July 28, 2025 • 52 mins
In this episode, Psychologist Anna returns to explore the complex topic of parental guilt - a feeling experienced by 70% of parents on a weekly basis.
We dive into the causes of guilt in parenting, how parental guilt affects men and women differently, and how to manage the pressure to be a perfect parent.
Anna shares valuable insights on setting healthy boundaries, coping with negative self-talk, and addressing the impact of social media on parenting.
The episode also highlights the importance of embracing the concept of "rough, rough, good enough" - because perfection isn't necessary for raising happy healthy children.
Key Topics Discussed:
What is parental guilt and its common causes
How parental guilt impacts men and women differently
The pros and cons of social media on parenting: how it creates pressure but can also provide support
The role of healthy boundaries in reducing parental guilt
The personality traits that might make some people more prone to parental guilt
Practical strategies for challenging negative self-talk like "I'm not doing enough"
Balancing career ambitions with parenting: how to avoid feeling like you're failing at both
The importance of self-care and making time for yourself without feeling guilty
Watch Anna's Interview on Postnatal Depression:
https://youtu.be/74cdzIIAePM?si=0CCddCLxSvxNYlxE
Resources Mentioned:
Gidget Foundation: https://gidgetfoundation.org.au
Where to Find Anna:
Instagram - Anna: https://www.instagram.com/ah.psychology/
Anna's Website: https://www.ahpsychology.com.au
Where to Find Ash:
Instagram - Ash: https://www.instagram.com/ashcam____/
Listener Takeaways:
- Understand the causes of parental guilt and how it affects both men and women
- Learn practical strategies to manage guilt, including setting healthy boundaries
- Gain insights into the impact of social media on parenting and how to cope with the pressure of being a "perfect" parent
- Embrace the concept of "good enough" parenting and let go of the need for perfection
- Discover how to balance your career and parenting without feeling overwhelmed
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Hello and welcome back to Reset.I have a guest with me today who
you might be familiar with from a previous episode.
I've got psychologists and are here with me today and we're
going to be unpacking all thingsparental guilt.
And I invite you to stick aroundeven if you're not a parent
because personally, I know when my friends started having
(00:26):
babies, I had zero clue what they were going through.
I like to think that I kind of understood their thought process
and how they might be feeling, what they might need at the
time. But then when they had these
babies, I was kind of dumbfounded of how to show up.
And then when their lifestyle started to change a little bit,
I also wasn't sure, like, had I lost my friend?
(00:47):
Will I ever get my friend back again?
How do I support them but also encourage them to find
themselves? All the things.
So we're going to dive deep intothat today.
And I think this conversation isone that we all need to hear.
Anna, welcome back to the studio.
Thank you, Ash, I'm so excited to be back again.
Your episode last time that we did, and I'm going to link it in
(01:07):
the show notes for people. It was all around post Natal
depression and surviving those sort of early days of
motherhood. It resonated so deeply with so
many people. I'm so glad it was.
It was amazing to actually to doand to have that reflection
myself because I think so often we don't look back on those
times and the ability to look back and have that compassion to
(01:33):
see that journey, I loved it. Yeah, and I think as someone
who's going to be a mom soon myself, it was really eye
opening. And then I know that a lot of
friends who have experienced post Natal depression listen to
that episode and they're like, thank you.
I wish I had it prior. I'm glad I have it now.
(01:53):
And it just really helps to kindof unfortunately normalise it, I
think, because so many people gothrough it, but it just made
them feel very sane and very hurt.
So thank. You.
That's the goal. I hope this does the same.
Yeah, yeah. I feel like this is almost Part
2 of that. So we've.
Got so many parts to go. We have so many parts.
This is going to be a never ending series, which is great.
(02:16):
A lot of having you here, but let's get started.
So what is parental guilt? So parental guilt, Look it.
I think it's a term we throw around a lot.
For a lot of people, it's this sinking, nagging, gnawing
feeling. It can be physical, it can be
cognitive, it can be both that shows up and tells us that we're
(02:36):
failing, we're not doing enough,we should be doing more, we're
letting someone, everyone down. OK, It is so common with being a
parent because of so many things, and I'll talk about them
in a moment. But this idea that it's like
we're trying to achieve so much and we just can't.
(02:57):
A lot of parental guilt, I guess, can come up with things
like juggling work with life. So are we staying at home?
Are we going to work? How do we juggle it all?
It can show up with trying to take time for ourselves.
Stepping away from our children can be really, really
challenging. A big one is discipline.
(03:18):
How we discipline, how we want to discipline and how that
actually translates can cause a lot of guilt.
One that I really struggle with,which I didn't expect was
feeding. Yeah, so, and I'm sure I will
talk to you more about that. But this idea of like, oh, I
should be feeding my children this.
I should be making sure that they're having XYZ.
Try telling that to a toddler. But it's still this expectation
(03:40):
that I am failing if I somehow cannot do that.
We see guilt around things like screen time, around play.
It seeps into so many areas of our life and as our of our
parenting journey, it comes from, again, which I think is
really important. It comes from a little array of
things. And I think the most important
(04:01):
thing to start on there is it comes from love.
It comes from wanting to be a good parent of wanting to
provide the best for your child.I think in that as well, it
often comes from wanting to to sort of unlearn, I guess is the
word of like some of the things that maybe you went through and
do it differently. OK, so that is like the core of
(04:22):
it. But then the other parts that
come into it is society, this expectation to be perfect, to
have the answers that feed so much into our guilt.
And then of course, comparison. OK.
So immediately I think of socialmedia, but just of other
mothers, we see people that appear to have it all together
(04:43):
and we start comparing ourselves.
So it's so multifaceted, not only like where it comes from,
but how it shows up. Oh, there is so much to unpack
in this. OK.
I warned you. Hi.
I'm Kane. Let's dive in.
Does it impact males and femalesin the same way?
Not in the same way. OK, So it does impact males and
(05:04):
females. I think this is AII really love
this question. It's really interesting.
So we often talk about mum guiltso much.
And the reality here, I think isthat mothers often not always
handle more of the emotional, the mental load of parenting.
So it's showing up in that area.That doesn't mean that dads,
(05:26):
fathers don't experience it. And I do want to touch on that,
but even the fact that we don't have a term as dad guilt says a
lot for moms. We're looking at like it's about
70% of us that experience mom guilt at least weekly.
That's from research in 2022, I want to say.
(05:47):
So three years ago. I also would hazard a guess, and
I'm sure you'd agree, it's probably pretty underrated.
Sometimes we don't even acknowledge that we're
experiencing this. But if we're going on that 70%
of women at least once a week are feeling like this, OK, It's
caught up in this idea, particularly for women that we
know what we're doing. You're a natural mother.
(06:09):
You've got the instincts. Mom knows best and if we don't
then it's like, oh God, like don't say that.
Like I meant to have these answers.
So that really comes up. The same is like you grew this
baby potentially like you, you might have had struggles to get
this baby. Don't complain, don't complain
about it. You should know what you're
(06:29):
doing. When we hear the shoulds, it's
usually pretty fast track to guilt.
