Motherless Mothers |
At the age of 10, talk-show host Rosie O'Donnell lost her mother to cancer. O'Donnell has since described her mother's death at the age of 36 as the single most defining moment of her life. Pop icon Madonna, who was five when her mother died at age 30, has said repeatedly in interviews that the loss of her mother is what shaped her and drove her to be famous. Through their celebrity, these women have helped to bring to the public eye the issues faced by the motherless woman. Now that they have children of their own, they are turning the public's attention to their latest roles: that of the motherless woman as mother.
Motherhood is a happy occasion for most women and an event that usually strengthens the bond between the mother-to-be and her mother. But what about women whose mothers have died? They are motherless mothers, and their experiences throughout motherhood--from childbearing to child rearing--are different.
The motherless woman encounters her first dilemma when deciding whether or not to have a baby. Experts on mother loss say that on one side of the extreme is the woman who desperately wants a child so she can continue the mother-child relationship she is missing. At the other extreme is the woman so afraid she does not know how to be a mother that she avoids having children at all. Irene Rubaum-Keller, a Santa Monica, California, counselor who was seven years old when her mother died at the age of 32, falls somewhere in the middle. She says that growing up without her mother as a role model made her much more hesitant to jump into motherhood. Once she took the leap, she found that she needed her mother even before the baby's arrival.
"It's a time when you really want your mom around, just to ask her stuff," says Rubaum-Keller, who gave birth to her first child, Jack Sterling, just before Mother's Day. "Especially things that are genetic, such as when you deliver--whether you're early, on time, or late relates to your mother, and I couldn't ask her that."
Also missing is the emotional support and nurturing that only a mother can provide. Christina Harris, a tax manager in Boston who is expecting her first child in September, had some problems at the beginning of her pregnancy, and it was at this time that she most felt her mother's absence. "My sister had the same problem with her first pregnancy, but she was able to tell my mother about it," says Harris, 29, whose mother died 2 1/2 years ago at the age of 52. "Together they went to see her doctor, and everything turned out fine. I wish that when it happened to me, my mother were here to talk to and ease my worries."
In the book HOW TO GO ON LIVING WHEN SOMEONE YOU LOVE DIES (Bantam, 1991), Dr. Therese A. Rando says that when we lose a parent, we are losing "a form of documentation of our lives and history." This can be particularly devastating for the new mother, who seeks to find parts of herself in her own child. "One of the things that I really miss is that my mom can't say, 'Oh, that was just like you when you were a baby,' or 'You took your first step when you were this old,' or 'You did that exact same thing at this age,'" Rubaum-Keller says. "That piece is really missing from me, and there's no way to get it back."
Many women who have experienced early mother loss fear they will repeat their mother's legacy by dying young and abandoning their children. "Everywhere I go and everything I do, I'm so afraid I'm going to die there," says Paula Almes, a LAN administrator in Islip, New York, who was 12 when her mother died at the age of 41. To deal with this fear, Almes takes many pictures of her sons, Matthew, four, and Michael, 18 months. She also records their vaccinations, saves everything they make, and keeps a calendar detailing what they do every day. If anything were to happen to her, they would have this documentation of their childhood, she says.
Rubaum-Keller, 39, says she also fears dying young but that in her work as a counselor for Motherless Daughters, an organization that provides support for motherless women, she's seen that the fear of death lessens once the woman passes the age at which her mother died. "Once I turned 33, the fear of dying young lessened by 80 percent," she says. "Somehow it's such a huge milestone. Now, even though I have that fear, it's not as big a fear as it was. I've been afraid to have kids all these years, so I think I'm just dealing with it by going forward and acting as if I'm going to live."
The arrival of a child can also bring to an end the motherless mother's fear of an early death. O'Donnell has said that since adopting son Parker in 1995, her whole viewpoint toward her own mortality has changed. "Before my son arrived, I always thought I'd die young, like my mother," she said in an interview with THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE. "Now, for the first time, I think I have something to live for. The dread, fear, doom and gloom has been replaced by love and sunshine. It's hard to put into words. It's like you grow another heart."
A motherless mother who is preoccupied with premature death can become extremely overprotective of her children, to the point that she won't let them out of her sight, Rubaum-Keller says. The first step to overcoming this fear, she says, is for the woman to recognize it and see what she's doing. She should then try leaving her kids with someone she trusts, a little while at a time. "Take baby steps toward changing that behavior," she says.
With the baby's arrival, the new mother experiences a flood of emotions, among them the desire to be mothered herself. Harris says she has many friends whose mothers stayed with them and helped them out after the birth of their children, and she is saddened that she won't have that. Almes echoes this sentiment. "If my mother had been there, I think she would have helped me," she says. "She would have made sure I rested and took care of myself."
Almes says she feels some resentment toward her friends because they have a relationship with their mothers that she will never know. Sometimes these same feelings are directed toward an existing maternal figure in the motherless mother's life. Harris says she sometimes feels jealous that her mother-in-law is here to enjoy her baby while her own mother is not. The motherless woman should never tell these individuals how she feels because it will only make them uncomfortable, Rubaum-Keller says. Instead, she should talk to other supportive people at whom the emotions are not directed.
"Watching one life end can inspire the powerful urge to nurture another--especially when a birth or adoption can create a bond similar to the one lost," writes Hope Edelman in her best-selling book, MOTHERLESS DAUGHTERS: THE LEGACY OF LOSS (Addison-Wesley, 1994). In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Madonna described how the birth of her daughter, Lourdes, in October 1996 helped to fill the void left by her mother's absence. "When I look into my daughter's eyes right now...I feel that I am being healed," she said. "Because I didn't have a mother that I could grow up looking into the eyes of, I couldn't recognize myself in her...Now I look into my daughter's eyes, and I see that recognition. And it is so extraordinary..."
