Motherhood Martyrdom
Exhaustion is the price you pay for motherhood.
This is a phrase commonly spoken, particularly in today’s day and age where moms are working a job in addition to their parenting duties. Today I want to change the narrative around exhaustion in motherhood.
Exhaustion is quite common given the sleep deprivation, sleep disruption and the visible and invisible load that come along with the role. Just like any position, motherhood comes with its fair share of responsibilities and also has an ebb and flow to it - periods of high intensity followed by fleeting periods of equilibrium. But it seems as though exhaustion has become a status symbol in motherhood much like busy-ness equals importance. A mom who is putting her children first and spending every waking hour devoted to them surely means she is a good mom, right? This is culturally infused in us. I am guilty of these judgements toward myself and others.
But it’s time to dismantle the myth of martyrdom surrounding motherhood. The more we DO is drilled into us by the societal pressure to DO more. DOING more in the day is celebrated. DOING more gets the promotion. DOING more gets the recognition. BEING, however - being still, being as we are - is not something acknowledged. I, for one, feel good at the end of the day when I’ve made the school lunches, bathed both kids, vacuumed the house, folded the laundry and prepped the next day’s dinner, to name a few accomplishments often on the to-do list. On top of working my two day jobs. Just writing all of that is exhausting!
These tasks are all essential and unavoidable, so then how does the shift happen? It occurs when those tasks don’t all get done at the end of the day, and instead of beating myself up, I acknowledge what did take place. Perhaps it was being there when Noah scraped his knee, or connecting with Lauren about her day on the way home from school. Personally, I’m trying to exercise gratitude for these moments of BEING over the things I’m DOING, and as I take steps in this direction, I notice that I need to be in a certain place mentally/emotionally/nervous system-wise in order to BE and actually connect meaningfully with my kids. I am typically one who drags herself to bedtime. Once we hit lights are out, I feel ready to collapse. And if one of the kids pops into my room after that with a fear of the dark or worry about tomorrow’s outfit, I snap. This is MY time! But recently, after snapping when Lauren came into my room after lights out, I went back to her room and just held her and stroked her hair. My type-A personality resisted the urge because it pushed my bedtime back and meant less down time on my own before sleep. Because it meant I still had to be ‘on’. But here’s what I learned by doing that: My wellbeing is paramount; I can’t connect with them from my frenzied, task-oriented self. Suddenly, caring for myself feels less selfish and becomes just as important as caring for them.
If the end goal of motherhood is to do as much as possible, then exhaustion is most certainly the price. As a perfectionist and type-A doer in active recovery, I am far from perfect. I will definitely still try to do too much in a day in order to feel good or snap at my children when I have completed my day’s to-dos and they still need something. But every time I pause to BE with my kids or acknowledge how I WAS BEING with my kids, I’m taking a small step toward building a new pathway in my brain which will slowly but surely dismantle the martyrdom of motherhood.
