Like most women I know, my relationship with my mother is complicated. I love her immensely, but there were years we didn’t speak, and our history still very much impacts our present.
For most of my adult years, I used to drown in a ball of shame thinking I was the only one who didn’t grow up like the mother/daughter relationships I saw mirrored back to me on television. But since writing openly about repairing my relationship with my mom, I’ve heard from so many women who have expressed a similar dynamic: Love, lots of it, but a history filled with endless frustrations, anger, and resentment. These stories of other women who too felt confused and disheartened by their relationships with their mothers, forced me to start exploring reasons outside of the individual relationships we so often examine. What if there was a bigger issue at play? I wondered.
For the last few months, I’ve been trying to answer a nagging question brewing in my mind: How has male dominance in our society impacted the relationship with the women who birthed us? Specifically, how has the patriarchy impacted our mother/daughter dynamics?
For years, I blamed my mother for not being enough, without ever looking at the system that reduced her power. It was easier for me to blame her for my lack of confidence and self-love, than to explore a society which continuously devalues our gender. While I’d never really thought about the patriarchy being a reason for the deep foundational crack in our relationship, I now see very clearly its distributing, and common, impacts between mothers and daughters.
Thousands of daughters see their mothers as having taught a compromise and self-hatred they are struggling to win free of, the one through whom the restrictions and degradations of a female existence were perforce transmitted. Easier by far to hate and reject a mother outright than to see beyond her to the forces acting upon her.
Adrienne Rich
The patriarchy impacted the way our mothers moved in this world, and it controlled their perception of what their role as a woman could be. Inevitably, the patriarchy influenced the way they (sub)consciously raised their daughters, and even dictated their beliefs in what their daughters could be in a patriarchal society.
The patriarchy values men above all genders, and this is evident in the standards we hold our mothers accountable to versus those we place on our fathers. We expect everything from our mothers and demand nothing from our fathers. The patriarchy has conditioned us to celebrate absentless and under-performing fathers, while shaming the mothers in the backdrop who are holding everything together. My father didn’t raise me, even when he was physically present, and yet, I’ve often praised him for being “an incredible father to an adult child.” The patriarchy taught me to see the human in my father and remind my mother of her shortcomings, even though she was the one emotionally and financially providing for me.
When I talked about this with a few of my close friends, their answers mirrored images of strong mothers supporting their families. “My mother was the breadwinner, put my dad through university, and paid for every extracurricular activity for me and my sister,” one friend proudly shared. Other friends expressed similar stories of their mothers going against the perceived norm of their time, one in which the man was the head of the family. Women weren’t powerless; we still aren’t—but in a patriarchy we have to work twice as hard. My own mother worked four jobs to ensure we had food on the table, while my stepdad struggled to bring home a steady paycheck.
The patriarchy controlled many of our mothers in when and how they were able to use their voices. And instead of blaming the system for keeping my mother voiceless, I resented her for not using it more.
Alexandra D’amour
And yet still, regardless if mothers were indeed breadwinners or the reason their families stayed afloat, they were oppressed in so many ways under the patriarchy. One of my friends admitted, “My mother had a voice, but she just didn’t use it very often, especially when she was around my dad” —something I personally witnessed as well. Last year, during an argument I was having with my mom about my childhood, I yelled at her (not proud of this) after being unable to understand how she could allow my stepfather to mistreat her (and me) the year before I moved out. Her lips quivered as she tried to find her words. “I didn’t know how to stand up to him,” she admitted shamefully. The patriarchy controlled many of our mothers in when and how they were able to use their voices. And instead of blaming the system for keeping my mother voiceless, I resented her for not using it more.
And this is where I’ve struggled with shame the most, asking myself how much I have upheld the standards the patriarchy created onto my mother? How have we, as daughters, perpetuated the idea that our mothers are lesser than? How are our own expectations of our mothers guided by the unattainable need for women, especially mothers, to be perfect?
