Good-Daughter Syndrome

Syndrome [ sin-drohm, -druhm ] noun : a set of concurrent things (such as emotions or actions) that characterize a particular identifiable pattern, abnormality or condition

It’s every little girl’s dream to win her mother’s favor. Without a doubt, that hope was in me when I first met my mother. I remember it like a picture pulled from a camera roll.  Her face in soft-lens and lips a Fashion Fair pink, my mother bent toward me in the Children’s Home Society receiving room. Somewhere between her smile and her outstretched hands, I grasped the truth of my fortune. The exquisite creature before me would be my mother. I was nearly four years old and it was love at first sight. But the honeymoon would not last.

My mother was not a bad person. She took care of me and was kind between bouts of aggression. She gave herself to our community and was the favorite kindergarten teacher to legions of kids, the long-time children’s choir director and special days committee chair at our church, and an avid fundraiser for the NAACP and the service-oriented sorority we now share. But away from the public eye, my mother was critical, disagreeable, controlling and, often, plain mean. And of all the things she found objectionable, I think I topped the list. Only those in our inner circle knew this side of my mother, leaving her public image, that she so valued, unscathed.

I spent decades trying to win my mother’s favor. Actually, her unconditional love. Despite and because of my mother’s resistance, I was driven to prove I was a good daughter and worthy of her choosing. Repeatedly, however, our interactions left me feeling harried, hurt and humiliated. But I couldn’t stop. Over the years a pathology had developed. A syndrome. Well into my forties, I continued to over-perform for my mother and jump to her ever-escalating requests—right up to the moment I learned I had been disinherited. I recognized myself in the tell-all book, Mommie Dearest, where author Christina Crawford says, “I spent more than twenty-five years trying to make sure that Mommie Dearest loved me, trying to win her acceptance and approval… ” Legendary actress Joan Crawford, Christina’s adoptive mother, was not as manic as portrayed in the film version but, like my mom, was grossly unfair, often irrational, sometimes brutal and unpredictably punishing.

Good-daughter syndrome is an equal opportunity disorder affecting women raised by biological and adoptive mothers alike. Written in short-story-like vignettes, Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club reveals the hidden pasts of four older Chinese immigrant women and their American biological daughters, and how each of their lives was shaped by their respective mother’s experiences. Although the book’s primary theme is the clash of Chinese and American cultures, the quest for maternal favor also surfaces as a theme common to the eight characters telling their stories. In one of the more startling vignettes, An-Mei Hsu, one of the founding members of the Joy Luck Club, describes what she witnessed when her estranged mother returned home to honor her dying mother, despite having been falsely accused, publicly shamed, torn from her children, and exiled.

“ … and then I saw her pull up her sleeve and pull out a sharp knife. She put this knife on the softest part of her arm. I tried to close my eyes but could not. And then my mother cut a piece of meat from her arm … my mother took her flesh and put it in the soup. She cooked magic in the ancient tradition to try to cure her mother this one last time.”

I’m certain many with good-daughter syndrome feel they have given their own “pound of flesh.” The abuse and entitlement exercised on daughters who only seek their mother’s favor has power well beyond the moment. Its effects leave daughters feeling unworthy and deny them life’s “best-quality,” as revered by the Joy Luck Club members and most of our mothers.

Having seen it in myself, I usually can recognize women suffering from good-daughter syndrome in the first few conversations. Most often, they are smart, driven and accomplished. They are also kind, compassionate and generous. But these wonderful qualities are offset by practiced denial of Self in favor of unworthy others and blinders that keep them from recognizing those who only consume. Good-daughter syndrome disadvantages women beyond the confines of the mother-daughter relationship as deep-seated unworthiness lingers—despite bravado, accomplishment or proven success—and informs present day choices and behavior. And I’m willing to bet there’s a male version of the syndrome that does the same.

  Women around my age have entered something of an era. Our mothers are dying and we are finding the freedom to talk about the ways their lives imprinted our own. “All you can be is your mother” is the tossed around retort as we recall things funny or quirky or lovely that we inherited from them. We are also unearthing some of the more difficult and tragic experiences that wounded our mothers and their ability to mother us. We are drawing connections between what we know of their pasts to the way they raised us and, whenever possible, giving them the compassion they sorely needed, but didn’t receive, way back when.

There is no one way to cure good-daughter syndrome and, maybe, like antibodies that remain after an infection, some remnants of the syndrome might never be cleared. But awakening to the indicative patterns is how healing can begin. And from there, patterns can be interrupted or, as I like to say, the routine can be interrupted. But believe me, it’s not easy. Facing the fact that you have been abused by anyone is tough but looking squarely at abuse by your own mother—the person who should cherish you the most—can feel like a frighteningly impossible task.

When I was a child unknowingly suffering from good-daughter syndrome, several special women in my community saw me. Without alarming my mother, they found ways to demonstrate their love and confidence in me. I am eternally grateful for their encouragement and support and, as Mothers Day approaches, hope every struggling good-daughter will be seen by stand-ins like mine. These stand-ins are mothers too, whether or not they have children, and are vital to surviving good-daughter syndrome.