Why You Hate Your Mother

Or why you sometimes feel like you do

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I doubt it if most people will share in the same sentiments. I very much suspect this may even be thought of as impertinent. I beg your pardon, I only mean to be sincere. The relationship between my mom and me has certainly not been been a thrilling or exciting slide downhill. During so many instances, we have had to bear the brunt of a strained relationship, and I would not wish it on anyone. It really is embarrassing to admit that at times I felt disappointed in my mother, and she no doubt felt the same about me. “You are being so insensitive, and what’s with the acting up?” God knows that though I never once had the courage to say those words out loud, I whispered them several times in my mind. There were times we even couldn’t bear to speak to one another. It felt like we had both hurt each other so badly, and we were both innocent, so we played the silence game. A game I have since realized I was particularly good at, to my own detriment.

It’s very easy for children to get hurt while they grow up, especially if they are brought up in a dysfunctional family. I, however, need to tread carefully, because what do I mean when I say a dysfunctional family? You can sniff it, right? The old, shameless, pervasive habit of denigrating what we have, while imagining and desiring what we never had. May the Lord forgive my ingratitude, for isn’t it much better to have a dysfunctional family than to have none at all. But, to ask again, what is a dysfunctional family? I might have cared to know the definition sometime ago, I no longer do. I may not be particularly excited when I think of how I grew up, how I was raised, or how my siblings were brought up. My parents could have done better. But now, looking back, why is it that I would not want it any other way? Why am I so nostalgic about all that plight we had to bear? My childhood, and my youth for that matter, scratched on me scars that I am now proud I bear. How would I know how to raise my children right, if I never knew how to be raised wrong? How would I love my wife right, if I didn’t get to know how my mother was loved wrong. If I went back, I would have tried to make sure things played out just right, but now, I thank God that I cannot.

Now, before you think me a saint, here’s some perspective to balance things a bit. My mom was a strict woman, and she believed in the rod, thank God she did. (I can’t believe I just said that) In consequence, my siblings and I grew up as very disciplined children in the eyes of our neighbors, and the society. We were thought of as respectful, and upright. I was. Given that I was also serious about Church, no doubt I was adored by other women who felt they had been denied the gift of a good and upright child. Maybe they wanted me as a son. I pity them. I pity them because they surely would have returned me to my mother as soon as they had had me. It was only my mother who could handle the mess that I was. I was a burden she was willing to bear. Oh God bless her soul, for she did the best she could.

Soon, when I was a little grown up, and when I had begun to figure a few things out, I got to realize how emotionally immature I was. Several times when there was a kind of altercation, or any disagreement of sorts that needed to be addressed between my mom and me, I would get emotional in the middle of the conversation and lose control of myself. We would be speaking about my misbehavior and tears would begin to literally stream down my face. With time I have come to see how the whole drama was nothing more than a presumptuous enactment on my part that was born of undue self-righteousness and an unconscious aim to be pitied. I didn’t want to face the fact that I was clearly responsible for some of my mistakes.

Me now thinks there are so many things that bruise a relationship between a mother and her firstborn son. Ladies, I am realizing, want to be loved. They long to be seen, and appreciated, especially by the man who calls himself her husband. It’s not that they are selfish or solipsistic, they are just naturally made to crave attention and protection. They want to know that they are valued. While men want on the one hand to be respected, ladies on the other hand, want to be valued; to be loved. Unfortunately, most of our fathers have been unable to do just that. Maybe they got distracted and instead looked elsewhere. They ended up disregarding the effort and struggle that their wives have had to bear in raising their children. And unable to get this love from her husband, I suspect the woman seeks it in her children, especially her firstborn, and more if he’s male. Maybe she expects her son to be wise enough to see her needs and attend to them. Now the problem comes in when the firstborn child is in need of love herself or himself, after all, he or she is still a child. If they are already adolescents, we know that’s when the rebellious attitude kicks in, and the child only thinks of himself, or herself; his needs or her needs, and no one else. Not even his mother’s. Maybe I have it all wrong, but looking back, that’s how it felt like for me. Things got thrown off balance. Who was to blame?

