Age Brings Acceptance
by Sheri Wallace

Change brings acceptance

Fingerman highlights a surprising finding: "Women also come to accept their mothers and daughters as individuals, and are therefore more able to see and accept their faults as they grow older."

Karen Jones, 47, says, "I think I have become much more empathetic to my mother as I've aged. When I was younger, she and I seemed to have nothing whatsoever in common. I didn't understand her at all and I felt she didn't understand me either. Now I realize that she really did understand a lot of what I was going through, and now I understand a lot of what she was going through too."

Both groups of women in the study were asked to rate their last enjoyable visit on a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being the most enjoyable. All the women, young or old, mother or daughter, rated their visit at very close to 4.

Fingerman concludes, "The pleasure women derive from their mother or daughter suggests that the things that make them valuable and pleasurable change as women grow older. What is enjoyable at one stage of life is not necessarily what is enjoyable at another stage of life."