What is a Mother Story?

A mother story is simply telling your mother's story. This is not how she affected you. This is often done to honor your mother after she's passed.

The salient points of her life are included: Birth, death, high school graduation, marriage information (when, where & to whom). If you know them, include her parent's names and her birth place and birth order. If religion was part of her life, include that.

From here, you have room to expand. I usually tell folks to write the stories she told you about her childhood. Any school stories? Bullying by other kids? What about sibling rivalries? Did she have a favorite pet? What about her friends?

Follow her life as she grew up. If you are a little organized about this, it helps. Write a timeline starting with her date of birth, and go to her date of death. Mark off either 5 or 10 year markers. If she told you stories about when she and her brother built a tree house, how old was she then?

Once you have her as an adult, talk about her achievements and her dreams. What were her un-fulfilled aspirations?  Were there any dreams she had that were filled beyond her wildest ideas? After she's had you, you can probably go into more detail about where she lived and the conditions of her life.

If disease, separation, mental health or addiction were part of her story, don't hold back. You need to know about that stuff because it affects you, too. 

Remember that your mother was once a little girl, clinging to her mother for safety during a thunderstorm. Try to have patience and compassion if your relationship was strained.

Once you have this written, there are several places you can submit it if you choose. One of them is here. You can also submit to this site, using the contact information provided. 

You can download the questionnaires from this site to write your mother-daughter story. I accept submissions as outlined on the forms. Please use them both.

Why Women's History?

Men's history is all around us. Wars, conquests, financial coups, military prowess, sexual conquest, and so on. Women marry and take the man's name for her surname. She moves to the man's home. She is already being cut off from her history.

In a matriarchal society, the man moves to the women's home, often keeping his own name. He may add her name to his in some way. We generally live in patriarchal societies today. The differences are subtle to us, but they are real, and make a major difference in outlook, how children are raised and other things. There are many great websites you can check out that outline and detail matriarchal societies.

So, why would women's history matter? There is a saying that those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it. I think that is also true of women, not just men and society.

A woman who is abused as a child is less likely to protect her children when they are threatened at about the same age as she was. Not because she is a bad mother, but because she thinks that is just the way things are. But it doesn't have to be that way.

She may be overly protective of her children, not allowing them to experience failure, frustration and pain. Children get a distorted view of life in such a case.

Then, there is the woman who became so damaged by her abuse that she offers her child up like a sacrifice to appease the gods and ease her pain. It doesn't work, but only makes things worse.

If she doesn't know her own history, and her mother's history, how can this chain be broken? She needs to know her mother's history. Why did MOM allow her to be hurt? Did MOM even know? Was MOM also abused?

Until these questions can be answered, a woman has no chance of breaking the cycle of abuse. Whether it's being beaten or raped, or the subtle abuse of a steady stream of verbal abuse causing erosion of her self-esteem.

It makes no difference what form the abuse takes. Abuse is abuse. Ask any survivor.

Then, there is the health issue. If a woman doesn't know that MOM had cancer, how can she learn to be pro-active and test regularly?

What about family histories of writing, art, music, and other talents? How can she know of these two or three generations back? Only by researching her history.

Does her matriarchal history include early marriage? Does that pattern make sense today? What of her attitudes toward money? Does she have ambition? Where do you think that comes from? Does she want to change her life? If a woman wants to change, she needs to who and know what she is, first.

What we inherit from our parents affects us. Women ancestors pass on half of our history. We need to pay attention to that half of our lives.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Women's History Project!

I have begun this blog to provide news and communication to those interested in relating their history, able to help support the project, or interested in the results of this project.

The Women's History Project was created to collect the histories of women. The focus of the history is up to the woman herself. All women over the age of 30 are encouraged to participate, regardless of location. This is a global project. I'm interested in your childhood memories, your schooling, your attitudes and opinions. Your childrearing practices, how you clothe and feed your family, how you heal their hurts, and generally ANY thing that is in your life: your interests and passions.

A history includes the basics, such as your name, date of birth and location, and how your family was structured, including your birth order. From there, it can be fairly fluid, depending on local custom and culture.

At this time, histories must be taken in English, but I hope to expand to many languages as the project progresses.

Your history will be included in a book, outlining the history or women. It may also be used in other books, which may concentrate on child rearing practices and outcomes, fashion and clothing, feeding the family, frugality, home making, home health cures or folk remedies, and others.

I've already seen cancer in clusters, family patterns of abuse and health, and patterns of rejection and acceptance of parental values, among other results. So there may be a lot of research value in your history.

History is fading and dying daily. Any woman over 70 who passes is taking with her a history from 1942. Any woman older than 70 has seen more than most of us will ever see, of the most tumultuous century so far. We need to preserve this history.

Unless a woman is famous, it's unlikely her history has been preserved beyond dates of birth, marriage and death. This project looks to address this inequity. After all, men's history is all around us on the bookshelves. But we, women, are not.

Hoping to hear from you,
Morgen Marshall