This talk felt like a salve for my soul. I’ve been spinning my wheels researching for 27 years, desperately trying to figure out what happened to me so I could heal. Mother hunger fits. Thank you so much !!

I finally realized a few years ago that the self hatred I’ve carried with me since I was a tiny girl, was because of the way my mom neglected and abused me verbally. I now am pregnant with my first baby and am on a mission to understand myself so I don’t pass this trauma to my sweet son. I’ve barely cracked this book and it has already helped me so much

I used to see Kelly as my therapist around 2008. She was literally the best therapist I have ever been to.

Yes, frozen grief. That's it. Thank you.

Kelly, I knew there was something wrong with me, why I had so many relationships and never belonged…people pleaser. My mom fed and clothed me, but I never remember her hugging me or telling me she loved me. Surely she must have. She told me once she worried that she had hurt me by being so cold when I was very tiny. She was hell growing up with in the Pentecostal church. She literally beat the hell out of me. I’m a survivor. I loved my four children with everything in me. Sometimes to the way lenient side, I flipped the coin. But thank God they are all normal and happy, I didn’t do too much damage. Thank you SO much for the books and these videos.

One thing I realize about the mother wound is that in order to survive my childhood I had to bury my need for my mother and be as self-sufficient as possible. Never ask for anything. Looking at how that has impacted my life, livelihood, relationships. I have more male friends that I trust. I don't have a close, intimate circle of women that I confide in. I'm too afraid that if I get close they will see how emotionally/developmentally young and undeveloped I am (or fear I may be). How needy I might be. I wear a big smile and act like everything is okay. I don't dare let others too close unless I really trust them. When I do trust another woman to open up to I feel such a huge longing to be nurtured and comforted and fear that it will be too much. That I will repulse them. That is how my mother reacted to me and my siblings. She acted repulsed and kept her distance. All of my life as far back as I can remember, she was an aloof, shut-down, silent, withdrawn, cold, distant, uninvolved shell of a human. She's 90 years old and hasn't visited me in 40 years. I went to visit her once before the pandemic. Wasn't sure if she would even open the door. One way I've coped with the mother hunger is to be part of dance groups like contact improvisation which is based on being in constant physical contact with your dance partners, including leaning into them and letting them support your weight. I've also danced the 5 Rhythms dance for over 25 years and find that through dance I can give and receive basic human closeness and nurturing. I learned young that having a lover was one way to get basic human contact that is so essential. For so long being lovers with men was the only way I knew to get my basic mother wound needs met. If I had a nurturing, understanding man it could work. But it seems so unfair and asking too much for my intimate partner to have to bare the burdon of my unmet childhood develpmental needs.

Thank you for addressing this topic... I have a narc mom and I was neglected even though I lived in a financially secure home. I knew at a very young age that my mom was just incapable of being my mom. So by the time I was literally in kindergarten, I was Not wishing she were different, I was wishing for a different mom... Now, in my 30s, the hardest thing for me is coping with my social ineptitude caused by her neglect, which has injured my ability to connect with people. I dont know how to make friends. Thats like a double trauma

Thank you so much for making this video. I have always felt lost, empty, scared, and considered myself "love-starved" which made me obsess over and pursue romantic relationships with the hope that they would fix whatever was broken inside. What I realize now is that I want maternal love. So, so much. I just don't know how to heal because I am an adult, and don't have a mother who wants to be emotionally available. I wish I had a mom to hold and comfort me.

Wow, Im a therapist and after seeing hundreds of clients I recognize alot of things had to do with the mother and now I see why, she is our first love. I understand so much here, including my own life story, this makes so much sense!

Third degree mother hunger is exactly what I have, spot on.

after i saw her at the red table i had to come here on youtube and look for her

I don't think my mom ever liked me. I recently learnt she was devastated that I was born a girl and not a boy. And she's treated me like a problem my whole life. It started with my sensitivity, then my weight gain, then my sexuality. She's been emotionally abusive towards me my whole life. I'm in my early 30s now. Always anxious. I feel this constant need for love and nurturing. She's stopped talking to me since I moved in with my girl friend. I'm so ready to let this hurt go. I won't allow her to make me small anymore. There's so much about me that she should be proud of. But she only sees me through this narrow lense and if I don't fit what she thinks is ok she withdraws her love and support.

