Healing Generational Trauma: Unpacking the Mother Wound, Rewiring Our Brains & Building Supportive Communities

Have you ever wondered how emotional pain can span generations and shape our lives? Join us on this deeply moving episode as we unpack the mother wound, a term that delves into the emotional and psychological scars passed down from mothers to their children. We explore how trauma is embedded in our DNA, impacting not just us, but our entire family lineage. Learn about the societal pressures that magnify feelings of inadequacy and guilt, and discover the transformative potential of healing to break these cycles and create a healthier future for generations to come.

Healing our relationships with our parents can be complex, but it's a journey worth taking. We'll discuss the importance of self-compassion and how it serves as the foundation for emotional healing. By understanding that our parents did their best within their constraints, we can begin to forgive and set healthier boundaries. This episode emphasizes the power of positive self-talk and gives practical advice on how to rewire our brains for better mental health. Discover that you have the freedom to choose which relationships to nurture and which to let go of, fostering a more supportive and balanced emotional environment.

As we close, we celebrate the ripple effect of individual healing on the broader community. Whether or not you have children, your personal journey toward healing can inspire and uplift others. We passionately discuss the rebuilding of supportive, tribal environments and the necessity of compassion and boundaries. With exciting new projects and mentorship opportunities on the horizon, you'll be inspired by stories of community members making a significant impact. Tune in to be part of this movement, spreading love and positivity to a world that desperately needs it.

Chapters

• 0:00 Understanding and Healing the Mother Wound
• 7:45 Healing and Forgiveness in Relationships
• 17:28 Healing Collective and Mother Wounds
• 22:04 Spreading Love Through Connection

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

So today I am doing a live podcast on Instagram. It's my first time doing it, so we're going to see how this works out. But today I really want to talk about the mother wound and I want to talk about, basically, the mother wound, the woman wound, and all about breaking generational trauma. Okay, so when we're talking about this, it's really, really important to understand, like, what the mother wound is. So it's all about the relationship with our mother. It doesn't mean that we've had a bad mother. Doesn't mean that we've had bad relationship with our mother. All it means is that we are having the emotional and psychological pain passed down from mum to us as children. Okay, that's what the mother wound is.

Speaker 1: 0:39

Okay, it's often rooted in unmet needs, emotional neglect, neglect, intergenerational trauma. Okay, because what will happen is that your mum will parent you in the way that she was probably being parented, so like this goes back through generations after generations of how your mum parented you, how she was parented, how her grandmother was parented. This is why the generation generational trauma lives within us. Okay, because when we think about our dna, our dna like I was so naive and used to think that dna used to be like oh, it's just like how you look right but it's actually not. Like 98 is all about your personality traits, your emotions and your behaviors. This all gets passed down through your dna, which is absolutely mad. And when we think about trauma, like, try and stick with me, because this is a really complicated part of the generational stuff and it's hard if I haven't got like a little diagram to to explain.

Speaker 1: 1:36

But when we are thinking about us and our fertility as women, so when we were born, we're born with all the eggs that we'll ever have, okay, so that happens when we're in our mum's womb okay, so we're in our mum's womb. So any trauma that she is experiencing whilst we're in the womb we also have, okay, and that will impact our children, okay. So let's recap on that, because when I first heard it, I was like you, what like you? Actually, what you're saying, girl, because this is mad. Um, so we are going in our mum's womb, okay, so when we're a fetus, we have all the eggs we're ever going to have in our life, and then when we're born, we're going to have all the eggs we ever have in our life. Okay, so that means that when we're in our mother's womb, whatever trauma she's experienced whatever trauma our dad has experienced, because dad's, like dad's sperm literally changes up until the point of conception. Okay, the trauma on our eggs doesn't really change. Um, as you go through life. You may become more, like, destabilized with your hormones and stuff which which will affect egg health, but the trauma actually stops impacting our eggs the minute that we're born. So then, when we have all the eggs, it actually means that when we were in our mother's room, we were, we had all of our eggs, so our daughter and our sons were in our grandmother's room and, like, in our mother's womb with us.

