The Mother Wound in Women: Why It's Not Just a Mistake
- Aug 7
- 5 min read
The mother wound in women is often brushed aside with one familiar phrase: “Every mother makes mistakes” — but a mistake and an emotional wound are not the same thing, and confusing them is exactly what keeps the wound alive. What if some of the things you’ve spent years trying to forgive weren’t mistakes at all? Understanding the mother wound in women means learning to recognise the difference between something that went wrong once and something that left a lasting emotional imprint. Learning to tell them apart is the first step toward repair.
In my early twenties, I danced in the modern ballet group, Fresco.
In one of my favourite choreographies, I was a woman who was getting lost in a forest of masks, to the music of Death and the Maiden by Mozart.
Asaf, my dance partner, was meant to catch me at a certain point and save me from being lost in the maze of all these frozen, false faces.
Only that in my real life, I was used to being my own saviour, saving my own butt from a constant sense of feeling lost, the result of living with a mentally ill mother who neglected me physically and emotionally since day one.
What’s the Difference Between a Mistake and a Mother Wound?
Used to navigating life solo, I’d often be out of tune and pace with Asaf. He’d come to catch me where I would already have moved to the next step.
Or he would try and help me jump but would miss my hips because I’d jump by myself instead of coordinating our rhythms.
I didn’t do that on purpose or even consciously.
Even when teachers raised my attention to my doing-it-all-by-myself attitude, I wasn’t able to change it.
I’ve made these mistakes and learned how to fix them in the dance duo.
But when I hear today women say things like, “every mother makes a mistake,” I know they can’t discern between mistakes and emotional wounds.
Why the Mother Wound in Women Gets Mistaken for “Just” a Mistake
A mistake is to step on someone’s foot unintentionally — an emotional wound is to be repeatedly hurt by your mother’s intention to overpower you.
A mistake is to forget the next move — an emotional wound is when your mother’s attitude is indifference, enmeshment or hostility.
Mistakes don’t shape your internal world to an extent that breaks your trust in yourself and others.
The mother wound is an ongoing rupture in the relationship with your mother.
It cannot, and should not, be mistaken for a mistake.
As a human being, you are far more resilient and naturally forgiving, to have your heart broken and then carry “a mistake” as an invisible weight throughout your life.
The Mother Wound as a Mis-Coordination, Not a Flaw
The mother wound is a mis-coordination of emotions and intentions between you and your mother that shapes your relationship with yourself, others and the world at large.
This underlying sense of coordination — like in a dance — is your drive to attach to your mother, reach out to her and create a bond. A duo.
You will each bring your own personality and style, interpretation of life events, preferences and tastes for values and life-pace, and will miss each other at times. Naturally.
When “missing each other” characterises your relationship with your mother and you get to carry within you the weight of this complex relationship, it is the impact of the mother wound, not just a mistake.
Why Apology Doesn’t Heal a Mother Wound — Repair Does
The antidote to making a mistake is apologising, doing things differently and moving on.
The antidote to an emotional wound is repair.
Because a complex mother-daughter relationship leaves deep and long-lasting marks on your nervous system and emotional body.
A ‘sorry’ can’t undo the emotional burden.
I bet you can recall right now situations where:
🍒 Your mother apologised for inciting fights with neighbours after a night of intoxication, and you already knew that this apology is short-lived until the next incident.
🍒 You tried standing up to your mother’s cold eyes and nasty comments, which only landed you with more aggression, leaving you feeling suffocated or defeated.
🍒 Your mother made you feel unwanted and all your efforts to gain her attention or love went into a void.
🍒 You always placed her needs in front of yours and all she has in return is complaints.
What Repair Actually Looks Like
No one can fix or redo a mistake besides the person who did it.
Repair, unlike mistakes, can be achieved with other people.
A repair — the heart of healing the mother wound — is a coordination of emotions and intentions within you today, so you can let go of that invisible weight.
Repair for your mother wound is a transformation of feelings and identity, leading you to:
🍒 Shed the invisible weight of old feelings like rage, grief, disappointment or frustration so your heart is free of guilt and shame.
🍒 Shift limiting beliefs like “I have to do it alone,” or “if I get close, I’ll be abandoned,” so you can move towards relationships that give you the togetherness you’re craving.
🍒 Reclaim your agency so you can speak up your mind clearly and directly.
That’s what I help women like you achieve.
Here’s an unpopular view in a culture that spreads subliminal messages that needing others is a weakness or a sign of incompetency:
Healing the mother wound happens in a duo.
The mother wound is a relational wound, and you can find repair in a relationship.
When you were young, you needed your mother to make you feel valued, to feel that you belonged, and to feel grounded so you could form empowering beliefs about yourself, others and the world.
But as an adult woman, you have experiences, resources and perspectives you didn’t have as a baby or a young girl — resources you can use with someone skilled in matching your childhood missing experiences so you can heal your mother wound.
The beautiful thing I get to witness every day in working with women on healing their mother wound is when they discover their own resolve, their own repair, and they don’t confuse mistakes with emotional wounds, which makes them feel a sense of completion that wasn’t possible before.
I believe you can achieve that too.
You can stop being your own saviour — saving yourself from feeling misunderstood, stuck in hypervigilance or stressed by a sense that it’s all on you — and become the woman who lets someone catch her.
If this tickles something in you, then let’s get on a free Get-Together call.
This free call is designed for undermothered women who know they want to heal their mother wound and are ready to get a real, embodied sense of the process of healing the mother wound:
🍒 You’ll fill out a form to give me some background so I come prepared for our call.
🍒 We’ll start with an easy, yet meaningful chit-chat so you don’t feel weird (we’ve only just met)
🍒 I’ll give you examples of how we’d potentially work with some of the things you share and what results you could expect in four-months’ time.
🍒 You’ll go sleep on it or you’ll have a clear ‘yes’ on the call — it’ll be your call to make.
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If you need more reassurance that you & I can make a genuine difference to healing your mother wound, here's something you'll enjoy:
Learn how to stop making an effort to fill in a hole in the heart with healing the mother wound in my private podcast, BirthRite. Add your details below, and you'll get immediate access to your free episodes 👇
Shelly is a trauma-informed, certified Hakomi therapist helping women who've had a complex relationship with their mother discover the hidden impacts of the mother wound 👉 so they can recentre back into the life they're meant to live
