Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Expectations of Motherhood

Posted by Tracy Wainwright at 8:34 PM
Today there is an expectation that we come home with our baby, our husband goes off to work for 40+ hours each week and we are to take care of baby, our home, our husband when he comes home, possibly returning to work ourselves after a few short weeks, or begin the activities of mommy groups and babycise, retain all our friendships and minister to other people in our lives. And this is all to be done while spending either 8-10 hours alone with baby or 8-10 hours at work and juggling home life afterword.
It’s no wonder so many new moms experience depression. Reality is often a far cry (sometimes a frequent cry) from the peaceful sweetness we tend to picture before becoming a mom. The expectation of what motherhood will be like generally does not match up with what we experience. We are all so generally good at hiding our struggle from others, not wanting to seem like we can’t do it. Therefore all the other moms seem to have it all together and we feel like even more of a failure when we’re not enjoying motherhood or can do nothing but cry because we’re so exhausted. But ask for help? Forbid! That would be admitting failure. I’m not a good mother. Or maybe just not adequate, because I can’t do what needs to be done as the mother I so longed to be.
The truth is, however, that we were never made to do it all by ourselves. We are interdependent beings. We were made to live together, love each other, help each other, and rely on each other.

1 comments on "Expectations of Motherhood"

W4TMN on March 8, 2008 at 10:38 PM said...

Hey Tracy,
The expectations of a mom are so large. I think we're all trying to come across as having our act together at church, home and work and its really not like that. As moms we all get flustered when the work is overload and those little smiling faces are looking at us telling us I just spilled a glass of juice or I need something. My Grandmother has always told me that she put her makeup on no matter what, because it didn't seem to do any good to gripe or complain. In some ways shes right. I often don't gripe or say anything when I'm feeling pain or feeling yucky and neither do alot of moms. Touche to Moms they deserve a cruise and a million bucks. Take care.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Expectations of Motherhood

Today there is an expectation that we come home with our baby, our husband goes off to work for 40+ hours each week and we are to take care of baby, our home, our husband when he comes home, possibly returning to work ourselves after a few short weeks, or begin the activities of mommy groups and babycise, retain all our friendships and minister to other people in our lives. And this is all to be done while spending either 8-10 hours alone with baby or 8-10 hours at work and juggling home life afterword.
It’s no wonder so many new moms experience depression. Reality is often a far cry (sometimes a frequent cry) from the peaceful sweetness we tend to picture before becoming a mom. The expectation of what motherhood will be like generally does not match up with what we experience. We are all so generally good at hiding our struggle from others, not wanting to seem like we can’t do it. Therefore all the other moms seem to have it all together and we feel like even more of a failure when we’re not enjoying motherhood or can do nothing but cry because we’re so exhausted. But ask for help? Forbid! That would be admitting failure. I’m not a good mother. Or maybe just not adequate, because I can’t do what needs to be done as the mother I so longed to be.
The truth is, however, that we were never made to do it all by ourselves. We are interdependent beings. We were made to live together, love each other, help each other, and rely on each other.

1 comments:

W4TMN said...

Hey Tracy,
The expectations of a mom are so large. I think we're all trying to come across as having our act together at church, home and work and its really not like that. As moms we all get flustered when the work is overload and those little smiling faces are looking at us telling us I just spilled a glass of juice or I need something. My Grandmother has always told me that she put her makeup on no matter what, because it didn't seem to do any good to gripe or complain. In some ways shes right. I often don't gripe or say anything when I'm feeling pain or feeling yucky and neither do alot of moms. Touche to Moms they deserve a cruise and a million bucks. Take care.

 

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