“Allow yourself to be imperfect”

The main ideas:

Know how to take care of others Many mothers count how much time they spend with their children, while they constantly feel that they are not feeding the child.

Don’t strive to be perfect When fatigue strikes and nerves are tense, mothers have the right to admit that sometimes their own children can annoy them. There is nothing supernatural in this.

Talk about what you feel By creating an illusory world around a child without anxiety, sadness and fatigue, we slow down his development and prevent him from growing up.

Psychologies: Is it more difficult for modern women to cope with their maternal role than for the generation of their mothers and grandmothers?

Natalia Kedrova: In a sense, yes. The idea that raising a child is a separate art that every mother should master to perfection arose relatively recently. In the old days, children of the nobility were raised by nannies and tutors, and in a low-income environment, a child was considered an adult by the age of five or six. In Soviet times, mothers did not have the opportunity to invest in upbringing – for many, it was more important for children to dress, put on shoes, and feed. Today, both the material and social position of a woman has improved significantly – more opportunities and prospects have opened up before her. However, along with the unconditional advantages, new problems arose: society makes higher demands on a woman. Today’s mothers are forced to do everything at once: they cannot afford to sacrifice either a career or a social life, but it is also not easy for them to reconsider their views on motherhood – for example, to admit that their child can be fine with a nanny or grandmother. As a result, women have to be torn apart, they have a feeling of their own imperfection – doing a dozen things at the same time, none of them can achieve the ideal. Complicates the situation and the cult of the child. Concern for the happiness of children today seems necessary and natural. Mothers feel obligated to make the child absolutely happy. To a large extent, this is due to the popularization of the ideas of psychoanalysis, which traces many of the difficulties in the life of an adult to the time of his childhood and, first of all, to problems in relations with his mother. But the task of raising a child to be absolutely happy is unbearable. If a mother constantly tries to protect him from pain, sadness, emotional experiences, she deprives him of the opportunity to grow up, because growing up occurs precisely at those moments when a person overcomes something in himself or in the world.

Interview

Natalia Kedrova – Gestalt therapist, lecturer at the Moscow Gestalt Institute.

Many mothers have a deep-seated fear that they don’t love their children enough. Where does it come from?

N.K .: Its origins are in the guilt that many women feel. Since my child is not completely happy, it means that I am not doing my part well, that is, I do not love him enough. After all, if I truly loved him, I would be able to fulfill my duty properly. If the mother initially doubted whether she should give birth, if she broke up with the father of the child or thinks that motherhood interfered with her career, the feeling of guilt becomes very strong, and with it doubts about her own love arise. In this situation, the slightest manifestations of irritation or fatigue, inevitable during prolonged communication with the child, are perceived by the mother as confirmation of her own inability to give her son or daughter the necessary amount of warmth. However, no matter how great maternal love is, a person has a certain resource of strength and attention that he can share with others. In the event that mother’s strength is running out, irritation inevitably arises, including that directed at children. If a woman manages to realize this in time – herself or with the help of someone close – feelings of guilt will not arise or, in any case, will not be so acute.

Answer is positive

Are there criteria to understand that the upbringing process is going well? “If such a question arises, if parents think about it and try to analyze their behavior, then the relationship with the child is developing correctly,” believes Natalia Kedrova. The feelings that we experience when we communicate with children are also important. If, despite all the difficulties, communication brings us satisfaction and joy, most likely everything is going well. “When children become teenagers, the most important thing at this moment is to maintain a dialogue with a son or daughter,” continues the developmental psychologist. Yuri Frolov. “If a teenager talks to you, even if at the same time he makes his claims, you can be congratulated: you have successfully coped with one of the most difficult moments in education.” Another important indicator is the age at which the child is ready to leave the parental home, to give up custody. If this desire arises too early (before 17–18 years old) or too late (after 25–30 years old), you may still have made certain miscalculations in communicating with him.

Galina Yuzefovich

Perhaps that is why it is so important for a mother to be able to share the care of the baby with someone else?

N.K .: Yes. With a husband or partner, grandmothers, other adults. Do not be afraid to ask for help and temporarily transfer the care of the child to others. This is reasonable, but not as easy as it seems. Motherhood is an area in which it is easiest for a woman to assert herself, to feel significant and irreplaceable. And if for some reason she does not feel that others – her husband, colleagues, society as a whole – recognize her authority, then she will certainly use her position as a mother to make up for this deficiency. Moreover, we live in the conviction that only a mother can have emotional closeness with a child. But this is not so: albeit in a completely different way, but father, grandmother, grandfather and other relatives are capable of important and close relationships with the child. By communicating with them, children get the opportunity to feel how differently you can express your love and reach understanding. Or not achieve, but this is a very important life experience.

What if the mother is raising the child alone?

N.K .: Then the participation of other people becomes even more important. A single mother is forced to rely only on herself. In this situation, it is much more likely to make a mistake – to become too actively involved in the life of your child, or, on the contrary, to move away from him too much. That is why a mother who raises children alone needs the support of loved ones especially. By sharing the care of the child with her, they can give her an invaluable opportunity to see herself from the outside.

Single mothers feel guilty that they could not save the family …

N.K .: Or failed to create it. In both cases, they know that their children are deprived of something very important, and therefore they often try to compensate for this deficit in various ways: someone fills up their son or daughter with expensive gifts, someone tries to protect them from all life’s turmoil. All this does not benefit the child, and the mother’s guilt remains unchanged – at best, it subsides for a while. To stop tormenting herself, a single mother should try to build her life with a child, based on what they have, and not what they lack. Something is always missing: your own castle, a magic wand, a good fairy. But this does not mean at all that we are doomed to eternal deprivation – unable to give the child a father, the mother can give him her love, attention, life experience and support, and this is not at all small.

In relationships with children, it is common for many to strive for some kind of abstract ideal of motherhood. Is this aspiration useful?

N.K .: In no case. Wanting to achieve the ideal, we are forced to give up our true feelings for the sake of popular notions of “how to do it right.” For example, everyone knows that the “ideal mother” is always attentive to her child, that she is ready to take care of his affairs at any moment, and therefore, returning exhausted from work, many women try to show interest in the child’s affairs, to play with him, despite the fact that it is contrary to their desires, and often simply goes beyond their physical capabilities. It seems to them that they need to pull themselves together and do everything for the child, completely forgetting about themselves, their needs and feelings. Of course, the quality of such communication inevitably turns out to be low and does not satisfy one of the main needs of the child – the desire to understand and be understood. Trying to create a world that does not penetrate sadness, irritation, fatigue, we create only an artificial space and do not allow the child to know reality. A child – even the smallest one – is quite capable of understanding a tired mother. If she tries to explain what is happening to her, he will be calmer: he will understand that his mother’s irritation is from fatigue, and not because he is bad. He will feel his value, because his mother shared with him. He learns that mom can be different, which means that he, too, can be different. He will see and feel that negative emotions do not destroy people, that there is nothing to be ashamed of in them. And this understanding will render him invaluable help in the future.