Mommy Issues In Women (and how to fix them)

Mommy issues in women refer to emotional challenges or behavioral patterns stemming from a complex or troubled relationship with their mother, potentially affecting their adult relationships and self-perception.

Mothers are often the primary caregivers. These early experiences influence a girl’s attachment style, which can shape her life as a child and her relationships as an adult.

Mommy issues can manifest differently, and everyone’s experience is unique.

A person’s challenges are also not usually the result of one factor but a combination of different things, such as life experiences, trauma, peer interactions, and other family dynamics.

However, the mother-daughter relationship is powerful. Some common signs may indicate mommy issues in women.

The unique bond between mothers and daughters

Mothers are often their daughters’ first female role models and thus teach them what it means to be a woman.

Several behaviors can affect a girl’s emotional and social development. A mother might constantly criticize her own appearance, have an unhealthy relationship with food, or tolerate disrespectful behavior. She might also reinforce traditional gender roles or compete with her daughter.

Attachment Styles and Mommy Issues

Attachment theory explains why. A child’s earliest experiences with a caregiver shape what she expects from relationships and from herself (Bowlby, 1969, 1988). Because mothers are usually the primary caregiver, that early template can carry into adult relationships.

Where care was inconsistent, unavailable or frightening, an insecure attachment style can develop and persist into adulthood. Researchers describe three main patterns.

Anxious attachment tends to follow inconsistent mothering, with warmth alternating with coldness or unavailability (Ainsworth et al., 1978).

The child learns to seek reassurance constantly. In adulthood, this can mean craving intimacy while fearing rejection.

Avoidant attachment tends to follow a mother who was emotionally or physically unavailable, authoritarian or overbearing (Ainsworth et al., 1978). The child copes by avoiding closeness. As an adult, she may find it hard to trust others or express emotion.

Disorganized attachment tends to follow abuse or highly inconsistent care (Main & Solomon, 1986). Adults may swing between anxiety and avoidance, wanting intimacy while fearing it. The result can be intense, unstable relationships.

Recent research supports the link. A study followed 705 people from infancy to around age 30. It used repeated assessments of relationship quality, not adults’ memories of childhood.

Warmer, more sensitive mother-child relationships with less conflict predicted more secure attachment across every adult relationship studied (Dugan et al., 2026). Father-child quality showed far fewer consistent links. It is a single cohort, so it still awaits replication.

Signs and Symptoms of Mommy Issues in Women

Mommy issues are not a clinical diagnosis, so these are common signs rather than formal symptoms. Each is explained in its own section below.

• Negative body image: Criticism of her weight or looks, or a mother’s own body talk, can erode how she sees herself.
• Low self-esteem: Conditional love can leave her feeling never good enough and always seeking validation.
• Feeling unworthy of love: A critical, neglectful or abusive mother can instill the belief that she is unlovable.
• Fear of abandonment: She may become clingy and preoccupied, or emotionally distant and avoidant.
• Emotional expression: She may struggle to open up or be vulnerable, fearing she will seem dramatic or a burden.
• Boundaries: She may find it hard to say no, state her needs or recognize disrespect.
• Excessive independence: She may refuse help and believe that needing others is weak.
• Self-identity: She may struggle to define herself apart from her mother and to make her own decisions.
• Perfectionism: She may hold impossible standards for herself and others, with an intense fear of failure.
• Other women: She may see women as threats, or seek out replacement mother figures.
• Parenting: She may fear repeating her mother’s mistakes, or overcompensate with her own children.
• Mental health: Maltreatment can contribute to depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress.

1. Negative body image

If a mother constantly criticizes her daughter’s weight, appearance, or clothes, it can slowly chip away at her body image.

A woman may become preoccupied with her appearance and constantly feel inadequate if her mother encourages unrealistic beauty standards or speaks negatively about her own body.

In some cases, this can also lead to eating disorders.

For example, a recently coined phrase “almond mom” describes a mother who encourages unhealthy eating advice and habits in her daughter to keep her skinny.

The phrase comes from a clip of Yolanda Hadid, the mother of model Gigi Hadid. Gigi felt faint after “eating like half an almond today.” Her mother told her to “eat a few almonds and chew them really well.”

2. Low self-esteem and seeking validation

If a mother’s love and approval are conditional on her daughter’s achievements and behaviors, her self-esteem and confidence may diminish.

She may never feel good enough and constantly seek external validation from other people in real life and on social media.

It can manifest as negative self-talk like “I’m stupid” or “I’m so ugly”. She may dwell on mistakes. Much of the time, she feels like a failure.

