To help Psychologies readers further Philippa Perry took to Twitter to answer and aid your mother-daughter questions and dilemmas…

Hi everyone, I am the @psychologiesmag live Tweeter today. Tweet your questions to @psychologies and I will be here to answer.

@stokeseyk asks: My 14-year-old girl and I are forever at war. It’s wearing me down. Now I find it hard to speak to her at all, she’s so moody.

Spiralling into a dynamic of I’m right you’re wrong means that you will both lose. I recommend reading How to Talk so Teens Will Listen and Listen So Teens Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish.

@mydaysandways asks: Could an insecure infant attachment with my depressed mother have caused my own mental health problems? And how can I prevent this when I have children?

An insecure attachment with a parent can lead to emotional and relationship problems. Becoming aware of harmful impulses so that you don’t act on them means that those mental health problems don’t need to be passed on.

My mother always put me down and didn’t appreciate me and now I only fall for men who do the same. What can I do?

You’ll need to embody truth that your type is not your type. Feel the impulse to fall for the usual type, but don’t act on it. This takes practice.

My 15-year-old daughter says it is not cool to be seen with me. People say we look like sisters, not like mother and daughter.

It is ok to respect your child’s opinion even when it is different from your own. It sounds like she may need space to separate from you to individuate.

@LadyNathalie asks: My mother doesn’t like me. She tries to hurt my feelings all the time.

She may dislike herself and feel merged with you. Her criticism of you may be a form of self-criticism of herself. She may even be passing down the dynamic she experienced with her own mother. Try not to take it too personally.

My 15-year-old child’s dad gives her so much freedom, for example he lets her stay out until 2am, but I don’t. She is getting difficult to handle.

You need to agree on boundaries with her Dad. This isn’t fair on her. Take her feelings seriously, put yourself in her shoes.

All me and my teenage daughter do is fight. She borrows my clothes yet I am not allowed into her wardrobe and she has lost a shirt of mine. What should I do?

Part of growing up is learning that parents are not just to be used, but to be respected, yet we only learn to respect when we are shown it. It is not easy.

I hate my parents then feel guilty and try to make it up to them, and then I feel that I hate them even more, what’s wrong with me?

It is not all your fault. It sounds like a situation co-created between all of you. Are you swinging from one extreme of rage to the extreme of guilt?

Mum is a serial over-sharer about inappropriate topics, which really grosses me out. I have asked her in a light-hearted way to stop, but it hasn’t done much good.

My daughter has had this problem and she got serious to stop me. Light-hearted may not cut it. I admire and respect her for setting boundaries.

Why is it always me that calls my parents? Why don’t they call me? I have asked, and they do once or twice, and then it is just me again.

Perhaps they don’t want to intrude on your life. It is perhaps how they habitually maintained contact with their parents. There are more questions that you need to ask them.

When I tell my mum one of my achievements she just counters with one of hers instead of saying ‘Well done’. This makes me so mad.

Spell out to her what you need from her and what you don’t need from her. You could unpack together what achievement means to each of you.

I am so annoyed with myself that my mother’s ridiculous opinions get to me so much. Why do I make what she thinks matter so much?

When we were small we were dependent on parents for life itself. It is no wonder we have a habit of taking them seriously – even if they are daft.

I miss my mum so much and spent too much time during her life locked in petty squabbles with her. I have regrets.

She would not have wanted you to give yourself such a hard time over this. Really, she wouldn’t. I am sorry for your bereavement.

@C_Ashy asks: What effect can having a mother reject you (during your teens) for her new husband have on later adult life? It’s been over 5 years.

I think you know the effect – devastating and I am sorry. You will know it is not your fault and it can take time to embody that.

I feel split in two by my mother. I don’t think of her when I am not with her, and when I am with her I am a different person compared to when I am not.

Have you found a way to gain acceptance without losing who you are? I wonder how it would go if you dared to open up to her more.