So that definitely comes up. Let me go back to your question.
Sorry, Ash. You know, I'm going to go on
tangents here, so. We're here for it.
We're all here for it, Anna. Is this idea around dad?
So yeah, I think it's it's definitely less researched and
therefore we get less prevalence.
It does feel like it's less intense for dads.
(06:52):
OK. There's something innately there
that it's like as mothers we take on this sort of
responsibility. Exactly like I said, I think
society has a large sort of partto play there.
What we know with dads is I guess this, there's a lot of
guilt again, around this struggle of work and missing out
everyone. I guess one of the ways I can
(07:12):
explain this, I want to share about my my partner.
He runs his own business, he's abuilder, he works massive hours.
He then comes home and we've gotabout an hour usually when he
gets home for us to do like the bed routine, the bedtime routine
and spending time with the kids,showing up, being fun, doing all
of that. And I know he has got so much
(07:34):
work to do in quoting and I don't even know what he does,
but like all of that sort of stuff, you can see that he's
pulled in so many directions. If he prioritizes work, he's
going to miss out on this. But if he's with the kids, he's
probably thinking and feeling guilty about not being there.
So where is he anyway? And I think that's a silent
(07:54):
struggle that a lot of dads might experience, not want to
speak up because they also know that mum is often handling so
much. How can I complain about this
when she's been home with the kids all day or when I can see
she's barely hanging on? I think it's less culturally
accepted. So yeah, we we definitely still
see it. I think it's an area that needs
(08:15):
to be given space, but it's different.
Yeah, I actually ran into a friend on the way here and he
has two kids, He has his own business, and life is pretty
hectic. And we were just briefly
catching up about what we were gonna be discussing today.
And I thought, oh, good chance for me to do a little bit of
consumer research. And he was saying that for him
(08:35):
and a lot of male friends of his, there is this pressure to
financially provide for the family.
And they sort of start to feel that weight sitting on them from
before baby even arrives. Yes.
And it's the pressure of we needthe bigger house, the bigger
car, the best schooling, the best there's.
And he said he's constantly tornbetween like, OK, well, do I go
(08:59):
all in on work to be able to provide that?
But then my kids are missing outon my time.
Yeah. And my love and my attention and
what I have left, similar to what your partner has, what time
and energy I have left to give when I get home is really
limited. And he was kind of saying that
in his mind, there is no such thing as balance if he wants to
(09:19):
be, quote, UN quote successful. Yeah.
And so he kind of looks at it and he's like, it's not right,
but it's how I'm working right now.
And he's like, I work in these sprints and he's like, I'm all
in with work right now. And then I can see like fires I
need to put out on the side. And then so, you know, in a few
weeks, I will be all in on my dad life and my parenting
(09:41):
responsibilities, put those fires out.
But then while I'm there, my work will be suffering.
And so I know that financial stress is huge for men across
the board, whether they have kids or not.
And it's the number one leading cause of divorce at the moment.
And so layer kids into a relationship and this parental
guilt, whether it's dad, whoever's the primary caregiver,
(10:05):
whoever's the primary earner at the time, like so layered and so
complex. It is, it's so complex and I
love that idea of like, yeah, it's, it's putting out spot
fires. I guess there's that part of me
that I just it's like we we can't do it all.
We try and do it all and exactlythat.
It's like we're over here, but then we're missing this and how
that eats us up. I think he's huge.
(10:25):
You've also got this idea with financial part in there, I guess
ashes looking in every family I think is different, but this
pressure on often dads to go, OK, well, I don't want my
partner to have to rush back to work.
So I want to take that load. The other thing, and I just want
to mention this sort of lightly,but I think it's really familiar
and I think you'll resonate withthis.
(10:47):
So personally, I feel like dads when we're in pregnancy, moms
are trying to prepare, we're trying to emotionally do all of
this or whatnot. Sometimes we're trying not to
think about it. Dads seem to anecdotally decide
to do Reno's. We it's like this preparation
that comes in that it's like, I've got to, I've got to do
(11:08):
something. I need to do something.
And I think that comes in this helplessness as well, which can
often have this guilt like, oh, mom's going through so much, I
don't know what to do. I need to do something.
So we often see that. And I think that also leads
another little comment of how men or how fathers can often
feel this guilt is the idea thatmoms or the primary caregiver
(11:31):
there. I think that's an important
catch. They might know how to do
something better or appear to mychild's crying.
Ash just knows how to soothe them.
So I'll just let let that happenbecause it makes me sort of feel
incompetent, but also guilty because I'm I don't know what to
do here. So that's a really common thing
(11:51):
as well of just being like, Oh, I don't know.
So I sort of step back. Not in a a way of trying to
weaponize that incompetence, butmore in a like a guilty like I
should know what to do. Does that make sense?
Yeah, definitely, definitely. And I've heard a few families
reflect on that and say I should've.
Again, this word should I shouldhave shown up more when my baby
(12:16):
was young because then I wouldn't have been scared to do
these things and but equally I guess I see it happen where one
parent is the primary caregiver does happen to have slightly
more experience than at doing all of these things and do.
Something every day you're gonna.
Get better at it. Yeah, It's.
It's hard. It's hard.
(12:37):
So hard. Is guilt ever a helpful emotion?
I know you said before that it can come from a place of love,
but is it ever helpful or is it just a hindrance?
Is it just bad? No, it is.
Look, all emotions, they're justemotions.
They're trying to communicate some something with us.
Guilt is this moral emotion. It's trying to say, hey,
(12:58):
something in your actions here. It doesn't align with your
values, with your morals. It's a message.
OK, so for instance, let's say like you come home story in my
life, if you come home for a bigday at work, you've picked the
kids up, they're grizzling, you're trying to do all of the
bedtime routine or whatnot. And you just you just snap, OK,
You just snap at them and it's like guilt comes up.
(13:22):
Guilt is giving us this message that says, hey, that's not how
you want a parent. That's not that's not what you
want to show up as. It's giving us an opportunity to
reflect and to realign. So it's about if we can,
stepping back and being like, all right, what what happened
there? What happened?
What went wrong? OK, I was rushing.
I was doing this. I wasn't regulated.
(13:44):
It gives us an opportunity to make change for next time.
Amazing. So good.
Guilt doesn't usually just happen in silo.
What follows guilt so closely isshame.
OK, so this idea guilt comes in and says, look, I didn't parent
how I wanted to then I don't want to yell at my children, and
(14:05):
I did. Let's look at that.
Shame comes in and says, you yelled at your children, you're
a bad mother, you can't do this.You should know better.
This sort of idea, guilt looks at the the behavior at the
moment. Shame attacks your identity.
OK. So it's a really distinct
difference, but they go so quickly together and it's about
(14:28):
trying to separate that. And I'm sure easier said than
done, especially from here on our comfy podcast catch.
But when you're in the moment, it's just.