Low self-esteem has many possible causes. On its own, it is not a reliable sign of mommy issues.

3. Feeling unworthy of love

A mother who is very critical, neglectful, or abusive may instill the belief in her daughter that she is unworthy of love.

As a result, she might constantly seek validation or isolate herself to avoid rejection. 

She might become clingy and jealous, pick fights, or be emotionally avoidant.

By behaving this way, she subconsciously pushes partners away. This confirms her fear that she’s unworthy of love, like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

4. Fear of abandonment

Like the above, a woman might fear abandonment and rejection. She experienced it with her mother.

She might become clingy and preoccupied with relationships (aligned with an anxious attachment) or become emotionally distant and avoidant (aligned with an avoidant attachment).

For example:

• Clingy: she might call and text her partner throughout the day and get very upset if he doesn’t reply immediately.
• Avoidant: she might frequently cancel dates at the last minute or shut down conversations about commitment.

Mommy issues can also steer partner choice. People often gravitate toward partners who resemble their mother, even when that relationship was hard, because the familiar can feel “right.”

This can mean choosing emotionally unavailable partners, or partners who need fixing or constant caretaking. Some women recreate dynamics such as codependency or emotional distance. Others unconsciously seek a partner who resembles their mother, hoping to resolve old conflicts.

5. Difficulties with emotional expression and being vulnerable

If a mother is very critical, dismisses her daughter’s feelings, or is inconsistent or unpredictable, it can affect the daughter’s ability to open up. It can make vulnerability in relationships harder.

She might become emotionally distant and avoid intimacy and vulnerability in relationships, struggling to express her feelings openly.

For example, a mom constantly shut down her daughter’s attempts at talking about her feelings, saying things like “You’re so dramatic”.

As a result, this woman struggles to express her emotions in relationships as she’s worried it would be seen as dramatic or a burden.

6. Struggling with boundaries

A woman with mommy issues may struggle with establishing and maintaining boundaries. This may manifest in the following ways:

• Difficulties saying no and asserting herself
• Feeling uncomfortable when expressing her needs and limits
• Tolerating partners and friends who are controlling or disrespectful because her sense of normal is distorted
• Being overly attached and clingy in relationships (no strong sense of separation between “I” and “you”)

7. Excessive independence

As a way to cope, a woman with mommy issues might become extremely independent, rejecting help and not allowing others to care for her.

While independence can be a good thing, it can sometimes prevent the formation of close and intimate relationships. 

For example, she might always feel like she has to prove herself and never be a “burden” on her mom, romantic partners, or friends.

She might see emotion and asking for help as weak. So she builds a wall. She pushes people away if they try to get close to her. 

8. Struggling with self-identity and individuation

In some mother-daughter dynamics, the mother is overly involved in her daughter’s life, doesn’t implement appropriate boundaries, and controls many aspects of her life.

As a result, the daughter might struggle to define herself outside of her relationship with her mother and have difficulty making independent decisions.

She might doubt her decisions, feel overly responsible for her mother, and feel guilty for wanting space.

9. Perfectionism and high standards for self and others

Some women with mommy issues internalize their mother’s unrealistically high standards in all aspects of life, from work to appearance to relationships.

They’re haunted by an intense fear of failure (of not receiving their mother’s and others’ approval) and often feel inadequate even when they have objectively succeeded.

They might hold others to these high standards as well. This can negatively impact relationships.

It can manifest as a need for control and order, difficulties delegating tasks, and criticizing others often.

10. Complex relationships with other women

Mommy issues can shape how a woman relates to other women. This can take several forms:

• Seeing women as threats: she may replicate the competitive dynamic she had with her mother. She might criticize other women, projecting her own insecurities onto them.
• Preferring men: she may struggle to form close bonds with women and feel more comfortable around men, whom she sees as less threatening or judgemental.
• Seeking replacement mothers: she may seek closeness with women who resemble her mother, such as a woman of similar age, and crave their approval to fill the maternal void.

For example, a woman might feel drawn to her warm, supportive college professor. She might seek her out often, ask for her advice and try to build a connection. She is subconsciously hoping to fill the void left by her own mother.

11. Difficulties parenting her own children

Some women with mommy issues worry about repeating their own mother’s mistakes. This can play out in three ways:

• Avoiding parenthood: some women don’t want children out of fear of repeating the same mistakes their own mom made.
• Repeating the pattern: mommy issues can lead a woman to unintentionally repeat the same patterns with her own children.
• Overcompensating: she might do the opposite and be overly attentive or fearful. Unresolved issues can fuel parenting anxiety and lead her to project insecurities onto her child.

