Hope and Help For Life's Most Challenging Task
This blog has been created to encourage and support parents who desire healthy, happy families. It is our hope that on the pages of this blog you will find wise advice, practical tools and most importantly inspiration to persevere in "life's most challenging" and also most rewarding task.
Mother-Daughter Duet, by Cheri Fuller and Ali Plum
ReplyDeleteI have just finished reading "Mother-Daughter Duet" by Cheri fuller and Ali Plum. The intended audience of this book is mothers of adult daughters, but I would include moms of teenage daughters as well. Cheri and Ali's gut honesty about their own relationship help the reader see the many pitfalls inherent in the mother/daughter relationship. Honestly, for a mother of a teenage daughter, it would be nice to see these coming and recognize them for what they are...relationship crushers and just "not go there." I can tell you this: It sure would have been nice to have some of this wisdom earlier in my life with by daughters, and I can promise you they would have been thrilled and thankful as well. As you read, it becomes very clear that the purpose of their book is to help other moms and daughters either find a healthier relationship or escape going down some well-worn unhealthy paths.
Cheri and Ali have walked through many of the problems they address in this book, so they speak not only with wisdom, but also with compassion and humility. This is no "Do what I tell you" kind of book, rather it is a mother and daughter who have found victory in this sensitive area of regaining a loving and close mother/daughter relationship and have a heart to help others.
Throughout the chapters there are wonderful bits of wisdom that you can use to begin healing in your own relationship right away. I love this kind of practical advice. Chapters include: "Letting Go," "Generational Differences," "Respect and Belief," "Connecting and Bonding," "Are You Going to Church, Honey?" and "The Power of Forgiveness."
I learned about what it can do to a daughter to always hear she is being "prayed for." I found out that constantly relating her experiences to mine, minimizes hers and causes the opposite of the close relationship I desire. And the truth that her spiritual journey is just that...hers...and that I can trust the God who created her to lead her just as He led me was a freeing moment. (It really is exhausting to be everyone's Holy Spirit.)
I would highly recommend this book to all mothers of older daughters. It will give you hope if your relationship with your daughter is not where you would like it to be, as well as help give wise advice to those moms who haven't quite gotten to the "letting go" phase of their parenting. Cheri Fuller and Ali Plum have given to mothers of daughters a great gift in their book "Mother-Daughter Duet."