It's so it feels almost instantaneously and I think it's
a lot of I don't want to discount the work that can go
into this. This is something that as a mom,
(14:49):
very like on a self disclosure, I'm working out a lot in my own
therapy because of you know, we're our own childhoods, our
own things that shape, which again, I'm sure we will
definitely unpack these things can be there and sew ingrained.
So even though I know it, and I remember saying this to you last
time, even though I know it, even though I know better, it
(15:12):
feels like it happened so quickly.
The shame spiral, the shame feeling makes us want to
hideaway guilt, wanting us to approach, to make repair, to
make it better. Shame makes us want to hide And
that's what happens. There's a big difference in then
how we show up. Yeah, so interesting.
And I feel like all of us go into motherhood, career, any
(15:36):
life endeavour thinking that I want to do better because I have
these new tools, these insights.I've been to therapy or I've
got, you know, this, this understanding of moving forward
and doing better than what has happened in my past.
But things like social media, I think can inspire.
(15:58):
They can educate, but it can also probably make us feel like
we're drowning with information of, again, that word should, of
everything we should be doing and not only bombarded with
information, but conflicting information.
Yeah. What do you think the role of
social media is on new moms or parents in general and guilt?
(16:22):
And can it ever be a helpful resource?
Look, I think it can and I I think you put it in there it
beautifully. It's it can give us all of this
information, but it can give us all of this information.
It's this double edged sword. I think social media can be
incredible in giving us a sense of connection.
We can see someone else struggling and we can go, oh,
(16:45):
OK, cool. I really resonate with that.
Or maybe I'll try that. Beautiful.
For me, I think I, I have got twins and I didn't have many
people around me that had twins.So I was looking for that sort
of connection or just someone else to be like, oh, OK, cool.
That person's also juggling too.So I think there's a beautiful
(17:05):
sense of connection in that. However, most of us logically
know this. We are seeing a highlight reel,
we are seeing a carefully curated photo, real TikTok,
whatever it is, even if it's designed to be real a day in the
life, it isn't. You also don't the.
(17:26):
Amount of moms I see that like film themselves waking up in the
middle of the night to feed their kids and I'm like, hang on
a second you set that camera up,you got back into bed, you then
got up and I'm like, I think theidea of getting up multiple
times a night is exhausting in itself, let alone the theatrics
of it I'm like, let's just thinkabout how you actually film
(17:49):
these day in the. Life.
It absolutely blows my mind actually.
I remember waking up in the middle of the night and I would
be feeding a baby and I had to between.
So I had luckily I also had company.
Mind you, we weren't talking because it was just like this
and I would fall asleep and I think a lot of parents can
resonate with this. You'd wake up in a shock of
being like, do I still have the baby or have I put them back in
(18:12):
the usually they're back in there, but I was you don't even
know where you are, let alone sorry, setting up a tripod.
It is just absurd. So I mean, hats off to them in
one sense, but let's just make it a not lower the bar, like
just a realistic bar. This is not happening.
It is, look, yeah, it is a highlight reel again, Even if
(18:33):
it's saying, oh, I'm experiencing guilt or I'm doing
this, we're still not hearing the inner thoughts of someone.
We're still not having that shared.
So I think that that's a really important thing.
I think there's a comparison that just happens.
You only have to look in the comments section of any TikTok
or Instagram to see it. You go in there and a new mom
(18:57):
has been having trouble with, say, her baby sleeping.
And so she's like, oh, cool. Last night I put them in a
swaddle with their arms out the comic.
Don't do that. That doesn't work.
It's not safe. It's this, Have you tried this?
Have you done this? I know you don't want responses,
but. And it's just like your head
will explode. Your head will explode with so
much information. I think, yeah, it's just, it is
(19:21):
a beautiful place, but it's a really scary place.
One thing I think I wanted to share with you as well, when I
was like prepping for this podcast, I went on to TikTok,
any excuse really. And I looked up mum Gil and I
was met with some beautiful, like really nice, honest sort of
(19:42):
examples of it. And that was lovely.
I was saying really shocked. I came across this TikTok of
quite a well known author in thesort of Wellness space speaking
about mom guilt. And it was this sentiment that
if you experience mom guilt, just stop.
Just don't. It's not good for you.
(20:03):
Second to that, your children will be miserable and they will
suffer if you are experiencing in that.
And I was a bit like, oh, OK, that.
Now I feel guilty for feeling guilty.
I went to the comments and that is exactly what was written
there. To me, this is the beautiful
part of social media. It's the epitome.
(20:24):
You can't get it right. You now feel guilty for feeling
guilty, you feel guilty for not feeling guilty.
It's just everywhere. So I think it's like use social
media, but you need limits and limits her heart as a mother who
is feeling like they're drowningand using it as an escape and
connection. You can't any longer curate your
feeds. The algorithm is feeding you.
(20:45):
So set limits. If you find you're scrolling at
night while you're feeding, maybe a book, maybe ATV show,
what else can you do so you're not flooded.
The best thing here is to check in how you feel after you've
consumed it. That's a really good flag and I
spoke to a friend who has a new baby recently and she said she
(21:05):
conscious she found herself in that sort of spiral and she had
to just unfollow a whole heap ofaccounts, which I was proud of
her for putting up that kind of boundary and having that
self-awareness. But again, easier said than
done. Yeah.
And I think again, social media is now designed that it's like
it doesn't matter if we don't follow, Tiktok is going to give
it to us. Yeah.
So it's just trying to have thatawareness about it, either pre
(21:29):
or when you're in a state like it's hard to have that when
you're sleep deprived. Yeah, yeah.
Why do you think it's so hard for mothers in particular to
take some time away from their kids and have solo time?
Because I think it's ingrained to be a good mother means to be
selfless self. And let's put good in adverted
(21:51):
comments. Oh, please.
Sorry. Yeah, but yeah, thank.
You good call. Yeah.
Yeah, it is. It is this idea from society
that it's like we need to be self sacrificing.
We need to be available all the time.
We are the one that has the answers.
It means that to step away takesalso so much preparation and
(22:12):
it's just, it's looked at like it's a treat.
What a treat. You've got an hour to yourself.
How great is that? To me, it shouldn't be like
that. To most people it shouldn't be
like that. It should be a non negotiable
thing. It's often, again, I hear this
idea that it takes more work to leave.
So yeah, cool, I'm going to go and meet Ash for lunch, but now
(22:34):
I've got to do XYZ to make sure that my baby or my child is
looked after, right, whatnot. Again, society, it feels
selfish. It doesn't feel worth it if it
takes that much mental load. So I think it's it's, it's
wrapped up in so many things, but it really comes to this core
that it's like we should always be available.
If someone's listening and they're like this feels like a
(22:56):
friend of mine or this feels like my partner or it feels like
myself, what are some things they can do to sort of make that
possible, like that solo time possible?
Is there anything we can do to call on our village or our
support network? I think one of the things is,
and I found this really useful, is actually voicing it.
