What is the Mother Wound and How Can We Heal It?
After growing up with a mother who wasn’t capable of providing you the love & support you needed, whether she had mental illness, addiction or a deep mother wound herself, you may find that you feel stunted later in life.
The mark this kind of mother-child relationship leaves on you is generally known as the mother wound.
While it can have severe negative impacts, rest assured it’s something you can heal from to create great change in your life.
Not too far down this post, I’ll show you some of the ways you can facilitate healing.
For now, let’s look take a closer look at the mother wound and give you a better understanding so you can recognize if this is something you might need help with.
Causes and Signs of the Mother Wound
CAUSES
The mother wound is often passed down over generations, meaning your mother — and maybe hers — might have had it too.
It takes hold in your own life because of the way your mother may have treated you while you were younger. She may have been:
● Self-centered and unavailable to respond to your needs
● Focused on external factors like looks or achievements
● Well-meaning, but unable to show love outside of helping you with practical issues — neglecting your emotional needs
● Entirely unable to provide because of substance abuse or mental illness
● Provided conditional love depending on certain behaviours or ‘impressing’ her
● Couldn’t love you because she didn’t love herself
● Or a mixture of all of the above
As you were growing up, it’s possible you never quite felt you had your mother’s protection, approval or unconditional love. You may have also developed perfectionist, self-critical or inappropriately supportive tendencies to try and win a more apparent sense of her love.
Many times, children with mother wounds also became co-dependant towards their mothers, meaning they based their own emotions around how their mothers felt. Never really creating a good sense of self and easily becoming lost in who their mother was.
Overall, the starkest sign of the mother wound is feeling a lack of emotional connection with your mother.
Signs
If you’re suffering the effects of the mother wound, these are some of the things you may find yourself struggling with:
● Anxiety
● Depression
● Falling into toxic relationships
● Struggling with co-dependency
● Addiction
● Eating Disorders
● Reduced self-esteem and self-worth
● A constant sense of loneliness
● Hyper-Vigilance
● Self-loathing
● An inability to connect to other women
These are definitely things I went through for the first 30 years of my life. My mother struggled deeply with alcoholism and drug use, and that led to me feeling very unsafe in the world and being very co-dependent, trying desperately to help her and protect myself in the way a mother should. I found myself an adult that felt completely intertwined with her patterns and if you know my story you know it took me down a dark road.
Thankfully, I have worked hard to reparent myself and find a path to mending the mother wound.
And that brings us to...
Healing from the Mother Wound
Many of the things you need to do to heal from the mother wound begin with establishing a healthier sense of self.
That usually involves working towards healthier boundaries within the relationship to your mother.
For starters, some distance between yourself and her can be helpful. It can allow you to realize that while your mother may have given birth to you, she is not you and you are not her.
This is the start to building an authentic sense of self.
Still on that, your earlier years were likely deprived of a chance to individuate and develop a genuine identity. As you heal, keep in mind that those feelings that weren’t acknowledged are valid, and it’s important to caringly respond to your emotional needs with the compassion of a loving mother. This is something called Reparenting and it’s a huge part of my work with clients because it is a life changing tool for thriving as an independent adult.
Also, accepting that your mother won’t be able to address those needs. While learning about yourself and getting in touch with your inner child, recognize that it’s up to you to see and nurture your own emotional well-being — and that you’re capable to do so!
A huge step is seeing your mother simply as she is, not as who you’d have wanted her to be.
As you go about these methods for healing, you can expect to find significant emotional obstacles in your way. This is a huge healing process with a lot that usually comes to the surface - which is why you’ll also have to focus on...
Your Energetic Wellbeing
Changing your energy is the surest way to make lasting progress on your healing journey. It helps you release the stuck emotions that your mother wound is holding in place. And it’s an effective means of creating more space for healing within yourself.
The methods you can use for this include breathwork, cord-cutting, and reiki, as well as rewriting your nervous system, NLP, and affirmations.
In my first breathwork session with Gwen Dittmar three years ago, I surrendered a lifetime of trauma in that single session, making significant strides in achieving emotional freedom.
These processes allow the body’s innate wisdom to take charge and start resolving the pain we’ve been carrying for years.
And it especially works well when, after the breathing work, you integrate all that came up. This helps you consolidate the progress you make as you allow your energy system to correct itself.
Focusing on your energetic well-being addresses the anxiety, depression, and hyper-vigilance traditional therapy often has trouble with. You’ll be able to take greater steps in dealing with your childhood trauma. And you’ll face fewer drawbacks in your journey.
The mother wound can have far-reaching effects on your life, sometimes in ways that may be difficult to see. But if you start the path to healing, especially focusing on your energy system, you can free yourself from its effects. Rebuilding a new future for yourself and future generations of women in your ancestry.
To work with me in regards to the mother wound or shifting ancestral patterns you can head here.