Mothers Who Can't Love: A Healing Guide for Daughters

by Forward, Susan

  “Arm yourself with nondefensive responses,” I advised Karen. With a volatile mother, it’s especially important not to fan the flames. Don’t argue or get defensive. Don’t get into a yelling match. Don’t engage in an exchange of blame or insults. Don’t get sidetracked. Keep it simple and direct, and stay on message.

  If you have an unloving mother like Karen’s, she is likely to project blame onto you almost automatically, and she may attack you for daring to suggest there’s anything wrong with her behavior. Karen was braced for a barrage.

  KAREN: “I know exactly what she’ll say: ‘How dare you talk to me like that? Who the hell do you think you are! You’re shaming the whole family by getting involved with this immigrant. He’s beneath you. You’d better take a good look at yourself, young lady!’ I’ll be lucky to get a word in edgewise.”

  SUSAN: “You don’t have to take insults and abuse—no one does. You can say, ‘If you continue to insult me, I’ll end this conversation.’ You can also interrupt her by saying, ‘Stop right there,’ or ‘That subject is off-limits,’ or ‘Unless you calm down, I’m going to hang up.’ There’s nothing chaining you to the telephone, and nothing chaining you to the chair if you’re sitting across from her. You’re an adult. Nothing will ever change until you change the way you characteristically behave with her.

  “Until now, your mother has had all the power. But now you are telling and showing her that that has to stop.”

  Summoning her courage, Karen called her mother, and she reported back in our next session.

  KAREN: “It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, Susan. My stomach was totally in knots. Just dialing the phone took a lot. And it was about as bad as I expected. I told her I wouldn’t tolerate her criticism of Daniel and me, and that I wouldn’t talk to her anymore about the wedding. That really put a stake in the heart of my crazy fantasy of us shopping together for a wedding dress… . She just roared at me, yelling about how awful I was and how much she despises Daniel. I held the phone away from my ear for a second, then I said, ‘Stop right there. Screaming and berating me isn’t going to work anymore.’ She went silent for a second. I said, ‘Your choice is to have a civil conversation with me or no conversation at all. Those are the only options, Mother. I need you to stop assaulting me. And I need you to understand that who I fall in love with and marry is my business, not yours.’

  “All she could say was, ‘Fine. Go ahead and ruin your life, see if I care.’ And she slammed down the phone. It didn’t feel like a total victory, exactly, and I was churning inside, but I was so relieved. I could look Daniel in the eye and not feel ashamed. I could really feel my integrity.”

  Taking steps to put distance between yourself and verbal abuse the way Karen did will probably leave you upset and shaky. It’s not easy to face your mother’s anger. But along with any inner turmoil you feel, I promise you that you’ll feel pride, too, a sense of “Oh my God—look what I just did!”

  “You now have the tools to protect yourself, and you can do it again, if need be,” I told Karen. “Walls didn’t cave in on you. The sky didn’t fall. Breathe deeply, and do whatever you need to calm yourself down after a difficult exchange with your mother. Soak in a hot bath and remind yourself how courageous you’ve been. You can take care of yourself. You’ve tapped the warrior woman inside. She’s always been there, waiting for you to find her.”

  It’s Not Easy, Do It Anyway

  This is the moment when you decide: “I’m either going to go on with the status quo, letting my relationship with my mother continue to erode my well-being, or I’m going to change.”

  There’s no easy way to do this. You just have to do it, a step at a time. You may feel guilty or afraid, but promise yourself that you will tolerate that guilt, and any other discomfort you feel, in the service of becoming a healthy woman. That is the most important pledge you can make to yourself.

  Chapter 12

  Deciding What Kind of Relationship

  You Want Now

  “I finally feel like an adult.”

  You’ve changed.

  You’re stronger now for having embraced your rights and taken steps to protect yourself. You’ve set boundaries with your mother and shifted your habitual responses to her behavior. You’ve reclaimed your integrity.

