Mothers and daughters and bears oh my!
by Mira and Charles on May 27th, 2010Why mothers and daughters have troubled relationships
What is it with mothers and daughters? I remember once telling the mother of an 17-year-old young woman, “Woe to the mother whose ass is smaller than her daughter’s.” And in fact, this girl was furious with her mom for many reasons, not the least of which was her mom’s compact ass, compared to her own, well, large rear end. But you just can’t win, if you’re a mom. We all know moms whose daughters are merciless because the mom’s ass is too big, embarrassing the daughter whenever they are out in public.
You just can’t win. I’ve seen daughters excoriate their moms for working outside the home: “You were never there for me!” And I’ve seen daughters tear into their moms for staying at home: “You can’t tell me what to do. You don’t know anything. All you’ve ever done is sit around the house.”
But let’s be completely honest. Do we know if it’s true that mothers and daughters have specially complicated, difficult relationships? We don’t. But it certainly seems to be the case that there is more conflict, anger, resentment, bitterness between mothers and daughter than fathers and daughters, fathers and sons, or mothers and sons. (Not that there aren’t plenty of examples of horrible relationships in all of these categories.)
But WHY do mothers and daughters have such a tough time of it? I’ve been wondering about that for decades. Of course there are a million explanations floating around.
Well, I’ve got a new one. Not that it cancels out all the other explanations. But it is at least as powerful an explanation as any other, and it has the great advantage of pointing out something we can do to help mothers and daughters get along better.
Basically the idea is that mothers generally feel more guilty than fathers. Moms feel guiltier than dads for having to work late. Moms feel guiltier than dads at disappointing their kids. Moms feel guiltier than dads if something goes wrong in their kids’ lives—from a bump on the head to failing a course in school.
But it’s not the guilt that causes the trouble directly. No. Instead what happens is that because moms feel guilty they try to do more. They show themselves as holding to a higher standard. In other words, they create expectations: “expect more from me,” they say, by deed if not by word. Meanwhile, dads are working to lower expectations.
Well, when you play the expectations game, you always know how it will play out. The person who lowers expectations will win. He will under-promise and over-deliver. The person who raises expectations will lose. She will over-promise and under-deliver. Not only will this make the dad look better than the mom, but even if you take the dad out of the picture the mom will disappoint. The daughter will be angry, the mom will resent the daughter’s anger, and the seeds will be sown for a difficult relationship.
But, you might ask, why doesn’t this cause trouble for the mother-son relationship too? Well, actually it does. It’s just that moms create higher expectation for daughters because there is the notion that because they are both females they will be closer and the mom will be specially helpful.
And by the way, even if the mom herself doesn’t raise expectations, society does and daughters can’t help but pick this up.
So, memo to moms: stop being so guilt activated. It doesn’t make you a better mom. It just creates expectations that will lead to disappointment, to resentment, to anger, to hostility, to distance. And here’s the huge added bonus. By being less guilty, you will be a far happier person. You’ll be the fun mom. And then you’ll have a much better relationship with your daughter.
By the way, I got this idea reading an article on “The Anatomy of Guilt” in the latest issue of Working Mother magazine. In it, you’ll find good tips on reducing guilt. A very helpful article.
We have a chapter in our award-winning book The Emotional Energy Factor on doing away with guilt. Check it out, plus all the other chapters on how to not just feel less down, but how to feel more up.
Now what about you? Have their been rocky patches in your relationship with your mom? Why? Why do you think this is such a widespread issue? Or DO you think this is a problem for a lot of women? Let us hear from you!
