You feel like you are literally being torn apart. You can’t possibly combine work and raising a child, and it’s not possible for you to choose just one. As soon as you take a step towards home, you begin to think about the work, affairs, career or earnings that remain behind the scenes. But even a step in the opposite direction doesn’t help - diapers, bottles, first words or first illnesses don’t come out of my head...
As soon as you think about work again or try to do it, you notice that you are “terribly drawn” to the child. You even begin to feel like a traitor who abandoned your baby to the mercy of fate. And you stay at home... But the same force pulls you to work, and while you are trying to be a good mother, playing with your baby, preparing something tasty for him, your thoughts persistently take you to business, great professional decisions are spinning in your head. problems, and instead of pleasure the child for some reason causes irritation and annoyance.
How to avoid falling into a trap?
If all this applies to you, then you have found yourself in one of the most common traps for modern women, which is called “child or work” or “I have to cope with all the problems.” It is very difficult to be in this state for a long time. Moreover, this situation is aggravated by an ever-growing sense of guilt, either in front of the child, then in front of colleagues, or in front of herself. But how did you end up in this situation? On the one hand, modern society is to blame for this, which invites a woman not to waste time, not to miss chances and to get everything from life. “You can do anything,” it seems to say with its films, advertisements, and reports. And, inspired by the examples of heroines of TV shows or just friends and acquaintances, the woman takes on work, family, and child. But somehow imperceptibly encouraging: “You can do everything” is replaced by a categorical: “You must do everything”... And, having taken upon herself responsibility for what happens to her child, husband, work and her own spiritual and personal growth, she automatically finds herself in a trap . Now, as soon as she tries to evade any of the responsibilities she has taken on, a powerful force comes into play - a feeling of guilt.
Horrible power
The feeling of guilt is that a woman begins to reproach and blame herself for all the failures and troubles that happen at home or at work. “My boy got sick because I stayed late at work and didn’t come home on time.” “I have to finish my studies, I study a lot, and therefore my daughter sleeps poorly and eats almost nothing.” “I always think about how my son is doing in the garden, and therefore I can’t concentrate on work, I miss mistakes and retype documents several times.” As a result of all these thoughts, the conclusion suggests itself: “I am a bad mother” or: “I am an unsuccessful employee.” If you allow the feeling of guilt to grow, it can take a form called “Serves me right” or “Let it be worse for me.” A woman begins to unconsciously punish herself for not taking good enough care of the child, for not giving all her attention to the baby and not immediately satisfying all his desires. Or for not meeting the boss’s expectations, delaying the completion of work and not putting your soul into it. “I can’t allow myself to do anything good and pleasant for myself,” Masha complains, “I know that I won’t buy new things and watch interesting films, but I will burden myself more and more, until - nothing will stop this crazy carousel. Then you can lie down under a warm blanket, drink hot tea, watch stupid movies, play with your baby and do many other nice and necessary things that you don’t get around to.”
The feeling of guilt itself is an important regulator of people's behavior and their interaction with other members of society. It can act as the first signal of impending trouble, calling a person to pay attention to the disorder that may have been caused by some actions taken. A healthy sense of guilt is an extension of the responsibility that a person takes upon himself. It allows you to notice that you did something wrong and then correct it, apologize, and remember your mistakes for the future. People who are conscientious and decent, sensitive to what is happening around them, have a certain amount of healthy feelings of guilt. However, painful guilt can become not only a source of unpleasant experiences, but also, in one “wonderful” moment, destroy a person’s normal life.
Perfectionistic views of motherhood
Many modern mothers have built a picture in their heads that it is necessary to be an ideal mother and an ideal wife.
. They believe that it is necessary to manage everything, to be well-groomed, caring, to have time to take care of themselves, their home, and their husband. But even keeping up with everything is not enough. It is important to take this to the highest level.
