When/why do mother-daughter relationships go bad?

[Anonymous]

So many posts here on DCUM are about barely being able to tolerate your mother. Nearly 100% of these posts are written, I gather, by mothers. How and why did your relationship with your mother sour, and what are you doing to prevent that from happening in your relationship with your children? How confident are you that whatever strategies you are employing with your children will work to preserve your close, loving relationships? And if they don't work, how well equipped are you emotionally to handle their antipathy?

[Anonymous]

I see a lot of posts written by daughters, actually. A lot of posts about borderline mothers, controlling mothers, overly involved mothers. A lot posts from daughters asking how to set better boundaries.

My advice is this: as your children get older, allow them more freedom. Don't impose rules and control that are the same from year to year.

[Anonymous]

OP are you a man or woman?

As a woman, a daughter and a mother of a girl and boy, I experience this in full force. The relationship between moms and daughters and moms and sons are so, so different. Mothers and daughters tend to become much more entwined in each other. It is a very intense relationship and thus has more complications than most.

Personally, having been raised with a wonderful mom who has major issues, my goal is to take care of myself so that I don't look to my child to be my sounding board/sole support system/ emotional dumping ground (which is where I am with my own mother.) I'm applying the "oxygen mask" rules long term and getting my own self sorted out so I am the most balanced and whole person I can be.

DD and I still may wind up with issues, but I'd like to think we will both be able to address them in a productive and healthy manner.

[Anonymous]

I suspect a lot of it is people perpetuating unhealthy relationships in each generation because that's all they know.

I feel lucky to have the type of mom who never crossed the line into expecting me to be her best friend while growing up, never burdened us with her issues or problems (she's not perfect, she had them, she just dealt with them herself and without impacting us) and always was kind and caring and thoughtful. Now that I'm an adult, I very much consider her a close friend as well as my mom. I'm hoping that, if I follow her example, I can have a similar relationship with my daughter. Like PP, I have a son, too, but right now both kids are so young my relationships with them are very much the same. We'll see!

[Anonymous]

I don't have mother daughter issues really, but my read is that mothers are more intertwined with daughters lives than sons. With that comes good and bad -- some of the bad is feeling SO close and SO much like she's an extension if you that you control her, criticize her the way you'd criticize your own self without thinking - she's a separate person who can/will get offended. Moms back off a lot more with grown sons - generally - bc they realize he's not as intertwined and could walk away if he gets too offended and then you see him once a yr. So with sons you get moms who stand back and beam with pride; sometimes those same moms w daughters will be like - well that's a nice accomplishment but don't you need to spend more time with the kids and btw your hair is a mess.

[Anonymous]

I don't know, OP but I wonder, too. I love my mother but she drives me crazy. It is just super intense (made even more so because she raised me on her own and I'm an only child, so there are just two of us). But the weird thing is that my daughter is only 3 and I swear that it has already started with us. She behaves completely differently with me than with my husband. And I have a son who is completely different from my daughter. Son often hugs me and tells me he loves me unprompted whereas if I try to hug daughter, she pushes me away and says no. She just pushes my buttons and I push hers. It scares the crap out of me because I want to have a good relationship with her when she's older but I honestly am afraid that I won't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know, OP but I wonder, too. I love my mother but she drives me crazy. It is just super intense (made even more so because she raised me on her own and I'm an only child, so there are just two of us). But the weird thing is that my daughter is only 3 and I swear that it has already started with us. She behaves completely differently with me than with my husband. And I have a son who is completely different from my daughter. Son often hugs me and tells me he loves me unprompted whereas if I try to hug daughter, she pushes me away and says no. She just pushes my buttons and I push hers. It scares the crap out of me because I want to have a good relationship with her when she's older but I honestly am afraid that I won't.

Part of the problem is that she's 3! It gets better PP....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I see a lot of posts written by daughters, actually. A lot of posts about borderline mothers, controlling mothers, overly involved mothers. A lot posts from daughters asking how to set better boundaries.

My advice is this: as your children get older, allow them more freedom. Don't impose rules and control that are the same from year to year.

Yes, but daughters who are also mothers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know, OP but I wonder, too. I love my mother but she drives me crazy. It is just super intense (made even more so because she raised me on her own and I'm an only child, so there are just two of us). But the weird thing is that my daughter is only 3 and I swear that it has already started with us. She behaves completely differently with me than with my husband. And I have a son who is completely different from my daughter. Son often hugs me and tells me he loves me unprompted whereas if I try to hug daughter, she pushes me away and says no. She just pushes my buttons and I push hers. It scares the crap out of me because I want to have a good relationship with her when she's older but I honestly am afraid that I won't.