  As you continue to use your new behavioral strategies, you’ll find out if your mother is truly willing to respect your limits, boundaries, and wishes. It may take time for her to accept that you’re serious, but each time you tell her what you’re willing and not willing to do, and then hold firm, you’re demonstrating that this is the way things are going to be—the new normal.

  As that reality sinks in, some mothers, especially those who are not extremely critical, controlling, or narcissistic, realize that the stakes are high, and that if they want to preserve a relationship with you, they’ll need to begin respecting you as an adult and equal. Others feel attacked and can’t bear the thought that they may be in the wrong, so they defend themselves by intensifying their unloving behavior rather than examining and trying to change it.

  You have four options for going forward—and maintaining the old status quo is not one of them. You can:

  1. Continue using your assertive and nondefensive strategies to protect yourself and keep her unloving behavior in check. In some instances, that’s all you’ll need to do.

  2. Negotiate for a better relationship. That requires spelling out what you want yet again, then coming to an agreement about what both of you will do, and monitoring her behavior and your own to prevent backsliding. Negotiation generally comes into play in more complex situations that can’t be handled by gradually putting boundaries and limits in place.

  3. Have what I call a tea party relationship. You maintain contact but keep it superficial, and actively protect yourself by closing off opportunities for your mother to see or criticize your vulnerabilities.

  4. Cut off from your mother entirely.

  We’ll explore each of these options in the pages that follow, the first three in this chapter and the final option in the next. Remember that you are in control of this process—you set the terms of the relationship, and you decide what will serve you best.

  Option 1: Use Your New Skills

  to Reinforce the New Normal

  Lauren, who had used position statements to give herself more breathing room in her relationship with her enmeshing mother, was optimistic when she came to see me after a few weeks of keeping her new boundaries intact.

  LAUREN: “I can hardly believe it. Our old phone checkin time of five P.M. comes and goes, and sometimes I don’t even think about it. I actually kind of look forward to chatting with Mom a few times a week. I’m not saying everything is magically perfect, but things are a lot better. I have to watch myself to keep us from going backward, because I know Mom would still like us to be joined at the hip. But I’m getting better at letting her know I can’t do everything with her.

  “I was planning a little dinner party, just some friends, and when I mentioned it to Mom, she was really upset about not being invited. I almost said, ‘Oh, all right. Just come.’ But then I thought, ‘No, that’s crazy. I don’t want her there.’ And that’s pretty much what I said. I never used to be honest with her, but this time I told her, ‘Mom, this is the kind of thing I’ve been talking to you about. There are times when I just want to be with my friends.’ I didn’t apologize, not even when she went back to the old ‘You don’t love me anymore.’ It was hard. I said, ‘That’s silly, Mom.’ And then I said, ‘I love you, Mom. I’ve got to go.’ That was it.”

  Every time you express a truth that isn’t cruel or abusive, you grow. Lauren had stopped being the dutiful, guilt-bound daughter—“Yes, Mother, of course you can come”—and was fast becoming an empowered woman—“This is what I want.” I asked how she’d handle situations like the ones that had come up in the past, when her mother would buy tickets to a concert without checking with her and expect her to drop ever
ything to go.

  LAUREN: “I’ve thought about that. And I’m prepared to say, ‘I appreciate your generosity, but that won’t work for me. I have other plans.’ As long as I remember how good it feels not to resent her all the time, and how good it feels to actually be honest with her, I think I can do okay. It occurred to me that I used to lie to her all the time because I thought I’d hurt her feelings if I didn’t. How can you hope to be close to someone that way? I think we have a chance of having a better relationship now.”

  I wish I could say that it’s common for mothers to respond as Lauren’s mother did, but many don’t. And in that case, you’ll need to take further steps.

  Option 2: Negotiate for a Better Relationship

  For many, even most, of the mothers you’ve seen in this book, a daughter’s day-to-day assertiveness will have little impact.

