Mother(less) Day
A Motherless Daughter’s Attempt to Edit the Context of the Holiday
Happy Mother(less) Day
It’s that time of year again. It seems that around every corner is another advertisement to remember your mother and thank her for all she’s done for you. And yes, I am grateful for many things my mom did for me.
We also haven’t spoken in 6 months.
She cut off contact with me after I told her I’d be writing about my experiences growing up in the cult in which she and my father raised me. Naturally, Mother’s Day brings with it a lot of emotions this year, as every holiday has in the last several months.
When I originally sat down to write this, my intention was to provide a semi-instructional post on navigating this day as a motherless daughter. I quickly realized that to do so would be disingenuous. I am still learning how to navigate the grief that comes from having a mother with whom I can’t have a healthy relationship.
“Are you my Mother?”
As I’ve expressed in my last post, my mom and I didn’t have a particularly effortless relationship. The cultic system is designed to erode connection removing the protection, nurturing, and trust that are part of a healthy parent-child bond.
For the uninitiated, “Are you my Mother?” is a children’s book written by P.D. Eastman. In it, a baby bird hatches from an egg with no mother bird in sight. Baby Bird then hops around to all manner of creatures asking, you guessed it, “Are you my mother?” Mother Bird eventually returns and the two are reunited.
For much of my life, I felt very much like Baby Bird; searching for a mom and applying the label of “mother,” to anyone who crossed paths with me. I wanted a close relationship with a mother-figure who was nurturing, warm, and understanding. A mom in whom I could confide in without fear of that trust being betrayed or being on the receiving end of a flash of heated anger.
An incomplete list of “mothers” I’ve had includes my Grandma, the cult leader, several cult members (some of which, such as Tori & Carmon I’ve discussed previously), a lady at the grocery store who was nice to me, a friend, a coworker, a man with long hair, my horseback riding instructor, a boss I worked for once, my therapist, and basically any other woman older than myself who took an interest in me. Not all of these maternal-figures were healthy and because of my desperation for their approval I sometimes found that I abandoned myself in the process.
Mother Hunger
For the first time ever, I’m not rushing to fill the maternal hole in my life. I’m not seeking to soothe the ache (as I used to) through dissociation, food, alcohol, or attaching myself to the nearest person to whom I could fit into the maternal archetype. The emptiness there feels strange and raw at times.
I recently learned there is a name for the feeling I’ve had since early childhood: Mother Hunger.
Kelly McDaniel explains the term she coined as follows:
“Mother Hunger is a term I created to describe what it feels like to grow up without a quality of mothering that imprints emotional worth and relational security.”1
McDaniel’s book, Mother Hunger, was helpful in showing me that there are many of us out there, particularly women, who find ourselves with these mom-shaped holes in our lives. McDaniel posits that we often try to fill that void through any variety of coping mechanisms, but ultimately, the only way out is through the pain itself. Feeling the “disenfranchised grief” that comes with being estranged or disowned is vital to healing.2
So instead of leaning into habitual coping mechanisms, I’m trying to allow this grief to take its natural process.
At this point in the post, I could tell you about how the sacred process of grieving has healed the wounds I’ve carried all my life…While that may be a pretty lie, what I will tell you is the messy truth: grieving sucks. Allowing yourself to actually feel the pain you’ve spent a lifetime trying to numb is not a fun process. It’s not a one and done cry session (possibly while listening to Noah Kahan on repeat.) It sometimes sneaks up at inconvenient or embarrassing times. It hurts. It’s uncomfortable. It sometimes comes out as anger or disguises itself behind denial. Grieving isn’t fun, but it is necessary.
Editing the Context
One thing I have decided to do is to start reframing special days around new memories and traditions despite the grief. So while I am feeling the emptiness around that motherly archetype very acutely during this holiday, I’m also taking this day to spend time on one of my most treasured hiking trails and letting Mother Earth be my guiding maternal figure for the day.
If you are also a daughter surviving Mother(less) Day, I hope you find ways to honor your grief and experience joy on this day and throughout your healing journey.
One of my favorite things is reading your thoughts and perspectives. I always welcome polite and lively discussion
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Sources:
Why Share My Story of Being Raised by a Cult?
If you are just reading my blog for the first time:
My name is Megan and I was born and raised in a cult called The Family of Light. I was brought up to believe that the cult’s leader, Sri, was the vessel for God Himself. Sri claimed to channel the entity we referred to as Master and He directed us to prepare for a great devastation to mankind. We were His chosen Children of Light and were tasked with using our prayer and meditation to hold the Darkness at bay and help usher in a golden age after the foretold destruction.
For much of my life, I was a model member. I prayed to and worshiped the voice that spoke through Sri. I sat at her feet, taking in her teachings to the best of my ability. As I got older, I began to notice incredible discrepancies, hypocrisy, and harmful practices. After years of being subjected to and witnessing extreme abuse caused a crisis of faith, I began to see things clearly for the first time.
When you join a cult as an adult, you have a pre-cult identity to return to. When you’re born and raised in one, you are left with the duty and honor of completely rebuilding yourself. This blog is a series of personal essays, a peek into my memoir, an examination of how my experience shaped me, and how I built myself into the woman I am today. While this blog does not follow a linear timeline of events, it may be helpful for some readers to start at the beginning.
Note: names and locations have been changed to protect identity and privacy.
(McDaniel, Kelly. Mother Hunger: How Adult Daughters Can Understand and Heal from Lost Nurturance, Protection, and Guidance (p. 5). (Function). Kindle Edition.)
(McDaniel, Kelly. Mother Hunger: How Adult Daughters Can Understand and Heal from Lost Nurturance, Protection, and Guidance (p. 180). (Function). Kindle Edition.