15 Questions to Ask Your Mom This Mother’s Day

Have you ever wondered why you do what you do? It may be because your mom did the same thing when you were growing up. Maybe she still does. If you want to find out, we have just the thing to help you get the conversation started this Mother’s Day—some questions to ask your mom.

Here’s an example. Whenever my son knocks into something and hurts himself, we play a little game of “putting the pain back.” If he falls down or crashes into something, I wait for his reaction to judge the severity.

If tears start flowing (assuming this is a mild injury) then I huddle down close with him, touch the spot where he is injured and say, “Are you OK? Let’s put the pain back.” Then I gently push on the injured spot with my hand and then touch whatever it was he injured himself on (the ground, the table, the tree root, whatever it was).

When I touch whatever he bumped into, I also say, “Bzzzzzz. No thank you. Take the pain back.” Then I repeat the buzzing and the thank-yous until he stops crying. As a toddler he does it himself now without me. I know it’s just a distraction. But it works for us. It’s appropriate to do when I know he’s more emotionally stunned than physically hurt.

My mother did the same thing for me and my sister when we were young. I have absolutely no idea where she came up with this little tradition. But it’s something she did that both of her daughters remembered and loved so much that we continue to do it with our own children.

So much of what we do as parents comes from what feels like intuition. Some of it is intuition, but most of our gut reactions are based unconsciously on what we first learned about that topic or situation—what was modeled for us. Some things like my “put the pain back” example we just do out of habit because that’s what our parents did and we never really questioned the reasoning behind it.

Have you heard the story about chopping the ends off the roast? Though there are many variations out there, the quick version is that a woman is preparing a roast for dinner and chops off the perfectly good end pieces before putting it in the oven. Her husband observes this and asks why she would do such a thing. “That’s what my mom did,” she explains.

Mom calls the next day to see how things are and the daughter asks, “Why did you always cut the ends off the roast?” “That’s what my mom always did,” she replies. Mom calls her mother and asks, “Why did you always cut the ends off the roast?” “My pan was too small!” she exclaims.

Are there any examples of that type of habitual behavior in your life as a parent? Things you do because that’s how your mother did them but you don’t really know why? I’m going to go ask my mom some questions about the buzzing story.

Try these 15 questions to ask your own mother or grandmother or whoever raised you. Try it with your mother-in-law and see how her experiences shaped your partner’s experience as a child.

Having a solid understanding of where your “parenting intuition” and expectation of parenthood comes from is one of the first topics we cover in the Leading Your Child to Success course.

As in all of our discussions of how to be a family leader, first knowing why you do something helps you make an informed and thoughtful decision about how or whether to pass on that family value, recipe, or other tradition to your own children.