The oppression of women has created a breach among us, especially between mothers and daughters. Women cannot respect their mothers in a society which degrades them; women cannot respect themselves.
Adrienne Rich
When I think of common complaints from daughters regarding their mothers, it’s often rooted in their mother’s expectations and demands. “The expectations that were put on me were SAVAGE,” one of my friends shared, which is another sentiment I can vouch for. Conversations about my future with my mother included going to Harvard and ensuring I never had to rely on a man to provide for me. A daughter’s worth wasn’t defined by who they were inherently, but who they could be in the patriarchy, with independence and success as the key measures.
While I resent my mother’s expectations of me growing up, I understand now that she was simply trying to prepare me for the “real world,” one that didn’t value women as a gender equal to men. Our mothers were trying to survive in a capitalistic society run by men, and our childhood was shaped with this survival mechanism in mind. I’m still detangling the impacts of those expectations on my self-worth and I’m left wondering: Was she preparing me for the patriarchy? Or protecting me from it? Or both? And can I really blame her or resent her for this? Wouldn’t I, too, want to prepare my daughter for what to expect in a society and culture that doesn’t naturally empower her?
The reality is that both mothers and daughters have placed unattainable expectations on each other, which only mirrors the pressures the patriarchy places on women. It’s imprisoned motherhood, alienated women from their bodies and each other, and ensures these limiting and controlling beliefs about women are passed down from mother to daughter. How can we expect our mothers to build us up when they grew up in a world dedicated to taking women down? We think we can’t stand on our own, even though we prove otherwise again and again. We can’t break free from the parameters and walls the patriarchy keeps us contained within—let alone raise daughters, future women, to believe they have worth outside of what the patriarchy defines for them.
Every mother and daughter is a victim of the patriarchy, and every mother and daughter has the opportunity to stand up against it.
Alexandra D’amour
Mothers are daughters. Mothers are women. Mothers are human. And yet somehow, when a woman becomes a mother, the patriarchy reduces her to only that: mother. The reality is that our mothers, just like us daughters, are complex human beings carefully traversing a society that diminishes them. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that our mothers, just like us, were once too, and for some still are, daughters.
At what point do we start looking at our mothers as daughters? Women who were oppressed and subjected to keeping up with the patriarchy long before they became mothers and had daughters of their own? Our mothers never had the opportunity or safe space like many of us do now, to examine the broken pieces that shaped them. The patriarchy taught them to push through, silently, at all costs. Many mothers my mother’s age are now just realizing and healing from the impacts of their childhood, very often because of conversations their daughters are forcing them to have.
Every mother and daughter is a victim of the patriarchy, and every mother and daughter has the opportunity to stand up against it. And while there are so many issues we are fighting that the patriarchy has caused, I think it’s too time to address how the patriarchy has severed us from the womb that birthed us. Maybe this is how we heal from this unhealthy, oppressive system; together as one, instead of separate, creating anew. Maybe the ultimate way to fight the patriarchy is to honor the daughter that lays dormant in our mothers. Maybe with the recognition that we are all daughters who have suffered under patriarchy, desperate to heal, we can envision a new world.
Starting now, I’ll be extending empathy to my mother, celebrating her, a woman, who is doing her best to navigate a world that wasn’t built for her.
Thank you for writing this piece & sharing your thoughts. It’s reawakened this conversation in my mind that, admittedly, I let fall to the back of it. I’ve slowly been going through the process of recognizing the areas where I don’t extend the general empathy towards my mom that I try to extend to others. It’s a painful but healing process.
This struck a cord with me in particular – “A daughter’s worth wasn’t defined by who they were inherently, but who they could be in the patriarchy, with independence and success as the key measures.” A good reminder that these external markers are a societal measurement as well.
It is always slightly comforting to find others who have a complicated maternal relationship, it reminds you that you’re not alone. Thanks.
I don’t really have much to say, other than this was really insightful and gave me A LOT to think about.
wow
Thank you for this beautiful piece.
