I celebrated one decade of motherhood yesterday, and I’ve come to the conclusion that we put far too much pressure on moms.

This wasn’t something I even started to understand until I was sleep deprived with a baby that never slept. I’d heard that moms have the hardest job, but my pre-motherhood self didn’t see it that way. I naively thought that because you didn’t really need qualifications to start this job, besides the biological ability to have a child, that it was easy.

Oh bless your heart naive younger self. Thank goodness we have a saying for that level of stupidity here in the south.

It’s not easy.

It’s actually extremely difficult.

As I drove to Chick-fil-A to help my son’s 10th birthday “perfect” I thought I might scream. I wanted to turn and drive the other direction for a few hours. I’m so tired of the bickering, the kids that won’t cooperate, the mess, and the knowing that it is “my” job to fix it. I don’t think I am the only mom who feels this way sometimes.

You don’t get to walk off the job, clock out, stop caring, or rest easy. From the day that child enters your life, you are on the clock.

If COVID has taught us one thing, besides that timed tickets are amazing, it’s that moms have a hard job. We expect moms to be everything and to do it with a smile. By everything, I literally mean everything. We require moms to give up careers, time alone, their physical wellbeing, and let’s be honest, sanity, to raise their kids. This is a physically, mentally, and emotionally demanding job. We expect moms to be all the things (teacher, driver, psychologist, nurse, disciplinarian, etc) while also being wives, employees, and contributing members of society. Something about this doesn’t seem balanced.

I’m sure the pressure on dads is immense too, but since I’m not a dad, I can’t tell you much about that.

There are days (or decades really) when I feel like I hit a wall and cannot do anymore.

Last week (maybe it was more than that, but it all blends together) someone asked me if I could step up and do one more thing and I exploded. I was SO angry, like hands shaking and seeing red angry. The task wasn’t actually unreasonable, but it was one more thing from one more person that couldn’t see that my hands were already overflowing. I talked to someone about this anger and they looked confused, but as I was venting I realized that I’m in a different place than the person making the request. The rest of society is not required to understand how hard it is to be in this place.

I am in the place where I wake up in the middle of night and put reminders in my phone to change sheets, return library books, email students, and buy birthday presents. I am in the place where alone time is scarce, where everything (and I mean everything) is a battle, I am in the place where my head is full of grocery lists, meeting notes, books I need to read with the kids, and guilt that our Come Follow Me lessons are basically non-existent. I’m in the place where someone is literally talking to me all the time and my brain can no longer process any new information. I am in the place where I need help, but asking for it is either too difficult or too complicated to explain. I’m in the place where one more request without dropping something else seems impossible.

I don’t think I am alone in this place. I think as a society we have created a cycle where many moms feel this way. We’ve been taught from day one that we can do it all and that we should do it all. If you’ve ever been pregnant or had a newborn you’ve experienced this. I am currently 5 (maybe 6 months) pregnant and guess how many of my daily activities have slowed or been taken on by another person, exactly zero. My entire body hurts, I am exhausted, and until recently I really wanted to throw up all the time, but have we missed a beat…of course we have but not intentionally. The expectation is that we keep going as if nothing has changed, we are at all the practices, church activities, and completing all the homework. We haven’t asked dad to take on more, skip meetings, or ask his employees/employer to take on more. We are fighting our way through piano, chores, and dinnertime. Do I want to cancel everything and serve cold cereal every night, heck yes. Is there an expectation that we will not do that, heck yes. So what are we doing? Oh we are trucking along as if nothing has changed.

As a society we tell pregnant moms, new moms, and moms in general that this is a blessing and we should be grateful! With that expectation of gratitude comes the the implication that we should be able to handle it on our own. We should be thrilled to have this blessing, we should love everything about this stage of life. Add to it the extra layer that many moms were something else before we were moms or are something while being moms. As educated and professional women, we are expected not only to handle it but to excel and love it! If we can handle a “real job” then surely we can handle our own children and we should do it with a smile.

This expectation is unfair.

About a year ago someone told me that she really disliked the littles stage of motherhood. This mom is amazing. I could not be more grateful for her candor. Knowing that someone else struggled through this phase and didn’t love or even like it was freeing. I felt like I could breathe a little easier. So for anyone else that needs it to hear it, I don’t love the littles stage either, there are lots of days when I don’t even like it. It doesn’t mean that I don’t love my kids, but it does mean that I don’t necessarily find arguing with my children about putting their shows on fulfilling and that… is ok.

What if we changed the paradigm? What if instead of celebrating moms once a year with flowers and cards, we gave moms a break? I’m not talking about one day off, I mean what if we took some of the pressure off permananetly? What if we acknowledged that motherhood is a hard job and that expecting one person to be all the things for a child is… well too much?

What if we looked at children as society as a whole’s responsibility instead of the responsibility of one person?

What if we stopped asking dads, grandparents, and neighbors to “help” and instead viewed raising the next generation as something we are all responsible for?

What if we as employers and employees advocated for parents? What if we acknowledged that one of the things that would help moms that most would be that if dads were around more to co-parent? What if we started respecting family time and the meetings really did end at 5pm so dads could be home to eat dinner, go to sports practice, and put kids to bed?

What if we increased or encouraged the amount of time that dads are home with the family instead of over-scheduling them with church meetings, work meetings, civic meetings, or the incessant ding of emails coming in from work?

What if we acknowledged that sometimes we put other things ahead of of a mom’s sanity and have expectations that are just too high?

What if we started asking moms what they need and really listened to the answers and made adjustments?

What if we stopped the mom shaming? What if we acknowledged that screen time is sometimes needed to keep the peace, that bribing your kids to behave doesn’t mean you are raising criminals, and yelling at your kids because you are DONE really isn’t the worst thing you could do?

What if we as moms admit out loud to ourselves and each other that the current paradigm isn’t working? What if we admit that we stay up at night worrying we are raising potential serial killers and that some help would be nice?

You know what I think?

I think if we did any of these things that the quality of life would improve.

I think we would be happier and I think that kids would thrive. I think we would be more connected as a neighborhoods and communities, and I think we would stop blaming one person for problems and start looking for real solutions.

I think it’s time we step up. I think it’s time we as moms say, enough is enough, one person cannot realistically do all the things and love it.

Good luck moms!