In addition, many young mothers are overwhelmed with ambitions related to raising a child. They give birth and raise a child not just to live and enjoy life, but so that the child becomes the very best
: the smartest, the most sociable, the healthiest, the happiest, etc. Living according to such a scheme of ideality, disappointment is inevitable, as well as a feeling of guilt if you were unable to ensure that the child met all the criteria. But where do all these ambitions and ideas about the ideal come from?
Ideal ideas are born thanks to:
To check how high (or too low) your internal bar is, do a similar exercise as mentioned above (see the circle picture at the beginning of the article). Draw a circle, divide it into 4 sectors and use different colors to mark how developed your child is in each of the four areas: physical, intellectual, emotional, relationship with the child. Enter a number from 0 to 10. And use the second color to mark how developed you would like the child to be.
Results.
Once you have placed the points, see how large the discrepancy is between them. If the discrepancy between the present and the expected is more than 2 (on 2-4 axes), then most likely you are dissatisfied with the current state of affairs.
If you fall into the category of moms with high standards, then ask yourself the following questions and answer them honestly.
If you are still overwhelmed by a feeling of guilt because you are doing something wrong, then make a list of those people to whom you want to prove something. This will greatly help you return from the world of ideal.
But is the feeling of guilt always real? Perhaps this is just a mask behind which is hiding a completely different problem?
Images of a good person
There are several images of a working woman in our society. The negative image is represented by an unsuccessful, disheveled, uncollected woman who performs her duties formally and thoughtlessly, while she still strives to run away from work early and thinks only about her own interests (family and children), instead of moving forward production and striving for professional growth. A positive image of a working woman is personified by an interesting and energetic lady who, moreover, easily solves all the problems occurring in her home. Not a shadow of anxiety appears on her confident face, and no one can even suspect that something is upsetting her: everything is always okay with her.
- Studies conducted on the development of children of working and non-working mothers have shown that children of working and studying women develop faster than those who devote themselves entirely to the home. This is explained not only by the higher level of education among working women, but also by the fact that the time spent with the child is more saturated with communication, it is valued more highly by both mother and child, while for non-working women, communication with the baby is gradually reduced to care behind him or almost entirely devoted to housekeeping.
Now let's see how the right and wrong mother are represented in our society. The wrong one is a complete egoist who minds only her own affairs, is not at all interested in the child, abandons him in the care of one or another “outsiders” - the baby moves from one nanny to another, from grandmothers to aunts, acquaintances, is sick, does not study well and later he becomes a miserable loser. A correct, good mother is the bearer of the idea that children are most important. She devotes herself entirely to the baby: she is friendly, caring, attentive, does homework with the child, takes him to clubs, arranges round dances, sings lullabies, bakes pies, plays sports and is always there for the baby, always ready to help in difficult times.
Don't you think that a good business woman resembles a bad mother, and a good mother has the traits of a bad worker? Thus, the images of a professional and a good mother proposed by modern society contain a contradiction, which leads a woman into the trap called “work or child.”
Who benefits from this?
Now let’s try to answer the key question: who benefits from a woman feeling guilty and being torn to pieces? The answer will most likely surprise you, but it really benefits almost everyone, sometimes even the woman herself. When a person experiences a feeling of guilt, he easily agrees to additional concessions and takes on additional responsibility. If a woman feels guilty before her child, relatives, or husband, she agrees to perform more and more duties in order to atone for this guilt. And then the rest of the family members are freed from these responsibilities (most often without noticing it at all) and begin to receive certain benefits from this. That is, when a mother comes home from work, scolding herself for spending so much time outside the home and the poor child suffering without her, then in his light whims she will be able to see the terrible torment of the baby that she has imagined and, in order to correct the situation, will rush fulfill all his whims. Now she has no time for severity or education - she is ready to take the Moon out of the sky, just to “atone” for her guilt.
Excessive responsibility is also beneficial to employees and superiors. Usually, having taken on some responsibility, a woman who feels guilty will most likely see it through to the end, fulfilling the share of her colleagues at the same time. However, she will not apply for a promotion, because she knows that she is not a good enough worker and devotes too much effort to her family.
