Relatos de mães, relatos de filhas: o relacionamento na vida adulta

Abstract

Personal relationships are at the basis of society and are fundamental to direct our behavior. The relationship between parents and adult children, particularly between mother and adult daughter, represents a recent and poorly investigated research area. The literature about this complex relationship usually presents one of them as dependent and the other as a caregiver. However, there is a moment when these two women share a similar condition: when both are adults. This work aimed at investigating, describing and analyzing the relationship between mother and their adult daughters emphasizing the aspects promoting their getting close or getting apart and the influence of the daughters' marriage in their relations with their mothers. In the history of relationship between mother and daughter we observe changes which promote instances of separation and proximity, dependece and independence between them, what is influenced by family. The shared activities and the process of communication, as well as the cooperation, mutual influence and the perception that mother and have of their relationship are related to getting close or getting apart. In this dynamics, mother and daughter share similarities and differences, apresent reciprocal and complementary behaviors wich may give rise to conflicts, whose solution is associated with self-revelation and privacy, present in the relationship. Finally, despite sometimes getting apart, mother and daughter try to emphasize the situations which keep their relationship due to its importance for both.