Hello all, this is a relationship question. I need genuine help going forward, not judgments - I already know where I screwed up, otherwise I wouldn't be asking this question.

My husband was 30 and I was 20 when we married, and we had been acquainted for a few years before then but only dated for about 9 months before marrying. At the beginning stage of our relationship, I didn't consciously realize how easily influenced and scared I am by my mom. Its been like this my whole life - she's a very controlling person, and I'm a spineless coward. If she said something was wrong with me or my life, rather than disagreeing with her, I just fixed what was wrong according to her.

Unfortunately, that extended to my marriage. If she didn't approve of our house, I wanted to move no matter how inconvenient it was, and the reasons I gave my husband were not original thoughts but regurgitation of what my mother said was wrong with it. If my mother said I should continue working but my husband wanted me to stay home while I was pregnant, I went to work even though it wasn't in my best interest (physically active job + complicated pregnancy didn't mix) and treated my husband like an asshole, again, repeating my mother's points as if they were facts. She was more concerned with finances than health. If my mother said I needed to go back to school, but my husband said that was unnecessary, I still tried to make it happen despite lack of money, time, and need for it. These are just a few examples, I could go on and on... but my husband ended up living with a proxy of my mother, not me. I hadn't mentally moved on from the childish mindset of trying to please a parent, to the adult woman's mindset of trying to please her husband.

As one would expect, my husband started acting like my dad, who generally of takes a backseat to my mom because she won't listen to anyone and wants to decide everything. I'm simplifying here, but she does fit the bill of what people think of when they picture a feminist: third marriage, workaholic who owns her own practice, went back to school for a PhD in her 40s, is an accomplished but generally abrasive person.

When I realized what was happening (fairly recently, like 5 months ago) I made a concerted effort to remove my mother's grip on my mind. I started to avoid talking to my mom about the way we run our household, parenting, or marriage. I've now become skilled at deflecting those topics with her and ignoring her comments.

So, I plan to just stay the course of returning to being myself, the person he married.

But I wanted to know if its a good idea to explain that everything I said I wanted for the last few years, I didn't actually want but was just trying to make us both live up to my mom's expectations of what is "right"...

Or if it would be more effective to see if things naturally return to the way they were if I'm behaving like myself again, not like my mom who just wants a sidekick. I realize this is ultimately my fault, not my mom's, because I should have known better to guard my mind against that kind of extramarital interference. I'd like to help his confidence return, and feel horrible for being such an idiot puppet.

Thank you.