I'd lean towards that is how toddlers act and it ebbs and flows.
I don't think the "relationships go bad" until maybe end of elementary school, if at all.
My mother and I are quite opposite - she is illogical, super sunny personality, talks to everyone, and very defensive when she messes up. Being the opposite might be good for Dad but not for me the daughter. Things were civil through age 18 at home, if anything I'd just be embarrassed. But now as an adult, and in my 20s and 30s, I could never go to her for advice or even venting about situations at work or whatever because while she'd be my #1 cheerleader, she just didn't listen, process or actually reply to anything I was saying. Everything from planning visits, my wedding, babysitting my kids just ends up in a big mess of a conversation and sometimes a fight. My husband, brother and I are now suspecting mild dementia, that may have been developing for awhile. Though my Dad doesn't think so.

[Anonymous]

With adults money does not equal control.

If I decide that I will provide the money for college. That's it, that's all - I don't "have a say" in the choice.

If I decide that I will provide money (a little) for a house down payment - I don't say anything re: daughter's choice.

I don't offer advice - I do not comment, unless my opinion is asked for. These are adults. I try to respect them as I would a friend. If I wouldn't say something to a friend, I don't say it to a daughter.

[Anonymous]

The PP's comment about it falling apart after elementary school is interesting. That's exactly when my relationship crashed. And it's not the awful story of abuse. Just no decency in the relationship.

My mom is an adult child of an alcoholic. So is my dad. So they recreated an alcoholic family without the alcohol. My mother was very superficial and cared about what other people thought of our family to the exclusion of how "we" felt about anything.

Everything was about appearances and nothing was about substance.

I was overweight, and so I was an embarassment to her. She dragged me to Weight Watchers when I was 10. Up until then, I didn't know there was anything wrong with me. But from that point on, everything was about my weight.

I had my first bout with major depression at age 11 and was crying for no known reason one day in the living room. And she yelled at me. I was too old for that. She just never could truly understand what I was going through. Which is fine. But she never even asked. That wasn't so fine.

Affection was all for the sake of appearance. No hugs, no kisses, no I love you, except when we left the house. Then it was demanded of us. Nothing spontaneous. No hugs when scared or hurt. When I was sick, she completely fled from me, terrified of illness.

She favored my younger brother to my detriment. I remember studying hard for a calculus exam my freshman year, and she demanded that I stop doing that and help my brother with "his" homework, because he wasn't good at school and I was. No regard for my fear of failing that exam, my budgeted time for study vs. my job, etc. It was all about the boy.

She just had a constant disregard for my feelings. They were worthless, meaningless. "Do as I say, no questions asked. Who cares what you are feeling?"

She had a fit once, when my dad called me "dear." He wasn't affectionate in any way, either. And I felt this great warmth when he called me that term of endearment. For about a second. Then she gave him hell for calling me dear, when he never called her that. That was the end of his scarce affection toward me.

She kicked me out of the house at 19 because I had too many black friends (I had four). But you know, what would the neighbors think?

She was also crushingly controlling.

The takeaway here was that she would like me if I kept up appearances, but she cared nothing for the "real" me at all.


My son is exactly like me. Very sensitive. Very emotional. I validate his feelings as much as possible. I genuinely listen to his troubles, his anger, his despair, his joy. I give him respect. He has value just like every human has value. And of course he has even more to me because he's my son. And he knows it. We are much more affectionate, tons of hugs and I love yous.

I admit when I'm wrong. I apologize. I show him how I try to make things right. I show him how I try not to repeat my mistakes.

He's 9. My confidence level in my success in not repeating my childhood? It was very high when he was little. I feel like I'm on shakier ground as he hits his tween years.

I am completely ready (intellectually) for him to pull away. I know that I had to figure out who I was independent of my mother, and I know he will have to do that, too. However, I see so many moms with great relationships with their tweens, teens, and college kids. I do hope that I can let him go and still maintain a good relationship.

There's a lot of hope there. But only about medium confidence.

[Anonymous]

It is white women and their mothers....
Not trying to cause trouble, but it seems like every single one of my white friends has an issue with their mother.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is white women and their mothers....
Not trying to cause trouble, but it seems like every single one of my white friends has an issue with their mother.

All of my white friends have good relationships with their mothers. My black and Asian friends, too, actually. I guess I just have mentally more stable friends than you. Probably says more about you than them.

[Anonymous]

Sadly, I think some mothers start to feel threatened by their daughter's youth/beauty/opportunities as they become apparent.

[Anonymous]

I didn't grow up with a mother, but my oldest of three daughters is 20. So far, so good. Got a little rocky at 11 and a little rocky at 15. I kind of backed off, then doubled down and went back in. Sometimes I had to let things go that I didn't want to. It helped that part of my village was moms of older kids, who could say to me "This'll shake out, just hold steady" or "You need to nip that in the bud, immediately, before it becomes a bigger problem."