Healing the Mother-Daughter Bond
Many mother-daughter relationships feel as strained as a toxic mix of beer, a joint, and codeine-laced cough syrup. These tensions, often unresolved, can persist into a daughter’s thirties or forties, leading to a lifelong standoff marked by steadfast resentment. This scenario is disheartening, but it’s not inevitable.
The good news? With effort, these relationships can transform. Sometimes, small changes can mend a strained bond. At their core, most mothers and daughters deeply love each other, but this love is often buried under criticism, unmet expectations, and misunderstanding.
Research and years of therapy reveal that mothers tend to be more openly critical of daughters than sons, especially in households with one boy and one girl. A recent survey found that 68% of women aged 18–35 felt their mothers resented them for not being a specific person or living a certain way, compared to 36% of women aged 36–56 and 23% of women over 57. While these figures come from a therapy-heavy sample and may vary, they highlight a common trend: mothers often hold daughters to higher or different standards.
Why are these relationships so strained? Freudian theories point to competition for the father’s attention, as daughters often bond more closely with fathers, and mothers with sons—hence terms like “Mama’s boy” and “Daddy’s little girl.” This dynamic can create early tension between mothers and daughters.
Building Bridges Through Communication
Both parties must work to ease the strain. Mothers often offer advice to help daughters avoid their own past mistakes, but this can feel like criticism or a lack of understanding. Daughters, striving to meet their mother’s expectations, may lose sight of their own desires or struggle to express them. This miscommunication fuels resentment, especially when a father’s unconditional support draws the daughter closer to him, further straining the mother-daughter bond.
Effective communication is key to unraveling this tension. Mothers should ask daughters about their goals and offer encouragement before advice. Daughters should recognize that their mothers are often trying to protect them from pitfalls, seeking to feel needed. Mutual acceptance can calm conflicts, reducing sarcasm, quips, and bickering. With proper boundaries, many mothers and daughters discover they genuinely like each other.
Setting boundaries can be challenging for mothers, who want to shield their daughters from pain, such as heartbreak from someone resembling a past mistake or workplace struggles like those they endured. Mothers must understand two things: first, their daughters are distinct individuals with the right to make their own mistakes; second, daughters crave their mother’s approval, regardless of age or bitterness. A mother’s pride can significantly improve the relationship, while constant disapproval deepens the rift.
Honesty is the greatest gift in healing this bond. Daughters who exaggerate or lie to provoke their mothers should reflect and change this behavior. Mothers who nag about finding the right partner, as discussed in finding the right person, should focus on celebrating their daughter’s achievements instead. These small, honest steps can open the door to a stronger, healthier relationship with the most important women in each other’s lives.
3 Responses
I agree with this synopsis but I am facing a different issue. My daughters and I have made it through their 30s and 40s but are now faced with their 50s and my 70s. They, of course, are menopausal and prickly. Now when we talk they expect me to add nothing to the conversation especially advice or insight through personal experience. It’s like I have no right to conversational input at all. I feel like telling them I am not a priest, shrink or impartial confident and if I am not allowed to add to the conversation they need one of those and not me. I am becoming quite resentful especially when they let slip that they have been talking to each other about what they think are my short-comings. For instance; One daughter preparing to move to CA from IL was telling me her landlord changed the front door lock and back door lock-code after she gave notice of her pending move and while she was out of town on business. I tell her they cannot legally do that and she should document it. Guess I spoke too soon as she became very disgusted with me, hung up and called her sister to report I was giving unwanted advice again. It is getting so bad and sooo upsetting I feel like separating myself from them altogether for their sake as well as my own. We currently live many miles from each other but talk (they talk – I am expected to listen) most days. Due to my age, 75, I sense they fear that somehow, someway they will be responsible for me. If so, it may be what is driving their attitudes. I hope not. Maybe it is menopausal attitudes??? Can you help us?
Dear Judy, I can hear your pain in your input not being welcomed by your daughters, and that they also talk about how you have “again” given unwanted advice. And I’m guessing that at your age, you long to have the better connections you had with them at their earlier ages, and that you long also to be included in their conversations and in their lives, and have the same respect and inclusion that they seem to offer each other. These are very understandable needs. What might help is that you find an alternative way of contributing to their conversations, other than adding things that you feel would help or fix the problem. This will take some restraint on your part unless you come to value what I have found to be even more helpful to my children than my advice – and that is to listen with empathy to whatever they are willing to share – to try to see it from their perspective, and make “empathy guesses.” An example would be “Are you feeling angry and frustrated that your landlord changed the lock and you weren’t able to get back into your apartment after you came back from your trip – because it didn’t meet your needs for fairness and consideration – especially since you had given him notice ahead of time so that he could find another tenant?” To most people in our culture, a question like that would not seem as helpful as advice, such as you offered your daughter – but most women mostly just want to be HEARD for their pain, and it better meets their needs for being cared about when they are just heard, and not advised! I hope this tip has been helpful for you. I have a few more on my website, as I specialize in helping mothers repair their strained relationships with their daughters. If you want to learn more, you can check me out at http://www.francesdelahanty.com
Maybe you should make the changes they requested and see how things go.