My mum is so unmotivated. She watches daytime TV all the time. I am worried I will end up like her.

You might. What are you going to do to ensure this doesn’t happen? (If you don’t want it to that is).

My mother has taken over my wedding. You’d think it was her getting married, but I don’t want to fall out with her.

I am getting quite a few questions about wanting to avoid confrontation. When we want to make a complaint we need not to make ‘You’ statements, make ‘I’ statements instead. Those ‘I’ statements should be about our feelings, for example ‘I appreciate you trying but when you do X, I feel Y’. Don’t give a complaint without giving a recommendation too, for example ‘Instead of doing X, you could do Z instead’. I talk more about how to make complaints in a respectful way in my new book How To Stay Sane.

@BasilCat123 asks: How do I cope with my mum who is in a lot of pain with arthritis but won’t take painkillers due to religious beliefs?

I’d find that hard too. I would tell her it was hard for me to see what I saw as needless suffering.

Thanks for having me and do feel free to Tweet me any questions about anything to @Philippa_Perry

Later, as a fledgling academic, I learned that glamour and pallor have been synonymous since the time of the Song of Songs. Achieving hypnotic presence on the silver screen relied upon the same pale beauty. From the most ancient to the most recent icons, ivory was the material from which heroines were created.

Up until now, whiteness has been a matter of class. Before the twentieth century, paleness was a sign of the sheltered aristocracy, a tan being the badge of the weather-beaten peasant. Then, in the 1920s, these class associations were inverted: suddenly, it was the factory-bound masses who were pasty, while the beau monde globetrotted and sunbathed.

With the advent of mass, cheap travel in the 1970s, a tan became the emblem of a new socially and geographically mobile hoi polloi. Accordingly, where for millennia the ideal of feminine loveliness had been to be sun-shielded, so today it is to be sun-scorched. The adjectives once used to describe the complexion – snow, milk, pearl – have been usurped by shades of wheat and fawn.

And, where something is ubiquitous, so there will be those who find it banal. From the moment I realised that being tanned was a social imperative, I felt it imperative not to be. While other girls basted themselves with oil, I slathered myself in sunblock – a petrol-blue gunk that gave me a sheen akin to that of a dead fish.

For my pains, I was nicknamed moon-face, vamp, goth girl, the Wicked Lady. At school, boys trailed after me clicking along to the Addams Family theme. I have had a tan once in my adult life, inter-railing at 20. I also caught scabies, and found the two alarmingly similar – something alien lurking in the skin.

While I resist bronzing – faux and real – on aesthetic grounds, I also cannot see beyond the damage. Society labours under the delusion that a tan is a badge of health. Instead, we should see it for what it is: traumatised skin attempting to rectify injury. Smoking, obesity and excessive drinking are all regarded as harmful, yet tanning remains the socially acceptable killer du jour.

I use the word ‘killer’ advisedly: skin cancer is one of the UK’s most common forms of the disease, with 100,000 cases emerging each year. Melanoma, its most aggressive type, will claim more than 10,400 new sufferers in 2010, a quarter of whom will die. Such is our kamikaze behaviour in the sun that skin cancer accounts for more loss of life in Britain than it does in Australia. Melanoma is now the most common cancer among 15- to 34-year-olds, despite the fact a person’s risk of developing it increases with age.

Dr Jodie Moffat of Cancer Research UK has these alarming statistics: ‘Melanoma rates have more than quadrupled since the 1970s – faster than any other cancer in the UK – and predictions are that we will continue to see an increase. There is a misunderstanding that skin cancer is a minor thing, where you simply cut away and move on. But melanoma will kill more than 2,600 people this year.’ (See sunsmart.org.uk.)

Should the risk of killing oneself not be sufficient, it amazes me that the ageing effects alone do not provide more of a disincentive. At 38, I am ageing, of course, but not with the leathery rapidity that besets former ray slaves. It is the beauty industry’s most lucrative paradox that the same women who will spend any amount of money on anti-ageing snake oil baulk at offering their skin the smallest degree of protection.