Maybe some parents are just evil. Maybe some of them just want to hurt their kids. Seeing the kind of news that has frequented the media lately, surely we cannot object to that fact. Men have hacked their children to pieces, sometimes after killing their wives; women have burnt their children to death, sometimes after stabbing their husbands.¹ This domestic violence says much about the world we now live in; evil seems to have triumphed over good. Father can trust son and son can trust father no longer. We know that our Lord Jesus said He had come to divide families against each other,² but surely it could not be with all the hurt and bloodshed we are witnessing. The world is becoming a darker place, everyday.

Having admitted that some parents act in the most insane way and harm their children, we can then turn the coin over. The Lord in Isaiah explains that mothers can forget the young ones they have suckled at their breasts.³ However possible that is, we know that it is every bit obviously unnatural. When we carefully look at it, what we would expect is that mothers would usually not want evil for their children. Could that then mean that every attempt to discipline them, however irrational, stems from a need and desire to protect their children. Growing up I noticed that mothers would sometimes beat their children until I feared that they would to kill them. “That lady is so cruel!” I would think. The next day, if someone else dared to even raise a finger at this same child that had had to bear a thorough beating the day before, the perpetrator would face their mother’s fury in full throttle. It was as if they were tacitly passing the message, “no one can lay their hand on my children but me!” As it is, they are disciplining their children as it seems best to them.⁴ Could that then make it an expression of care however wrong it is expressed. Like I said, my mom also believed in the rod, and while in those days I saw it as unfair and insensitive, I do appreciate the lengths she would go to make sure we were growing up right. Probably that was not the right way to handle things, nor was it the best way to keep me on track, but I now believe am what I am, even if at least in part, because of her insistence to beat indiscipline out of me. (Once again, I can’t believe I said that)

Being born again, much as it is obvious we shouldn’t, we sometimes seem to forget why it that the relationships we have with our family members sometimes become so strained, and sometimes even get broken. We don’t get along with a brother. We despise a father who was not available. Assuming that those reading of you reading this are grown up already, the question for us then would be, do we have a part in it? Do we have a part in the bitterness that sometimes drives our homes to their breakage and ruin? So much may not be clear to us, but one thing that is, is that sometimes peace, healing, and reconciliation depends on how far we are willing to go, how much we are ready to be uncomfortable to fight for harmony once again. It could be that we were the ones that were wronged and hurt, but sometimes because no one will, we have to go out of our way to right things. That is not to promise that suddenly things will get better, we know that some wounds take ages to heal, but even when we should in the end fail, there’s something freeing to know that we did the much we could.

“That your prayers may not be hindered,”⁵ Peter exhorts men to make sure that their relationship with their wives is as best as it could be, warning them that if otherwise, they risk having their prayers ineffective. Many times, it takes a lot of courage to admit that we were in the wrong, or at least we have a part in it. It is not easy to see our mistakes for what they are, least of all to admit them. Someone else should be the first to apologize, they are the ones who hurt us anyway. We cannot bear to think that we ourselves may have hurt others as well. And here again, as in other times, I draw a lesson from fiction. That is the success of some works of fiction, to portray to us life as it is, and perchance stir us to live better. Daniel Defoe in his timeless work of art the Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, through the protagonist Robinson Crusoe, has more than two cents to share on our unwillingness to apologize:

As to going home, shame opposed the best motions that offered to my thoughts; and it immediately occurred to me how I should be laughed at among the neighbors, and should be ashamed to see, not my father and mother only, but even everybody else; from whence I have since often observed how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such cases, viz., that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; nor ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be esteemed wise men.

We just cannot bear to ask for forgiveness. “Won’t it demean us?” we seem to think. “It wasn’t our mistake.” Jesus had a deal to teach about this: If while giving your offering, you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift their before the altar, and go get reconciled with him.⁶ But is it really something we who profess Christianity are willing to do? Notwithstanding, things get a little messier when we obviously know we are the ones who have been wronged. How is it then that we should be the ones to make reparations for a mistake that is not ours? We simply cannot bear to be the ones to stretch our hands first, and admit wrong. Surely that is unfair. Christ’s teachings didn’t make it easier. Do not resist evil. Turn the other cheek. Give him the cloak as well. Go two miles instead of one.⁷ Such injustices we might bear from flagrant enemies, but what about when it is from a a close friend we ate bread with?⁸ Or a brother? Or your own father? Would you bear it?