Speaker 1: 3:01

Okay, this is why we have the generational trauma. This is why the things that affected your grandmother are going to still affect your children. Okay, so, like, well, they're gonna affect your mother and then they're gonna affect, so they're gonna affect your mother and then they're also gonna affect your children. Right, you are the person that's in the middle. I'm trying to like, make it make sense. So, yeah, this is how intergenerational trauma works. Okay, it's not a joke, it's not anything.

Speaker 1: 3:26

And if you have a family line where money has always been a problem, or you have things where, um, I don't know, like there was always a thought pattern in your family that has been passed down from time and time again. There's an absolute reason why that is. It's because it's programmed into your dna and you're like, okay, shit, how do I actually change this? This is what you do when you start to heal yourself. When you start to heal yourself, you heal your family line, you heal the whole fucking thing, right? So when we're talking about like the mother wound specifically there are so many examples here, but it does come down to you individually in the context of you and your relationship with your mother.

Speaker 1: 4:04

Okay, I have literally just recorded an episode on the narcissist mother, because I literally do not see any episodes on the podcast, like out there, or like I don't even see, like on social media, many things about the narcissist mother, which is like a really huge thing. So, yeah, when we go into like mother wounds, how it kind of manifests is inadequacy, guilt, shame, emotion, emotional emptiness. You may feel quite numb. You may have a thing where you just don't feel really good about your experience in life. You may wake up in the morning and feel guilt and shame, but you have no idea why. Like you may feel really inadequate, that everything you do is never really good enough. This comes from a highly, highly critical mother and any sort of relationships with our mother. It carries on through all our life.

Speaker 1: 4:50

Okay, and also something that is really important to highlight is that we have this view in life that what a mother should be right, because society tells us they should be these all-knowing beings that are so caring, so deeply, nourishing all of the time, and there's just like this unrealistic expectation put on them as a mother, but then also as a woman. Okay, so now I need you to work full-time but also be a full-time mom. I need you to do xyz. I need you to take the kids to all of the after-school clubs. I need you to be emotionally available to you, to them. I need you to gentle, parent them. I need you to open up and hold safe space for them.

Speaker 1: 5:30

But it's incredibly hard to do that if, like, you're struggling with your own mother wound and then having all of this pressure added, added onto you. Like I really do feel like that is such an unfair deal. Unfair deal, right? I'm only talking about mothers today. I'm not talking about fathers, I'm not talking about that type of stuff. We're talking about mothers today.

Speaker 1: 5:49

So a big thing that you can do is recognizing that there is a mother wound. Okay, that comes from awareness, that comes from self-awareness. Like you know, some of the questions you can be asking yourself is how is my relationship with my mother, how does my mother, my relationship mother with my mother, make me feel? And also like what, what was my life like growing up with my mother? How did that make me feel? And not meeting those feelings with judgment, just meeting them with experiences of okay, it's shit that that happened, but I'm glad that I was able to, I was able to go through that and see the strength in it and pull out the strength the other side, okay, and then now I'm going to heal it and not do those things. Okay, because otherwise the generational pattern continues. I saw this all the time when I worked in, when I worked in prison, like I would often go in sometimes and there would be mothers and their daughters in prison at the same time because they were doing the same thing. So this is how generational patterns can be really, really important to to acknowledge that they do really really exist.

Speaker 1: 6:55

Um, so so yeah, in terms of like, breaking the cycle, it starts with awareness, okay, it starts with being like okay, maybe my relationship with my mother wasn't the best, maybe it wasn't the greatest. Hey, mel, thanks for joining. That was like one of my clients she's like healed all their mother wounds, um, so, yeah, so we are talking about mother wounds today, mel, and just saying like, um, basically it starts with awareness, maybe being more aware of your relationship, and understanding that you know, maybe the relationship they had wasn't normal. And it's so hard because how do you know what normal is if you've never experienced, like, had the experience of anything else. So it's about speaking about your relationship, it's about opening up, about it being like hey, is this okay? Like, is this okay?

Speaker 1: 7:45

Mel is like boo, yeah, yeah, girl, um, you know, it's okay to accept that you feel hurt. It's okay to acknowledge that the relationship they had with mum wasn't the best, like it wasn't there, it just wasn't the best. And even if she tried her hardest okay, she's like a woman with her own trauma, a woman with her own experiences. She did her best but it wasn't enough. Like I remember, when my therapist said that to me and I was like wow, wow, because like it was so validated, I was like what the that's like, what the fuck. Okay, this is validated, I think, and this is somethingating the same thing, and this is something I say to literally all my clients all of the time is okay that your mum did her best and it wasn't good enough to meet your needs. 100% of the time, and when we think about it, okay I'm seeing this narrative a lot in relationships at the moment.