I didn't get any of the three from any mother figure, and I think there needs to be discussion around forgiving ourselves when we, as damaged and struggling children of these parents become parents ourselves and make some of these mistakes ourselves. A blessing I have found in the things I never got in my upbringing is knowing what NOT to do. However, sometimes, the lack of parental guidance leads us to inadvertently repeat the mistakes of our parents. Personally, I don't yet know how to let go of and forgive those mistakes. I'm open with my children about mistakes I've made and ways I may have hurt them, and while they may have forgiven me, I haven't. And it's holding me back from healing further. Thank you for sharing this invaluable information. ❤

Thanks so much, a wonderful podcast. I'm a 52 yr old woman, recently having become aware that my mum is very much on the covert narcissistic spectrum, explaining a lot but bringing a lot of grief and sadness. Your perspective Kelly has given me a whole extra swathe of tools and understanding of my, and my mums situation in our relationship. I feel more empathetic towards her but also towards myself. Thank you. ❤ Ps I have just ordered your book and looking forward to receiving it! 🙏

I waited for that apology and then finally I got it. My mother is 79, and she finally sees how she hurt me.. or she says. I can tell you the apology feels unreal, the pain is still there, and the grief is the only way through.

This finally gave me not just the ‘right name’ but also an understanding to my unidentified health issues/cravings and my challenges with my daughter! Many lightbulb moments 😌; thank you very much Kelly and Dawn!! 💗🙏🏻

I just found this and just started listening to this and I’m very excited about it. There is a children’s book called Are You My Mother? I always could relate to the title of that book because I think I’ve spent most of my life trying to find mother love. So anyways, I’m so excited to listen to this.

I just want to say how excited I feel when a teacher in trauma/CPTSD/attachment work mentions yoga. It's like a little excited yogi in my head perks up to listen and then starts doing cartwheels. I love recognizing ideas that I've heard in other niches, as I've lingered in spiritual spaces as well as CPTSD and attachment specific spaces. I love that they all intersect and come together. I had the little seed of doing yoga planted in my head over the years, and then because I was studying these concepts, finally decided to go for it. Particularly Van der Kaulk teaching yoga for trauma. I am on my own healing path, but I also want to eventually be a clinician/healer of some sort. Not sure how that will manifest yet. I absolutely love yoga, but I also love psychology and trauma work, but I also don't want to just be a talk therapist, as I love the idea of working with the body and intertwining spirituality, and that can be tricky in traditional therapy circles. Right now I feel blessed to be working with a coach who is familiar with all these concepts and more. Still figuring it all out, but in the meantime thank you for teaching these ideas that set my soul on fire!

My mother was the original mean girl. She never gave encouragement. Wouldnt go to any games or sport events i was involved in. i had one birthday party ay 8 when i first moved back in with her. Shr would always tell me the story of how she tried to abort me but she couldnt. She was 16. She would always talk about how her life would have been better if she didnt have me. I always felt the lack of respect she had for before i knew what is was. I felt she didnt like me, at all. I have the book and its helping me.

My good friend put me onto you so I can learn more about my lady. Just the comments I have read here make so much sense to me about her now, wow! I can not wait to let my lady know about this. Mother Hunger explains so so much about her. Thank you, and thanks to my good friend Jen!

Apology Ache: She has told me that she has never, ever did a single thing wrong to me.

Yup I definitely have mother hunger I was emotionally abandoned by two so called mothers my biological and adopted mother

I've been in therapy since I was 13 and no one has been able to help me at all. Since no one knows what to do with us they hospitalized us

Wow this was so powerful and I so enjoyed Kelly McDaniel's approach and way of speaking. I felt my emotions come right to the surface hanging on her every word. I have been in therapy for a few years now and the aspect of grief I am still working with.

This work is very much needed and appreciated thanks to you both. As for the yoga section the technique is called "Alternate Nostril Breathing" using the "Rule of 4" breathing and yes this works wonders for decluttering the mind and improving focus. Again thank you both 💚

I am so grateful and appreciative for this information, as well as all the immense intentions to help, educate and heal sooo many women that desperately need a name for these feelings and voids in their hearts and minds. Thank you so much. 💗🙏

I am so fearful of other women. I lost my mom at the age of 9. (Cervical cancer) My dad remarried 4 times. I just can’t attach to women well. I’m afraid I’ll love them and they’ll leave again. I’m a mother of a 10 year old and 15 month old and I’ve been in therapy. I would love a good life coach.

I am so grateful to find this today! Thank you both for shining a light on our wounds. Resonates. 🙏

Absolutely brilliant and liberating . Thank you Namaste 🙏

I'm mind blown already definitely will read the book

Thank you for this video. Starting book tomorrow. 🙏

Very helpful, thank you for this!!

This is so GOOD!!

Yes! Pranyama breathing is really good for anxiety. Also, The Art of Living has a great course on this.

Thank you❤

I'm listening to your book and each chapter has given me such understanding. I can't wait to discuss with my therapist.

Thank you for this

Wow, I was aware of the Mom connection to my issues, etc. However, this just opened a huge Pandora's box with not much that I could discern I do with IT! Excellent material & research.

i’m so glad i came across your video!

