The feelings I have inside, and how I feel about myself, and how much I know myself, and where I come from, are huge factors in how I mother.
When I had no connection to myself and the truth of my history, I mothered by controlling the child. When I knew who I was and where I had come from, I mothered by controlling me.
The difference is in knowing where I can affect change and where I cannot. What is my business and what is not. What I am allowed to control and what I have to surrender to. The difference is knowing where to put my attention and focus.
My life didn't change, but what I concentrated on did. In the past I used to focus intently on what they were doing, and now I had to keep looking at me.
For the past 4 years I have had an adult daughter, or two or three, all come home to live, while they completed their schooling or become financially able to make it on their own. But, regardless, they were back home living with me.
The first year there were 4 adult women in my home, and I panicked. For, I instinctively felt the control of the home slipping out of my grasp. Yet, it had nothing to do with the home or them,and had everything to do with me. I felt that I would have to have iron control of myself...or be out of control.
It was like I was being thrown into a Mothering Test.
One that would require my utmost skills to make it through with healthy relationships with my daughters in tact.
When I didn't know my self or the path I had grew up on, I mothered by needing to control... severely control. I expected the outside to bend and sway in a way that made me comfortable. And when the outside was a mess or confusing, I would go out of control.
I didn't know that I could instead make me comfortable no matter the situation. So, I would fly off the handle at the barest of excuses. I wasn't in control of my life.
It seems impossible, but the more I knew of where I came from, the more in control I became. It didn't matter if my childhood was out of control...or my feelings inside about it were confusing and emotionally out of control...the more I discovered about me, the more I could control me.
When I was mothering in the dark, if you will, I was way out of control.
But, once I knew the mess I came from, I began gaining control over my self.
It was a long process and still a work in progress, but what I know, is that the outside isn't what we learn to control, but rather how we will respond, that grants us the freedom from being out of control.
What I find so amazing is that there is no control being out of control, and yet we feel we are in control...and we feel powerful, while being powerless.
The oxymoron of this all, is what is so hard to escape from...for real power comes when you stop controlling or wanting to control of the outside...meaning the people you live with.
I had to learn this while living in real time with my adult children...and they gave me great lessons in giving up control...and some were harder won than others.
This power struggle eclipses love and nurturing or even caring. For the biggest pull is to be in control.
In my experience, love and control are the opposites.
Suffocating the life out of your child is not love, it is control.
To relax in my home and give up power or control over even the little details was not an easy thing to do for me. Mostly to surrender or open the space for everyone to move a bit more freer...to breathe.
Details of the house relaxed. Rules were adjusted. Ideals were released. It became a much freer space for all.
I believe to the depth of my being, that my kids had to move back home, so I could do the Mothering Test and learn to set them free.
My last daughter moved out this weekend. And I believe, we neutralized the negative feelings each of us had of the other...over the past 4 years. For she was my greatest teacher.
She didn't fear standing up for her rights...her needs or what she wanted. She would answer back and argue her point...making me work harder to keep my inner peace.
It is easy to mother (okay control) a child who wants to please you...much harder when it is one who wants to please herself. She was doing what I wanted and needed to do...she was my example of being your own self.
My other daughters do that too, but just not so loudly...
All my daughters are in control of themselves and are now free to do what they please and not what pleases me. That is a success as a mother. How awful it would have been to have children live to please me. To do what I wanted, needed in order for me to be comfortable in MY life.
A controlling mother sees her children as what it means to Her, not what it means in Their lives. She fails to see her child, but what Her child can do for her.
The difference is so wide...and the gap between is where love gets lost...where respect disappears, and a child's life swings in the balance.
I am so grateful to have had the chance to re-mother. It wasn't perfect or pretty, but it was much closer to being loving and free.
The parting was without drama.
She didn't leave angry. I didn't feel desperate to have her gone.
But, it was time...for both of us. She needs to make her own home...and I completed my test.
The combination of what I had to do within this Mothering Test boggles my mind.
I was undoing the damage I had done to my children.
I was re-learning how to mother.
And I was healing the child within me.
Mothering my children and me, while being the mother and the wounded child.
My children's lives will tell me...if I succeeded at mothering.
If they have a voice and a choice...and they are free to use both, they will live free.
If they feel worthy and empowered, I did my job well.
I am hoping I planted the right seeds.