For example, a woman may constantly worry that her baby isn’t sleeping or eating enough. She might believe she’s a bad mother, which is parenting anxiety.

Or if her own mom was a workaholic, she might feel she has to spend excessive time with her own kids. That is hovering, a result of projecting her own insecurities.

12. Mental health issues

Maternal abuse, neglect, or other forms of maltreatment can have a lasting impact on a woman’s mental health.

Low self-esteem, attachment issues, and not learning how to regulate difficult emotions can contribute to the development of mental health issues, such as depression or anxiety.

In severe cases of neglect and abuse, a woman may develop forms of post-traumatic stress disorder. 

What Causes Mommy Issues in Women?

Mommy issues rarely have a single cause. Every mother-daughter relationship is different, but some experiences recur.

Neglect, Abuse, and Absence

Physical or emotional neglect can lead to a fear of abandonment and dependence, and a belief that her feelings do not matter. It can also feed low self-esteem. One reader describes it like this:

“My mom was physically present, but I always felt like she was disconnected emotionally… I never felt like my feelings mattered.”

Abuse is another route. Psychological, physical, emotional or sexual abuse can have significant long-term effects. These include attachment insecurity, mental health difficulties, substance-use problems and a struggle to live a fulfilling life.

Absence matters too. A mother who was absent, left the family or died young can leave a child with lasting feelings of abandonment and loss.

Attachment difficulties, mental health or substance-use problems and an enduring sense of loss may follow.

Controlling and Emotionally Immature Mothers

Several maternal patterns recur:

• Emotional immaturity: a mother who is emotionally immature may have mood swings, unpredictable reactions and little empathy, which makes it harder for her daughter to express her feelings.
• Enmeshment: a mother who ignores boundaries and exerts excessive control makes it hard for her daughter to build an identity apart from her.
• Criticism and high expectations: constant criticism and impossible standards can leave a daughter feeling inadequate, fueling perfectionism and a search for approval that never feels satisfied.
• Mental health or substance misuse: these can strain a mother’s ability to provide a stable, nurturing home, even without malicious intent.
• Narcissism: a narcissistic mother who is controlling, belittling, competitive or unpredictable can damage her daughter’s self-worth and ability to form healthy relationships.

One reader recalls an enmeshed mother who “read my journals and always wanted to know everything I was doing… I felt guilty all the time.”

Parentification and Generational Patterns

Parentification is when a child takes on an adult caregiving role, such as caring for a depressed or unwell mother or younger siblings.

It can bring chronic anxiety, relationship difficulties, identity confusion and codependency.

A survey of 448 Turkish university students tested this. Caregiving directed at a parent was only weakly related to depression (r = .09) and somewhat more to anxiety (r = .18). The link ran largely through toxic relationship styles in adulthood (Gavcar & Gavcar, 2026).

The study has limits. It used a convenience sample of business students, relied on recall and could not show cause. It also measured caregiving for parents in general, not mothers specifically.

Family patterns also pass down. A mother may repeat behaviors she learned from her own parents when she has not healed her own wounds.

Evidence Check: Does the Research Back This Up?

Verdict: Mixed or contested.

Research agrees on two points. Attachment security is moderately stable across childhood. A mother’s own attachment pattern also predicts her child’s.

Researchers disagree on whether early security still predicts attachment 15 or more years later. “Mommy issues” is a popular label, and no study tests it directly.

Two meta-analyses test whether security lasts. Fraley (2002) read his results as early patterns being retained. Pinquart, Feußner, and Ahnert (2013) read theirs as later experience modifying those patterns. The two reviews read overlapping data differently.

Here is what the studies found:

• Stable early on: Fraley (2002) found moderate stability across the first 19 years of life. Pinquart et al. (2013) pooled 127 papers and found r = .39.
• Fading over time: stability was r = .20 for 60 to 180 months and r = .14 (not significant) beyond 180 months. That estimate was too imprecise to rule out a long-term effect.
• Passed on from mothers: Verhage et al. (2016) pooled 95 samples (total N = 4,819). They found r = .31 for secure-autonomous and r = .21 for unresolved representations.
• Sensitivity explains part: both figures were smaller than an earlier synthesis reported (van IJzendoorn, 1995), and maternal sensitivity did not fully explain the link.

What does this mean? Early caregiving matters, but the evidence does not show that a difficult mother fixes a woman’s adult relationships.

These studies measured attachment security in infants and children, not the quality of mothering or adult relationships. They bear on the wider story only by inference.