(23:19):
I feel really guilty. Or even if you're not sure if
it's guilt, I feel really uncomfortable about leaving
understanding what it is. And I think this is a really
important differentiation is, isit guilt?
Is it grief? Because it's also, let's just
acknowledge it might be that youfeel guilty for leaving your
child, whatever that's sort of wrapped up in, or you may not
(23:42):
have done it before. It might be really hard, you
might not necessarily want to. They're two different things.
Being able to voice it and to talk about it I think is so
important. Having someone that you care,
care for, you trust, I guess, tolook after your child is really
important. Again, it's like starting slow.
(24:03):
Don't expect yourself to be ableto go out there for a day and be
like, see, it's done. It's like start slow, start
small. The other thing here, actually,
it's so important. This idea is like, take time for
yourself. You'll come back recharged.
You don't always come back recharged and don't cue the
guilt that you should have. You may just come back.
It might be better, it might be the same.
(24:24):
That's OK. It's still a learning curve.
It doesn't mean don't do it again, but it's like lowering
the expectations, verbalizing what's going on for you so that
one, either you can challenge itor someone else can challenge it
and support it for you. A certain personality types more
prone to this I'm I'm just thinking of a whole host of
(24:45):
people and myself and I feel like we all want to see do
experience everything the world has to offer and we want to do
it at a really high level. Is that kind of a personality
trait that then once you become a mother just like magnifies
this guilt of Oh my God, I'm nowsacrificing aspects of my
(25:07):
career, my health, my relationship, and I'm also not
being a good mom. Like talk to me about who we
should be looking at for most. So definitely look, I think and
it's probably going to unfortunately be a lot of the
listeners, it's those of us who are high achieving, those of us
(25:28):
who are more of that sort of perfectionistic or aiming for
that we're going to struggle with the concept of good enough.
It doesn't feel natural. I don't know about you, but most
things in my life, and it feels funny even saying this, but I
will say it is most things in mylife.
I have been able to set a goal, to work hard and achieve it.
I've been able to get good at it.
(25:50):
Or if I don't, I'm thinking of surfing here, which I was failed
miserably at. I stopped doing it.
Yeah, I don't have to keep going.
So it feels really uncomfortablefor me when I'm not just
naturally good at it. So yeah, we've definitely got
that sort of idea of like more of our our high achieving
people. We have got unfortunately as
(26:12):
well. And I'm resonating with this
people pleasers, those of us that struggle with boundaries.
It's not always this idea of like we struggle saying no.
Sometimes we want to say yes to everything.
We actually don't know where ourlimits are.
So that's a big thing as well. Again, with people pleasing here
or boundary setting, we're goingto have to say no to our
children or we're going to have to sometimes this is a big one
(26:35):
that comes up, drop them off to daycare and they're going to be
screaming and crying and we're still going to have to go.
That is going to tug on everything.
Again with that, people pleasingboundaries.
Also people that are sensitive or feel things deeply, that's a
big one. There's other things like our
different mental health struggles.
We've got depression, anxiety, OCDADHD, all of these sort of
(26:59):
things that come in that mean that it can be that bit
trickier. There might be struggles with
organization, with planning. There might be rigidity or more
of like a proneness to I guess that like negative self talk.
This is not to be alarmed. OK, So it's not that it's like
cool, if you've got these things, just don't do not
(27:22):
procreate. It's like absolutely not.
It's these are strengths. These are beautiful things.
You want to do it right or you're more inclined to do this
in a certain way. We need to be aware about it to
be able to then meet up with compassion, with kindness and to
implement this stuff. The other thing I think is
really important here, Ash, is something I touched on before is
(27:43):
it's challenging for those of uswho maybe have been raised or
experienced different things in our childhood.
Maybe that's not always traumas,although sometimes it is.
We may be trying to unlearn or to change patterns.
OK, We might have been brought up in a childhood in a, in a
family home, for instance, that didn't talk about emotions and
(28:03):
so it wasn't safe to. So we're trying to challenge
that. We're trying to learn it at the
same time as we're trying to teach it.
These are really hard things andI think it's more about for me,
if this resonates with anyone that's listening, it's going,
hey, you might just need a little bit more support.
That might be therapy. It might be looking into, you
(28:24):
know, self help, self development.
It also might just be a little bit more self compassion that
it's like, gosh, this is really hard because of this.
Yeah, what advice do you have topeople listening that are like,
okay, I feel like you're talkingto me When it's the high
achieving perfectionist, set a goal, usually smash it.
Parenting is not so black and white and just kind of adjusting
(28:50):
to having that it's enough is OK.
I think one of my friends said rough, rough good enough like
and it's like stuck in my head, but that's that's an adjustment
and that is going to feel uncomfortable for a lot of
people. How do we get used to that?
I actually love that. That needs to be like the name
(29:11):
of the podcast app. So there's a couple of things
here and the good enough is a big thing that I want to talk to
you about. First of all, I think when it's
coming up in this feeling, we need to also tune into how guilt
shows up for us. It'll show up differently for
me, for you, for anyone else. For me, I, I feel this sort of
(29:32):
sinking tightness feeling and I need to start to go, ah, that's
guilt. There it is.
If I can name it, We talk about this concept of naming it to
tame it. That's so important.
You can go out. That's guilt.
That's you know, I know that comes from this place of TikTok,
the Bento box lunches. I should be doing that.
(29:53):
And actually I packed baked beans today.
I'll give you that one. It's like it's that that's the
comparison. Or it might be your own inner
critic, your own expectations here based on whatever.
I like to do this with a lot of things where it's like, let's
actually call it something. So it's like there's my gnarkey
mum voice, my gnarkey mum guilt.Sorry.
(30:14):
It allows us to diffuse from it.It's not you, it's guilt.
OK, so that's a big key concept here.
The other thing we can do here is then come back to your
values. I'm going to use, hopefully this
works. This idea that this morning I
did, I packed baked beans because I didn't have anything
else ready. I was worried that I didn't have
(30:35):
enough food for them, blah, blah, blah.
Juggling, juggling. You can hear me trying to
explain it. Yeah.
Anyway, the kids went with bakedbeans.
The guilt came up. Oh gosh, that's not what I
should have done. I should have had vegetables.
I should have had these. I should have been more
prepared. A little bit of shame, but let's
stick with the guilt. Coming back to my values, yes,
it's important for me to feed mykids good food and have
(30:57):
nutrition, but it's also important for me here.
And it's not a value around parenting, but to be regulated
and to show up for Ash and to show up for my work and whatever
it is, I can't have it all. So right now, that value has to
trumpet. Does that make sense?
We then need to go to the next sort of part of this.
What did you say? Rough, rough.
(31:18):
Good. Enough, Yeah.
Is this concept of the good enough parent?
So your friend is spot on with this.
This is a term good enough parenting.
It's termed by this man Daniel Widak.
I'm going to check this so I don't butcher it.
Winnacott, he is, from memory, apediatrician and he looks at the
good enough parenting. It's not about being perfect,
(31:42):
it's about showing up OK. We misatunement, making
mistakes, snapping at children. Whatever it is, it's actually
normal. It's common.
