Founder of Shame School and author of You Are Not Your Mother: Releasing Generational Trauma & Shame and Difficult Mothers, Adult Daughters: A Guide for Separation, Liberation & Inspiration
finding a way forward
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I have a purpose in the world and it is to help adult daughters with narcissistic, neglectful, cruel, authoritarian mothers become the emotionally mature parent to themselves they never had. My values of dignity, expression, and audacity (and my Human Design 6th Line) ask me to be a role model for that. So here we go. If you're like me, you may be reckoning with feelings you really, REALLY don't like having right now. If you're like me, you wanted to wake up yesterday and not feel simultaneously full of dread and rage...and grief. You may want a to find a way to observe and express your thoughts and feelings in a way that you like and respect, without shame or judgment, so you can show up the way you want to, and not harm yourself or the people you love. So you can, when you're ready, summon and wield your feelings-into-action intentionally. There's no "love and light" here. No toxic positivity. No platitudes. This isn't about calming down. Or controlling yourself. No bypassing. No gaslighting. Notice it. What do you observe first? Is it a feeling? A sensation? An image? A thought? A movement? Name it. For me it was feelings. I named them this way: Gutted. Resentful. Bitter. Rage. Selfish. Spoiled. Guilty. Out of touch. Naive. Powerless. Loser. Ashamed. (ah...so many of my shame-based identities mixed in there) Neutralize it. Write down or say out loud what it's like to have this experience using as many sensation-words as you can. "Numb. Still. Alert. Buzzy and tense and hot and raw. Heart pounding. Pit in stomach. Droopy and limp and numb again with no life force." (there was also a lot of functional dissociation aka I am here and functioning but also checked out) Normalize (unshame) it. "It makes all the sense in the world that this is my experience right now. I am not wrong for having this experience. I am not flawed or weak or broken because I feel this way. Of COURSE I feel this way. It's not a 'me' problem. How human of me." Need. What do you need? I need to be a hot fucking mess. I need to connect with people I love and who love me. I need to notice when I feel compelled to rush. I need to let some things set a spell. I need to express myself. I need to tend to myself. I need to keep some semblance of routine, which includes coffee and playing Wordle and Connections. I need to show up for my clients. I need to remember who I am when I have access to, and am grounded in, the values, traits, and qualities important to me. I need to cry and growl and curl up in bed. I need NOT consume any "news." Next. What's next for you? For me, it's more of the above. Rinse. Repeat. Over and over and over again. I am gutted. I am also grounded. I am resentful. I am also grateful. I am bitter as all get out. I am also connected. I am full of rage. I am also audacity personified. I am grieving. And grief stands by itself. I am naive. I am also dignity. I am selfish and guilty. I also have so much to offer. I am spoiled. I can also wield my privilege and power. I am an out of touch, naive loser (ashamed). I am also Alpha Mare with HeartWideOpen. Sharing this one from Brittney Cooper again with some parenthetical comments: "Joy is not based on happiness or things going our way or that all is well in the world (oh but I am so freaking angry that things are not going the way I want them to...the bitterness is right there). Joy is rooted in a deep internal sense of purpose (I have this). That we have a reason to show up here and do our work with righteousness and integrity and care (I have this, too). And any time we secure an sustain the conditions to be able to do that, there is a reason for joy (I can do this...I can secure and sustain those conditions but it also feels tenuous right now). Particularly for those who believe, even in the face of deep injustice, that ultimately justice will prevail (I will choose this no matter how naive they tell me I am)." I love you. Karen I can help you do this. The second round of Shame School starts February 2025. Click here to get on the wait list. Want to work with me privately instead?
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Karen C.L. Anderson
Founder of Shame School and author of You Are Not Your Mother: Releasing Generational Trauma & Shame and Difficult Mothers, Adult Daughters: A Guide for Separation, Liberation & Inspiration
“She said, you met a lot of hurt people who wanted you to feel the same/you used to tune them out, but now/in the quiet corners of your day/you regurgitate all of the negative opinions they used to throw your way…” ~ poet Rebecca Dupas What her brilliance here. Much, much love, Karen We slay that dragon in Shame School. Get on the wait list.
I received many responses to "when your mother hates you" and wanted to share this one: "...it goes both ways. It's only human of us to hate them sometimes, too. I actually made an ENORMOUS stride of progress a couple months ago when I admitted to myself I was feeling hatred toward my mother. I was in an awful but all too familiar moment of anger and frustration towards her, and I can't remember if I said it out loud to myself or just in my head, but the words were, "I hate her." Immediately...
She was celebrating a significant career achievement at a large public event where she would be honored and where she was keynote speaker. As she was leaving the hotel suite where colleagues, friends, and family had gathered prior to the event, her mother, who was behind her, yelled out: "You know...you look fat in that dress!" She froze. Then had the wherewithal to turn and say, her voice taut with pain, "MOTHER!" before rushing to a restroom where she cried as a friend consoled her. Later,...