But the most interesting thing is that, to some extent, being guilty is beneficial for the woman herself. The fact is that at the very bottom of the feeling of guilt, behind unpleasant remorse and self-claims, hides a feeling of self-worth and indispensability. “Only a mother can give a child everything he needs. Can a grandmother or a nanny understand a child as well as their own mother!” - Irina says proudly, refusing the help of “outsiders.” But these proud words have another side. After all, if a child feels bad, then only the mother is to blame for this...
My cry for help and feeling of guilt before the child
My daughter is almost 2.5 years old. Over the years, I have periodically experienced what is commonly called “burnout,” but to a fairly mild degree. Now this burnout has simply reached its climax. Under the cut is a sheet.
There are three of us living: my daughter, me and my husband. In a foreign city, we have no relatives or friends here. Due to these circumstances, the child is almost exclusively on me. My husband leaves for work, we are still sleeping, he comes around 20 o’clock, shower, dinner, and at 21.30 my daughter goes to bed.
From birth, my daughter is very characterful, sleepless, and demanding. I tried to be a good mother, I read a lot of books on child psychology, all this time I was as patient as I could, I controlled myself, I tried not to raise my voice, I always tried to calmly explain everything in words a million times, I carried her in my arms at the first squeak (read: constantly), hugged, kissed, consoled her, never spanked her in her life. We did a lot of different development activities, it wasn’t a burden for me, but a joy, I came up with and implemented various ideas, we have a whole children’s library at home, we read a lot, we constantly communicate, I tell her everything and about everything that she can understand due to age. There was a lot of rage, hugging, fooling around...
Naturally, my husband and I don’t go anywhere alone. Everywhere only with my daughter. There is no other option. Previously, at least in the evening there was time to talk to him alone after my daughter’s lights out. Now their work schedule has changed, he gets up a lot and often goes to bed with his daughter, well, at most he will sit for another hour. I've been in a kind of social isolation all day. I only communicate with my daughter. Well, the mothers know each other on the playground - but it’s more likely to say hello, find out how things are, and each run after their child, because children are not particularly interested in playing together yet. I go to the pool 2 times a week, this is my vacation, my husband is with my daughter at this time. About 1-2 times a month I go somewhere alone for half a day on my day off to do my business: to a shopping center, to a hospital, to the library to get my daughter’s books)), to the cinema, sometimes I meet with my friends - we live far from each other, therefore this happens extremely rarely.
In general, this is all a preface, a description of our life. Now I'm just mentally crushed. I've been tormented by some depressive feelings for a couple of months now. I don't want to play with my daughter anymore. No, every day we play, draw, sculpt, read, study... But I do all this differently than before, when I was most interested and enjoyed it. Now I do it because “I have to,” through “I don’t want to.” And my daughter asks. I catch myself thinking that I am putting off these classes in every possible way, that I’d rather do the extra cleaning, wash the dishes, cook, so as not to play. When we play something, I think about how to quickly end my participation in this action. I look at my watch, trying to remember if I have any other “urgent matters.”
My daughter is now in a crisis, and it’s just bad. “No” to everything. For a walk, he runs away and yells. When he eats, he runs away and screams. this, if you don’t go for a walk, for example, he comes later and is hysterical, “I want to go for a walk!”, but there is no time. Wash your hands, change clothes, go to bed—everything is a wild protest. He doesn’t want any food that I offer to eat, he gets hysterical. They gave me water in the wrong mug - hysterical, I turned on the vacuum cleaner, not she - hysterical. The seat she needs on the minibus is occupied - hysterical. I added butter to the porridge and stirred it - she was hysterical, she shouldn’t have stirred it. If she wasn’t given the right to choose something, she’s hysterical. It does everything the other way around. Play (role-playing games) - ONLY and EXCLUSIVELY according to her script. And God forbid something goes wrong as she decided (by accident, for example), snot, drool, screams and yells. In general, this is a crisis in all its glory. In theory, I know how to deal with all this. But practice leaves much to be desired. My nerves just can't stand it.