We don't want to really encourage it, but it's a part of
it that also helps children. It helps children to understand
(32:04):
frustration. It helps children to learn
repair. So the part of the good enough
parenting that we need to acknowledge here is the repair.
So with the good enough parenting, we're looking at this
concept. Of course, you don't need to be
perfect. You need to be consistently
responsive. You need to be attuned enough.
Enough is the key here, Ash. We don't always have to get it
(32:27):
right. Attuned enough to your child to
their core emotional and physical needs.
OK, so it's about being able to respond to your child's needs to
repair when we make mistake. So again, if we come back to
this idea, the baked beans doesn't really work here.
But say I yell at my child and it's like, oh God, that's not
(32:50):
quite right. It's not going to be incredibly
damaging for my child to be having a moment of where I've
lost my cool if I'm able to attune to them.
Hey, that that wasn't OK. Mommy got frustrated then and I
yelled. I can see that that frustrated
you or scared you or whatever happened for you.
(33:11):
Mommy's really sorry. I needed to take a breath and
I'm here. Do you want to hug?
Whatever it is, it's about then meeting them at that emotion and
creating that space. That's really powerful.
It is. It's also really hard to
remember in the morning. So I think like it's something
we need to come back to and that's why those steps are
important. If we can come back to this idea
(33:33):
of like, sometimes it needs to be good enough.
We are allowed to then or allow ourselves to have more
compassion. OK, so it's like we're not
aiming for perfect here. We're aiming for attunement.
I think if anyone's listening and they're like, cool, this
sounds good. This sounds like something that
would resonate with me. I urge you go and look it up
more. Read about it, get into it
(33:54):
because it's a concept for me. I may not articulate it the
best, but it sticks in my head so much that it's like it's not
about these little things that might slip up.
It's the big moments and it's about coming back and making
repair. What advice do you have to
parents around the actual benefits of spending time away
(34:16):
from their kids? Because I think there's a lot
of, again, guilt and pressure put on to be there for your
kids, to shop for your kids to be there for every moment.
But surely there's a flip side as well.
There's got to be. There's got to be, there's got
to be everything. There's yin and Yang.
Like what are we? What are we?
And The funny thing with that islike, yeah, for everything,
there's yin and Yang. And yet for parenting, we don't
see it. You go to work and most of the
(34:39):
time you'll have a day off. You'll have a weekend.
Even during the year, you'll have a holiday.
We hope you go to the gym, you have a rest day.
These are just normal parts. No one goes like, oh, it's
ridiculous. You're having your Saturday off.
That's so bad. It's expected.
And yet with parenting, it's not.
So one, it's incredibly beneficial for us as parents to
(35:00):
have our own time, to regulate, to breathe, to have an identity.
Outside of that, it is, it's such a, look, we have the
mothers, we have this time when we're pregnant where we're
trying to adapt to it. But still, it's such a shift of
identity that we're thrown into.And I know we touched on this
last time about how long it can take for us to feel like
(35:21):
ourselves again. I don't actually believe we feel
like ourselves again. We have this new, improved,
different, whatever it is version of us.
We need the space to be able to find that.
OK, so there's that concept withit.
The other part here is the benefit for our children, how
children learn to become securely attached, OK?
(35:42):
It's about the fact that we are teaching them that mom or dad or
whoever it is goes and we come back.
And that's so incredibly important.
It shows that it's not about this constant proximity that I'm
always there for you. Again, it's talking about this
quality. When I am here, this is how I'm
showing up. Children weren't meant to be
(36:05):
raised in isolation. We had our villages.
I also get that this is such a privilege now, but I think it's
so important that we do call on other people, whether that's
family, friends, daycare, teachers, whatever it is, it
teaches our children as well about this, creating this
emotional safety. For me, this is something as
(36:28):
hard because I do have this belief that I should have it
all, I should have all the answers.
I should be able to do that. That's particularly how my mum
guilt shows up, is this idea is that I shouldn't have to ask for
help. So then when I do call on other
people, it feels really uncomfortable.
I acknowledge that we're workingthrough it.
One thing I like to remember here is that as my children age,
(36:52):
even now, they're going to need more than just me.
Heavens forbid they don't want to talk to me about something.
I can't understand why, but theymay need other people.
I don't have all the answers. I want to create this
environment where they know Ash.I can ask her about that.
You know what, Uncle so and so Ican go to him.
They've got other people in their circle that they feel safe
(37:14):
with. So to me, it's a big focus of
creating safety and that just helps me be OK sometimes with
stepping back. I think that's such a gift to
give to your children because itcan be easy to think that, well,
I'm their parent, they should come to me for everything.
But we know from our relationships with our own
parents that sure, there's a lotof stuff you can go to your
(37:36):
parent with, but then there's a lot that you probably would
rather have a slightly removed or different.
Yeah. And it's the same.
It's like, I don't have the answers for all of that, and
that's OK. That doesn't make me less of a
mother, a bad mother, but it's like, I'm going to just think of
something simple that's not evenemotionally.
If my child wants to ask me about Excel spreadsheets,
(37:58):
they've got the wrong girl. I need to create this
environment where they're supported in so many different
areas. And I think, look, again, I want
to acknowledge that it's not always easy.
I haven't struggled as much as Iknow a lot of friends have with
this separation, dropping a child off at daycare kicking and
screaming, it's really hard to remember that.
(38:19):
It's like I'm developing my community, but it is coming back
to that idea. It's like my child knows that
I'm coming back. They are learning that this is
this is. I am here.
I'm not abandoning them. It might feel like it in the
moment, but I will be back. I love that idea of community
and it's not like my hairdresseris also going to be the person
that does my taxes, right? Like we all have.
(38:42):
We try and surround ourselves with people that are able to
work to their strengths and their areas of expertise.
So gifting that to our child, I think that's a really fresh
perspective. It's the most beautiful way to
put it. And I think simple.
Yeah, beautiful. For some people, I know that
they have always wanted to be a parent, and when they become a
parent, their child is their number one priority in the
(39:04):
world. Beautiful.
If that's the case, it's not thecase for everyone.
And some people still have thesebig ambitions for career and
growth and things outside of parenthood.
Neither is right or wrong. But how do we hold space for the
multiple versions of ourselves? Yeah.
It's really, really hard. I, I think for me, I, I
(39:27):
struggled to conceive my children.
So I went through a big fertility journey.
I got my children. I was told I should, I'm so
lucky. I've got two of them.
And I was sitting there going like, yeah, what the hell am I
going to do with two of them? But this idea is like beautiful
now we need to be really grateful.
And I also was like, I want to go back to work.
It was really hard to admit thatI was like, great, cool, I
(39:49):
really want to do this thing forme.
It's the idea here, Ash, and it's very much easier said than
done, but it's like dropping thebinary.
It's like we, we don't have to have one or the other.
