I think we all have moments (or, you know, life times’ worth of moments) when we feel we’re not ‘enough’. Not pretty enough. Not smart enough. Not good enough at our job and not good enough as mothers. Lord knows I’ve been there and continue to visit regularly. More’s the pity because guilt is a fairly futile emotion and serves little purpose that I’ve been able to see other than making us feel like crapola.
G wrote to me last week:
I’m a 34 mum of two (2yo and 5 months) and just can’t seem to shake the mummy guilts. Let me preface this with the disclaimer that I’m not a total wreck – I love them madly, feed them, keep then warm and generally out of harms way – so rationally speaking i know I’m not a ‘bad mum’.
But…. I just can’t seem to shake the overwhelming feelings of guilt that accompany motherhood.
I was diagnosed with PND with my first bub and it took a while (and some counselling) to get over it – and I know then I had strong feelings that I wasn’t good enough to be responsible for this beautiful new creature in my life & loads of anxiety. Happily, I did get over this in time, and definately coped better with No 2. But i was just wondering how others feel about this and how they cope?
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had coffee/playdate with another mum friends (or even just met some random at the park) and come home feeling crap about myself after they told me about their own parenting techniques or given me ‘advice’ about my kids. Then I resolve to change what I’m doing and usually end up moaning to my husband about all the things we are doing wrong (“We have to stop letting her into our bed – she must ‘self settle’, “we have to stop letting her eat additives”, “we’re not brushing her molars properly”, “too much TV”, “little johnny can recite his numbers up to 13 – we mustn’t be reading to her properly” etc etc… you get the idea) and how “things have to change” – which drives him mad! Then we fight, it blows over until i learn about something else I’m not doing ‘right’ and the whole cycle starts again. Exhausting.
I’m not a complete idiot (well, not all the time:)), I understand that all mums feel guilt at times and have heard all the mummy mantras: “you just have to do what feels right”, “happy mum, happy baby”, “listen to your instincts” – but sometimes I wonder how everyone else copes with this? I’m educated, have a great family, good friends a successful career and think that generally I’m a reasonably nice and responsible person, so why can’t i get it together and get over this? It’s eating away at me and generally causing loads of tension in my marriage. I just always doubt myself when it comes to my kids – i guess it’s just that I love them so much that I don’t want to let them down. I don’t want to fail them.
I had a play date with some old school friends yesterday (who admittedly were a bit toxic back at high school – why do I do this to myself??) and a negative comment about the way I changed my son’s nappy sent me spiralling and crying into my wine glass last night. I’m outwardly a “coper” – but inside petrified that I am somehow fucking up the most important job of my life and letting down those I love the most – my babies.
Look forward to gaining some wisdom. Any advice?
When I had my first baby and had the first of many freakouts (I don’t even think he was born yet, I think I was freaking out hypothetically) about being a crap mother, my own wonderful mother imparted the following wisdom “It’s not like your baby has done this before. He knows no other mother and has nobody to compare you to.”
This was wise because I think we do SO much comparing of ourselves to others. To celebrities. To Nigella. To women in magazines or playgrounds who seem to Have It All and Do It All and Have All Their Shit Together. I’m going to have a wild guess and say that NOBODY has it all or does it all or is free from self-doubt (that’s one of the reasons I wrote my book).
Can you relate to what G is saying? Do you have any advice?
How Matt Moran Really Feels About Fast Food
What I Eat When
Top Comments
wow-I could have written this post. Outwardly everyone seems to think I am supermum - inwardly I am constantly beating myself up about not being good enough. It's amazing how hard it is for us to all be honest with each other at the playground or whereever. Do we have something to prove? I have 3 boys under 4 and lately it has been really tough. i get upset and then I spend the rest of the day feeling bad about being upset. How do you get out of this spiral? Yesterday I was at a playgroup where #1 son refused to share the trains, #2 son complained about hunger and begged food off everyone constantly (even though I did have a bag of food with me) and 6 month old #3 son needed to be rocked to sleep in the pram. Someone looked at me sympathetically and said "oh, it 's one of those days'. I now it was meant to be supprtive, but it made me feel terrible because it wasn't ut of the ordinary and I had hoped for my distress to not be so obvious. It would have been nice if someone had offered to help by rocking the baby while I attend to the othr 2 screaming meemies...the again, maybe I just should have asked....it's tough! I feel like I spend 70% of my days saying 'no' and tryng to think of appropriate consequences when the kids ignore 'no'. Is this normal??????
Yep that's normal. I feel *exactly* the same.
*Sigh*
Someone really needs to write a book about motherhood so as to WARN would be mums what the @#*$& they are getting themselves into!
I'm at the point now where if I see a pregnant woman, I feel sorry for her! She should have been warned! :S
Hmmm....
"self settle" is usually a euphimism for "give them a pacifier and shut the door to their room".