My attitude is extreme: the majority of pale girls will at least tint their legs – that last bastion of colour conformity. And my bleached limbs do attract horrified glances from the Tango-ed majority. Still, I would not deign to darken my skin any more than I would expect a black friend to lighten hers. Instead, I am advocating valuing what nature gave us – black, white or, in my own case, a sort of pale green.

Jamie Coombes, Dior national make-up artist, reports that ‘beautifully pale skin has seen a huge surge in popularity, with stars such as Dita Von Teese and Julianne Moore modelling the look with elegance and confidence. I think it is fantastic that women are revealing their natural beauty rather than concealing it with self-tan. It’s a way of asserting your individuality in a sea of identikits. I recently worked with Lily Cole, who has the most breathtaking porcelain skin. I wouldn’t have dreamed of hiding it under layers of bronzer.’

Happily, one finds oneself in good company as a tan refusenik. These days, when I get ridiculed, it will be a shout of ‘Sophie Ellis Bextor’ – hardly an insult. Girls Aloud’s Nicola Roberts has done a huge amount to dispel the notion that hot equals seared. Meanwhile, Givenchy’s summer campaign features a recognisably milky Liv Tyler touched with the merest hint of gold.

Fortunately, technology has moved on since the days of my blue block. Vichy, Biotherm and Chanel all make flattering SPF50 shields, while Clinique’s Super City Block SPF40, £16, and Dior’s Capture Totale UV Protect SPF35, £37, are ideal for every-day use. And Boots’ Soltan mini-spray SPF50 in its 75ml handbag size, £4.99, is portable enough to make reapplication a habit.

Consumers are waking up to the fact that uneven skintone suggests ageing far more than wrinkles do. Clinique’s sterling Even Better Clinical Dark Spot Corrector, £37.50, boasts long-term and short-term instant benefits. The South African brand Environ has an array of pigmentation solutions based on research from studying European skins living in an African climate. And Caudalie has made radiance a brand mission.

Every pale girl should possess something to lend her complexion lustre. Some swear by By Terry Or de Rose Elixir Extrême, £108, Chanel’s illuminating bases, £24 and £27, or Armani Fluid Sheer in Porcelain, £32. My personal obsession is Becca’s Shimmering Skin Perfector in Pearl SPF20, £32.70, which instantly transforms withered old crones into fresh-faced virgins.

New foundations will not only perfect but offer an extra safeguard. Bobbi Brown’s and Dior’s are unparalleled. When it comes to a mineral base, then Origins‘ Multi-Grain Makeup in 01 Light, £20, is exceptional, and Bobbi Brown’s Creamy Concealer, £16.50, a must, while Becca’s Fine Pressed Powder, £35, removes shine. Guerlain’s Météorites, from £33, and Givenchy’s Le Prisme, £34, are highlighters that gleam rather than glitter, although perfectionists may want to deploy the catwalk strategy of blending some body lotion with foundation, or use MAC Strobe Cream, £21.50.

If all this sounds like hard work, rest assured – a few tricks of the light are as nothing next to the graft of turning tawny. Moreover, there is something incredibly liberating about revealing one’s true colours. A lover once confided that he found my body more erotic than faux-tanned girls’ because my paleness made me seem more naked – the bronzed bodies felt clothed, and what he craved was skin.

Products and prices correct at time of going to press

Sian and Peter came to me for help as they couldn’t understand why their family was having so much trouble. They had dated for a year before moving in together, and during that time her children – Adam, 12, and Adele, 14 – and his – 11-year-old Ben and 13-year-old Chloe – had got on famously, and all seemed pleased that their parents were happy. But since they all moved in together there had been endless quarrels.

