Even after marriage, he needed his mother’s approval for everything. And this is not an isolated case. At the beginning of a relationship, they can be extremely charming. According to psychologists, these men are very sensitive and emotional and understand the female soul. However, there is one catch, there will always be one and only woman in the first place – their mother, even when they mobilize and find a partner with whom to start a family. It is a phenomenon that is not unique even in our country. European statistics also indicate something. According to them, Slovaks leave home as the third oldest of all EU countries, just before turning 31. Only Croatians and Portuguese stay with their parents longer. Even Greeks and Italians are better than Slovaks. Some of them stay at home because housing is increasingly unaffordable, but this will probably not be the main reason. This trend has remained the same in our country for several years, almost the same figures were recorded in Slovakia in 2011. Young people do not want to leave the comfort of home, some of them do not even know how to detach themselves from their parents. “It’s as if my husband doesn’t even notice that we’re already married. He needs his mother’s approval for every decision,” Silvia from Bratislava tells Postoj about the problem that shakes the foundation of a young marriage. Silvia is a 32-year-old mother of a four-year-old daughter and a one-and-a-half-year-old son. She asked us to remain anonymous because, she says, she is still hoping that a miracle will happen and her husband will realize that he cannot submit his life to his mother at the expense of their family, and revealing her identity would certainly not help that. At first glance, everything seems to be idyllic. In the beginning, there was great love, the children arrived shortly after the wedding, Silvia is a satisfied mother who wants to stay at home with the children until the end of the parental leave, her husband manages to provide for the family without major problems. However, there is one big but, which destroys the joint married life, brings great tension to the relationship, and Silvia is afraid that she will not be able to endure such a situation for a long time. What is it about? Her husband is an only child, his parents live in a small town 30 kilometers from Bratislava. Both recently retired and are vital. They live in a family house with a small garden. Silvia considered it normal that her man went to help them on the weekend or stopped by their place sometimes after work even during the week. Her parents live on Orava, and as she says, if she could, she would also like to see them more often if they were closer. However, when she and her husband started living together after marriage, she took a closer look at their relationship and found out that they had a problem. He shares his normal life with his mother, not his wife “The husband consults his mother first about everything important. I will learn about everything as the second. He also confided in his mother about the fact that he had received a good job offer and decided to accept it. I didn’t even know that he had been thinking about it for a long time, he discussed these things with his mother.” Silvia blames herself for not having overlooked the signs that everything was not going to be alright in the beginning, and she could have done something about it earlier. For example, she did not attach much importance to the fact that her husband called her mother several times a day. “He shares everything he experiences during the day with mom, not with me. Without exaggeration, he calls her ten or more times a day.” That’s how the renovation of their apartment turned out. The husband consulted all the changes with the mother. Although they had a common idea with Silvia, they went through the shops together and selected together, but the selection was valid only when it was later confirmed by his mother. “When she had reservations, for example that the floor was dark to her taste and she didn’t like it, her husband immediately changed his mind, even though until then he wanted exactly the same one,” describes Silvia. In the end, it turned out that every change in their housing was approved by the husband’s mother. At the time, Silvia was pregnant with her second child in addition to her young daughter, and she did not have the energy to get into bigger conflicts with her husband. “I cried a lot then. I was sorry that the man doesn’t see that we are building a home together, which is not at all according to ours, but according to my mother-in-law’s ideas.” Family trips during the weekends bring the family together, but for Silvia they are a rarity. They spend most weekends at their in-laws together or when he doesn’t feel like going there, the husband goes alone with the children. If they happen to have a weekend free, a single phone call from the husband’s mother is all it takes to change the plan. “I was sorry that the man didn’t see that we were building a home together, which is not at all according to ours, but according to my mother-in-law’s ideas.” Share “Last time we had to cancel a trip with the children to the zoo, because mom needed help with something in the greenhouse. He didn’t even consider the crying of the daughter, who was very disappointed that she was not going anywhere.” As if the husband felt obliged to spend all his free time with his parents, and not with the family he had already established. “We don’t spend time together as a family at all. As if my husband’s family is still his mother and father, and I with the children are just some kind of accessory to which he devotes a moment of time between work and the needs of his mother,” he says unhappily. “And I’d rather not describe how my husband almost cried when I suggested that we could stay at home as a family for Christmas at least once, just the two of us and the kids.” But what angered her the most and what was the reason why decided to talk about what life is like with a man who can’t tear himself away from his mother, there was a recent case when both children got sick. “They had high fevers. I probably got it from them, the next day I felt sick too, I was dizzy, I was very tired and my fever literally shot up. I really needed my husband to help me and take care of the children as well,” says Silvia. But then the phone rang. “His mom called that she needed to wash the windows. And instead of explaining to her that he has a sick wife and children at home, my husband simply got into the car and left for the day,” she says angrily. The young family has been very stuffy since then, and Silvia sees that she is getting the short end of the stick. So much so that he wonders if there’s even any point in trying to keep the family together. When no woman can compete with her mother’s virtues, Silvia’s husband is a typical representative of the so-called “mother’s darling” phenomenon. Of course, an unhealthy relationship with one of the parents can also affect the partner in the marriage union, and it will certainly not be just some rare exceptions. The naming of this type of people in different languages concerns male actors, for example in English-speaking countries they have their “Mamma’s boy” or Italian women have a problem with “Il mammone”. It is the Italians who are famous for this phenomenon, and more than one comedy was created about it. The Italian psychologist and psychotherapist Riccardo Cicchetti also begins this topic with a smile, recalling one of the interviews from his practice on his website studioclinico.it. “Have you been in a long-term relationship?”
