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Mark* was a pretty good student growing up. He worked hard in school but wasn’t exactly striving to be valedictorian. He wanted to be a normal teen, not someone who constantly bent over backward for schoolwork.
This didn’t exactly sit well with his mother. When Mark didn’t complete his homework or came home with average test scores, his mom grounded him or took away TV privileges. And there was always a threat of being sent to military school. As a result, he felt like he was never good enough—an emotion that’s lingered to this day. “I still feel a sense of never doing quite enough now and then, which was for sure ingrained in me,” he tells SELF.
If you instantly clicked on this article, you can probably relate to Mark—as can a lot of people. Many moms hound their kids to go to top-tier schools, eat “healthy,” make friends with the “right” kind of people, get a high-paying job, and find a successful spouse.
Why the hell do they do this? The truth: It probably has very little to do with their children (i.e., you). Some parents project their own fears onto their kids, and even though they think they’re setting them up for a life of success, they wind up being overbearing and even cruel. “It’s kind of bullshit that they’re doing it because they ‘want what’s best for their children,’” Star Rose Bond, LCSW, a therapist based in Asheville, North Carolina, tells SELF. “They’re really trying to ease their own anxieties.”
According to Bond and the other expert we consulted, here’s why your mom was extra hard on you only so you could “have a good life”—an approach that tends to backfire and, well, drives you to read stories like this one.
Why are some moms so damn tough on their kids?
Again, if your mom was particularly harsh, she, most likely, was projecting her own desires, beliefs, fears, and anxieties onto you, Bond says—and discounting the fact that you’re a different person with a unique upbringing. If, for example, your mom didn’t get the chance to go to college because she grew up financially strapped, she might badger you to be at the top of your class so you can get a college scholarship and have the opportunities she never did.
Another projection scenario: Maybe your mother always got on you about what you should eat and how much you should exercise because she was bullied or hated her own body when she was your age. Sarah* recalls her mom teaching her how to “portion control” when she was in middle school and praising her for calorie counting. When Sarah entered high school, her mom constantly made comments about how her clothes fit her body—and even signed Sarah up for Jenny Craig after she gained some weight. “This kind of behavior is based on this idea of ‘I don’t want my kid to feel how I felt,’” Bond says.
Some moms nag their kids because their parents did the same to them, so they think it’s normal to, say, push a child into finance or encourage them to break up with their partner and marry for money instead, Minaa B., LMSW, a New York City-based therapist and author of Owning our Struggles, tells SELF. This behavior can also come down to your family’s culture—it’s common, for example, for people from certain immigrant communities to pressure their kids to get prestigious degrees and succeed professionally. Minaa, who works with a lot of BIPOC clients, says such parents often say things like, “I came to America so you could have a good life, so I expect you to become a lawyer or doctor.”
Yep, a controlling mom can turn you into a stress ball.
Needless to say, it’s incredibly stressful to constantly try to live up to someone else's (potentially sky-high) expectations of you, especially if they don’t align with what you want. Take Mark’s experience—the relentless pressure to excel academically made him feel like he was always falling short. Research suggests that when a parent pesters their kid to succeed, it often backfires; it makes them feel inadequate or leads them to lash out.
Similarly, Sarah has struggled to develop a healthy relationship with food because of the negative messages she received from her mom in her teens and 20s. She restricted calories, felt guilty when she ate, and tried every diet out there. “There’s still a voice in the back of my mind telling me what’s ‘good’ and ‘bad,’ and I have lots of subconscious food rules,” she tells SELF.
Not only can this pressure, whether it be about being a straight-A student like Mark or watching what you eat like Sarah, hurt your self-esteem, but it sends a message that you’re not capable of knowing what’s best for yourself or growing from mistakes, Bond explains. If you had an overbearing mom who laid out a life plan for you, you may not feel confident in your choices. “You might expect other people to make decisions for you because you didn’t learn how to trust yourself,” Minaa adds.
You may then struggle to pursue what you, deep down, want to. Minaa says, for example, that it’s normal to feel like your mom wouldn’t love or respect you as much if you pursued a riskier job (like a fashion designer) instead of the more stable one she envisioned for you (say, a business executive). Mark can relate: He wanted to give comedy a shot, but working in the creative arts felt too risky. He pivoted toward a career in advertising instead because it was stable and offered a good salary.
If you feel like your mom loves you but with conditions, then of course you’ll be more inclined to follow a path you think she’ll approve of. And, understandably, chasing your mother’s dreams instead of your own can make you pretty anxious, resentful, and unfulfilled. Not to mention, as Mark knows all too well, there can be an underlying sense of “no matter what you do, it’s not enough,” Bond adds.
How to cope with an overbearing mom.
Figuring out how to deal with your mom’s demands in a healthy way can be a challenging, emotionally taxing journey. She might lash out at you for setting boundaries or guilt trip you for making decisions that don’t align with what she wants for you. Because this is tricky territory, both experts say you might want to consider teaming up with a therapist so you can learn how to understand (and maybe even forgive) your mom and regain autonomy.
Whether you work with a pro or not, though, it’s important to reflect on how your mom has influenced your decisions throughout your life. Minaa says one solid way to do this is through audio journaling. Talking openly about your relationship with your mom and how her expectations have affected you can help you better understand, for example, if you went into engineering because you love math and science or because your mom pushed you in that direction. Record yourself for a few minutes—try to do it every day if you feel up to it or, ideally, at least a few times a week. Then play the recordings back and pay attention to what you’re saying, Minaa advises. Do your thoughts make sense? Have you made the best decisions for yourself? How has your mom influenced your behavior over the years?
Another helpful tool is a life map—or a diagram that lists out your past accomplishments and future goals, along with the steps you need to take to achieve them. You can create one in a notebook, the Notes app on your phone, or a Google doc. “As you write this out, ask yourself: Is this my goal or my mother’s goal?” Minaa says. Ideally, you want it to reflect your wants and needs—not your mom’s.
After that, it’s boundary-setting time. You can’t control your mother, but you do have power over what you share with her and how you react to her criticisms. So if your mom nags you about marrying a doctor when, in truth, you’re more into people with creative jobs, for example, consider remaining tight-lipped about your dating life until you feel confident and secure in your relationship, Minaa suggests. Establishing boundaries can be painful, she adds, especially if you love your mom and want her to be proud of you—but having them in place doesn’t mean you’re a bad kid. It just means “you’re an autonomous adult who has a right to take care of yourself and make whatever decisions you want to make,” Minaa says.
No one is going to read this article and be healed overnight, Bond adds. But if you start with these little steps—and potentially call in a therapist if the process becomes too overwhelming—over time, you might start to see your mom for the imperfect human she is. You may never be able to totally silence her voice in your head (wouldn’t that be nice!), but you can learn to live with it—and regain some much-deserved peace of mind.
*Some names have been changed or abbreviated for privacy reasons.
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