It's hard. And I I said before, I don't
really subscribe to the idea that it's like we can have it
all, but it's like we need to stop the expectation that it is
(40:10):
one or the other. We need to make it more of a
supportive environment. Is there some research around
how long we should ideally spendwith our children before going
back to work? Is there I don't know if there's
best practice or is it just a case by case basis?
Look, there's some research thatsays early bonding is important,
(40:31):
but again, I'm going to come back to that good enough sort of
side of it. And it's not like our good,
that'll be good enough. We can go back to work.
It's more of this idea of quality, OK, Being able to show
up and attune to your child is the most important thing.
I think for so many of us. We are looking for for an
answer, for a guide. And because we don't have that,
(40:54):
there's no instruction manual that says, OK, cool that six
months, at 12 months we shall begoing back to work and that's
OK. We then look externally.
We're looking externally. Well, she went back to work.
At this point, they work in the government.
They had 12 months off. They have this many times off.
Whatever it is, we don't know. It's really hard because we have
to then figure it out for ourselves in terms of the
(41:18):
bonding for your child and creating that secure attachment.
Again, your child one, they're so resilient, but it's also
about secure attachment means being available, being attuned,
coming back to them. It's not always about always
being present. It's about returning and
attunement. That's the key.
(41:39):
It's hard and you know, I mentioned this before, it can
often have a concept of like we're trying to return to work
for different reasons. Amazing.
I'm talking for me about wantingto go there for my identity and
my passion. That's fantastic.
Not everyone feels like that. A lot of grief can come with
this. I don't want to leave my baby.
I don't want to go back from matleave, whatever that looks like,
(42:01):
or paternal leave, whatever it is.
There's grief that can come withthat.
There can be financial burdens as well.
There's no right or wrong in terms of a rule.
Hard and hard and fast, but it has to be right for your family.
So I think it's, it feels like abit of a cop out of an answer,
but it's, I know that you know that that's the answer as well,
(42:21):
that it's like it's what works for you and it's knowing and
trusting that it's like when youare there for your child, the
quality of that relationship is the most important thing.
Yeah, and I think it's nice to touch on that privilege, like
for work to be optional for one parent.
He's a privilege. Life is expensive, kids are
(42:43):
expensive, and so many of us have to go back to work full
time. Both parents, kids are in
daycare. And I think it's beautiful for
anyone listening that is in thatsituation to just be reminded,
like you said, it's quality timeover quantity.
It doesn't mean you're a bad parent.
It doesn't mean you're going to stuff up your children.
And as long as we can apply someof these principles that we've
(43:06):
discussed today, we can still give them a really beautiful,
secure attachment, healthy, happy life. 100%, I think one of
the big struggles, I've actuallyreally struggled with it this
week for whatever reason, the, Idon't know, Mercury's in some
space is that it's like I've just had really, really big
days. I've been getting home later,
(43:26):
picking the kids up later. Obviously it's darker, It's
getting darker earlier. So it already feels like we're
against the clock. I'm trying to get them in bed.
We're dealing with all of this and I'm a rusher.
The time. Time is never my strong point,
so. You were here early today.
Well, yeah, I don't know what what mess I left behind.
Let me just say that I, I, and now I'm like, oh, what a
(43:49):
compliment, thank you. To me.
I, I then struggle because, and this is where the mum guilt
comes in. And potentially it's not
necessarily the difference between mum guilt and dad's
here. But for me, my personality goes,
I've got to do this, I need to do this, I need to do that, I
need to do this. Let's get through it, through
it, through it. And I need to remember in those
(44:11):
moments about being able to stopand just be present.
I've got about an hour when I get home before the kids are
down and I want to spend that time with them.
Realistically, I can't leave allthose jobs behind and just sit
on the floor and do it with them.
We've still got to do things. So what I've been trying to do
is then carve it out. Can I then sit with them while
(44:33):
they're eating their dinner, noton my phone, not watching TV,
but just be with them or after bath and we've put their jammies
on. Let's find a book and read just
that book again. It's quality.
We don't need an hour there. That'd be ideal to have this
time where I'm there and I'm grounded.
I am this and I'm that. You come into my house at that
(44:54):
time of night. That's not me.
But if I can carve out those moments, that's what counts.
And when I go to bed at night and try to think of it's like,
what was lovely, Like what was nice today, it's like that just
that simple thing of, you know, pulling faces or trying to
understand what they're saying about their day.
It's like, that's the bit that says mom's listening.
(45:17):
Mom's here. She cares.
Everything we've discussed todayis beautiful in theory and easy
ish to soak up when I've had a good night's sleep before this.
For anyone who is in the depths of parenting right now and just
(45:37):
feeling like they're drowning inthis feeling of guilt, what
advice do you have for them? I just also consensually want to
wrap you up in a big hug and feel like it's OK.
I think the big thing here for me is like, you're not failing.
And then I again, like you said,Ash, it's so easy to say, but I
(45:59):
want you to hear it. It's like you are not failing.
You've never done this before. Even if you have other children,
you have never parented in this exact situation.
OK, It is hard. It is so hard.
The idea that we make it harder for ourselves with this
(46:20):
comparison, it's just it's so painful.
So you are doing the best that you know how to do.
I would be asking you to check some of those expectations to
come back to what's important for you to see if there's any
ability to lower the bar. I think it's about speaking
(46:40):
about it, but knowing that it's like it's feeling hard because
it is hard and you are doing thebest that you can do.
Great advice and I hope that felt like the beautiful warm hug
that we wanted it to feel like. For anyone listening, that's in
the depths. Tools, resources, helplines.
Where can people turn to if they're looking For more
(47:03):
information on this? There is so much, which again,
double edged sword. OK, so there's a couple of
things. We're looking at self compassion
here and I want to put this in the show notes.
There's a couple of really beautiful self compassion
practices. Even just simply Ash is being
able to step away. I always love to put my hand on
my heart, exhale. I probably shouldn't do it into
(47:25):
the microphone, but it's like taking a really deep breath and
saying like I'm doing the best that I know how to do can allow
us to just come back and pause for a moment.
Again, feeling simple, but it can be really important.
Self compassion is key here and there is a couple of key things
that I will drop in there in terms of books and whatnot.
You know, I'm going to say it, it's therapy.
(47:48):
It's therapy to unpack what's atthe core of this.
Like I said, I'm juggling with my own.
I'm struggling juggling with my own stuff at the moment of like
this shame of where that comes in, where it's ingrained from.
It's not as easy as just like cognitively challenging it.
Sometimes we need to understand where those patterns have come
from. The other thing here I think
that's important is the peer support.
(48:10):
Other mothers, even when we're talking about juggling work, we
so often have access to but don't use our peers.
We might be working with a mum of, you know, she might have
teenage kids, older kids, whatnot.
And I would urge you to turn to her and be like, what do you
think? Like how have you managed this?
What would you do? How what did you do different?
(48:32):
What worked, what didn't work? Turning to those people around
us for support, remember to takethings as a grain of salt, but I
think that that can be an important sort of tool to use as
well. There's a couple of books that I
like. 1 is The Mother Wound and 1 is Good inside, which I'll
link. These are beautiful sort of
starting points to look at that guilt, trying to shift it.
