Grief and the motherless daughter

Being a motherless daughter is a community, a sisterhood. Often we find each other without even knowing it, only to discover later that we have something so fundamental in common. Here are some lessons that women have shared over the years about being a motherless daughter. There are, of course, many more. What lessons would you share?

You can’t prepare for how you’ll respond to loss

One of the hardest things to learn is that everyone responds to loss differently. For many, women alternate between working almost robotically and depression, anxiety and/or addiction. We work to numb the pain. Then, break down and grieve in private. This pattern can last a long time.

Grief isn’t something you “get through”

Grief is a process, it isn’t a journey with a destination. Many of us find different ways of grieving and grief takes different forms. Loss is something that requires processing and it changes over the course of your life, as we do.

Anxiety is often our body’s way of telling us we’re grieving

Sometimes anxiety is related to unprocessed grief. Often we don’t allow ourselves to feel the sadness and when this happens, it turns into anxiety about something else. This is the body’s way of saying we need to listen to our grief, to really tune in.

You always need your mom

Regardless of age or life experience, we need our moms. It is very typical for women at all stages in our lives to grieve not having our mothers. Whether they were amazing or awful parents, we still miss them. We want them to see us as professionals, as parents, as adults with our own lives. This longing is normal and healthy and can allow a new way of processing our grief as adults if we lost our mothers at a young age.

Our mothers were not saints

Our mothers were not saints but they often become sanctified when they pass away. This is very common and it allows us to process the grief we feel for someone so important in our lives. Our mothers were human, flawed and fallible just like the rest of us. Their mistakes are what make them human.

Healing can take a long time and requires a process

The thing that many of us think about grief that was so unhelpful is that it will just go away on its own. This is the bootstrap theory of healing from grief. Grief is a process and is non-linear. Over time, with functional and healthy coping skills, grief can be transformed and managed. Healing, on the other hand, takes real commitment. Healing, requires commitment. Many of us have found healing through reading books, journaling, listening to free podcasts and therapy.