And the thing that irritates me the most is WHINING. Just endless. It’s just that when she asks for something, and when she just says something, she immediately NOOOOOTS. I can't stand this whining anymore. Previously, I might not have taken it so seriously. Now I just can't. I explode when I hear this whining again. And these constant questions. Recently my daughter started asking questions. Why? Why? Where? And if...? It was all very cute and funny at first, I try to answer everything, but these questions just DO NOT END, it’s non-stop. Either questions or whining. I thought that at least the street would be my salvation, I would have a mental break there from these conversations, but that was not the case. She can’t even just run for 2 minutes or climb a slide, or swing on a swing SILENTLY!!! She asks questions just every minute, every second. I myself am not a very talkative person, it’s hard for me. There are also these non-trivial questions, the answers to which are given to me with great difficulty.
The last 2 weeks have finished me off mentally. During this time, I didn’t go anywhere alone, except for Pyaterochka. First, I fell ill with some kind of virus with a high fever and feeling very bad. Naturally, my husband was working and all the responsibilities were on me, plus the temperature was 38.5. Then my daughter became infected, and we continued to get sick together. Less than two days after recovery, I came down with rotavirus. So much so that I spent half a day hugging the toilet, the fever was such that I was shaking with wild weakness and aches all over my body. I just got up from the sofa and held on to the wall so as not to fall. My husband was working. And in this state I was still preparing food for my daughter, feeding her, washing her, putting her to bed, listening to her shout about “Play with me!” and tried to play somehow while lying on the sofa. The next day, my daughter became infected again, vomiting like fountains and other delights of the rotavirus. By the end of the week, I was simply at the limit of my strength and dreamed of going to the cinema alone on Saturday. But on Saturday my husband got infected from us. Of course, he didn't get out of bed at all all day. Instead of going to the movies, I treated my husband, cooked different meals for everyone (depending on the degree of recovery), cleaned, did laundry, and worked with my daughter. And today he had an appointment with the doctor. and Tomorrow is football. and on Thursday meeting with friends. and on Wednesday my daughter and I go to the clinic for the whole evening of doctors.
And girls, I just CAN’T take it anymore. I am so tired. I do not want anything. I want to be left alone. ALL!!! I just want to sit somewhere in the forest alone. Or go to the ends of the world and lie there stupidly for two days and do nothing. And if before I almost never raised my voice at my daughter, now sometimes I just yell “STOP IT NOW!” "STOP IT QUICKLY!" “HOW I’M SICK OF YOUR WHINING” I start to boil just instantly. Today at lunch it got to the point where I was so boiling over her whining that I grabbed her from the chair, carried her into the room, yelled at her, left her there alone and slammed the door. And she went into the bath and sobbed at what a terrible mother I was. My daughter is already struggling, crisis, new skills. And she asks these questions because she is simply interested in everything and wants to know everything. I understand all this, damn it. I just CAN’T, I can’t do it anymore. I'm trying my best to restrain myself and not yell, but I just can't control myself anymore. On sedatives, it doesn’t help. Then I came to her room, she was sitting on the floor, crying, hysterical, already choking, all red. And he repeats, “Mom, I’m sorry. I won’t do that again...” She doesn’t really understand the meaning of this phrase, it seems to me that either I or my husband just told her that it should be said that way. Lately, I often scream, and she sits so scared, pathetic, in tears and repeats this phrase. I start crying myself, I feel so sorry for her that she has such a mother, then I ask her for forgiveness. But I can’t help it, it starts again. This is just some kind of nightmare, I'm already going crazy. I’m already afraid when she comes up to me that she’ll whine again and I’ll scream. In recent days, sometimes I can barely restrain myself from hitting her. Help me. I don't want to be such a mother, it's terrible. My daughter is stressed, I am stressed. I don't have the opportunity to be alone in the next week. Yes, I don’t even want to go to this pool anymore. This won't give me anything. I don't want anything at all. I wait for them to fall asleep and breathe a sigh of relief. I’m afraid that even 1 day without a child will not save me, I’m just at the limit. I don't know how to get out of here.