(48:56):
Curate your Instagram feed. Just where possible, these
algorithms are strong. Where possible, just make sure
you are really conscious of whatyou're absorbing.
I think is a big thing. One thing I think is simple that
I would like people to take away.
It's really hard to do any of this when we're not regulated.
(49:17):
There's a couple of things that's really hard to regulate
as a new parent. Sleep deprivation is one of
them, hormones is the other. I like to remind us, might
remind others, remind in therapymyself.
We're just little babies and babies need a couple of things.
Have we been fed and watered? Are we warm enough?
(49:39):
Are we comfortable? Do we need to be in a different
environment or whatnot? Do we need a cuddle?
Do we need comfort, and do we need rest, asleep?
Those sort of things For me is like, let's come back to that
and see if those needs are beingmet, OK?
It's this idea of keeping those core needs met before we can do
(50:00):
anything else. The other little thing here, and
I know that you'll laugh at thisor it's pretty true to me, My
mum used to always say to me with my kids when they were
young is like, if in doubt, put them in the bath.
There's something about water that can calm a baby so quickly,
and I'm pretty similar. Throw me in the bath, it's
usually not that. Throw me in the shower, let me
(50:22):
splash water and it allows me toregulate.
It allows me then to have that moment of self compassion, put
my hand on my chest, remind myself that I'm doing good
enough, and then come back and approach the situation
differently. And I thank you as always.
It's such a gift to have you here.
And I think our listeners are going to come away again, very
(50:44):
feeling, very seen, very heard and loved.
I hope so. And you've actually just got me
on the one of the most importantthings that I forgot.
Oh, sorry. Yeah, a little bit of spice.
A little spice. The other thing I think when I
mentioned on therapy there, and I'm sorry, Ash, I can hear
myself just talking so much. There is this foundation called
the Gidget Foundation. We will link it in here.
(51:05):
This is something that is only new for me.
I did feel a bit of guilt here. I was like, I should have known
this. I should have known this
earlier, but I know it now. It is this foundation that aims
to support parents both, you know, in the preconception
stages, prenatal, post Natal with therapy and resources.
I believe it's at free cost, telehealth, if not low, but
(51:28):
there is so many resources available there for parents.
It's also if you're struggling with things like loss of a baby,
miscarriage, everything in between.
This is a great place to start. I also think it might be a
little bit less confronting because you can go online and do
that. So to me, that was one of the
key things I wanted to share andI'm glad I didn't forget
(51:49):
completely that we'll add in because that is just, let's just
start that as a foundation. Yeah.
And maybe rather than scrolling social media, we should be
scrolling something like that. That's a little more evidence
based or yeah. Relevant.
Yeah, So, so important. Yeah.
And I thank you. Thank you, Ash.
Hello and welcome back to Reset.I have a guest with me today who
you might be familiar with from a previous episode.
I've got psychologists and are here with me today and we're
going to be unpacking all thingsparental guilt.
And I invite you to stick aroundeven if you're not a parent
because personally, I know when my friends started having
(00:26):
babies, I had zero clue what they were going through.
I like to think that I kind of understood their thought process
and how they might be feeling, what they might need at the
time. But then when they had these
babies, I was kind of dumbfounded of how to show up.
And then when their lifestyle started to change a little bit,
I also wasn't sure, like, had I lost my friend?
(00:47):
Will I ever get my friend back again?
How do I support them but also encourage them to find
themselves? All the things.
So we're going to dive deep intothat today.
And I think this conversation isone that we all need to hear.
Anna, welcome back to the studio.
Thank you, Ash, I'm so excited to be back again.
Your episode last time that we did, and I'm going to link it in
(01:07):
the show notes for people. It was all around post Natal
depression and surviving those sort of early days of
motherhood. It resonated so deeply with so
many people. I'm so glad it was.
It was amazing to actually to doand to have that reflection
myself because I think so often we don't look back on those
times and the ability to look back and have that compassion to
(01:33):
see that journey, I loved it. Yeah, and I think as someone
who's going to be a mom soon myself, it was really eye
opening. And then I know that a lot of
friends who have experienced post Natal depression listen to
that episode and they're like, thank you.
I wish I had it prior. I'm glad I have it now.
(01:53):
And it just really helps to kindof unfortunately normalise it, I
think, because so many people gothrough it, but it just made
them feel very sane and very hurt.
So thank. You.
That's the goal. I hope this does the same.
Yeah, yeah. I feel like this is almost Part
2 of that. So we've.
Got so many parts to go. We have so many parts.
This is going to be a never ending series, which is great.
(02:16):
A lot of having you here, but let's get started.
So what is parental guilt? So parental guilt, Look it.
I think it's a term we throw around a lot.
For a lot of people, it's this sinking, nagging, gnawing
feeling. It can be physical, it can be
cognitive, it can be both that shows up and tells us that we're
(02:36):
failing, we're not doing enough,we should be doing more, we're
letting someone, everyone down. OK, It is so common with being a
parent because of so many things, and I'll talk about them
in a moment. But this idea that it's like
we're trying to achieve so much and we just can't.
(02:57):
A lot of parental guilt, I guess, can come up with things
like juggling work with life. So are we staying at home?
Are we going to work? How do we juggle it all?
It can show up with trying to take time for ourselves.
Stepping away from our children can be really, really
challenging. A big one is discipline.
(03:18):
How we discipline, how we want to discipline and how that
actually translates can cause a lot of guilt.
One that I really struggle with,which I didn't expect was
feeding. Yeah, so, and I'm sure I will
talk to you more about that. But this idea of like, oh, I
should be feeding my children this.
I should be making sure that they're having XYZ.
Try telling that to a toddler. But it's still this expectation
(03:40):
that I am failing if I somehow cannot do that.
We see guilt around things like screen time, around play.
It seeps into so many areas of our life and as our of our
parenting journey, it comes from, again, which I think is
really important. It comes from a little array of
things. And I think the most important
(04:01):
thing to start on there is it comes from love.
It comes from wanting to be a good parent of wanting to
provide the best for your child.I think in that as well, it
often comes from wanting to to sort of unlearn, I guess is the
word of like some of the things that maybe you went through and
do it differently. OK, so that is like the core of
(04:22):
it. But then the other parts that
come into it is society, this expectation to be perfect, to
have the answers that feed so much into our guilt.
And then of course, comparison. OK.
So immediately I think of socialmedia, but just of other
mothers, we see people that appear to have it all together
(04:43):
and we start comparing ourselves.
So it's so multifaceted, not only like where it comes from,
but how it shows up. Oh, there is so much to unpack
in this. OK.
I warned you. Hi.
I'm Kane. Let's dive in.
Does it impact males and femalesin the same way?
Not in the same way. OK, So it does impact males and
(05:04):
females. I think this is AII really love
this question. It's really interesting.
So we often talk about mum guiltso much.
