Mother Hunger: How Adult Daughters Can Understand and Heal from Lost Nurturance, Protection, and Guidance

by Kelly McDaniel

Although I benefit from white skin, a robust education, and other advantages, even a life of privilege can’t protect someone from Mother Hunger.

fathers can’t replace mothers. Naming Mother Hunger isn’t about dismissing the importance of fathers or other primary caregivers. Nor is it about blaming mothers for what they couldn’t provide. Mother Hunger is a framework to help you identify what the essential elements of maternal care are so you can recognize what you lost and reclaim what you need.

without early maternal nurturance, we grow up hungry for touch and belonging. Without early maternal protection, we are constantly anxious and afraid. Without maternal guidance, we lack an internal compass directing our choices. These are the symptoms of Mother Hunger.

As a child, if essential elements of maternal nurturance and protection were missing, you didn’t stop loving your mother—you simply didn’t learn to love yourself.

For a baby, feelings are facts. If baby is afraid or hungry and a sensitive adult responds to her cues, all is well. If no one is there, all is not well. Separation from a familiar caregiver means danger.

Emotions are stored in the body and create a certain reality or belief system: The world is safe and so am I or The world is scary and I’m all alone. Stored sensations like these become implicit memories. Unlike explicit memory that is conscious and has language, implicit memory is unconscious and has none. Implicit memories reside deep within the limbic structures of the brain, silently whispering messages of safety or danger to the rest of the body.

When fear isn’t soothed and happens regularly, a baby stores the fearful sensations in her cells, building a body and brain poised for danger—hungry for love but wary of human connection.

The basis of lifelong psychobiological well-being is established during the first 1,000 days of our lives.

I was 876 days old when my mom died.

Neuroscience informs us that the brain doesn’t differentiate emotional pain from physical pain. The body can’t tell the difference between a broken bone and a broken heart. An infant who is hungry or lonely feels pain.

the myth that all mothers love their daughters erases the truth that many women know: maternal love didn’t feel good. The fantasy of maternal love did not apply. The myth creates confusion for many daughters who never knew this kind of tenderness.

In this way, a mother’s love is the foundation for a brain that fundamentally trusts or mistrusts human connection.

From the last trimester of pregnancy through a baby’s second year of life, the brain doubles in size. During this time of rapid growth, a baby’s brain depends on her primary caregiver’s brain for emotional regulation—to soothe distress, to feel safe, and to trust human connection. She can’t yet “think” for herself. In other words, she needs her caregivers to translate love into baby language through sound, touch, and consistency.

There is no such thing as spoiling a baby, but this widespread misinformation is everywhere. Tending to a baby’s needs for comfort, food, and touch builds belonging, love, and trust.

Without healthy maternal nurturance, little girls may grow up with an implicit, embodied sense that I’m alone, and it’s my fault. Thoughts like these create shame, a self-loathing that gets in the way of self-care, healthy relationships, and genuine moments of joy.

Children with avoidant attachment learn to shut down their feelings at a very young age. Most create emotional space from people as a defensive measure—a way to avoid rejection or suffocation. As adults, women with avoidant attachment tend to be linear thinkers. Discussing emotions or feelings makes avoidant folks very nervous. This attachment style is often referred to as dismissive, because in the process of shutting down our own feelings, we struggle to relate to how others feel in a genuine way.

LOL

Under-mothering: The primary caregiver was frequently unable to respond. She abandoned her child too early and too often, leaving unrepaired separation distress that damaged early bonding. The absence of nurturance required the child to surrender efforts to reach her mother. If no one else came to soothe her distress, the avoidant personality structure began as a way to shut down the need for human comfort and tolerate the intolerable.

Since we live in a culture that values independence over interdependence, women with avoidant attachment style are frequently affirmed for their achievements, ambition, and strength. They typically feel more powerful than others. A calm disposition, charming wit, or super-active personality can hide a deep well of insecurity from themselves and anyone close.

Babies without sensitive, responsive nurturance may eventually stop crying when they need something. Constant crying is too hard on a vulnerable little body. Crying cessation is an example of adapting to compromised care. So, it’s possible that a quiet baby might be a resigned baby.

Infants can’t self-soothe.

In fact, loneliness triggers brain cravings similar to physical hunger.

daughters struggle when they can’t count on their mothers for safety and protection.

maternal anxiety, stress, and fear can be passed on to a baby in utero, specifically in the last trimester.

Relationally dependent, babies and toddlers can’t manufacture a feeling of safety by themselves. Just like a fragile tree that needs additional support when first planted in the ground, infants are supported by their primary caregiver. When a plant isn’t thriving in the garden, we don’t blame the plant. We test the soil. We monitor the sunlight. We adjust the water. We work to enhance the environment so the plant can thrive. But with children, sometimes we have this turned around—we expect a new baby to adapt to the environment, even if she’s clearly not doing well in it.

Little ones who learn to rely on themselves for comfort and safety become guarded teenagers who are hard to reach.

unprotected children appear overly energetic or day-dreamy (dissociated) while they are at school or daycare. Hyperactivity or being tuned out is simply a way of regulating a frightened brain.

When you understand that your nervous system has been shaped by early, ongoing fear, and that your body is doing its job to protect you, it can be very empowering.

Your body is simply biologically wired in protective mode and responds very quickly, below your awareness, to anything that is a reminder of childhood abuse.

Third-Degree Mother Hunger, there is no body-based experience of comfort or safety, because the person designed to be our source of comfort became our source of fear.

Since you are adapted to danger, situations that would frighten a regular person don’t raise a red flag for you.

Your personality developed to survive your mother’s lack of care.

it’s time to stop reaching for your mother, rest your weary soul, and grieve what is lost.

Healing comes from facing your fear, from being present with the wounded parts of you that your mother didn’t see and couldn’t tolerate.

As you work to replace lost nurturance, protection, and guidance, remember that this is an ongoing process. You’re building a new brain, and like any new routine, it takes time before you feel the results. Please don’t do all this by yourself. You’ve been alone long enough. Your body is designed for well-being, but we are relational creatures and we need connection with others. Healing Mother Hunger brings you home—home to yourself—but it’s really helpful when you have a village around your home.

Solace for Mother Hunger is in the natural world. Nurture and protect her so she can nurture and protect you. Plant things, tidy your closet, eat food that nourishes your spirit. Tend to your heartache and befriend those who understand your journey. As you heal, rest when you are tired and afraid until you remember “there is nothing to fear.”