  Controllers and narcissists, especially, may be deaf to your position statements and go on as if nothing has changed. Or they may respect your boundaries for a while and promise that they’ve changed for good, only to revert to their old behavior. (Narcissists, especially, pride themselves on looking good, and it’s not unusual for them to go along for a time simply to burnish their own image, and look as if they’re really trying.) In cases like that, you’ll need to have a more formal negotiation with your mother about your wants and needs rather than trying to make incremental shifts, issue by issue.

  You’ll also want to negotiate for a better relationship if you know that only a swift and significant change in your mother’s behavior can give you any chance of healing. That’s true when:

  • Your mother has an untreated addiction or condition such as depression that prevents your relationship from improving.

  • A crisis requires you to change the destructive aspects of your relationship immediately.

  • Abuse was part of your history with her, and you need to see how willing she is to take responsibility for either her complicity in the abuse or having been an active abuser herself. If she’s not willing to take responsibility, it is destructive to your well-being to have a relationship with her at all.

  In all of these instances, you’ll need to tell your mother the critical issues you need to resolve and let her know what you’d like her to do, what you’re willing to do, and what will happen if the situation does not change. This negotiation can protect you from your mother’s unloving behavior and give you the degree of contact with her that you believe is healthiest for you.

  Because the issues involved are so significant, and they may be complex and contentious, it’s essential to prepare thoroughly for your negotiation so you’ll have the inner clarity and confidence to communicate with your mother calmly and nondefensively. Sometimes, as you’ll see below, you may feel comfortable enough, based on the experience you’ve had using position statements, to negotiate on your own. But if your anxiety level is off the charts, it’s important to have the support of a therapist. If your family history involves physical or sexual abuse, the support of a therapist is mandatory. You need an advocate; it’s unwise to take this on by yourself.

  Allison: “I’m not willing to be your mother any longer.”

  Allison, who had grown up in a role reversal with her helpless, depressed mother, saw clearly how her caretaking tendencies with men grew from having been put in the role of being her mother’s caretaker and marriage counselor.

  ALLISON: “A light went on this week when my mother called me after another fight with my father. She was really upset. Apparently Dad came home from work to find her in her room, with no dinner happening, and he lost it. He started slamming doors and drawers, and then he emptied all the pots and pans out of the kitchen cabinet, yelling and swearing, ‘You haven’t even started!’ I know it must’ve been awful.

  “Mom started the usual litany of ‘What am I going to do? What am I going to do? I don’t know how much more of this I can take.’ The first thing that went through my mind was ‘I can fix this. I’m stronger now, I’m healthier… . I know exactly what she should do.’ And then I caught myself. I took a deep breath and I said, ‘Mom, you’ve been taking Dad’s abuse ever since you were married. You’re perfectly capable of figuring out what to do and making a change. But, instead, all you’ve been doing is shifting your unhappiness to me, and quite honestly, I’m not willing to take it anymore.’

  “She started to cry, and I felt like a criminal. I almost called her right back to tell her, for the millionth time, that she ought to leave Dad. But then I thought, ‘What am I thinking? I’ve been doing this my whole life, and it’s never done any good.’ You know how they say one definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result… . What does that say about me?”

  I assured Allison she was far from being insane—and she’d done a good job of protecting herself. She was just becoming ever more aware of the way she had been programmed to fix, to solve, to take care of, to be the grown-up. And those automatic responses had to end.

  ALLISON: “I know, Susan. I just can’t keep trying to be her mother. She has to take care of herself, get some treatment. I can’t do it for her.”

  But Allison could insist that her mother get the help she needed, and I told her she could make that a condition of continuing their relationship. Until the illness, whether it’s depression or an addiction, is under control, you’re in a relationship with the illness, not the person behind it. A decision about the role your mother can play in your life can only come after she’s gotten help. And if she won’t, there’s no way for any involvement with her to be healthy for you.