The heart of Christianity, the heart of unrelenting love, seems to be a readiness to embrace porcupines. That is what the Bible says of us, while we were yet God’s enemies because of our sins, he sent his son Jesus to die for us.⁹ God was the one who had been wronged, but he was the one who stretched his hand first. Would we not be imitators of God? The Apostle John asks, and together let’s also ask with him: how is it that we claim we love God who we do not see but hate a brother who we do? Paul was disturbed when he found out that brothers in the Corinthian Church were taking one another to court. Is it not better to bear to be defrauded or to be mistreated, than to take a brother to court? And that before unbelievers?¹⁰ Bear to be mistreated? Bear to be defrauded? Come on Paul!

What if that is precisely what is wrong with our Christianity, we have put lots of value and worth upon our lives, and we just cannot bear to be mistreated, least of all to be defrauded. At the slightest hint of disrespect, especially if we are the ones in charge, we would turn the wild upside down with rage. Have we become like the unforgiving servant who forgot that he himself had been pardoned for his debt, and went on to throw into jail one who owed him way less than what he owed the King (Matthew 18:21-35). I have heard the joke that if we had been God, there would have been no earth. How soon we would have burnt and destroyed it because of our rage. Bless the Lord, for he is not one such as ourselves.¹¹ Praise God for his long-suffering, and his steadfast love that endures forever!

Given that we won’t bear to be wronged, why then do we wrong others? You yourselves wrong and defraud— even your brothers. All this reflects on our failure of character, and our inability to love as instructed by our Lord and Savior. We can, however, not downplay the enemy’s hand is in all this. I myself never thought seriously about this until the afternoon of September 4, 2024 when I was reading through C. S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters. The Screwtape Letters is a chronicle of letters from Screwtape, an older demon to his nephew Wormwood, a younger demon. He advises him on how he is to go about tempting his victim who he calls the patient, and how he is to make the patient’s faith ineffectual. The letters are sly, and so revealing, that it is a wonder C. S. Lewis was able to write such a book. The third letter moved me to tears because I saw my life in those sentences from Screwtape. It felt like without ever knowing it, I had all along been the patient. It was as though my eyes had been opened to see how the devil had worked so hard to strain the relationship between my mom and me. It reminded me of all the trivial matters that had often got out of hand because of our inability to reach an understanding. I could see the self-righteous attitude. The play to look innocent. I felt ashamed of all that I allowed my younger siblings to see and take in. Surely they expected me to perform better, they looked to model my behavior in all its aspect, and I did let them down when I became careless in how I related with my mother, before their very eyes. It also gets darker when Screwtape instructs Wormwood to work with Glubose, the demon assigned to tempt the Patient’s mother. With such a realization, who is to blame for our failed family relationships? No one. Not us. Not our parents. As soon as we learn all this, however, we need to make amends, and work towards reconciliation.

In order not to risk lengthening this piece beyond what is appropriate, I will leave it at that, hoping to continue the discussion later on, for much remains to be said. Your relationships, especially with your siblings and your parents, may not have been the best, but they are the siblings you will ever have. He is the dad you will ever have. She is the mom you will ever have. Other people come into our lives and give us the love of a father, or the love of a mother, thank God for them, but we can only have two real parents. So long as it is in our power, while there’s still time, let us live peaceably with them. Let us fight for reconciliation.

Do not hate your mother.

Proverbs 15:20 (ESV) A wise son makes a glad father, but a foolish man despises his mother.

Speaking of mothers, here’s something:

It’s a story about a mother’s love. Please have a read.

Stay lit.

1. Here’s one such case. And they have been so many recently.

https://nation.africa/kenya/counties/bomet/shock-as-mother-kills-two-children-takes-her-own-life-amid-battle-with-depression-4715216

2. Luke 12:51-53

3. Isaiah 49:15

4. Hebrews 12:10

5. 1 Peter 3:7

6. 1 Peter 3:7

7. Matthew 5:38-41

8. Psalms 41:9

9. Romans 5:8

10. 1 Corinthians 6:7

11. Psalms 50:21