Blaming Our Mothers, Blaming Ourselves: Women's Accounts of Childhood Abuse and Disruption

Abstract

This article examines the ways in which women who have suffered childhood abuse or disruption explain the breakdown in their relationship with their parents, and the extent to which their attributions of responsibility are influenced by expectations of `normal' parenting and family life. The women `s accounts are analysed in terms of the attributions of responsibility which women make for the disruption in their relations/zips, and the factors which they see as valid in mitigating maternal and paternal responsibility. It is argued that in attempting to come to terms with their experiences the women draw heavily on constructions of parenting and family life which represent the normal family as a private haven in which heterosexual relationships are viewed as both natural and unproblematic and in which women assume primary responsibility for the well-being of the family. It is also argued that this representation of family life leads women to blame and to distance themselves from their mothers, and thus leaves them unable to come to terms with their own disadvantage as women.