To answer your question, yeah, I do think the patriarchy has influenced my relationship with my mother. She was the victim of emotional/physical abuse, because therapy faced so much more stigma during her young adulthood, never truly processed it. Her dad (who was a victim of PTSD) took out so much of his anger on the family, and my grandma couldn’t stand up for my mother or any of her three siblings.
I always wondered why my mom would slam the door and hide from me when we argued—it caused me so much more pain to have her ignore me when I was upset, and then contributed to my anxious attachment style. But she was protecting herself (and more importantly, me) from the residual anger she carried from her childhood. Domestic violence, war… These are all symptoms of the patriarchal world we live in. Once we acknowledge these layers, and peel them back, we can see our mothers are people with scars just like ours.
Of course, how can it not? It’s not just about the mothers attitude but her whole reason for being. She is defined and reduced to mother, and then we fight over how she expresses those patriarchal values. My experience: Paying her primary attention to men, secondary to money, ( both represented safety to her) then the children’s needs came after; wanting to be loved, adored and objectified by seeking separation from the role of mother and adoring her value as sex thing over mother, as if there are only two choices. Choosing men over her children every time because their value is ultimately higher to her. Survival meant to find a man and keep hold of him, so while she says her childhood is put away in a box, she lives it daily through her choices.
Bella: Absolutely! Patriarchy either pushes us to depend on men or to seek independence which does trigger feelings of resentment towards our mothers. My mother and I no longer speak. After years of trying to gain her approval, her love and attention that would have helped soothe my trauma I have finally decided to put her to the side. Not only does she places me and my sister in the same box of the importance of finding good reliable partners “like her” she has allowed the men in our family to abused us and blame us instead of having these men be accountable! My mother has done to us exactly what has been done to her and fed us her trauma. That trauma and abuse has led to and harbor anxiety and deep resentment. Resentment that spits bitterness but is also gaining insight to acknowledge the pain, her pain and the disgust of recognizing how men control our lives even before we are born.
I am so glad you put all of this into words. I have been having the same internal dialogue for months, and recently wrote a piece about how I have grown to see my own mother. Accepting them as humans and unhealed daughters is so critical, and I feel grateful that we are the generation to awaken to this realization and begin doing the hard work.
My mother knew we were being abused. She admitted it. She did nothing because he supported us and made the living, and you do not contradict the husband even when you know he is wrong. She did nothing to stop the violence and simply left the room. Afterward she came back and examined and treated our injuries. She gave us excuses to explain the injuries.
We were supposed to believe the alternate story too. “What happens in the family stays in the family.”
I left in my teens when I realized she would never take our sidr against him. That is how satan destroys marriages. He used children to divide spouses from each other.
She and the relatives circled the wagons around him. When they found out I was in therapy for the abuse I was subjected to staged “interventions” aimed at getting me to “forgive” them because forgiveness means “putting it behind you” and “leaving it in the past.” The subject is never raised again, or you did not truly forgive. That protects my father, the family is not embarrased and shuts me up, because you no longer need therapy if you forgive and “close the door on the past.”
I would be invited to another family member’s house for dinnet ot a visit, but here come my parents from a back bedroom and the speech starts…. “Now, we have all entered a Reconciliation Zone! No one is leaving until we lay our anger to rest….”
I am the enemy. Not the abuser. Not the church. Me. I lost my entire family over patriarchy and male as law.
Thank you for writing this.
THANK YOU for writing this piece, I only just began making the connection between my father’s under-performance as a husband and father and my mothers over-performance in order to try to balance it out. At first I resented her for not having a voice and not teaching me confidence and an internal locus of control, but now I’m recognizing her own mother taught her always to defer to men and was deeply patriarchal herself, so my mother had terrible role models and it’s a miracle she turned out as she has. I am stuck trying not to resent men, and I admit there are very good, feminist men out there who will side with me but am I wrong in that they are few and far between? Thankfully I do know a few, my brother for one.
Thank you for the clarity you have provided, this is a very important piece.