How women can resolve mommy issues

Resolving mommy issues, or issues and insecurities stemming from a difficult relationship between a mother and daughter, takes time and patience.

It’s often helpful to seek professional help as it can be difficult to fully understand these conflicts and insecurities and resolve them alone.

The research is encouraging. Attachment patterns are not fixed for life.

• Earned security: adults who reflect coherently on a difficult childhood (called earned secure) show relationship and parenting functioning statistically indistinguishable from adults secure throughout (Roisman et al., 2002).
• Ongoing relationships: in a study following participants from mid-adolescence into their late twenties, positive romantic interactions at 25 predicted greater attachment security at 27 (Dinero et al., 2008).
• Therapy: a meta-analysis of emotionally focused couple therapy, which works on attachment-related fears, found a large average effect size, largely maintained at two-year follow-up (Spengler et al., 2024).

Alongside professional help, there are things a woman can do to start healing her mommy issues:

General Strategies for Healing Mommy Issues

There is no single path, because every mother-daughter relationship is different. These strategies run through most approaches:

• Build self-awareness: reflect or journal about your relationship with your mother and the patterns that echo it in your adult life.
• Explore the emotions: look at the feelings and triggers underneath, ideally with a trusted person or professional, because this can be triggering.
• Educate yourself: learn about mommy issues, attachment styles and mother-child relationships.
• Set boundaries: if the relationship continues, tailor limits to the behaviors that distress you. State them firmly, clearly and consistently, and expect some pushback.
• Practice forgiveness and acceptance: do this where appropriate, as a process aimed at your own relief rather than excusing what happened.
• Prioritize self-care: look after your physical, emotional and mental wellbeing through rest, movement, connection and activities that restore balance.

Advice more specific to women

Some advice is more specific to women. It is general, so it might not apply to everyone, but you might find parts of it useful. Three areas are covered below:

• Societal and cultural expectations: how to challenge the “ideal” mother-daughter relationship and the “good daughter” myth.
• Your inner (maternal) critic: how to spot your mother’s voice in your self-talk and reframe it.
• Independence from your mother: how to untangle enmeshment, set boundaries and build your own identity.

Societal and cultural expectations

Societal and cultural expectations of women can sometimes exacerbate mommy issues for several reasons.

Society often portrays the ideal mother-daughter relationship as close, nurturing, and built on unconditional love.

Women without this kind of relationship with their mothers can find it very difficult. They may feel they’re missing out. Some feel they have failed.

Culture also expects women to be nurturing and selfless. This can pressure daughters to put their mother’s needs first, a belief known as the “good daughter” myth.

They might feel obligated to prioritize their mothers and keep the relationship good. That can make it hard to set boundaries and live independently.

Tips for overcoming societal and cultural expectations

These social scripts are often deeply rooted and difficult to overcome, especially if you’re not aware of them. However, building awareness and challenging these expectations can lift some of the pressure.

• Spot the clashing messages: notice ideas about being a woman or daughter that clash with your experience. If your mom wasn’t nurturing, pressure to be nurturing might feel inauthentic.
• Redefine your role: challenge these expectations and decide what being a woman or daughter means to you, based on your values.
• Find your voice: practice assertive communication when comments or messages push you to conform to these norms.
• Accept imperfection: every mother-daughter relationship is different. Celebrate the good parts, such as a mom who is critical but supports your education or work.
• Connect with others: seek out women with similar experiences and learn from women who don’t follow traditional stereotypes.

Challenge your inner (maternal) critic

Mothers can play a significant role in shaping a daughter’s self-esteem and body image through comments and behaviors.

Negative messages about appearance and the mother’s own relationship to her body can have a lasting impact on a woman’s confidence.

1. Pay attention to your self-talk: what does your inner critic say? What tone and words does it use? Can you hear your mom in this voice?
2. Challenge the narrative: are those thoughts true or helpful? Are they based on facts?
3. Reframe: try to reframe the criticism into something more useful. For example, instead of saying “I’m a failure”, try to say, “I’m learning, and I’ll try again next time.”
4. Treat yourself with kindness: would you speak to a friend this way? If not, use the same kindness and understanding you would offer them.
5. Focus on strengths: Make a list of your strengths, talents, and accomplishments. Stick it somewhere you can see it and read it daily to remind yourself of your successes.
6. Embrace your imperfections: everyone makes mistakes. Learn to accept yourself and where you are on your journey. You can strive for self-improvement while still loving yourself as you are.
7. Seek support: While you can practice a lot of these techniques alone, it might be good to seek the support of a therapist so they can help you along this journey.
8. Set boundaries: If your mom still criticizes you or makes comments about your appearance, it’s probably important to set boundaries.

