Tired Of Having The Same Conversations (on replay) About Your Mum's Impact On Your Life?
WE DON’T DO THAT HERE.
INSTEAD, WE CENTRE ONLY ON HOW YOU WANT TO FEEL.
You’re not a shrinking violet. You’ve become a resilient, accomplished woman, despite a complex (or jarring?) childhood with your mother– and though you know that asking for help is not weakness you can’t help but taking everyone’s needs on your shoulders, feeling like you need to do it alone, while worrying you’re not doing enough
To everyone else you seem so calm, grounded and open – but inside there’s often a confusion: “Can I trust myself to do the right thing for me?,” and you want to stop the splitting feeling that you are responsible for others’ disappointments whilst your feelings get sneakily swept under the rug
Your super powers are sensitivity, self-honesty and kindness - but you know you give too much weight to what people –or your mum– say, and you want to finally know how to use your own voice, to state your needs and dream with clarity, without apology while keeping the sincerity and compassion that matter to you
You’re a talented, half-full glass kinda’ woman- who’s hungry for validation, and letting love in which gets you chasing it in the wrong places and from the wrong people, fearing you’ll stay alone if you are finally express your authentic self
You Also Know
It All Comes Down
To A Ruptured Relationship
With Your Mum
You're sick of hearing you need to forgive your mum and "she did her best."
What I’ve seen to be true after a couple of decades working with women from around the world is that you’ll find the resolution and move on when you stop playing by other people’s should’s and finally centre yourself in your own life.
In the end, it felt like a weight I'd been carrying for a long time was lifted off my shoulders, something rooted in a lack of safety during my childhood.
In the middle of a big life change, moving countries, stepping into a management position at a retreat center, and taking some huge leaps, I thought everything was going well. But I was running, running, running, and I hit a wall at the first sign of trouble.
I faced a serious confrontation and an emergency I didn't have the tools to handle. Things I had safely pushed under the carpet came forward and resurfaced. I experienced deep suffering and anxiety, couldn't sleep, I was stuck in fear, and it felt debilitating, overpowering all my senses.
Shelly came recommended by a dear friend. From our very first check-in, something in me softened and a barrier seemed to melt.
During the months we worked together, I realise that
I believed I had to do everything on my own, and that everything was urgent or an emergency.
I work with people who come to retreats to slow down and reconnect with themselves, yet I had not seen this blind spot in myself.
We explored many aspects of my life and the different personas that would show up automatically. She gently helped me see that I don't have to take them so seriously--It's okay not to be perfect, not to have all the answers, and not to be the one who has to save the day.
The compassion I so easily offered to others began to turn toward myself, and I learned to meet myself with kindness.
Working with Shelly felt like a breath of fresh air. I became more spacious and more at ease. Her approach is both steady and gentle, and I always felt held in safety. It was also powerful to do this work while life was in full motion, to have her walking alongside me as everything unfolded.
The affirmations she shared continue to support me in everyday life, and that has been incredibly meaningful. I would recommend working with Shelly in a heartbeat. It is truly a gift to yourself.
You know what?
I think you're
Done With:
HITTING A WALL
1
You're surprised at how reflexive saying “I’m fine” has become.
You appreciate your capacity to flex with others — but saying yes to every suggestion your partner makes, being available to clients or your boss 24/7, it's quietly exhausting.
Inside yourself it’s like you’re always waiting for someone to be mad at you – almost just for existing. Keeping tabs on other people’s reactions and what will keep them happy doesn’t make you happy– you’re seeing how much energy you’re losing to it
And though you swore to yourself you’ll never again date people who don’t respect your boundaries, you’ll never do and say the things you hated your mum did to your children, you find yourself – in spite of many efforts — at the again point.
Perhaps you’re connecting the dots, seeing vividly how your childhood shaped your anxiety, the hypervigilance and the emotional burden you’ve been carrying all along.
AND YOU NEED TO KNOW WHAT'S POSSIBLE BEYOND THIS WALL
STUCK AT A CROSSROAD
2
You started a new job, a business or moved to a new country and you’re tired of keeping on changing the outside while carrying your mum inside yourself.
You had a burnout and realised you were fulfilling your mother’s dreams - but how to start over feels confusing at best
You’re pregnant (congratulations!) and the thought you’d be anything like your mum scars the s**t out of you
Perhaps your mother is an elderly woman in need of support and you’re swinging between guilt and resentment.
Or your mother passed away and a new wave of grief is washing over you
NO WAY YOU’RE STARTING YOUR NEXT CHAPTER WITH THE SAME-OL’-GUILT & EMOTIONAL BURDEN
THINKING YOUR WAY OUT
3
Being in your head is how you survived childhood
Pretending that everything is ok every damn day was your refuge
Now you want to drop to your heart and that feels scary
or you simply don’t know how.
Maybe you heard me speak on a podcast and realised that insight about your childhood and naming patterns was just the beginning but you want to finally heal your mother wound
I am less enmeshed with Mum now. I am beginning to learn some of what I most yearned from her as a child, wasn't, and never will be, present--attunement, emotional safety, felt loving connection, shared play and delight. I am freer now, to find (and offer!) those things elsewhere; and of course, to give them to myself.
I heard Shelly being interviewed on a podcast episode title that caught my eye, "healing the mother wound." The conversation gave words to many of the things that had hurt me, and I had struggled with in my relationship with my mother. I was certainly drawn to the wisdom that sat gently and steadfastly in Shelly's conversation and was equally struck by Shelly's presence alongside her willingness to bring her own experience to benefit others.
I knew I wanted to work on the pain I felt around my relationship with my Mum, and I had a strong sense that 'going from Australia to Zurich' (over zoom, thankfully!) to take the journey with Shelly was going to be deeply worthwhile.
I was right. Over time in our work, I have come to feel some big shifts; in a shared space which Shelly held with skill and love. I've learnt to hold more space for my own experience, including when others can't or won't.
This looks like acknowledging my own feelings: It's ok/natural to feel hurt by that, angry at that, dismissed by that tone or comment. I can also make choices to engage where and I am loved and regarded.
While I continue to give to others and want to, I have further learnt to choose myself, and my own commitment to wholeness. Sometimes this is about recognising when I do and don't have capacity, not simply responding regardless- choosing the relationships I will invest in, and sometimes how much of myself I share.
Life comes with some more ease now. I am somehow both more able (mostly!) to slow down, as well as step forward into what is meant for me. So greatful for Shelly and our shared work - I have moved away from heartbreak and continue to walk into my own strength, and new possibilities for my life.
Hi, I'm Shelly
A trauma-informed, Hakomi therapist
And I never planned on becoming an expert on dysfunctional relationships between mothers and daughters.
After my mother left me homeless at the age 16, with no dolls or picture album to remember my albeit neglectful and abusive childhood, all I wanted to do was run away as far as possible from looking back.
When my “perfect married life” didn’t change my peanut-size self-esteem, and the unsolicited comments people shared about my relationship with my mother kept me feeling invisible, I finally began to heal my mother wound I turned my childhood story on its head, ending up as the mother wound therapist I now wish I’d had years ago.
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