Healing Your Mother Wound

What was my Mother Wound and how did I heal it? It wasn’t until 2020 at the age of 41 that I had even heard the term mother wound. 

My mother wound was I thought my mother felt alone, abandoned, and possibly unloved by my father, and in turn, I felt abandoned. While my parents will be married 50 years next year, there was a time growing up when my dad thought it was ok for him to leave my mom on the weekends to go hunting, fishing, and camping. His logic was that he worked hard during the week going to a job to provide for the family and my mom’s role was to stay home to take care of the kids. He deserved this time for himself.

As the empath that I am, I realized that I was holding onto this feeling of loneliness for my mom. How did I find out that I have been holding onto this so deeply for so long? It was when I was having difficult conversations with my parents last year about politics, racism, and our own white privilege. It was in one of these weekly conversations that I had a breakdown that led to my breakthrough with my mother wound. I could finally let go of something I didn’t even know I was carrying, and wow did it feel so good to get it out and truly let it go. 

It was during one of the weekly family video sessions that my family agreed to have in an effort to heal the divide between my “radical” left notions - BLM, Climate Change, Covid is real, etc. and my Fox News-watching parents - that opened a door to communication. 

To find what my mother wound was, I really needed to have difficult conversations with my parents to get down to the root of what had been deep inside me. It was in these open conversations that we tried to listen to each other. At one point, I just started talking and the more my family listened, the more I felt heard and the truth just came out. 

I started to speak about how I felt the family never communicated and continued down different spirals until I finally told my dad how I really felt about him abandoning us as a family and how selfish I felt he was. I told him my entire life he told me I was selfish for wanting to do things for myself but I didn’t have a responsibility to a wife and a family. He was the selfish one for abandoning his responsibilities.

And all while I was saying this, I later realized, it was largely how I felt based on growing up watching my mother be unhappy. I remember times she’d be talking to her girlfriends on the phone saying how my dad didn’t love her anymore. One specific conversation is as clear as day in my mind, but I never knew how much I was holding onto this for my mother, how this feeling of abandonment was passed along to me, and how much this was impacting my life from moving forward. 

After my clear breakdown in front of my family and husband, my mom made it clear to me that this was her choice. She was happy with her choice and loved my father. Even though I know that she didn’t have many choices nearly 50 years ago, I had to let go of any resentment I had toward my parents. My dad worked hard and she had a nice house with nice things - we were standard white middle America, white middle class. At some point in her life, she felt this was enough for her. If she was happy in that world and in her life choices, there’s no reason for me, as her daughter to hold onto something that’s not serving me and ultimately was only weighing me down. 

My mother wound wasn’t something I ever knew or thought about, but once I acknowledged it, put it out there on the table, and became vulnerable with my family with what I had been carrying, it was clear we all needed to take some time and reflect back on what was the past, so we could all move forward. My father admitted there are many things he wishes he could change, but he can’t. At the time he made his decisions, he thought he was doing the right thing. He apologized and said that what I said to him were things he’s already heard from my mother. In this deeply painful moment, we all saw what the family had been carrying and it no longer served us as a family to carry it. 

None of us can change the way our parent’s raised us, and in some cases might not have been there to raise us, but when we all have the courage to dig deep inside ourselves to find out what our mother wound is, acknowledge it, and let it go, we’re letting go of so much darkness that the only thing that this can be replenished with is light.

I don’t know how long I have in this world or how long my mother does, but I do know that everything she did for me and my sister was from a place of love. So I’m here to show up today and the rest of my life with love in our relationship. I’m lucky our relationship was able to heal as I know that’s not true for all. This mother’s day, I’m thankful for all the LOVE my mother has given me as it’s her love that allows me to show up in this world with so much love to give back. 

Happy Mother’s Day.

Love, 

Your Daughter Amy

I LOVE YOU MOM

Arting with my mom!