How are you mothering yourself?
This is not about your mother
I miss her still. Of course, and yet she taught me well, and showed me how to mother myself.
And of course, there were gaps. Jay Shetty talks about everyone having gifts and gaps from their childhood. Because parenting is not perfect. Mine certainly isn’t. I hope I have given my girls great gifts but I know there will be gaps.. and their job will be to learn to mother themselves in those gaps, as I have done.
But in the treasure trove of gifts my mum gave me was how to show love, how to repair when that love got lost in moments of frustration, how to be kind, how to call a spade a spade, how to hold myself accountable, how to go gently but also be strong.
This Sunday is Mother’s Day in Ireland - and I still miss making a card that would make her laugh or smile.
But it’s all year that I need her. And so I had to learn to mother myself in her memory…. showering myself with her gifts, and stepping in myself for the gaps she missed. The gaps in her parenting of me were the wounds I had (have) to heal myself. And that is my job just as her life was about figuring out hers. My girls will have to do that work too.
For one, I’ve had to fill the gaping hole she gave me of people pleasing and learn to please myself too. She felt responsible for everyone’s happiness and as I am learning, that was a a gap I have to fix. And I’m not alone.
As a coach, often, I work with women who have been socially trained and conditioned to only love externally. We all were. We were told our value lay in what we do for others. I certainly saw my mum struggle with the crushing reality of that and so much of my work (on myself) and for my writing and clients is helping us all shift away from that patriarchal mind fuckery and allow a little love in for ourselves.
I will often say to my client - if you where mothering yourself (or more generally, parenting) yourself the way you need to be parented - and this has nothing whatsoever to do with your actual parents - how would you be behaving? What would you be saying to yourself? What would you be encouraging yourself to do? How would you want to be supporting yourself?
I don’t mean giving yourself a scented bath, lovely as that is. It means showing up for yourself with relentless fortitude, mothering yourself with curiosity, care and challenging conversations (less critic, more coach).
Yet one of the hardest parts of being a woman (often a gap we took from our childhood) is that often unseen but much expected burden of feeling responsible for everyone’s happiness.
If you were born with a uterus you were likely silently sent the mental memo as you left hospital: as a woman it’s your job to smile, and be kind and be loving and be generous, and be practical, and be patient and be happy and many more of those ands.
The biggest ‘and’ of all? Be responsible for everyone’s happiness.
It’s there in the small print. Along with knowledge of how to stack a dishwasher properly, apparently.
Albeit you get a few years off - that sabbatical when you go through your teenage years as it’s hard enough trying to figure out how you fit into this world with all its messages and unseen structures that tell you how and who you should be. But as you traverse your way through life, perhaps accumulating partners, friends, colleagues and kids along the way, the small print glows in the dark recesses of your ever-overloading brain, and you take on more and more guilt and responsibility for everyone’s happiness.
I’ve felt it myself, especially as a single parent to three teens. The lurch in my stomach the moment I hear a door slam, or the thump of teenage footsteps running heavy and ominous up the stairs, a bored sigh, a half-eaten meal that I’ve laboured over but hasn’t met the ambitious approval of those unable (or unwilling) to cook. Or supporting my 88 year old dad who is dealing with lung cancer, and who let’s face it, has earned the right to grumble occasionally. Yet somehow it can be really easy to feel it’s my responsibility to make sure everyone is happy and having a good time, regardless of how they actually feel or what they’re going through. I have to mother myself through that gap and remember it’s not.
Letting go of that feeling of responsibility took awareness, then practise and now intention and it’s like taking weights off your shoulders (and anything that makes a midlife woman feel lighter is a good thing).
It comes up so much in my coaching too: this parental pressure, daughterly duty, friendly friction, partner propaganda, that you must contort and dance yourself into a spin like a court jester to make sure everyone in your family and life is happy and have all their needs met. With my clients it can show up in the form of
Guilt
Over-parenting
Resentment of a partner
Burnout at work
I had a client in her early 60’s who was on the verge of leaving her marriage and distancing herself from her adult children and parents because she was at the absolute end of her tether, exhausted from being everything to them all which conflicted consistently with being anything to herself. It wasn’t about loving and caring for them which she was happy to do - it was the over-emotional responsibility that was crushing her.
She was so busy fixing everyone’s lives, her spirit was breaking.
She was so focussed on meeting all the external demands, she’d lost sight of her internal needs
She was so joyless from being a do-er, there was no joy in being with any of them.
I’m happy to report she is now laughing and loving in her marriage again, has deep, delightful relationships with her adult children, and has put up clear boundaries with her siblings to redistribute the care of their parents, and empower them more to help themselves.
What it took was for her to realise her value was not dependent on what she did for others:
That by doing everything for her kids she was disempowering them, and by letting them fix their own lives while she remained a loving force beside them, she was empowering them.
This applied to her siblings who needed to learn how to share the care of their parents.
That she could be a kind and loving person AND have clear boundaries.
That she could be a wife, mother and daughter AND invest in her own needs.
The counter of those endless ands I mentioned above that women think they have to be, is the creativity in the ANDS that can release them from being responsible for everyone’s happiness.
I can be a loving, generous, inspiring woman AND not be responsible for your happiness.
I had to really learn not to be knocked off kilter by one of my daughter’s bad moods. It wasn’t my fault or responsibility. It was my job to simply let her experience life and be there to offer tea, chocolate and a hug if required. Or leave her alone and not take it personally. That they will survive if I don’t say yes to every lift that is asked of me. That our relationship won’t rupture if I choose the movie occasionally and they don’t like it.
This is one that shows up the most. Because we love our kids, we think everything is our job… including their good moods, their appreciation of everything, their friendships, their love of your food, and did I mention moods? But our job is to support and guide them through a wide range of experiences and emotions, including the hard and ugly ones. Our job is to gradually stop taking emotional responsibility for them.
Yep. Raising children is only one aspect of parenting… making adults is the other.
We often never stop to check in how the sands of time have shifted and where we once helped, now we disable. Where we once supported, now we disempower.
The most obvious place this happens is within families. I see so many women worry themselves into a crumpled mess, running around doing everything for everyone, especially holidays, and there is no joy. NO JOY! I have to help them see they can be practical AND playful. That they can shift the responsibility to others and guess what? The world doesn’t implode.
Now sometimes in my coaching kindness, I have to point out they have built this straw that now breaks their back. They have to dismantle it.
How?
By parenting yourself the way you need to be parented…. with gifts and filling in the gaps.
We were socially trained to only love externally. Let’s close the gaps and show the next generations that loving and mothering ourselves is the greatest gift of all.
I just loved running my online The Overwhelm Breakthrough Session last night - and I’m so grateful for all the lovely comments and emails this morning. There is still time to register for the in-person version this Friday, 28th in Dublin 6. All the details are below and as always, my paid subscribers get a 10% discount. Just email me at alana@alanakirk.com for the code. I’d love to see you there!
The Overwhelm Breakthrough Session
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