What puzzled Sian and Peter was that it wasn’t always family against family. Sometimes, the boys fought and the girls supported Adam. At other times, everyone ganged up on Adele. But mostly, everyone was against the adults. And the more Sian and Peter emphasised how lucky they were to be living in a family instead of struggling on their own (after the death of his wife five years previously and her divorce two years ago), the worse it got.

In step-families, whether you realise it or not, there are so  many reasons to be angry – many more than in a first-time family. None of us starts our own family with a totally clean sheet; we all bring with us baggage from our childhoods. But in a step-family you can be struggling with a double load – damage from your past but also from more recent hurt. While all families have a lot in common, step-families have one profound difference: a person has to have died or a relationship come apart for a step-family to exist.

This means two divergent agendas are created from the start, and these can cause havoc. Separation and divorce are adult solutions to adult problems. Children may have found living in that family difficult, but while a partner can look at a partner and say, ‘I lived without you before and I can do without you now’, a parent is for life. So while you may see extricating yourself from this relationship as the answer, a child would prefer for you to fix it, and feels angry that their views aren’t taken into account. Ending their original family may not be their preferred option, creating a new one is certainly not what they’d choose.

The times when Sian’s children stayed with their father were particularly difficult, with all four children behaving badly. For Adam and Adele, it meant someone else’s children were spending time with their mother. They loved seeing their father, but the days before and after each visit only served to underline they only visited him, they didn’t live with him. And when Adam and Adele stayed with their father it drove home to Ben and Chloe that their mother was dead.

They’d dump their pain on Sian, but left their father alone because it felt too risky – he might die too if they pushed him. Conversely, Adam and Adele targeted their mother because it felt safer – they were afraid to show anger to their father in case he stopped contact with them. But Paul wasn’t their dad, so all their rage could be vented at him. The constant refrain was, ‘You can’t tell me what to do, you’re not my dad.’

Both adults were losing control of the children and themselves. Like many people in similar situations, when faced with toddler tantrums or teenage moods they reacted with corresponding behaviour. It’s natural to get pulled in to trying to win the argument, rather than calming everyone down.

Step-families may have more initial difficulties, but that doesn’t mean you can’t resolve them. The keys are understanding and communication. When Sian and Peter put themselves in their children’s shoes, they were astonished at the very different points of view that this brought up. Their joyful beginning of a new life together was an ending for the children –
confirmation for Sian’s kids that she was never getting back with their father, and for Peter’s kids that their mother was gone for ever. Because the new family was not their choice, they had less incentive to make it work, and wanted to make their grief known.

The adults began talking and, more importantly, listening. Everyone was given the chance to say what they were feeling, and what they were upset about. Together they came up with a list of rules, and worked out ways of giving everyone responsibilities that helped them feel included. Most importantly, Sian and Peter acknowledged the losses their children had sustained for them to be there. This enabled the children to move on to seeing the gains.

So what can you do in a step-family to manage the differences? Communicate. This is two-way – you need to listen as much as talk. Try sitting down one-to-one with a timer and giving each person two minutes to talk. No interruptions, show you’re listening by eye contact, and afterwards, check you understood by paraphrasing back what was said.

Family counselling can help with day-to-day grievances, but if you feel you have more to deal with from the recent split, you could try individual sessions.

Children can manage having different rules in different houses. But under the same roof you need to agree a compromise so everyone is treated fairly. Make rules as positive as possible – more dos than don’ts – and take their rules as well as yours. Revise them if they’re not working, or need to be updated.

Instead of trying to fix problems for them, help children do so themselves. State the problem – ‘You’re upset because…’ and then say ‘What can we do to resolve this?’ Sometimes, the answer is simply being sympathetic. You don’t have to solve a situation to help people feel better. Saying, ‘I can see that you’re angry/upset/frustrated about this’ can help.

Help step-parents make their own relationship with step-children. Find ways of spending time together. And give each child quality time alone with a parent. This takes planning but is worth it.