Gain independence from your mother

Blurred boundaries (or enmeshment) are also more common between mothers and their daughters. This can result in the daughter having difficulty developing her own sense of identity apart from her mother. 

She might feel overly responsible for her mother and experience guilt for seeking independence.

Clinical psychologist Ramani Durvasula calls this the “mother wound.” As she explains in her talk How Can You HEAL the MOTHER/FATHER Wound?, it is not an official construct. It is popular shorthand for insecure attachment and intergenerational patterns.

In her view, a wounding mother is not attuned to her child. She keeps poor boundaries and may expect her daughter to act as “her friend and her shrink.” Durvasula argues that healing needs a coherent narrative. It separates your own worth from a parent’s behavior.

1. Identify signs of enmeshment: reflect on your relationship with your mother. Are there signs like emotional fusion, oversharing, lack of individual identity, or codependency?
2. Acknowledge the feelings that arise: Identify the emotions that come up when you think about your relationship. Frustration, anger, sadness, or guilt are all valid.
3. Set boundaries: start small, with clear limits like set call times or off-limits topics. Tell your mom why boundaries help you keep a healthy relationship.
4. Practice saying no: learn to say no politely but assertively.
5. Focus on you: explore who you are outside of your relationship with your mom. What are your interests, goals, and dreams? How can you achieve those?
6. Expand your social circle: make new friends by pursuing hobbies or joining groups.
7. Seek professional support: you can do a lot alone, but a dependent relationship is hard to untangle solo. A therapist can teach assertive communication and boundary-setting and help build self-esteem.

Remember that healing takes time and patience. Don’t expect things to change overnight.

There might be setbacks and obstacles, but if you keep working on them, you’ll start seeing small changes that eventually lead to bigger changes.

It’s a journey and you’ll learn many new things about yourself on the way. Always make time for self-care and never hesitate to ask for support.

References

Ainsworth, M. D. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: A psychological study of the strange situation. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent-child attachment and healthy human development. Basic Books.

Dinero, R. E., Conger, R. D., Shaver, P. R., Widaman, K. F., & Larsen-Rife, D. (2008). Influence of family of origin and adult romantic partners on romantic attachment security. Journal of Family Psychology, 22(4), 622–632. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0012506

Dugan, K. A., Kunkel, J. J., Fraley, R. C., Simpson, J. A., McCormick, E. M., Bleil, M. E., Booth-LaForce, C., & Roisman, G. I. (2026). A prospective longitudinal study of the associations between childhood and adolescent interpersonal experiences and adult attachment orientations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 130(2), 260–290. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000502

Fraley, R. C. (2002). Attachment stability from infancy to adulthood: Meta-analysis and dynamic modeling of developmental mechanisms. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 6(2), 123–151. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327957pspr0602_03

Gavcar, E. G., & Gavcar, E. (2026). When caring becomes a burden: Childhood parentification and its links to relationship styles, depression, and anxiety in young adults. BMC Psychology, 14(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-026-04136-x

Main, M., & Solomon, J. (1986). Discovery of an insecure-disorganized/disoriented attachment pattern. In T. B. Brazelton & M. W. Yogman (Eds.), Affective development in infancy (pp. 95–124). Ablex.

Pinquart, M., Feußner, C., & Ahnert, L. (2013). Meta-analytic evidence for stability in attachments from infancy to early adulthood. Attachment & Human Development, 15(2), 189–218. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616734.2013.746257

Roisman, G. I., Padrón, E., Sroufe, L. A., & Egeland, B. (2002). Earned-secure attachment status in retrospect and prospect. Child Development, 73(4), 1204–1219. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00467

Spengler, P. M., Lee, N. A., Wiebe, S. A., & Wittenborn, A. K. (2024). A comprehensive meta-analysis on the efficacy of emotionally focused couple therapy. Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice, 13(2), 81–99. https://doi.org/10.1037/cfp0000233

van IJzendoorn, M. H. (1995). Adult attachment representations, parental responsiveness, and infant attachment: A meta-analysis on the predictive validity of the Adult Attachment Interview. Psychological Bulletin, 117(3), 387–403. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.117.3.387

Verhage, M. L., Schuengel, C., Madigan, S., Fearon, R. M. P., Oosterman, M., Cassibba, R., Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J., & van IJzendoorn, M. H. (2016). Narrowing the transmission gap: A synthesis of three decades of research on intergenerational transmission of attachment. Psychological Bulletin, 142(4), 337–366. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000038