Mark Marino is a Copy Editor at FamilyFun
Motherhood is a happy occasion for most women and an event that usually strengthens the bond between the mother-to-be and her mother. But what about women whose mothers have died? They are motherless mothers, and their experiences throughout motherhood--from childbearing to child rearing--are different.
The motherless woman encounters her first dilemma when deciding whether or not to have a baby. Experts on mother loss say that on one side of the extreme is the woman who desperately wants a child so she can continue the mother-child relationship she is missing. At the other extreme is the woman so afraid she does not know how to be a mother that she avoids having children at all. Irene Rubaum-Keller, a Santa Monica, California, counselor who was seven years old when her mother died at the age of 32, falls somewhere in the middle. She says that growing up without her mother as a role model made her much more hesitant to jump into motherhood. Once she took the leap, she found that she needed her mother even before the baby's arrival.
"It's a time when you really want your mom around, just to ask her stuff," says Rubaum-Keller, who gave birth to her first child, Jack Sterling, just before Mother's Day. "Especially things that are genetic, such as when you deliver--whether you're early, on time, or late relates to your mother, and I couldn't ask her that."
Also missing is the emotional support and nurturing that only a mother can provide. Christina Harris, a tax manager in Boston who is expecting her first child in September, had some problems at the beginning of her pregnancy, and it was at this time that she most felt her mother's absence. "My sister had the same problem with her first pregnancy, but she was able to tell my mother about it," says Harris, 29, whose mother died 2 1/2 years ago at the age of 52. "Together they went to see her doctor, and everything turned out fine. I wish that when it happened to me, my mother were here to talk to and ease my worries."
In the book HOW TO GO ON LIVING WHEN SOMEONE YOU LOVE DIES (Bantam, 1991), Dr. Therese A. Rando says that when we lose a parent, we are losing "a form of documentation of our lives and history." This can be particularly devastating for the new mother, who seeks to find parts of herself in her own child. "One of the things that I really miss is that my mom can't say, 'Oh, that was just like you when you were a baby,' or 'You took your first step when you were this old,' or 'You did that exact same thing at this age,'" Rubaum-Keller says. "That piece is really missing from me, and there's no way to get it back."
Many women who have experienced early mother loss fear they will repeat their mother's legacy by dying young and abandoning their children. "Everywhere I go and everything I do, I'm so afraid I'm going to die there," says Paula Almes, a LAN administrator in Islip, New York, who was 12 when her mother died at the age of 41. To deal with this fear, Almes takes many pictures of her sons, Matthew, four, and Michael, 18 months. She also records their vaccinations, saves everything they make, and keeps a calendar detailing what they do every day. If anything were to happen to her, they would have this documentation of their childhood, she says.
Rubaum-Keller, 39, says she also fears dying young but that in her work as a counselor for Motherless Daughters, an organization that provides support for motherless women, she's seen that the fear of death lessens once the woman passes the age at which her mother died. "Once I turned 33, the fear of dying young lessened by 80 percent," she says. "Somehow it's such a huge milestone. Now, even though I have that fear, it's not as big a fear as it was. I've been afraid to have kids all these years, so I think I'm just dealing with it by going forward and acting as if I'm going to live."
The arrival of a child can also bring to an end the motherless mother's fear of an early death. O'Donnell has said that since adopting son Parker in 1995, her whole viewpoint toward her own mortality has changed. "Before my son arrived, I always thought I'd die young, like my mother," she said in an interview with THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE. "Now, for the first time, I think I have something to live for. The dread, fear, doom and gloom has been replaced by love and sunshine. It's hard to put into words. It's like you grow another heart."
A motherless mother who is preoccupied with premature death can become extremely overprotective of her children, to the point that she won't let them out of her sight, Rubaum-Keller says. The first step to overcoming this fear, she says, is for the woman to recognize it and see what she's doing. She should then try leaving her kids with someone she trusts, a little while at a time. "Take baby steps toward changing that behavior," she says.
With the baby's arrival, the new mother experiences a flood of emotions, among them the desire to be mothered herself. Harris says she has many friends whose mothers stayed with them and helped them out after the birth of their children, and she is saddened that she won't have that. Almes echoes this sentiment. "If my mother had been there, I think she would have helped me," she says. "She would have made sure I rested and took care of myself."
Almes says she feels some resentment toward her friends because they have a relationship with their mothers that she will never know. Sometimes these same feelings are directed toward an existing maternal figure in the motherless mother's life. Harris says she sometimes feels jealous that her mother-in-law is here to enjoy her baby while her own mother is not. The motherless woman should never tell these individuals how she feels because it will only make them uncomfortable, Rubaum-Keller says. Instead, she should talk to other supportive people at whom the emotions are not directed.
"Watching one life end can inspire the powerful urge to nurture another--especially when a birth or adoption can create a bond similar to the one lost," writes Hope Edelman in her best-selling book, MOTHERLESS DAUGHTERS: THE LEGACY OF LOSS (Addison-Wesley, 1994). In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Madonna described how the birth of her daughter, Lourdes, in October 1996 helped to fill the void left by her mother's absence. "When I look into my daughter's eyes right now...I feel that I am being healed," she said. "Because I didn't have a mother that I could grow up looking into the eyes of, I couldn't recognize myself in her...Now I look into my daughter's eyes, and I see that recognition. And it is so extraordinary..."
Mark Marino is a Copy Editor at FamilyFun
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