Resources
• ‘Teach Yourself: Be A Great Step Parent 2010’ by Suzie Hayman.
• Family Lives is an excellent website from this national charity, providing support to anyone caring for children. You can Skype or chat online, or call the freephone confidential helpline on 0808 800 2222.

Lucy Beresford replies: You could talk to your partner about what you regard as the inequalities in your relationship. You could even perhaps ask him to look at his apparent fixation on money. But my sense is that this isn’t about, or at least isn’t just about, the money. It’s about values and acceptance.

Your partner doesn’t understand your view that you dream of a career in which you can be happy. Nor is he prepared to compromise over expenditure. And you don’t share his passion for lavish and anally recorded spending. Relationships can work when – sometimes because – there are different interests, different incomes, differences in faith or race, even different heights. But different values are harder to reconcile.

You need to focus on what principles are important to you. For example, being happy and fulfilled in your job is clearly of more value to you than how much you earn. And, I sense, being understood by your partner also comes high on the list. Focusing on this aspect of who you are can help you look beyond the financial inequalities to assess whether this is a relationship where your underlying values and passions are being understood or accepted.

What would you do? Add your comments below.

Email your dilemmas to dilemmas@psychologies.co.uk

Though seemingly unconnected, we flit back and forth between the two stories and as relationships evolve, so too does the notion that love can not only save us, but can ultimately destroy us, too. Sigur Rós, Pink Floyd and, inevitably, Café de Flore, provide a divine soundtrack that intensifies the already-heightened emotional tales.

The constant maneuvering between stories is hard work at first, but any struggle soon pays off: this is a glorious exploration of love in all its guises, between parent and child, partners, friends and soul mates. Paradis is marvelous as a deeply conflicted mother who wants her son to thrive, but not leave her, yet most will feel an affinity with Antoine’s ex-wife Carole (Hélène Florent), who tries desperately not to crack as life as she knows it crumbles around her. This film is unforgettable, beautiful and original.

Here, she tells Psychologies readers why she believes in humanity, not perfection.

Look out for more videos of Sally in the next few weeks.

Image and video by Sonja Earl

Summerscale, author of The Suspicions Of Mr Whicher, brings to life another Victorian scandal. Isabella Robinson, trapped in a loveless marriage to a boorish husband, falls hopelessly in love with handsome young doctor Edward Lane. Her love is unrequited (at first), and she records her feelings in her diary, at turns consumed with yearning and at others chastising herself for being so foolish.

When Isabella falls ill her husband discovers the diary and launches divorce proceedings on the grounds of adultery, even though he has had several affairs and fathered two illegitimate children. As the case drags on, and Edward tries to prove Isabella is mad in order to save his own marriage, we gain a fascinating insight into the inequalities of Victorian society, women’s place in it and the boundaries of privacy.

As newborns we don’t question how our bodies look and feel, but as we grow, and sex enters the picture, the insecurity, guilt and the self-blame start creeping in. Insecurity about our body begins when, in childhood, we’re caught touching ‘down there’. It takes root when adolescent rejections come from those we lust after. It may become fixed in adulthood by messages that suggest that unless we’re young, slim and deodorised we won’t get – and don’t deserve – sex.

Research suggests that nowadays women measure erotic satisfaction not by the pleasurable sensations they feel but by what their partner sees during sex. But research also suggests that one of the most potent cures for negative body image is sex itself. Women who feel erotically fulfilled rate themselves as physically beautiful whether or not they measure up to the ‘ideal’. Passion, positively experienced, turns body hate to body love.

‘I’ve never liked my legs,’ says Juliet, 23. ‘I used to wear trousers all the time to hide them. When I made love, I pretended I felt the cold so I could pull the duvet up. Then one man I slept with kissed my legs passionately, saying they were like marble columns. Since then I have been much less obsessed with them. I still don’t love them, but I know someone else could.’

