Maternal Ambivalence: The Loving Moments & Bitter Truths of Motherhood

Picture yourself as a young mother with a three-year-old daughter and a newborn at the playground. In the moment you've turned to the diaper bag, your toddler disappears--at first, all you can feel is terror, and then instinctively you look up--and there she is at the top of the slide, looking so proud of herself. At this moment, you might find yourself deluged with conflicting feelings, including anger and relief and resentment and gratitude and fear and even flashes of hate--you told her to wait for you before running off. You're overwhelmed by these colliding feelings--including the waves of guilt and self-blame you feel for all the fuss when everything has turned out just fine. This is the experience of maternal ambivalence.

In Maternal Ambivalence, Dr. Margo Lowy explores the complex emotional landscape of mothering and the taboo issue of maternal ambivalence, arguing that it's actually these darker feelings that most powerfully fuel our love for our children--in fact, they are the key to being a mother. Confronting the many moods of motherhood, using them to understand ourselves and our children better, and learning the language of ambivalence strengthens our love and leads to its own reward: maternal wisdom.

Throughout her narrative, Dr. Lowy offers case studies from her professional practice, cultural examples from classic and contemporary literature and film, and anecdotes from her own experience of mothering children born over three separate decades. Maternal Ambivalence both overturns the long-held, secretive misunderstandings of mothering, and reshapes the maternal language of love and self-acceptance with a transformative, invaluable new point of view.