  You must not betray yourself by continuing to rescue someone who will not get treatment. This is essential.

  If your mother refuses to get help, remember:

  • Detachment isn’t betrayal.

  • Saving yourself isn’t betrayal.

  • Setting conditions for a healthier relationship is not betrayal.

  They are healthy, adult responses to a toxic situation.

  I asked Allison to rehearse with me exactly what she wanted to say, and the words poured out.

  ALLISON: “I want to say, Mom, I’m no longer willing to be your mother. I’m not willing to solve your life problems for you… . I want you to know that I’m happy to talk to you on the phone, but when you start to moan and complain about your marriage and your life, I’m going to change the subject or say I have to go. I want you to be prepared for that… . Now listen carefully because this is important. The main condition for my continuing to have a relationship with you is that you see your doctor about your depression. I’m willing to go with you, but you must get treatment to get your depression under control. Will you do that?”

  Allison was excited when she phoned me a few days later.

  ALLISON: “I’m so relieved, Susan. It worked. I went over to Mom’s house in the late afternoon before Dad got home and found her there in an old housedress with no makeup on, watching TV. I said, ‘Mom, I need to talk to you. I want you to go wash up, put on some makeup, and get dressed, and then we can talk.’ I made us some coffee in the kitchen, and then I told her I couldn’t live her life for her—she had to take care of herself, and especially deal with her depression. She said, ‘I know it’s a problem, but I don’t know what to do.’

  “I said, ‘I want to help you through this, Mom, but you have to keep your part of the bargain.’ She squeezed my hand and said, ‘I’ll do it, honey. I know I lean too much on you.’ Then she actually said thank you. I didn’t expect that. I don’t know why I never had the guts to have the conversation. I don’t know what I thought she’d do. I actually feel hopeful.”

  There was a realistic basis for that hope. Her mother had made the small, but hugely significant, shift from being totally helpless to saying she’d take some responsibility for herself. For the first time, she agreed to get professional help.

  Stacy: “Things have to change immediately.”

  Sometimes your mother seems to h
ave so much power in the relationship that the consequences of a rift with her feel dire, or the pressure to come to an agreement with her is freighted with fears and concerns.

  That was Stacy’s situation. She had an urgent need to shift her relationship with her enmeshing mother, who lived a few doors down the street and had gotten into the habit of spending all her free time at her daughter’s home. Stacy’s husband, Brent, had given Stacy an ultimatum, saying he couldn’t “be married to two women—you have to do something NOW,” and the clock was ticking. (You saw my earlier sessions with Stacy in the chapter on enmeshing mothers.)

  Because Brent and Stacy had relied heavily on the financial support of Stacy’s mother—she had bought the house they were living in, allowing them to rent for a nominal amount as Brent built his business, and she babysat their young children after school—the idea of negotiating with her mother activated deep survival fears for Stacy.

  STACY: “It’s been going okay, setting limits with Mom—I told her it wasn’t okay for her to poke around in our mail, and she actually stopped. But to tell her to … basically leave us alone unless we invite her over, which is what I know I need to do … I’m so scared about doing that. But if I don’t, I’ll lose Brent. I start getting heart palpitations every time I think about doing it.”

  I told Stacy that the best way to ease those fears was to channel her imagination and energy, which she’d been pouring into worst-case scenarios, into practicing what she needed to say to her mother. Being prepared—writing out a script and saying the words aloud until they feel natural—is the best way of gaining confidence as you learn to put your needs into words.

  SUSAN: “I know this is difficult, so let’s see if I can help you come up with some things you’ll feel comfortable saying. Since I’m not emotionally involved in the situation, it will be easier for me. Your mother has to know that she can no longer assume she has the same rights in your house as she has in her own. She isn’t respecting your separateness, your adulthood, or the fact that you have a partner. And the only way to let her know that is to tell her. You might want to take notes so you’ll have a script that you can study and memorize. That way, you’ll have the words you need to say if you get anxious and upset.