“Yes.”
“When was the last time?”
“Half year ago. We dated for a year, but then I left her.’
“Could you explain the reason for your decision?”
“She wasn’t the right one… My mom told me that from day one!” It sounds funny, but probably only to those who haven’t experienced it firsthand. Cicchetti points out that when such a “mammone” grows up and establishes a relationship with a woman, the specter of his mother, who is the model of the ideal woman, constantly hovers over them, and he mercilessly compares his acquaintance with her. “It is absolutely clear that a girlfriend will never be able to compete with the virtues of his mother,” he adds. According to psychologists, an unhealthy relationship with a parent, mostly with the mother, is mainly created by only children, second-born children who have a much older sibling, or children from incomplete families. However, it is not, of course, a rule. We have many preconceived notions about a grown man dependent on his mother. We mostly see him as an unsuccessful and unindependent man who, even in his forties, lives “in the children’s room” and allows himself to be served by his mother. However, Riccardo Cicchetti emphasizes that this is a big mistake. “He can be a successful person with a good career and lots of friends. He will continue to need his mother’s approval for everything like a small child.” And this is exactly how such a person proceeds in relationships. “When normal marital conflicts arise, he will seek refuge and comfort in the arms of his mother, who will always be ready to give him life advice. We are talking about behavior that a grown man should leave behind a long time ago, while he should face the problems that life will bring,” he adds. Cicchetti also shows how it should not be done using an example from his practice. An adult man, married for five years and the father of one son, agreed to live separately, but it had to be on the same street as the parents’ house. He did not go home from work to his wife and child, but his first stop was his mother’s kitchen. There he discussed everything with her, including intimate marital problems. “He can be a successful person with a good career and lots of friends. He will just continue to need his mother’s approval for everything like a small child.” Share Desperate, his wife sought professional help to try to save their crumbling relationship. She was angry that other men, even younger ones, go to the other side of the country for work and see their parents three times a year, and her husband can’t live more than 50 meters from his mother. The Italian psychologist does not give these relationships much chance for the future. From his experience, in such cases the partner can never win. He is convinced that if “childhood and adolescence were not enough for the process of separation and self-identification and self-awareness, this will probably not happen in adulthood.” Still, it gives at least a little hope. “I am often asked if such a man can change. I answer yes, but if it is he himself who feels that this change is necessary. In any case, however, it is a long process with an uncertain outcome,” adds Cicchetti. Let’s not hold children like in a cotton ball. Where can we look for the reasons that such dependence on the mother persists in a person even in adulthood? It would probably be pointless to get angry at non-independent adults, experts agree that this unhealthy attachment is mainly to blame for the mother, who refuses to accept that the child’s development is towards independence and that his education should be about learning independence. The main role in the emergence of unhealthy dependence on the parent is played by “protective parenting”, when mothers (but also fathers) try to solve every problem or misstep for their child, remove any obstacle and discomfort from his life, line him up in what circles he will be in walk and what he will do. They are mothers who themselves create an unhealthy dependence on their child. American psychologist and marriage counselor Debra Mandelová points out that it is from this group of children that the future “pseudo-husbands of their mothers” grow up. In an interview with the American magazine The Frisky, she also expressed her belief that there is a chance to save a relationship with such a man, but the initiative must come from him. He is a man who has to realize that his relationship with his mother is unhealthy and he has to want to make things right himself. “In general, the younger a man is, the more feasible this change is. Try to approach it with empathy and a sense of humor, showing these qualities is usually the most effective if you want a man to change his behavior,” Mandelová advises the partners of these men. Sometimes we have no idea what we can influence or even spoil in the lives of our children through education.