Some girls go out to tea with their mums; others share clothes, handbags, jewellery and secrets.

In my 30 years, my mum and I have done none of these things.

I still remember the first time I tried on lip gloss as a 14-year-old. It was gooey, sparkly like unicorn poo and made me feel like a sophisticated little lady. It was also forbidden, much like spaghetti strap tops, nail polish, staying out late with friends and boys.

When I got home, my mother eyed my glittery smackers with distaste and reprimanded me for being so “hiao” (a derogatory Hokkien dialect term for flirtatious or vain).

Tempers flared, and I must’ve screamed something angsty along the lines of “Stop trying to control me!” and slammed my bedroom door shut in her face for theatrics.

Cut from different cloth

My mother and I are poles apart. She is a hard-nosed, hardworking and practical woman; a conservative and devout first-generation Christian; a stickler for long-held Chinese traditions. I am your hopeless romantic, a “strawberry millennial” constantly with my nose stuck in a book, open-minded and always questioning established norms; a bit of a rebel at heart with an independent streak.

It goes without saying that I am far from my mother’s ideal daughter — homely, chaste, studious and pious. Why couldn’t I be more like so-and-so’s daughter who went to study groups and made a chastity pledge not to have a boyfriend until she was 18? she often lamented.

Over the next decade, our relationship grew so tempestuous that I only joined family dinners in the off chance I wasn’t out with friends. The intermittent years now seem like a blur — in a bid to escape the glare of her panoptic gaze, I shut myself in my room whenever I was home and snuck out in the middle of the night. I took pains to stonewall her so that she couldn’t judge me for my life choices.

Little did I know that having a baby would end our stalemate and draw us closer together.

Change of heart

When I got married and flew the coop, I learnt the hard way that absence does make the heart grow fonder. Being away from home (and having fewer opportunities to quarrel with my mum perhaps), I looked forward to visiting my parents every week to savour home-cooked meals. My mum came over to my place during the weekends to bake and try out new recipes.

It seemed like our tumultuous past was now water under the bridge.

Then I became pregnant, and my mother decided to retire from her job early to help me take care of my son when my maternity leave was up.

I should’ve been grateful to have my mother around as a helpmate, but the reality was, we rubbed each other the wrong way constantly.

I’d long grown to love my space and freedom, and having her bustling around, rearranging my cupboards, and stamping her influence on everything in my own home had me on tenterhooks. Fueled by postpartum hormones perhaps, I felt a roiling fear that my mother would trump and supersede me, especially in my new role as a mother. I felt that her over eagerness to help was a show of her distrust in my abilities to function adequately as an adult.

I am ashamed to say I behaved like a selfish, heartless bitch at times, snapping at her and behaving sullenly whenever I felt that she was encroaching on my space.

She was so effusively helpful but all I could see was a turf war, my mother’s secret ploy to reinstate control over my life and put me in my place.

The fault in our stars

Things came to a head one day when we had a particularly heated argument over my son’s upbringing (my mother tends to be overprotective while I am okay with him getting a few bumps and scrapes). Out of spite, I denigrated the way she’d brought me up. Do you want your grandson to grow up like me, mollycoddled and weak? I fumed.

Her face shriveled like a trampled lily, and she shrunk away from me like a wounded animal. I felt a little smug, thinking I’d won the argument.

The next day, my dad took me aside and related how the pastor at church had asked for all mothers to rise and be prayed for. My mother had cried and refused to stand as she felt like an unworthy mother.

“The truth is, we’ve all taken her for granted,” my dad said, his voice breaking.

“You can hurt anyone, just not your mother, you hear? When you and your sister were little, I worked long hours, sometimes late into the night, and she was the only one taking care of the two of you. She had no help from anyone. Yet everyday, she’d carry you in her arms and push your sister along in a stroller to take you places. She did her best to give you a fun and loving childhood.

“The only thing your mother ever did wrong was love you too much.”

I had never seen my father cry before. His words cut me to the core, and I understood then that being a grown, mature woman was not about winning arguments with those I love — especially the woman who had brought me up. All this time, I’d been so focused on nursing my hurt pride that I’d failed to appreciate my mother’s deep and abiding love. She may not have given me the love I’d wanted from a mother, but it was all I really needed.

And now, a mother myself, I had a second chance to make things right as a daughter.

The heart of a mother

Getting off my high horse and apologising to my mother for all the hurt I’d caused over the years is the toughest thing I’ve ever had to do. But in that moment, I felt a huge burden lift off my shoulders. My apology cleared the air between us and opened our lines of communication, paving the way for a more civil relationship based on mutual respect.

My mother finally understood that she needed to let go and let me grow into my new role as a mother on my own terms. She could play the role of an adviser, but I needed to bring up my child my way.

It didn’t take long for her to revert to her old dominating ways, but understanding a mother’s heart somehow made me feel more at peace and accepting of her aggressively helpful overtures. Aiding her daughters makes her feel fulfilled and happy, and I’ve learnt to indulge her (while also taking the chance to enjoy a breather from being the slave of a little human).

I’ve also learnt to listen to her stories, of her hurts, frustrations, regrets and triumphs. I now feel like I see the real her, an iron lady with an irrepressible spirit yet a sensitive soul. An independent, driven woman who nevertheless cast aside her burgeoning career in dentistry to take care of her young daughters.

It will take lifetimes for me to repay her, but I know she doesn’t want anything I can give. The best I can do is to be a good mother to my son, and to reflect my mother’s immense, boundless love in my parenting too.

Finally, I think I may have become a daughter she can be proud of.