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“I look at my mother and see a tired, irritated woman who is constantly waiting for an attack and at the same time demanding love,” admits 30-year-old Tatyana. - I'm afraid to be like that. Especially when I notice that I am talking to children in the same displeased tone.

We are like our parents. “Resemblance is inevitable,” says family psychotherapist Elena Ulitova. “It’s partly in the genes, partly comes from upbringing and imitation.” But we treat this similarity differently.

“If we like, for example, our smile, then the fact that she looks like her mother is unlikely to cause rejection,” the psychotherapist continues. “But if we don’t like our tone of conversation with children, we will be even more unhappy when we notice that it is similar to our mother’s tone.”

Let's look at the main reasons for this fear.

"I only want to be myself"

We all have an unconscious need to separate ourselves from our parents in order to assert our own "I". The need for self-affirmation is often realized in the form of a protest. We rebel against the lifestyle of our parents and against themselves.

“If such a confrontation could not take place in adolescence(for example, parents were too vulnerable or, on the contrary, authoritarian), it occurs later, explains psychoanalyst Brigitte Alain-Dupré. “Sometimes it takes the form of open competition with parents (“I’m better than you”) or remains hidden and manifests itself in an unwillingness to be like them.”

Rejection of resemblance to one of the parents is the fear of not becoming oneself. In a woman, this fear is stronger because of the premonition that she is called to repeat her mother's fate.

Rejection of one's resemblance to one of the parents means in this case the fear of not becoming fully oneself. In a woman, this fear is stronger because of the premonition that she is called to repeat her mother's fate - the girl is told very early that she will become a mother in the future. There is a contradiction: the script is known, but we need our own role. And we are trying to become as different as possible from the previous "performer".

"I have no freedom of choice"

“If a mother looks at her daughter as an extension of herself - she expects her to fulfill her dreams, demands that her instructions be followed, then it is difficult for her daughter to treat herself as an independent person,” the psychoanalyst continues. She will feel that she has been deprived of her freedom of choice. When we catch ourselves in a similarity, we feel that something is happening to us that we cannot resist. We are like a computer that performs the given actions in accordance with the program embedded in it. Our passivity can be depressing.”

"I see myself as old"

Common character traits and physical similarities lead to the fact that, looking at her mother, a woman understands: one day I will be as old as she is now. It is difficult to be enthusiastic about age in a society where old age is devalued.

The mother appears to the child as powerful and eternal, it seems to him that she has always been and always will be. But here we see new wrinkles on the mother's face, we see her vulnerability. We understand that we have the same path ahead of us, and we are afraid of our probable future. The questions before us are: will we be better? Worse? How will we experience our own aging?

How to deal with this fear?

1. Accept her as a person

We are disappointed by the imperfection of our parents, which we begin to notice in adolescence. As we grow older, we understand that no one is perfect, and we get the opportunity to see in our parents real people that have both strengths and weaknesses. We can accept a mother not only in her maternal role, but also as another person, in some way different from us. We can also accept ourselves - as we have become, in some ways following her example, and in some ways starting from her. Are we more considerate and generous than she is? If so, you can try to forgive the mother's shortcomings.

2. Take back your freedom of choice We inherited a lot from our parents. Ideas about the world, skills and habits, but also fears, prejudices, and sometimes curses... yes, now it's ours. But we don't have to carry everything on indiscriminately! Take only what suits you. It's not about rejecting everything at once, but about taking responsibility for your choice. And become an adult.

3. Understand the parent story

If you feel like a prisoner of history or personality, reflect and note, for example: "My mother is aggressive." Then find anything that opposes that thought, such as "Her mother was depressed and received little attention." The point is not to justify it, but to move away from the preconceived point of view that causes a painful response in you.

Question to the psychologist:

My parents raised me as a "modest Armenian girl". Most of the time, my mother took care of the upbringing. For the fault of her anger, I was most afraid, apparently because none of the "adults" defended me at such moments. Most of all, my mother beat me for lying (although I couldn’t understand why it’s bad to lie, but all adults do it), because I did something without asking her (this was already at a later age, there was an incident, connected with the fact that I pierced my tongue without permission).

In general, by the age of 23, I have grown up a two-faced person: a smart girl, an excellent student, with a law degree, who, going out into the street, can afford to have sex with the first guy she meets who she likes.

Mom always set a strict time frame: "at 9 pm home." Even when, after the divorce of my parents and the division of the apartment, my mother stayed with my older brother, because he is "an uncontrollable person and a drug addict", and I am with my father, because "I have influence on my father to control the amount of alcohol he consumes", it's all the same my mother's influence was so serious for me that I had to lie a lot and many, so as not to arouse suspicion that I was walking at a late time.

I have been living separately from my mother for 4 years. I have a stable job and am independent of my parents. AT Last year I began to report less and less about every step to my mother, often began to spend the night with friends without telling her about it (in general, I decided that I myself should be responsible for myself and choose my future, even if somewhere it does not correspond to the traditions of the Armenian family ). Scandals began on the phone and I quarreled with both my father and mother.

It always seemed to me that I am the result of my parents' upbringing, and accordingly, they should not blame anyone but themselves for the fact that I stepped over a lot of "empty" "DO NOT". My parents, ignoring my thoughts, considered me a disgrace to the family.

But it seems to me that the whole problem is this: after a quarrel with my mother, there could always be a lull that turned into another storm planned by her, and, without coming home to spend the night, the next night I was sure that my mother was about to burst in and there will be a scandal with beatings and insults. In a couple of hours, anxiety turned into panic, and panic into paranoia, perhaps even with auditory hallucinations. But no one came, and as you know, "the expectation of death is worse than death itself." The question is how can I stop being afraid to make independent decisions and at the same time be ready to take responsibility for my choice?

The psychologist Dvoretskaya Elina Alexandrovna answers the question.

Hello Arpinka!

All that you have described is very typical for dependent relationships.

You write that you are constantly lying. But this is quite natural, given the conditions in which you lived and live now. That is, I mean the excessive severity of the mother in childhood, and, as I understand it, the father's craving for alcohol. All this leads to a violation of the mental state in children, and, accordingly, keeps the child in constant tension, which leads to lies. In addition, you are now being used as a "stabilizer" to curb your father's appetite for alcohol. Don't you feel that way yourself? As a result of such an atmosphere - a decrease in self-esteem, numerous complexes and difficult adaptation in life.

You have not lived with your mother for 4 years, but psychologically you are very dependent on her. It is very good that you have a stable job and you are not financially dependent on your parents. But you still need to learn how to say “no” and not feel guilty about it. It is necessary to increase your comfort zone, relieve anxiety, anxiety, build your boundaries, and not let anyone in. Decide on your priorities, and learn to give up everything superfluous that contradicts them. And all this is quite possible to do.

How to get rid of the fear of mom's reaction? Answer yourself the question: “Does it really matter to you what your parents think of you?”. Fear will go away as you become aware of yourself as a person, and not a victim of your parents. And if you are afraid that your mother can break into you at any moment and make a scandal, you have every right to change your place of residence without informing her about it. This is not at all a rupture of relations with the mother. This is the protection of their borders. And you will carry love and care for your mother with you through your whole life.