Thank you for this video!

Wow breakthrough for me !

I feel like something got named, in hearing this message. My daughter is now effected by earlier mother daughter wounds and now has cut me out of my granddaughters life. Im being torn to shreds and thinking of living in an ashram at this point in my life.

Genius!

I've worked in epiginetics to understand my abusive family. When my MD abusive father who has the same genetic issues, chose to give my mother shots to stop her milk so I was not breast fed. At least I was rocked. My mom and her mom didn't deserve the abuse they received. Misogyny is a part of all this. I am finally late in life understanding more. En utero spot on. This genetics of her condition often causes preeclampsia. I feel I came to live for deep sharing of love and peace. My oncologist has it and lost a child.

The hurt, anger, tears, emptiness, unworthiness are always just below the surface. Therefore, I am always trying to please everyone around me. I am always trying to be "worthy. I try to be good, clever, funny, accomplished. But it does not heal the hole. If my own mother doesn't love me, what's wrong with me? All my friends gush about their amazing moms and how close they are. I am alone and abandoned in the world. I look to men for love, and they lie to me and exploit me, and then tell me I am worthless, and then I am more destroyed. I am talking about long-term relationships. They say, "So what if your mom does not love you. Just forget her". Forgetting her does not help. When the bad relationship is over, then I am more alone in the world than I was before.

Born a twin whose father passed away when I was 19 months old; father hole/mother hunger.

i watch yoga with adriene! she’s the coolest 😂❤❤ thanks for this video. i deal with mother hunger myself and it is a constant battle but i am def healing!

I lost my mother through divorce, at the age of 5, my Dad got custody of my brother and I. I recently have been looking at my childhood to find why I still feel unworthy. Also my mom was a narcissist and I don’t really understand that nor how she ended up that way, except possiblywas spoiled. Also my parents and ancestors were survivors of wars. I myself am of the baby boomer generation. I just want to feel whole and worthy.

Doctor, how would you elaborate possible suggestions with a victim of narcissistic abuse from her mother, who is battling cptsd and had to resort to no contact, and now has to fight the guilt of her mother having real cancer? I feel it's an impossible and brutal situation to live

What if we always turn to sexual relationship dependance from early puberty. Does it mean that we have something missing in our parental love hunger?

Yes, I am triggered😣😣😣 I need you Kelly

Kelly is so beautiful 😩😍😍 I wish she were my mom and gave that attunement to me❤️🌟

When you go thru consequences of abuse from childhood up to your adult life of 50 years u cannot not feel terrufied thats impossible i lived it

Please clarify that brain development is not complete at 5. That is wrong. That is used to say the personality is set by 5. Later abuse, even at 5 or in primary school can regress a child. If the mother is not emotionally tuned in she can miss the abuse or turn away. Parents who weren’t physically abusive in the first 5 years hear this and use it to deny the emotional and attachment wound. There is no outward abuse sometimes, but can lead to behavior issues later. Brain development and learning is more like 25! Years old! Please correct this confusing concept.

Watson nuts. Authoritarian parenting I believe has led us to now.

I DO BLAME MY MOTHER!

While I understand why you don't want to blame mothers, as someone who has been healing this wound for years - you'll have to blame. Because the rage and the anger, esp if it was a cluster B mother, is going to be severe. And those things need to assign blame properly - to mother - where it belongs, rather than in the gaslit mind of the daughter. That might be scary. That might be culturally taboo. But it does real victims a huge disservice to refuse to blame mother. We have an epidemic of severely traumatized daughters of mothers who are intentionally sadistic, intentionally destructive, intentionally in denial. I'm tired of making excuses and protecting "women" from proper blame, when victims need moral solidarity more than anything else.

Can you explain how this goes beyond Mother bashing- but many things can be true at once. How can we frame this within a hurtful patriarchal society and yet reframe this critique as showing the unique importance of Mother's? I feel stuck because I understand intellectually the how's and why's that made my Mom- but I still suffer silently with the pain, anger and grief. I chose not to have children myself. There was a painful confusion and an inability to articulate what the terror was at having a child of my own- I had three terminations and a miscarriage. How do I move from under the shadow of my Mom? This feels so wrong, immature and self indulgent to write about. Thank you

I disagree about this theory I hear everywhere that the first 5 years is when all the damage starts. I believe that for many, the 1st 5 years was probably the best of times, and indeed, when a child learns to speak is when the abuse starts.

It (the thing that gave birth to me) deserves all the bashing I can give.

This is too much to process for one video. Make 10 !😮

The nuclear family structure causes these issues.

Remove me from this

Omg.... Stop creating more and more mental health drama ....you need therapy!🙄🙄🙄

I'm new here and this is good stuff 🤍really good. 👍GREAT