Mother's Guilt

Feeling guilty is familiar territory for most mums. It usually comes on during pregnancy and comes and goes throughout motherhood. Have you questioned whether you are being a good enough mum to your child or children? Perhaps you feel bad that you returned to work too soon, should be playing more or less, preparing better meals or not taking time out for yourself. Each day we make choices and in turn we question if we did enough. The good news is that to feel guilty you have to care enough to do so. However it’s tiring being weighed down with guilt, so let’s look at what we can do to keep it in check.

One of the major stumbling blocks for guilt is striving for perfection. It is impossible to be a perfect parent and making mistakes is natural. We need to change our self talk from not good enough to my best is good enough. This means not comparing yourself to other mothers and noticing each time we do something right. Research has shown that if we practise naming what has gone well, we can change our brain focus to being more positively orientated. So the next time you pull yourself up on something you forgot to do, name something you did do. It may be things you do without thought such as getting up in the night to sooth your child or prepare nutritious meals.

I spoke last week about practising mindfulness to help us learn to be more present in our busy lives. We can be our own worst critic and not notice how often we chastise ourselves for every mistake. By pushing the pause button and taking a moment to take a few slow deep breaths, we bring awareness to what is happening in that present moment. Learning to notice the content of our thoughts creates distance from it and an opportunity to shift from guilt to acceptance. By lightening the guilt load we are able to focus on how we can do better next time.

I often say to women “if you are not familiar with guilt before kids, you will find it comes up all the time as you strive to be best mum you can be. The next time you feel guilty, remind yourself it means you care and without that you’d have nothing to feel guilty about!