I Was Younger Than My Daughter When I Lost My Mother
My daughter is 21 months old. She needs me almost every minute of the day.
She wraps herself around my legs while I make dinner one-handed. She watches me load the dishwasher as I dance around her to keep her entertained. She reaches for my hand while I answer emails, asking to be seen, to be held, to be met with presence.
And I do it—I meet her where she is.
Because not long ago, I had a quiet but shattering realization:
I was younger than she is now when I lost my connection with my own mother.
At 18 months old, a new baby arrived. My parents were overwhelmed—one child in the NICU, others needing rides to baseball practice, a divorce complicating relationships. Suddenly I was told I was a “big girl.” I was handed a diaper bag and expected to soothe myself. My feelings were too much. My needs, too inconvenient.
When I was 18 months old, carrying around a diaper bag that was bigger than me, I dislocated my collarbone as my mom tried to yank me out of a rain puddle. Around that same time, I was attacked by a relative’s dog—something my parents barely talked about. I was terrified of dogs for years, but the fear was glossed over. Later it was mentioned, almost casually, that in the chaos of that day, my mom could only grab one of us—and she grabbed the younger sibling. No one really checked in on how that felt for me.
No one held me through the pain. No one guided me through the storm of my emotions. And so, I began to disconnect from myself. I learned love had conditions. I learned my worth depended on how little I needed, how well I could perform strength. I started shaming myself for wanting more love, more cuddles, more care—because “big girls” don’t cry.
And the truth is—my mother wasn’t the only one who wasn’t there for me.
My father wasn’t emotionally present either.
He was loved by many, admired in public—but in private, he struggled in his relationships with his children and within his marriage. He required constant praise and validation, something he’s admitted himself. He confused his personal opinions with fact, and anyone who disagreed—especially within the family—was met with judgment, criticism, or religious condemnation.
He speaks of a God who loves unconditionally, but his arrows are always at the ready the moment his ego feels threatened—even when that “threat” is simply a reflection of himself in the mirror.
As a child, I didn’t feel emotionally safe with him. I didn’t share my secrets or my heart the way I did with my mother. So when my mother didn’t protect me, when she didn’t question the dysfunction—it felt like a deeper betrayal. I had hoped she would be different. I needed her to be.
And between both of them, I was left alone with my pain.
My dad often called me by my siblings’ names, like I was a blurred background character in the family. Once in high school, he came to speak in front of my history class and shared a story about a family trip to Washington, D.C.—saying, “Remember, Kate?” But I didn’t remember. I had never been on that trip. It was a trip he’d taken with my older siblings before I was even born. He didn’t even realize I wasn’t there—and now my peers, who already bullied me, watched as even my own father didn’t know where I belonged.
There was another moment—just as haunting—when he told me I should feel sorry for a cousin who bullied me because “all she has going for her is sex appeal.” Then added, “She looks like Britney Spears.” I still feel sick remembering that.
These moments might seem small to someone else, but to a child trying to feel seen, valued, protected—they compound. They erode your sense of self, your belief that you’re worthy of love simply because you exist.
And when I found out my mom’s father—my grandfather—was a pedophile, I did what any child would do. I turned to my father and asked for help. I asked not to be forced to attend family events where my abuser would be. I asked for protection. I asked for a boundary.
He declined.
He wouldn’t keep him out of the house. He wouldn’t stop attending the events. And worse—he would invite me to go, then spend the whole time laughing and chatting with my abuser over food, as if nothing had ever happened.
I felt so alone.
Not just because of what happened to me, but because no one stood up for me afterward. I was invisible even in my pain. Even in my plea for safety.
Now, I’m a mother.
An entrepreneur. A freelance writer. A full-time stay-at-home mom. I wear all of these hats out of necessity. Estrangement from my family of origin has eliminated the village I once thought I had.
But then I ask myself—
what kind of village punishes a child for needing love?
What kind of village protects the reputation of a pedophile instead of acknowledging the generational pain they’ve passed down?
I’m building a new village now, and it starts in my home—with how I show up for my daughter.
One day recently, my daughter reached up on the entertainment center to grab her coloring book. In that moment, my phone slipped and crashed hard on the wooden floor.
I was pissed.
I’d told her many times not to reach where she can’t see. And I was frustrated that my phone was now damaged—something I couldn’t easily replace. My voice started rising. My mind was filled with rageful thoughts like “You should get a time out,” or “Why did you do that?” But I didn’t say those things to her. She doesn’t even know what a time out is—and that’s a blessing she doesn’t need to carry. Instead, I stopped, took a deep breath, and apologized to her.
I said, “You shouldn’t reach up high, but I shouldn’t have put my phone there. It’s not your fault Mommy doesn’t always know how to handle big feelings. I’m working on getting better, and you deserve better.”
I took a few more breaths, feeling the tension ease.
And what happened next surprised me—she walked over, wrapped her arms around me, kissed my forehead, and told me she loved me.
I’m not a perfect mom. But I’m showing up.
And in showing up for her, I’m healing my inner child too.
She feels safe because I am the adult she needs—the mom she’s been looking for.
I recently held her through a difficult round of teething. Her canines were erupting. She cried out in pain for days, barely eating anything but cold smoothies. Even after giving her pain medicine, she’d wake up sobbing from the intensity. I didn’t shower. I didn’t get dressed. I just held her, sang to her, kept her cool, gave her bubble baths infused with salts to soothe her body and her nervous system. I made her space feel soft, safe, and sacred.
I didn’t punish her for crying—I encouraged her to release it in whatever way her little body needed.
Now, as her second molars come in—monstrously flat teeth that require her entire mouth to shift—I’m prepared. I know this pain. I’ve seen it. I’ve lived it.
And I see the deeper truth now:
When a doctor says to wait 18 months postpartum before getting pregnant again, it’s not just for the mother—it’s because the first child is still a baby.
Dr. Greer Kirshenbaum writes that a child’s brain is still in the infant stage until around age 3. That’s why they wake frequently, why they can’t self-soothe, why sleep training methods like “cry it out”—which 700 Danish psychologists just signed a petition against—can actually push a child into freeze or fight-or-flight. The brain may go quiet, but it isn’t calm. It’s coping.
And it makes me think again of Little Me.
Who was holding me while my brain was still forming?
Who helped me with my big feelings?
The answer is: no one.
I only realized this watching Ms. Rachel talk about emotions. She said: “Big feelings can be scary—even happy ones.” And it clicked.
Back then, I wasn’t just teething or scared of the dark.
I was overwhelmed by feelings I didn’t yet have the language for.
Now, I’m learning to speak that language.
I’m giving my daughter the love I never received.
And in doing so, I’m loving my inner child back to life.