Selfcare and the Too Busy mama
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Parenting is hard and you need all the help you can get. When working with mothers and families, I see those who are doing their utmost best by their babies and yet are finding some things difficult. Mostly they are so very tired. Often they are anxious and worried. Sometimes they are frustrated and resentful. Occasionally they are lost. They are worried about their baby sleeping. Whether their baby has colic or wind. About the effects Covid-19 isolation may have on baby.
These issues and the many others parents ask me about, I am not an expert in. I don’t have all the answers for getting a baby to sleep; I don’t know the reason for colic; and I’m not sure just what it may mean to have a ‘lockdown baby’.
When I tell mothers I don’t have the answers, that I can’t fix it all, it can be disheartening. And then I explain:
As a parent, you will often NEVER have the answers. Ask any mother at any stage of parenting and they will probably admit to ‘just winging it’. We are all doing the best we can.
The best you can do is be in the best position to be able to respond to the problem the way you want to.
And by this I mean:
- you are rested
- you are calm
- you are positive under parenting challenges
If you are running at close to optimum level of these things as you can, as often as you can, you are better able to cope with whatever your little one throws at you- literally and figuratively!
Striving for the Impossible
When you are totally and rightly, focused on your baby, other things go by the wayside: showering for example. Having a decent breakfast. The housework. And that is fine every now and then.
But there is a pressure amongst all that, where women feel that it’s NOT fine. That there is a constant stream of expectation filtering through media, conversation and from within, that you must be all things to all people.
Women are expected to work as if they didn’t have children, and raise their children as if they didn’t have to work~ author unknown
There is a lot of advice and a whole ‘selfcare’ movement that is gaining momentum around this dilemma- how women are to be rested, fulfilled and calm, all while packing school lunches, buying birthday cards, doing the ironing AND working. And by ‘working’ I am including the non-paid, inside the home type of working as well.
Becoming this ‘perfect’ parent and maintaining a state of wellbeing all amongst day to day life with children is a problem with modern society that women are having to deal with, constantly. The most common narrative is for women to start to put themselves first as the obvious antidote to the traditional ‘mother martyr’ of sacrificing everything at the alter of partner and children.
This is not a helpful perspective as it pits mothers against those they love in the lottery of ‘who gets the best of me’. That is where guilt comes in, alongside resentment and frustration. AND, mama is still overwhelmed, burnt out and unsupported. Hardly a workable solution. And yet that is the line women are being fed.
How about this:
Women put their needs ALONGSIDE those of everyone else, in an equality scenario, where everyone has their needs met?
But I don’t have the time…
There is something fundamentally wrong with a society when 50% of it’s population (women) feel they do not have time to take a breath; to have a cup of tea; to rest. Where they feel burned out, overwhelmed, unsupported.
There is a reason women feel that way- because they are burned out, overwhelmed and wholly unsupported. And yet, the responsibility still falls on women to sort it out.
They need to be more organised.
If only they got up earlier.
If only they had more sleep.
They need to ask for help.
There must be something they aren’t doing right, that they need to do more of, or less of.
It is not that mama’s don’t have the time, it is that their time is taken up by everything else their partners aren’t doing. A family’s success is often achieved through the detriment of a mother’s health, wellbeing, fulfilment or own personal success.
Click through to read an article on the imbalance of time and success within the relationships of many famous men. Imagine how fulfilled and successful women, in general, could be if that imbalance were righted in contemporary society. How amazing women are that their every day successes occur DESPITE this imbalance.
Or is there something else contributing to the disease of the ‘too busy’ mama?
There are a lot of factors contributing to this situation and plenty of solutions (not all simple):
Society does not promote rest as productive
Society promotes an assumed inequality in mothers vs fathers ‘load’ responsibility
Society does not encourage equality in working practices that allows for an equality in this load
Society has isolated women away from their traditional support networks
Women have a tendency to accept these inequalities
Men have a tendency allow these inequalities
Without going into the complexities of the socio-political-economic influences that have brought women to the point of being ‘too busy’ to be ok, and how to challenge or change the status-quo, there are some simple things mamas can do:
Be aware: this is socio-political-economic stuff. There is a bigger picture than making sure you take a bath. Or organising your diary better. Things are stacked against you being ok through this all. When it doesn’t work, there’s a reason but that’s not an excuse. You do have agency and choice to change stuff…
Off-load the Load: whether it be the mental, physical or emotional load, share it. If your partner is skipping off to work and you feel like the apocalypse is coming, there is an imbalance that needs to be righted- together.
Parenting is a shared responsibility, regardless of your working situations.
The household is a shared responsibility, regardless of your working situations.
Call it out: don’t buy in to the ‘status quo’. It might be COMMON for mothers to be burnt out, overwhelmed, and unsupported but that doesn’t make it right, or ok to continue in this way.
Multitasking Mummas, we salute you!
Wait. What?!
***Sigh***
But without any obvious political change or even immediate changes within a relationship, what selfcare can mama’s do in the meantime?.
The most basic and potentially accessible are the following:
1. Stop and breathe: I know you're short of time so this is the very basic first element. You can do this anywhere, anytime and despite it being short and simple, it can be incredibly effective in allowing you time and space to re-group. When you feel your stress rising, just STOP. Take a deep breath, through your nose and into your lungs. Feel your ribs expand. Try and make the inhalation last for a count of 3. Breathe out for a count of 5. Repeat for as long as you need or as long as you've got. Smile. Carry on.
2. Do the thing for you, first: everything and everyone can wait. I promise, they can wait. There will always be a ‘to-do’ list or things that need to get done. Try for a day or two, that when you move on to ‘the next thing’, you do something for yourself first. So, have a cup of tea, read a chapter of a book, pet the cat for a few minutes, hug someone. It does not matter what it is, it matters that it is something for you. After that, then you can continue with your chores or work or whatever. And you will get them done AND you will have felt better for ‘filling your cup’ a bit more.
3. Say ‘no’: say no to doing the dinner; say no to staying late to work; say no to dropping them at the park; say no, no, no… Boundaries are not some way of rejecting someone else, boundaries are a way of honouring yourself.
