Me and me mum
I remember the first time I was told I had a “good enough mother” I was in my early 20s in my then therapist’s office going on and on about the ways in which my mother had failed me as a child when my therapist said “It sounds like you had a ‘good enough mother*.'” At the time, not already a clinical psychologist and the more mature person I am today 🙂 I begged to differ! Today I know differently and I will tell you how.
Tomorrow is mother’s day, the day we honor mom, but also the day many of us compare our own moms against OUR perfect image of mom and wind up feeling lacking. I don’t know about you but my mom was not perfect. At times our relationship has been kinda tough but today I am extremely grateful to have the mom that I have. Somewhat like the mother Queen Cythona in my new novel “The Adventures of Isabelle Book I: The Embryo Goddess and the Morpho” my mother could be quite an imperious and demanding figure. Also a brilliant and very practical woman this artistic, very sensitive, artistic Gemini baby gave her a run for her money. Needless to say heads often butted, hard battles fought and resentments accrued. At one point my perception was so bad that I thought I was in fact damaged by this relationship!
Queen Cythona of Xamayca
The turning point in this perception came in the office of a very different therapist. He was a psychiatrist but atypical in that he was very spiritual. When I tried to complain about mom he just told me that on a spiritual level I had wished for and gotten the PERFECT mom for me! By the time I heard him say that I was mature enough to know it was the truth. I stopped complaining about mom and got down to my other spiritual work.
Today I’m so grateful that my mom and I have lived as long as we have to get to know and understand each other better. I’m also grateful I had the mom I had because it’s in large part why I am the woman that I am today (and I really like this woman).
Today I can I can look at all my mother DID for me versus wishing for what she DIDN’T do. I can view her as a necessity on my heroine’s quest, providing me with very important lessons and I can stop wishing for a different childhood.
Maybe Most Important! I have stopped haranguing her about stuff I didn’t appreciate and now take time to tell her thanks for all the things she did i.e. educating me, exposing me to the world. I sat down one day and wrote her a letter with all the things for which I’m grateful (she treasures this letter and probably pulls it out when I get on her nerves).
I know some people may read this and disagree. You may have had a horrible mom or you may have thought your mommy was perfect from the start. This is just my experience and understanding. If you are in the category of those who think you had a pretty bad mom I will suggest something that really helped me gain a new perspective.
Here’s a video of Neale Donald Walsch’s parable “The Little Soul and the Sun”
Click here for Part 2 of Vid
Happy Mother’s Day to All Mother’s out there (yes even the imperfect ones),
Nicole
*Good Enough Mother-a term coined by pediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott meaning a term for the ordinary and devoted mother who provides an adequate and good enough environment for the growth of the infant’s ego to be able to express its true self.