What do psychologists say?
Of course, a child really needs a mother. It’s good when she can be there to love, feel sorry for, understand, feed, clothe, play. It is clear that the baby becomes offended if the mother is distracted by some other “incomprehensible” things, or even leaves the house and abandons him. Some children are very jealous of their mother for work or school. “I will destroy your university, and you will have nowhere to go!” - the three-year-old son declares indignantly. But at the same time, with what pride he tells his friends: “My mother is at the institute!”
It doesn’t take much time for a baby to receive the attention he needs from his mother, communicate normally with her, and get enough of her company. It takes much more effort and time to get her attention, distract her from other worries, and force her to turn to the child. Requests, whims, and endless “well, mom!” are used. After all, usually after some time of communication, the baby can continue his activities independently or in the company of other children or adults. “And now I’m going to visit my grandmother,” the kid, who has played enough, declares with satisfaction. So it is very important to remember that the most important thing for a child is not the amount of time spent on communication and education, but its quality and content. It is important to be with your child, notice him, communicate with him not so much in your thoughts (when you are far from him), but when you are close, together.
Where is the way out?
What advice can you give to mothers who find themselves between work and a child, making a choice in favor of the former or the latter, or perhaps trying to combine both, while feeling guilty? First, look carefully, is your decision really making someone feel worse and worse? Is it true that your child cannot receive enough attention and care in your absence? Is it true that he no longer recognizes you and takes you for a stranger? Does work really stop if you miss a few days because your baby is sick? Is it true that no one can replace you if you suddenly urgently need to go home early? By answering these questions, you can understand whether there are real reasons for your worries or whether they are all caused by a painful sense of guilt and hypertrophied responsibility. Of course, in some cases you will have to decide to temporarily reduce your work responsibilities, but perhaps you will see that your feelings of guilt are a direct path to a trap for the modern woman. Try not to get caught in it!
Secondly, look at who benefits from your guilt. For example, decide whether it’s time for your loved ones to take on some of the responsibility for raising a child, running a household, or providing financial support for the family. Try to discuss these issues with them, maybe together you can distribute power and responsibility in a new way.
Thirdly, try to praise yourself for what you manage to do, and do not scold yourself for the fact that it is not yet working out as well as you would like.
Natalia Kedrova, psychologist-psychotherapist
Sources of Guilt
Guilt can arise for various reasons, but there are usually two sources:
External sources
Feelings of guilt are most often caused by the child’s condition and behavior when the baby is sick or behaves badly.
In all other cases, the feeling of guilt develops against the background of how your spouse and other relatives treat you. Do they judge you or criticize your methods of education? The slightest comments about how you dress your child can throw you off track. Even statements from famous doctors or other specialists can emphasize your feelings of guilt. Pediatricians and other children's specialists can be very harsh in their judgment and even outright blaming, saying, "Mommy, where were you looking?" To determine how much pressure your environment puts on you, you need to repeat the previous step. Take a piece of paper, a pen, and colored pencils and draw the same circle with four sectors (see picture above). And mark from 0 to 10 what others expect from you in the areas of child development:
Use one color to mark what your spouse expects from you. Perhaps, in the child’s physical development, he expects from you 8-9, but in the intellectual development, a two is enough for him. Using the same principle, note what your parents expect from you. This way you can experiment and identify all the people whose opinions matter to you.
Results:
If your marks are less than 5, and basically your loved ones are satisfied with everything, then this means that those around you trust you and support you. If the marks are above 5, then most likely you are experiencing strong pressure from others, they expect a lot from you. This can trigger strong feelings of guilt.
