When You Are a Good Mom Who Feels Like a Bad Mom

How often do you feel like a bad mom?

Here’s something that’s scary for me to admit: I feel like a bad mom every single day.

I feel it on days when things go badly; when my daughter is crying and we don’t manage to get out of the house like we planned and the kitchen is a mess and things feels out of control.

I feel it on days when everything goes well; when my daughter is full of smiles and giggles, when I take her on fun adventures, when she goes to bed on time and sleeps well.

The feeling hurts. It’s excruciating, actually. It’s the type of emotional, spiritual pain that I can feel physically in my body.

But here’s the thing: When I think about it rationally, from as objective a standpoint as I can, I know that I’m actually a good mom.

So… why this feeling that I’m a bad mom? I know, both from conversations I’ve had with other moms and from examining research on motherhood, that I am not alone in this feeling. I often hear it referred to as mom guilt.

Some moms falsely attribute this guilt to some specific, big source. They say stuff like, I feel bad that I put my child in daycare each day so I can work. I can’t believe I put my child through a divorce. I failed to protect my child from the abuse they suffered when I had my back turned. Some moms falsely attribute it to a bunch of small things that add up. I let my child watch too much television. I feed my child too many unhealthy things. I lost my temper with my kids again.

I have a feeling that in a lot of cases, the problem is actually a lot deeper than these things.

A friend told me a story the other day. She worked full-time after her first child was born. Even though she enjoyed her job, she felt mired in guilt, so much so that she had her husband do daycare drop-offs because it was too painful for her. She would think, if only we could afford for me to stay home, I could let go of this guilt. After her second child was born, she did stay home, and to her surprise, the mom guilt didn’t go away or even lessen. It just transferred onto other things.

I was listening to a podcast featuring the great Dr. Brené Brown the other day, and it occurred to me that when we say mom guilt what a lot of us really mean is mom shame. It’s not just, “I make mistakes sometimes.” It’s: “I’m a bad mom.” Dr. Brown defines shame as the “intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging.”

Whatever it is, it hurts a lot. And it’s not harmless. As Dr. Brené Brown says, “shame is lethal.” It can lead to unhappiness, depression, anger, feeling closed off, and all kinds of other issues.

Dr. Brené Brown says that shame needs 3 things to grow exponentially; secrecy, silence, and judgment. When I heard her say this, alarms went off in my head. Who knows secrecy, silence, and judgment more than moms?

I have a few theories on where some of this shame comes from, which I will talk about in another post, but for now, here are a few ideas I have about how to combat it:

1. Change the way you speak to yourself. You are not a bad mom. In fact, if you are still reading this post, it probably means you relate to it, and I bet you are a great mom! Make a list of the reasons why. Actually write it down and post it somewhere in your house where you will see it each morning. Read it every day.
2. Rewrite negative mental scripts. More specifically, try to flip the negative scripts in your head. Write down some of the terrible things you say to yourself in your head and then rewrite them. Example: Stop saying, “I am abandoning my baby at daycare.” Instead try: “I am going to work so that my child can have a happy mom, access to medical insurance, and can maybe even get braces one day.” Instead of, “I am damaging my toddler by letting her watch another episode of Sesame Street because I am lazy,” try, “I am distracting my toddler with happy, educational television so that I can decompress and she doesn’t have a mom that is totally burnt out.”
3. Speak your shame to trusted people. Whether you feel shame over one particular incident or just a series of small things, talk with trusted friends and family members about it. As Brené Brown says, “Shame cannot survive being spoken and it cannot survive empathy.” Often, things aren’t as bad as they seem in our heads.
4. Find communities of compassionate, inclusive moms. Maybe start a book club for moms based on the book “Daring Greatly” by Brené Brown or any similar book. I think the more we can support each other in combatting this mom shame, the better.
5. Be an anti-judgmental mom. Don’t just be nonjudgmental. It’s not enough. Do whatever you can to shut down judgment against moms whenever you see it. Defend the mom with the crying toddler to the grocery store customer who makes rude comments about how she should have better control over her child’s behavior. When you see a judgmental comment thread online, leave a positive comment. Let moms know that you see them and that they are not alone.

I think we can fix this. We don’t have to live with unnecessary shame.

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