Speaker 1: 8:41

Oh, mel, oh, bless you Mel. I'm seeing a lot of the narrative in relationships at the moment where, um, we're being told, like our romantic partner shouldn't meet all of our needs, but guess what, back in the day, like we would be in communities where, like we would have multiple mother figures in our community, in our tribe, in our whatever, where we would be able to get all of our needs met by multiple people, we wouldn't just sit there and have our mother. But now our mother is sit in isolation and you know you, you sit in isolation, you try and come together as mothers, but you, but it's not there anymore. You're not sat around a circle, like being able to breastfeed well, another's children, like it's not a thing anymore. So even when you weren't emotionally there, you would be able to have another strong mother figure that would meet the needs of your child. But no, now we live in this very individualistic society, which means that it's very, very hard for one person to meet an entire person's needs. Okay, and I just think that's really important to just acknowledge, because it's not all your mom's fault and it's not all your fault. So, when it comes to self-compassion, this is really, really important.

Speaker 1: 9:52

Self-compassion is absolutely critical for the healing process. So you become aware, you realize, okay, this is a problem. My validation, my validation, my emotions are valid and, yeah, I'm taking a first step towards healing, which is the self compassion piece and forgiveness. So, with self compassion, it isn't just doing like the nice little bits and pieces for yourself. It's literally talking to yourself nicely every single fucking day. Until you change your brain, the male will be like, oh, my god, I remember this, um, but it's literally, you know, subconscious reprogramming on a different level, where you can go back in and say how much you love yourself, how it's okay to make mistakes, whatever you need, how it's okay to speak your truth and to set boundaries and to be like, no, I don't want to fucking do the thing, even though I feel like I should. I really don't want to do it. So, yeah, it can be all of this stuff.

Speaker 1: 10:44

Then we move into forgiveness. Okay, yeah, persistence is key. Literally, you're so right now, like I think when I, when Mel started, she was like this isn't doing anything, why am I not healed in a week? Because persistence is absolutely key. You're changing the entire way that your brain is rewired. So literally it's really fucking hard work. It's not hard work and it's not for the, it's not for like the light-hearted either. I find, like my clients who come with me, I've got some massive, massive grit like they. They know like it's not gonna be an easy process, but the process is worth it and the way that I do it and I work with people is to be super effective so that we rip off the band-aid and we get the pain out the way as much and as quickly as possible, so then we can start looking at the wound and healing it right.

Speaker 1: 11:31

So when we are talking about forgiveness as well, like I don't believe forgiveness is one word, I believe it's broken into two parts. It is the acceptance of I don't have a time machine, I can't go back. I can't go back and change anything that was there for me before, but I can change the future. Okay, you have the power to change the future and how you feel about it. And then you have the letting go of the emotion attached to all the stuff that happened before. And that's a really difficult task and it might take multiple attempts in order to let go of those emotions. But literally, it's literally like the buddhist saying when it's like if, when you drink anger and expect the other other person when you drink anger, when you do anger is like drinking poison and then when you drink it, you expect the other person to die, right, it's.

Speaker 1: 12:15

It doesn't make sense because you're only hurting yourself by hanging on to those emotions. And guess what, if you've been through this experience, you've absolutely suffered enough. So then when we go through that forgiveness process, it's, it's really liberating because you're no longer hanging on to all of this shit. You feel so much lighter and then you start to be able to um. Then you start sorry, I have another client messaging me right now, never stops. Um, I have another client messaging me right now, never stops. So yeah, in terms of setting boundaries, they become a lot easier when you've let go of this obligation in order to care with your, not to care, to care about what your parent thinks of you. Okay, because you don't owe them anything. They brought you into this life. But also, relationships are two-way processes. Okay, you have no obligation to maintain any contact with them.

Speaker 1: 13:04

There are so many animals in the wild that just go. Thanks, ma'am, see ya, I'm off. Like there's so many animals that do that. But yeah, not you, not us. We are probably one of the most dependent, the dependent animals on the planet. Like, we can't even like walk when we're born. We have to learn it all, so we're really, really dependent on our parents.

