The Mother Wound

Picture Credit: Lakshmi Ambady

I can't see you, mama

But I can hardly wait

Oh, to touch and to feel you, mama

Oh, I just can't keep away

In the heat and the steam of the city

Oh, it's got me running and I just can't brake

So say you'll help me, mama

Cause it's getting so hard,

Now I can't keep you, mama

But I know you're always there

You listen, you teach me, mama

And I know inside you care

So, get down, down here beside me

Oh, you aren’t going nowhere

No, I won't hurt you, mama

But it's getting so hard,

Can't you see me here, mama?

Mama, mama, mama, please?

Can't you feel my heart?

Can't you feel my heart?

Ah, don't stop, don't stop me, mama

Oh, make the pain, make it go away

“Mama”- Song by Genesis released in 1983

The Mother Wound. An emotional, psychological, and somatic imprint left when the mother — or mother energy — is unavailable, rejecting, enmeshed, overly critical, or unable to offer consistent nurturing to her child or children. A dysfunctional pattern of generational trauma passed down from a mother to her children stemming from her own unresolved pain, limitations and social pressures placed upon her. The mother wound relates to safety, nourishment, and belonging because the mother is the primary caregiver and the first model for love and safety and any disruption in this bond can create deep lasting wounds. Being the primordial source of holding, feeding, and life itself, this is why the mother wound has such a profound effect on us in childhood and later in life. It can plant seeds of doubt in our minds about our worth, trust in others, and safety in the world around us.

It is very hard to accept that a mother can wound her child. This reading is an endeavour to delve into a glimpse of this psycho- somatic behaviour of a mother towards her child which is most of the time unconscious, unintentional and transgenerational.

The origins of the mother wound begin with trauma. A felt sense of unmet emotional needs. The mothers’ latent traumatic imprints from her own parents, dictating a certain behaviour towards her child. The wound manifests itself in two primary ways. One is the behaviour of the mother and the second is the internal experience of the child.

The mother, often operating from her own unhealed scar may exhibit emotional unavailability like being cold or distant or the mother is physically absent due to death or illness. Or there can be enmeshment where the mother treats the child as an extension of herself by being emotionally dependent on her child thus blurring boundaries or she is emotionally distant and rejecting. Or she offered love to the child only when the child performed or pleased her. Sometimes the child is also dismissed or criticized for expressing needs. Or the opposite like in a narcissistic family where the child is used as supply for validation.

The mother is the child’s first experience of the world itself. It is only through the mother that a baby experiences safety, nourishment, and attunement. But when this is broken, the psyche develops distortions. The child either feels responsible for the mothers’ moods and does his/ her best not to anger her or grows up believing that I am lovable only if I earn it. These wounds integrate into the psyche of sons and daughters in different ways.

A son with a mother wound may secretly long for a woman’s approval (mostly his love partners). He may exhibit an anxious attachment style like a clingy behaviour or acting needy in his relationships. But the opposite can also occur. Some men develop an avoidant attachment style. Shutting down their feelings, being distant, non- communicative, irritable are all avoidant strategies adopted by such a psyche. Both these are exhibitions of insecure attachment styles but men who struggle with this wound also fight within themselves with feelings of inadequacy, fear of displeasing people, and a sadness which then erupts as anger. This anger reveals itself in random and unconnected scenarios like a traffic jam or at work or in normal conversation where the man feels threatened, simply because as a child he felt unsafe with his mother’s unpredictable behaviour and hence as a child he could not comprehend this, so his body stores this as traumatic memories which then need to find a release to prevent overwhelm of the body system.

For daughters, the mother wound can invoke a very strong sense of shame. That they are not enough and need to remain small for their mother to love them and not hurt the mother’s ego. This can lead to guilt and the continuous feeling that they need to achieve more. And a drive to earn love that was not received. This low self-esteem associated with an unhealed mother wound can also manifest as comparison.  For example, they may compare themselves to other women whom they deem more successful, beautiful, or wealthy–and constantly come up short in their own perceptions. These comparisons then perpetuate the feeling that something is wrong with them.

The Mother Wound is the scar of disrupted maternal love — the fracture of safety, nurture, and belonging. It is not just a personal family issue. It is systemic generational cycle of trauma. Generational because for generations women have been socially devalued and conditioned to derive their worth from their role of being caregivers, wives and mothers. Their own ambitions, feelings, their own anger was suppressed. A mother who was never allowed to be her full authentic self or who was ridiculed may pass on the same control, criticism and limitations that she internalized to her children. She might say to herself- “I turned out fine.” Without realising the pain, she carries inside her. Also, the family pressure to be the perfect mother sets her up for shame which is unleashed on her offspring.

With the help of Family Constellations this saga of trauma can be transformed into an understanding of our mother’s tale with kindness, a sense of worth and the fact that a child receives the gift of life from the mother which encompasses everything including love and pain. As children we can only receive from our parents and give to our next generation. Honouring the mother as she is, is necessary in ones healing journey. Because if I exclude my mother, I exclude myself. Nature seeks equilibrium and we are a part of nature also. Somatic Experiencing® is a tool that potentializes Family Constellations. Together both the modalities can combine the power of body memory and morphic field energy to heal and restore balance to our wounds. You are your mother and your father. You have their DNA. You have their karmic memory weaved in your fascia and mitochondria. And you also have a choice not to repeat your parents’ behaviour in your body. So, your children don’t repeat you. So be you. Just you.