Physical pleasure, taken or given, not only makes us feel good, it makes us feel we are ‘good’ – worthwhile, deserving, valid. And the effect is not just emotional, it’s also biological. Skin-on-skin contact, combined with orgasm, releases oxytocin – the ‘cuddle chemical’ – the hormone that allows us to feel relaxed, reassured and safe.

Engrossing sex also silences our inner negativity. Self-criticism gets disrupted when we focus on our own physical pleasure or the emotional joy we get from arousing a partner. ‘The only time I feel really confident in my body is when I’m making love,’ confides Anna, 27. ‘I’m not thinking about my weight; I’m a piece of clay being modelled by my partner’s caresses. And whatever my partner’s physical defects, I love him because he gives me pleasure, and I give it to him.’

The effect becomes even stronger if you take into account your partner’s enthusiastic validation. And – in our anxiety we tend to forget this – validation is mostly what we’ll get from partners if we allow it. While scientific experiments might prove that humans get most aroused by the ideally beautiful, such studies are just that – experiments devoid of context and emotion. What’s arousing about sex with someone we are intimate and loving with is the erotic and emotional feelings; touch, smell, taste, the honour of being allowed access, the excitement of connection. A partner engrossed in taking pleasure in our arms – or mouth, breasts, thighs – isn’t mentally measuring our waistline.

One caveat: there are some kinds of partner who harm, rather than help. Sex with someone who doesn’t really like you will end up making you dislike yourself. If your partner thinks every woman needs to look like Barbie he will make you feel you should, too.

If you feel your body is inadequate, you need to remind yourself what pleasure it can give. Start by making love to yourself. Put away the mirror, lie back, close your eyes, allow your hands to wander. If something feels good, do it again – and let the sensations drown out your self-criticism.

To make peace with your body, you need to make love with someone who adores your body as much as you want to adore it, who wants what your body has to offer. Really listen when a partner appreciates you by word or by touch, and allow yourself to revel in their appreciation. A body that gives and receives erotic pleasure deserves nothing but admiration, gratitude and love.

HUMANISTIC THERAPY centres on the individual development of a person, rather than techniques for overcoming mental obstacles. Humanist therapists believe that problems arise due to a fault or interruption in our development – such as a traumatic childhood incident – and aim to work with the client to find ways of repairing the development process.

PSYCHOANALYSIS was developed by Sigmund Freud, and is perhaps the most misunderstood branch of psychotherapy. Analysts work with the client to investigate the underlying motivations for their behaviour, which may include clarifying their unconscious motivations. The therapist will not usually give advice, and clients seeking psychoanalysis will usually want to spend more time in analysis, looking for deeper understanding of their symptoms.

JUNGIAN ANALYSIS may take a similar form to Freudian psychoanalysis, but the theories behind the two approaches differ significantly in places, particularly in regard to the role of the unconscious mind.

COGNITIVE ANALYTIC THERAPY combines cognitive therapy and psychotherapy and encourages clients to use their own abilities to develop the skills to change destructive patterns of behaviour. Therapists use structured techniques, such as diary-keeping and  progress charts, to help clients explore their negative thinking.

GROUP THERAPY was initially created as a cost-effective form of therapy, but the group dynamic can help clients with interpersonal problems. It can be particularly effective for people with specific issues, such as bereavement, or addiction. The therapist, or ‘facilitator’, will work with the group to manage the flow of the discussion, but they may not take a traditional leader’s role.

Where to find a therapist
Your GP should be your first port of call. The NHS mostly offers CBT. For more specialised private therapists, the following organisations have websites and practitioner registers:
• UK Council For Psychotherapy
• The British Association Of Counselling And Psychotherapy or visit the BACP public-facing website It’s Good To Talk
• Centre For Freudian Analysis And Research
• Council For Psychoanalysis And Jungian Analysis
• The Institute Of Psychoanalysis
• The British Psychological Society
• UK Association of Humanistic Psychology Practitioners