Speaker 1: 13:24

Oh, mel just said you completely changed my view on forgiveness. Learning with, with acceptance really helped you. Yeah, that's great, mel. Like Mel, uh, yeah, like when we first came together, you were like I'm never forgiving, and then then, literally when we broke it down, yeah, the, the amount of things that Mel managed to clear was absolutely incredible. Like she did such an incredible job like so thanks for joining me on this life, mel. I feel like I'm just like talking about your story. I hope that's okay, um, but, yeah, um, so this moves into more of like how you get support right because with your inner child work and where you're working with the mother wound. Specifically, you're managing your conscious and your subconscious mind in a way that is just. Yeah, it's really hard to do in isolation and Mel is happy to share her story because she's the entirely different person now. Oh, I miss our cups of tea now, um.

Speaker 1: 14:25

So, yeah, I highly recommend, like you can get to a certain degree with this work, but it's really hard to be able to do it all yourself, and I've had clients who have come to me for bits and pieces or clients work with me intensely. I've got my six month membership, um mentorship also out at the moment and, yeah, these people are locking in for six months, like six months, and that's beautiful. Like they're going to be an entirely different person in six months. Like you know, I often see clients notice a difference after a week, not a week, a month to six weeks and yeah, it's going to be incredible and apparently I make a lush cup of tea. So, thanks, mel, thanks. So, yeah, you know, if you're lucky enough to have in-person contact with me or, like you know, appointments with me, then you get a lush cup of tea as well and hi Ems, lush to see you, um.

Speaker 1: 15:15

So, yeah, when we are rebuilding and redefining relationships. We are talking about healing our relationships. Sometimes that means like having an open, honest relationship with your mum about your feelings. Come on, in An open, honest relationship with your mum about your feelings. But also, sometimes it's just not. Sometimes that's not fucking okay. Sometimes that's really gonna cause a lot of problems within your relationship with your mum and, yeah, sometimes you just don't need to do that. Good morning, amy, thanks for joining. But yeah, sometimes you don't need to have that conversation with your mother in order to be able to have the closure in the relationship, to release the trauma, because sometimes it's just not, it's not helpful, it's not, it's not contuitive, it's not something that is going to be good for anyone.

Speaker 1: 16:02

Like I did work with a client and her mother. Like that was like a really, really unique and beautiful experience because I was working with the client on her issues and how she perceived her childhood, growing up, and then I also got to witness the mother and her trauma through her experience raising children. I got to see both sides of the coin and what I did with them is I worked with both of them to give them the emotional support so that they could have a conversation. First of all, it started with a letter back and forth because the mum wanted to initiate the conversation, so she gave the letter. I was able to emotionally support the client and then the client did the response and I supported the mother and they eventually had this like incredible conversation where they they just felt so amazing about it and they managed to reset and redefine their relationship and now they're closer and more connected than ever and that is just like a very rare and unique story.

Speaker 1: 16:55

But there are ways that you can break the chain of this, like relationship with your mother, in order for you to feel more free guilt free, like no more shame. In order for you to feel more free, guilt free, like no more shame. All of that stuff, okay, it comes down to healing this relationship, okay, and that self-compassion piece again is huge. So when we are changing patterns as well, we're not changing patterns just for us, like we're not changing patterns just for the people that we talk to. We're changing for our children. We're changing in our dna. We are changing it every for everything that comes after us.

Speaker 1: 17:28

So, whether or not that's you, whether or not that's um, you decide to have children or not, don't forget you're going to influence many people and children through your lifetime. You know, even if you're like ew kids, you will still have an impact on children or on people around you and you might be that light of inspiration, you may be that healing, that healing energy that that person needs for them to be able to heal that mother wound right. Because when you heal this, you heal the collective. So what I talk about when I talk about heal the collective is such a spiritual, woo-woo, bullshit term which I hate to use, but it does mean that when we are healing in the collective, we I'm healing. So I'm in a higher vibration vibration.

