When a mother can’t see her son as an individual, she will have a problem with him living his own life. Her purpose, as far as she is concerned, will be to be there for her and attend to her needs.

Still, this is not to say that this is something she will be aware of. Still, this is what her words and behavior will make clear.

taking a step back

There is a chance that this is not something she has pondered or questioned if she is behaving in a healthy way. Until this happens, there will be no reason for her to change her behavior.

Behaving this way will only be what you feel comfortable with and it will continue to happen until something happens. This could show that she is not very reflective and perhaps she is someone who is quite closed off.

very little resistance

However, since her son will be a man, not a boy, it could be said that it won’t matter what his mother wants, as he will be able to stand up for himself. He will be a man, but it is highly unlikely that he will feel strong and capable.

So while you should have the ability to stand your ground with your mother and make it clear that you’re not on this planet to serve her, this probably won’t happen. Instead, he is likely to go along with what his mother wants and do what she can to meet her needs.

Powerless

He will not have ties to him, but it may be as if he does and his mother will pull on these ties. He may not care what he’s doing, so if her mother needs him, he could stop what he’s doing and head over to her.

It will be an individual and it will be in the center of its own world, but it will be as if it is simply an extension of it. It may not even occur to you that you are neglecting yourself.

The foundations were laid

If you had received what you needed to receive during your formative years, you would not be in this position. However, since he didn’t do it, he will look like a man but he won’t have gone through the stages of development that he needed to go through to be one.

As a result of this, you will see yourself as a separate being but on an emotional level, you will be in a symbiotic state. In order for him to get past this stage and emotionally separate from his mother, he needed to receive adequate nourishment from both his mother and his father.

Dwarf

Since this did not happen, your physical and mental body would have grown but your emotional body/self would not have. Another way of looking at this would be to say that she had a physical birth but not an emotional birth.

The former would have provided him with a vessel with which to have a human experience, while the latter would have provided him with the sense of self that would allow him to embrace this experience. So, since this did not happen, it is likely that he is totally disconnected from himself and therefore unaware of the fact that he is not living his own life.

an external approach

During her early years, she would have had to concentrate on her mother’s needs; he would have had no choice. This would have meant losing contact with his true self and automatically creating a false self that would have allowed him to survive.

He would have become very good at tuning in to his mother’s needs and not very good at tuning in to his own. Ignoring his needs and concentrating on his mother’s needs would have ended up being what he felt comfortable with from the beginning and that is why he will feel comfortable now.

shame-based identity

Because of what happened so soon, you probably believe that your needs are inherently bad. He could believe that if he expressed his needs, he would be rejected and/or abandoned.

Neglecting yourself won’t do you any good, but deep down, it will be seen as the only way to survive. You are likely in a lot of raw emotional pain and trauma, and since your development is stunted, your survival will not have been internalized; he will still be attached to his mother.

all in the sea

If his mother was able to reflect on the fact that her son is not an extension of her and is an individual, it does not mean that she would encourage him to live his own life. Just the thought of doing this could make her very uncomfortable.

This could be a time where you end up feeling emotionally unstable and experience a great deal of fear and panic. So, in order to settle down, she will want to make sure that her child continues to focus on her and not live her own life.

going deeper

What this probably shows is that she, too, is in an underdeveloped state, which is why she would have used her son for her needs very early on and continues to do so. Most likely, one of her caretakers also used her to meet her needs and this would have prevented her from developing a strong sense of self and starting the individuation process.

So it wasn’t that she consciously did everything possible to prevent her son from developing; it was that she was trying to keep her own bread at bay. Her childhood would have been very traumatic, leaving her empty and unable to offer much to her own child/children.

Awareness

How he was treated during his early years and continues to be treated is not personal; it’s just a sign that his mother wasn’t and still isn’t in a good way. Ergo, there is nothing inherently wrong with him or his needs.

If a man can relate to this and is ready to change his life, he may need to seek outside support. This is something that can be provided with the support of a therapist or healer.