Mommy Issues, Greta Gerwig and Defining Ourselves Through Family

The 2000s and early 2010s was a period defined by the term ‘daddy issues’: Look at any teen drama and there it’ll be, from Elena Gilbert’s uncle/father fiasco in The Vampire Diaries, to Aria’s intensely inappropriate relationship with Ezra in Pretty Little Liars. It became a new way to objectify and sexualise women providing quote-unquote ‘justification’ for culture’s love of the damaged woman, someone who was easy, carefree, and loved a bad boy guaranteed to disappoint her father.

In contrast, the turn of the 2020s brought on a new era: ‘mommy issues’. The concept rose to prominence in books like Normal People and the cinematic work of Greta Gerwig. While women in the real world are repeatedly and misogynistically reduced to baby-makers, for the first time in the mainstream, popular media explores what it means to be a mother and in turn to be the daughter of a mother.

Gerwig’s Lady Bird is more than simply a love letter to Sacramento, where Gerwig grew up, but an ode to the titular character’s mother Marion. Watching Lady Bird for the first time is a uniquely painful experience for many, because coming of age in a Gerwig film is to become a self-aware daughter. It’s easy as a viewer to pass judgement on the characters: Lady Bird for her self-centred, demanding arrogance and Marion for her nit-picking and near-constant criticism, but it’s a rare example of a film that never passes blame, particularly on its female subjects.

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Instead, it's a painful reminder that love is a source of pain, especially in maternal relationships. Despite writing ‘fuck you mom’ on her arm cast, Lady Bird/Christine is constantly demanding Marion’s love and attention. Early on, Christine dejectedly says to her best friend Julie: “your mom really likes you,” a demand she makes of Marion when trying on prom dresses with the iconic “I just wish that you liked me” line. The tension caused by Marion’s “of course I love you,” confirms Christine’s fears that she is unlikeable, while reaffirming Marion’s inability to empathise with Christine.

This is the Sisyphean nightmare of Gerwig’s daughters: an uphill battle for unconditional love in which fucking up, and being criticised for fucking up, is unavoidable. Christine’s eternal damnation is that disappointing Marion is an inevitability, encompassing every aspect of life, from criticising how her eggs have been cooked, to disdain over spending thanksgiving with her boyfriend’s family.

These relationships are defined by their sacrifices. Barbie’s mother-figure Ruth Handler says: “We mothers stand still so our daughters can look back to see how far they have come.” While there is an ongoing debate over the validity of this statement, the idea inspires resentment in both parties regardless: Mothers constantly declaring “everything we do is for you” while simultaneously stifling their children’s independence of thought, while daughters carry the guilt of having stunted their mother’s self-development and providing disappointment in return.

“If mommy issues stem from anything, it is a culture that only views mothers as a singularity over the individual women occupying maternal roles.”

Similarly, Jo March’s internalised anguish comes from her inability to make up the shortfall of her mother’s sacrifice for her four daughters. The mutual love and respect between mother and daughter gets translated into self hatred: a fear of never measuring up to the other’s perceived success. Jo’s insecurities reach their peak after her younger sister Amy suffers an ice-skating accident under her watch. Yet her mother reassures her in the only way a mother can, telling Jo “You remind me of myself.” 

One of the most gut-wrenching scenes in Barbie is the home footage playing over Billie Eilish’s soundtrack contribution What Was I Made For? While Barbie’s answer is a bit more existential, a lot of women can relate to the sense of motherhood, and daughterhood, being so strongly intertwined with female identity. Within America Ferrera’s feminist monologue, Ferrera notes the contradiction inherent in embracing the maternal instinct: “You’re supposed to love being a mother, but don’t talk about your kids all the damn time.” 

If mommy issues stem from anything, it is a culture that only views mothers as a singularity over the individual women occupying maternal roles. In reducing a woman to this title, there is little left of personal identity for mothers, which puts immense pressure on the daughter to live up to high standards. 

In remembering our mothers as women also prone to insecurity, worry and self doubt, adverse to the “strong matriarch” stereotype that surrounds motherhood, we can further unpack the complicated relationship that exists between two women bound by a parental bond. Gerwig presents itself in small gestures, like Marion’s re-writing of the letter to Christine out of fear that “[she’d] judge her writing abilities.” 

Perhaps the most integral part of motherhood is Larry’s (Christine’s dad) response to Christine asking if her mum hates her. Larry says: “She doesn’t know how to help you and it frustrates her” epitomising the complex expectations that result in this pressure-cooker of mother-daughter relationships, in which the mother grows frustrated at being unable to fulfil her gendered role.

While Christine is desperate to impress her mother and make her proud with lofty ambitions of going to NYU, or acting in the school play, Marion is distracted by her own attempts to impress her daughter, as a breadwinner, as a nurse and most of all in her role as a mother.

Lady Bird’s final ‘Immaculate Heart’ setting seems symbolic of mother-daughter relationships as Christine and her mother both hold an almost religious reverence for the other, being doomed to stumble and self-criticise as the women begin to believe that all they can do is disappoint.

All hope is not lost however, Gerwig seems eager to highlight the pride that can accompany motherhood too, while still sympathising with these pressures. Her character Babette in Noah Baumbach’s White Noise is shown as suffering from depression, despite the uncritical adoration she has for her children, proving that these are not mutually exclusive and being a good mother does not mean being faultless. 

These women are flawed. Mothers are flawed. But they are 3D, fully fleshed-out characters that many of us will recognise from our own lives. And for once, this does not condemn them. It doesn’t make them bad mothers or bad daughters. Gerwig has humanised them, expanding what it means to be a woman, whether they want a family like Meg March, they want to balance motherhood alongside a career like Gloria, or are simply content alone like Jo March.

Words: Colette Fountain