shaped in the first few years of child's life."
Mother's Abuse Learned From Her Own Mother
At the age of about 5, Leslie remembers watching her mother fold towels
and jumping in to help, hoping she could "earn some attention."
"She quickly grabbed the laundry basket from her left side and placed it
next to me and said, 'Fine, you want to fold them, here you go,' and
walked out of the room," she said. "So feeling a knot in my stomach
because that was completely not the outcome I was seeking, I kept myself
from crying and started folding towels thinking that maybe I could
still salvage some attention by finishing folding the towels."
A minute later, still with no acknowledgement and a lump in her throat,
Leslie found a way to do the job faster, folding two towels at once. But
when her mother returned she slapped Leslie across her head and
shoulder and undid all the towels.
"The saddest part of this story for me was the moment I was showing her
my fancy new folding trick, when I saw her arm coming up out of the
corner of my eye," said Leslie. "I thought for a split second that she
was going to hug me for thinking of something so clever ... I was
wrong."
Leslie says she was lucky to break free at the age of 17 when her mother
changed the locks on the door while while she was at her high school
job. Today, she has a loving and close relationship with her own
children, 9 and 11, but Leslie has seen how the abuse can carry through
generations.
"My parents didn't speak to their parents," she said.
She learned to expect the worst and not let herself get hurt
emotionally, a survival skill that sent her into counseling later in
life when she had trouble in relationships.
Wendy, a single parent from Monterey, Calif., was raised by a mother who
likely had a narcissistic personality disorder, defined by the
psychiatric diagnostic manual as "a pervasive pattern of grandiosity,
need for admiration, and a lack of empathy."
"I felt like I grew up with no floor," said Wendy, who wrote to
ABCNews.com but did not want her last name used. "The attention my
mother needs is dumbfounding."
A pathological liar, her mother told her daughter she was "Queen Maria
Theresa of Austria" -- a would-be Hapsburg princess or queen. She once
advised Wendy, "If you say something enough it becomes true."
She exaggerated her accomplishments and took all the credit for her
daughter's as well. "I thought there was something wrong with me a lot
of the time," said Wendy, who was talented at art, but never got praise.
Her mother told her daughter to refuse a scholarship to college. "I
loved my mom," she said. "I worked to get her love. I turned down the
scholarship."
Sometimes mental illness plays a role in bad mothering.
Mental Health Disorders Can Trigger Child Abuse
Pamela grew up in the 1950s and 1960s with a mother who had undiagnosed
bipolar and multiple personality disorders. "It was a horrifying
experience," said the Springfield, Mo., woman who did not want her last
name used. "Many things I have blocked."
"The embarrassment, the treachery, the verbal and physical abuse left me
scarred for many years," she said. "I think my greatest fear was
growing up to be just like her."
Pamela, now 52 and the mother of two, remembers her mother screaming
that she hated the children, threatening to leave and never come back.
"We formed a human chain against the door but she threw us to the side
and left getting in her car and driving away."
Pamela doesn't know how long her mother was gone, but the "record player
of her hateful words still play in my mind."
Her mother died of a stroke in March at the age of 79, and Pamela was
finally able to forgive.
"Suddenly everything fell into place and I can say now that the
forgiveness came easily after I knew I was living with insanity," she
said.
"Clearly there are moms that are just not good moms -- they may wish to
be, but they don't get it right," said Columbia psychiatrist Muskin.
"Often they weren't mothered well themselves."
Learning to move forward from a painful past is difficult, though not
impossible. And psychiatrists still don't understand why one sibling
fares well psychologically and the other can be destroyed.
"We wish we understood the hearty child concept," said Muskin. "Through
all the horror of growing up, some move on and marry, have a successful
family. There are psychological factors that enable all of use to put
things in perspective, to take responsibility for ourselves and to
create the life we want. It doesn't mean we don't have limitations and
issues, but my life is my life."
"Living in the past doesn't work," he said. "Some people get it on their
own, some get it through therapy and some get it through religion. But
it's very powerful to be able to say, 'She was what she was, and it
wasn't good. But here I am today.'"
As for Leslie, she tried to reconnect with her mother when she had her
own children, but was disappointed when the manipulation began again.
They have since parted ways. "I don't feel compassion, maybe because she was the one who was supposed
to be taking care of me," she said.
Leslie said she "broke the chain" of anger that had passed from mother
to daughter. "I love my kids so much and I couldn't imagine not feeling
any connection with them," she said.
On Mother's Day, her children will let her sleep late and try to make
her breakfast. "They will shower me with cute and hilarious stuff they
made and dad makes me things for the garden," she said.
Leslie has also learned not to be a victim and not to dwell on the
negative. "I was born with a great sense of humor, so I was always able to find
something funny in even a bad situation and it helped me through," she
said. "The last and most important thing is that as we become adults we
have to move on. There is some forgiveness there, but in many cases
that may be really, really hard to do, but you have to."
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