Thoughts That Go Unnoticed

BRIDGERTON SEASON 3 (2024)

PEN AND COLIN

polin moments -> flipped

BRIDGERTON SEASON 3 (2024)

PEN AND COLIN

Alicent’s exposure to motherhood isn’t on her terms in any conceivable way. Her children are the products of marital rape and coercion. They are conceived and born when she is a young teenage girl 15-18, well before she is ready to have them. They are born in quick succession with no opportunity for her to recover. And, they are from a man that not only does she not love but who neglects and belittles her.

All these factors severely damage Alicent’s ability to connect with her children in their infancy. And can you blame her given the circumstances?

She’s not ready to have them at all, so she doesn’t know how to properly mother them. And she likely resents them at least a bit in the early stages because they are the physical manifestation of not only her rape but the life she is trapped in. And that likely compounds with severe guilt because these are her babies, why doesn’t she feel the love and joy she’s supposed to?

And yet. She still loves and cares for them. She holds them as babies (despite being a baby herself) and dutifully cares for them even though she could simply dump them off with a nursemaid. She charges with a knife at Rhaenyra for them. She stands between them and a dragon from them. She betrays her closest companion of her childhood for them. She defies the king and their father for them.

I know that Alicent makes some crucial mistakes that ends up hurting her children. And I know that the scenes we see with Alicent and her kids often show her lack of connection to them. But despite the fact that her relationship to them can be nothing but fractured at the onset. There is so much passion and love and devotion she has for them.

These are not scenes of a woman who is a bad mother. These are scenes of a mother who adores her children and would do anything for them. But who can only love them roughly because she never had an opportunity to love them gently. Their very existence was never gentle for her and never fostered through love.

"She has these children that just bring her so much sadness and sorrow, and she feels like such a failure." – Olivia Cooke