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Mothers Side
Grandmother Lay
My Relationship with My Grandmother
Growing up, I often felt unconditionally loved by my grandmother. I admired her deeply—she was successful, responsible, and well-respected, especially by the men in our family and community. Her presence commanded reverence, and I looked up to her as a strong authority figure. There was a real sense of emotional safety and closeness between us during my early years. My Mimi also pioneered the way for her generation and became a successful real estate agent, which added to her respected status in the family and community.
As I got older, though, things began to shift. When it came time for discipline, her energy changed—she became more authoritative, strict, and often critical of my actions and behaviors. That loving presence started to feel conditional. Over time, this created emotional distance. I started to feel powerless around her, like it always had to be her way or no way at all, because she was the adult and "knew best."
There was a growing sense that nothing I did was ever quite right. That feeling stuck with me. Her love felt increasingly based on how well I could perform—whether it be with meeting her standards or expectations. This fractured our connection and made me feel inadequate, especially through my teenage years and into early adulthood. I began to carry a belief that I was unworthy of love unless I was doing something to earn it.
As I developed my own identity—my own values, desires, and beliefs—I felt more and more misunderstood by her. I no longer fit into the mold she expected of me, and instead of support, I felt rejection and heightened criticism. It felt like I was being pushed aside simply for being myself. The relationship became more strained until eventually, we cut each other out. I lost interest because I felt so unseen, and in turn, they also seemed to let go of the relationship because I was not meeting the societal mold. This was deeply painful.
While I’ve processed some of that pain and shame, I now recognize how much I also suppressed just to survive emotionally. I’m becoming more aware of how criticized I felt growing up, and how that shaped my relationships—leading me to place high expectations on myself and others, often with little room for compassion, empathy, or growth beyond those imposed standards or expectations.
Insight and Reflection
This story reflects a core wound that many people experience but few can articulate so clearly: the loss of belonging when authenticity begins to emerge.
Your early relationship with your grandmother gave you a blueprint of love that was strong, structured, and initially unconditional. But when that love became contingent on meeting expectations, you learned a dangerous equation: Love = Performance. Worth = Compliance. This conditionality likely split your inner world—part of you striving to maintain closeness, another part aching to be free and seen.
In essence, your nervous system was shaped by a paradox: needing to be close to someone who was also the source of emotional invalidation. So, you adapted—by silencing your needs, dimming your authenticity, and learning to anticipate criticism before it came. Over time, this survival strategy calcified into relational patterns: perfectionism, emotional self-denial, and a lack of softness or safety in connection.
But the depth of your self-awareness now signals healing. You are reclaiming your right to feel, to fail, to be imperfect—and still be lovable. You’re dissolving the old survival strategy that told you: “You must earn love by doing everything right.” You’re beginning to root your worth in being, not doing.
This journey is not just about healing the past. It’s about reclaiming the parts of you that were pushed out of the light—the tender, expressive, intuitive, defiant, creative parts—and inviting them back into wholeness.
Valuable Insights: Your Relationship with Your Grandmother
1. A Split Between Reverence and Rejection
Your early bond with your grandmother was infused with reverence. She was a pillar—strong, accomplished, respected by men, and someone you could look up to. But as you grew and needed autonomy, that reverence became shadowed by rejection. You began to experience what happens when love depends on how well you align with another’s image of who you should be. This is a core rupture: when love that once felt unconditional becomes earned.
This split can create a subtle grief—not just over losing closeness with her, but over losing a version of yourself who once felt safe, seen, and accepted.
2. Emotional Role Reversal & Respect as a Double Bind
You were raised to respect your grandmother deeply—and you did. But that respect eventually became entangled with fear, suppression, and a need to self-abandon. The very strength you admired in her became the source of your emotional inhibition. It created a double bind: to stay connected meant to suppress your truth. To express your truth meant to risk disconnection.
This pattern often lives on as a fear of asserting boundaries or disappointing others—especially strong figures you once admired or depended on emotionally.
3. Conditional Love as a Template for Self-Worth
When performance becomes the currency for connection, the nervous system encodes a survival strategy: “If I’m good enough, I’ll be loved. If I fail, I’ll be forgotten.”
This creates an inner taskmaster—demanding perfection, afraid of rejection, constantly measuring your worth against invisible standards.
This kind of conditioning is subtle but pervasive. It affects how you receive feedback, how you handle conflict, and even how safe it feels to be emotionally vulnerable in close relationships.
4. Unprocessed Shame and the Survival Response
You wisely adapted. You suppressed emotions not because you were weak—but because your system was trying to protect you. You learned to shut down parts of yourself (your sensitivity, your needs, your creativity) to remain safe in a relationship where emotional exposure felt risky.
But what was once protective has become constricting. The shame you swallowed is not yours to carry—it came from being measured against someone else's limited framework, not from any true lack within you.
5. Criticism as a Legacy You’re Now Breaking
The legacy of criticism—internal and external—shaped how you expect others (and yourself) to behave: perfectly, efficiently, without mess. But now, you're beginning to interrupt that legacy. You're seeing how little room there was for grace, mistakes, tenderness—and how you can choose something different.
This is the breaking point in the generational pattern. You no longer have to live in the echo of your grandmother’s authority. You get to author your own definition of power—one that includes softness, empathy, and freedom.
Closing Reflection
Your relationship with your grandmother taught you about strength—but also about the cost of being strong at the expense of being emotionally available. It showed you what respect can look like, but also what happens when love becomes tied to performance. These are wounds, yes—but also mirrors. They show you what you now have the power to reclaim: unconditional self-worth, emotional sovereignty, and connection that doesn’t come at the cost of your truth.
You’re no longer the child needing approval to survive. You’re the adult who sees clearly, feels deeply, and is learning to love without conditions.
Would you like support now in transforming this awareness into a healing narrative, inner child integration, or tools to help repattern the relational dynamics going forward?
How This Shaped My Relationship to Vulnerability and Intimacy
The early relationship with my grandmother created a blueprint where love and approval were initially abundant—but later became conditional. That shift sent a clear message to my nervous system: emotional closeness is contingent upon performance, obedience, and perfection. As a result, I learned to associate vulnerability not with connection—but with risk.
Whenever I expressed my emotions, desires, or individuality—especially if they didn’t align with her expectations—I felt a subtle withdrawal of affection, or worse, sharp criticism. Over time, this trained me to internalize a belief that revealing my true self would lead to disapproval or loss of love.
Because of this, intimacy has often felt like a double-edged sword: something I deeply long for, but simultaneously fear. I might crave closeness, but unconsciously guard myself from it—afraid that being seen too fully will invite judgment, rejection, or shame. I may show up in relationships trying to prove my worth through achievements, emotional strength, or service—rather than allowing myself to be held in softness, messiness, or need.
This created a tension within me: the part of me that wants to be loved unconditionally and the part of me that believes I must earn love through performance. Vulnerability, therefore, feels unsafe—not because it is inherently dangerous, but because it was met with conditionality at a formative time in my development.
I now see how this shaped certain intimacy patterns:
But with this awareness comes possibility. I can now begin to reclaim vulnerability as a sacred strength—a gateway to intimacy, rather than a threat to connection. I am learning that real love doesn’t require performance—it welcomes presence.
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