My own mother parented me from guilt. When she looked at me, she didn’t see me, she saw herself, and primarily, her faults — everything she wasn’t, everything she did wrong.

She struggled with her relationship with food and was so nervous that I would too. Hence my food confusion.

She thought she wasn’t smart enough, so by default, how could I be? Was I? I certainly thought I wasn’t until I started raising my own children. I was a link in the chain leading back to my grandmothers before me. All products of their mother’s erroneous beliefs.

I remember the first time I noticed that my daughter had a healthy appetite. In my mind, alarm bells started tolling. Yup, there she goes. We’re even the same age…. blared a loud voice in my head.

Then I got a grip on myself. Whoa. There goes what? She’s healthy and vigorous and is enjoying her dinner. On that day, I started healing. I wasn’t dumb nor was I a glutton. I was simply… alive. And so is my daughter.

I watch my mature friends and marvel at how naturally they relate to their children. They don’t need to think their kids are perfect, nor do they feel devastated when their kids are having a hard time. They aren’t engaged in this constant struggle to separate themselves from their children. They wouldn’t even begin to understand why their kids’ issues would say anything about them.

Son’s having a hard time in school? Daughter’s struggling socially? Yeah, life isn’t always easy, but they’ll be okay in the end.

These friends make full use of contemporary parenting tips. The 80/20 rule is a gem. Unconditional love? Of course! Validation, boundaries, modification for the child pushing limits, time-out, or any of the potpourri of negativity-stoppers they choose.

But for those of us figuring it out along with our children, there’s only one tool that works: believing in ourselves. Accepting that we aren’t perfect, but that that in itself is perfectly human.

Sounds oversimplified? It isn’t. The growth lies in those gentle moments. The equanimity when a child does poorly on an exam. In the comforting hug that follows. The post-dinner sugar craving of my teen, and my offering of a hidden bar of dark chocolate. Oh, the delightful maternal instinct.

Sometimes I wonder if my incredibly bright daughter intuits the ups and downs of my struggle. Will she know the labor pains I cried through so I could look at her and not see my reflection? Will she know that when she went to sleep in a bad mood, I had to stop myself from crawling under the covers with her, reminding myself till sleep overtook me that we’re separate, and that just as I find my way through bad moods, she will find hers?

Will she read this the week it goes to print and think, That is sooo my mother, or will she think, I’m so glad that’s NOT my mother? I crave the reassurance that she’s blissfully unaware, but who’s to say that isn’t just another mirror moment?

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 737)