Speaker 1: 18:05

Guess what I'm going to work on I don't know Amy's name is that I'm going to work on healing Amy. Then I'm going to work on healing Emma, but guess what? Emma is already like, really healed anyway. So Emma's going to work on healing her children. Emma's going to work on healing other people, emma's going to share her experiences with others, and then this is the ripple effect and this is how we start to heal the consciousness. That's how we start to heal what it's like to be a mother, what it's like to be in a community.

Speaker 1: 18:29

Again, because we have lost that, we have lost this community, which makes me feel so fucking sad, like I want to bring back the days of um, like sitting in a community where, like we're in a fucking tribe, we're in a circle, the men have gone to get the food, we are all sat there, we're all mothering all of our children. In a community where, like we're in a fucking tribe, we're in a circle, the men have gone to get the food, we are all sat there, we're all mothering all of our children in a most beautiful way. I really would love that. So, yeah, if I start a little commune, um, women with or without children are welcome, just so you know. And we'll just sit around like, yeah, oh, I love you too, ems. Like literally, you're so first in first into my cult. It's not a cult, okay, I'm not a narcissist, but yeah, I just would love to have this community where we can connect again as women and when we start to heal the collective and you start to heal yourself, it ripples out, it helps to heal other women, women. So not only are you doing a beautiful job for you, but your family, but everybody else.

Speaker 1: 19:27

Okay, and take the journey one step at a time. This is a big fucking thing that you're deciding to do. So, yeah, make sure that you take the time and, as we like recap, there are things in your life that are not just yours. Okay, it's been passed down through various generations. We are just people who are living out our family line experiences, our generational experiences. So what's really really important is that we know that all the shit within us isn't ours, but it can be our responsibility to change that. Otherwise we just repeat the patterns of our mother. We can heal the relationship with our mother, with our mother wound, and become the best fucking version of ourselves. Like that. That's absolutely fine, like it's absolutely possible for us to, and not only that.

Speaker 1: 20:11

I think I've helped about a hundred over a hundred women connect with their inner child now and move forward, and I have big plans to do something really fucking big soon that is going to. It's really really exciting and like, oh my God, I was with Emma last night. We were in yin yoga and I had this huge download about what I'm gonna do next and I was like ever I didn't even get to relax, but yeah, yin yoga was absolutely beautiful ever last night. Um, I feel like ages ago because I haven't slept, but here we are anyway. I'm trying to round this up. Be compassionate, set boundaries. You can get so far on your own, but you do need help sometimes. My mentorship is open, if you're interested. I also have something mother wound specific coming up. I also have a mother wound challenge at the moment and then, yeah, I will be doing a big fuck off event, I think so, yeah, that's kind of what's happening in my world and as we come to an end now, I think I'm just going to wrap this up, bring it to an end.

Speaker 1: 21:07

This was my live podcast. This is literally what I sit and do behind the screen. Um, if you're watching on Instagram, this is literally what I do behind the screen. I literally sit here, I open up and I just channel whatever comes through. I make a few notes before like a couple of bullet points. That's what I've been like staring at the screen and yeah, um, oh, okay.

Speaker 1: 21:25

So Mel says fun, you say about helping other women. Now they've healed, I'm looking to volunteer to befriend, to be a befriender at for Bristol Women's Charity. Oh, mel, stop it. My heart is like melting. I'm too emotional, like I. Literally. My friend is getting married later and I'm already emotional and that just is so beautiful. So Mel has healed her mother wound. Now she's off and she's gonna help other women, like, how beautiful is that? And then, yeah, oh, okay, I'm emotional. Thanks Mel, thanks Mel. But yeah, I'm gonna wrap it up there for today.

Speaker 1: 22:04

Guys, thank you so much for joining me on the live. It's really fun to have people to chat to and to talk through this subject with, because it's yeah, it's really really important. But, yeah, love you loads. No, don't be sorry, don't be sorry, love it, love it, I love it. I love hearing the stuff that, like clients are doing and they go on to do because it, it's beautiful, right, like it's just this energy, this light rippling out across the world and like, yeah, we just become this fucking beautiful heartbeat in the world where we're just giving all this love. And, let's face it, in the world today, we absolutely need more love. So, yeah, thank you so much for joining me on the live. You'll probably find this podcast in a few weeks time, so you had first dibs on seeing this podcast and, yes, just thank you so very much, guys, sending you loads and loads of love. Have a wonderful day, whatever you're doing, and thank you for joining me live, love you.