And the reality here, I think isthat mothers often not always
handle more of the emotional, the mental load of parenting.
So it's showing up in that area.That doesn't mean that dads,
(05:26):
fathers don't experience it. And I do want to touch on that,
but even the fact that we don't have a term as dad guilt says a
lot for moms. We're looking at like it's about
70% of us that experience mom guilt at least weekly.
That's from research in 2022, I want to say.
(05:47):
So three years ago. I also would hazard a guess, and
I'm sure you'd agree, it's probably pretty underrated.
Sometimes we don't even acknowledge that we're
experiencing this. But if we're going on that 70%
of women at least once a week are feeling like this, OK, It's
caught up in this idea, particularly for women that we
know what we're doing. You're a natural mother.
(06:09):
You've got the instincts. Mom knows best and if we don't
then it's like, oh God, like don't say that.
Like I meant to have these answers.
So that really comes up. The same is like you grew this
baby potentially like you, you might have had struggles to get
this baby. Don't complain, don't complain
about it. You should know what you're
(06:29):
doing. When we hear the shoulds, it's
usually pretty fast track to guilt.
So that definitely comes up. Let me go back to your question.
Sorry, Ash. You know, I'm going to go on
tangents here, so. We're here for it.
We're all here for it, Anna. Is this idea around dad?
So yeah, I think it's it's definitely less researched and
therefore we get less prevalence.
It does feel like it's less intense for dads.
(06:52):
OK. There's something innately there
that it's like as mothers we take on this sort of
responsibility. Exactly like I said, I think
society has a large sort of partto play there.
What we know with dads is I guess this, there's a lot of
guilt again, around this struggle of work and missing out
everyone. I guess one of the ways I can
(07:12):
explain this, I want to share about my my partner.
He runs his own business, he's abuilder, he works massive hours.
He then comes home and we've gotabout an hour usually when he
gets home for us to do like the bed routine, the bedtime routine
and spending time with the kids,showing up, being fun, doing all
of that. And I know he has got so much
(07:34):
work to do in quoting and I don't even know what he does,
but like all of that sort of stuff, you can see that he's
pulled in so many directions. If he prioritizes work, he's
going to miss out on this. But if he's with the kids, he's
probably thinking and feeling guilty about not being there.
So where is he anyway? And I think that's a silent
(07:54):
struggle that a lot of dads might experience, not want to
speak up because they also know that mum is often handling so
much. How can I complain about this
when she's been home with the kids all day or when I can see
she's barely hanging on? I think it's less culturally
accepted. So yeah, we we definitely still
see it. I think it's an area that needs
(08:15):
to be given space, but it's different.
Yeah, I actually ran into a friend on the way here and he
has two kids, He has his own business, and life is pretty
hectic. And we were just briefly
catching up about what we were gonna be discussing today.
And I thought, oh, good chance for me to do a little bit of
consumer research. And he was saying that for him
(08:35):
and a lot of male friends of his, there is this pressure to
financially provide for the family.
And they sort of start to feel that weight sitting on them from
before baby even arrives. Yes.
And it's the pressure of we needthe bigger house, the bigger
car, the best schooling, the best there's.
And he said he's constantly tornbetween like, OK, well, do I go
(08:59):
all in on work to be able to provide that?
But then my kids are missing outon my time.
Yeah. And my love and my attention and
what I have left, similar to what your partner has, what time
and energy I have left to give when I get home is really
limited. And he was kind of saying that
in his mind, there is no such thing as balance if he wants to
(09:19):
be, quote, UN quote successful. Yeah.
And so he kind of looks at it and he's like, it's not right,
but it's how I'm working right now.
And he's like, I work in these sprints and he's like, I'm all
in with work right now. And then I can see like fires I
need to put out on the side. And then so, you know, in a few
weeks, I will be all in on my dad life and my parenting
(09:41):
responsibilities, put those fires out.
But then while I'm there, my work will be suffering.
And so I know that financial stress is huge for men across
the board, whether they have kids or not.
And it's the number one leading cause of divorce at the moment.
And so layer kids into a relationship and this parental
guilt, whether it's dad, whoever's the primary caregiver,
(10:05):
whoever's the primary earner at the time, like so layered and so
complex. It is, it's so complex and I
love that idea of like, yeah, it's, it's putting out spot
fires. I guess there's that part of me
that I just it's like we we can't do it all.
We try and do it all and exactlythat.
It's like we're over here, but then we're missing this and how
that eats us up. I think he's huge.
(10:25):
You've also got this idea with financial part in there, I guess
ashes looking in every family I think is different, but this
pressure on often dads to go, OK, well, I don't want my
partner to have to rush back to work.
So I want to take that load. The other thing, and I just want
to mention this sort of lightly,but I think it's really familiar
and I think you'll resonate withthis.
(10:47):
So personally, I feel like dads when we're in pregnancy, moms
are trying to prepare, we're trying to emotionally do all of
this or whatnot. Sometimes we're trying not to
think about it. Dads seem to anecdotally decide
to do Reno's. We it's like this preparation
that comes in that it's like, I've got to, I've got to do
(11:08):
something. I need to do something.
And I think that comes in this helplessness as well, which can
often have this guilt like, oh, mom's going through so much, I
don't know what to do. I need to do something.
So we often see that. And I think that also leads
another little comment of how men or how fathers can often
feel this guilt is the idea thatmoms or the primary caregiver
(11:31):
there. I think that's an important
catch. They might know how to do
something better or appear to mychild's crying.
Ash just knows how to soothe them.
So I'll just let let that happenbecause it makes me sort of feel
incompetent, but also guilty because I'm I don't know what to
do here. So that's a really common thing
(11:51):
as well of just being like, Oh, I don't know.
So I sort of step back. Not in a a way of trying to
weaponize that incompetence, butmore in a like a guilty like I
should know what to do. Does that make sense?
Yeah, definitely, definitely. And I've heard a few families
reflect on that and say I should've.
Again, this word should I shouldhave shown up more when my baby
(12:16):
was young because then I wouldn't have been scared to do
these things and but equally I guess I see it happen where one
parent is the primary caregiver does happen to have slightly
more experience than at doing all of these things and do.
Something every day you're gonna.
Get better at it. Yeah, It's.
It's hard. It's hard.
(12:37):
So hard. Is guilt ever a helpful emotion?
I know you said before that it can come from a place of love,
but is it ever helpful or is it just a hindrance?
Is it just bad? No, it is.
Look, all emotions, they're justemotions.
They're trying to communicate some something with us.
Guilt is this moral emotion. It's trying to say, hey,
(12:58):
something in your actions here. It doesn't align with your
values, with your morals. It's a message.
OK, so for instance, let's say like you come home story in my
life, if you come home for a bigday at work, you've picked the
kids up, they're grizzling, you're trying to do all of the
bedtime routine or whatnot. And you just you just snap, OK,
You just snap at them and it's like guilt comes up.
(13:22):
Guilt is giving us this message that says, hey, that's not how
you want a parent. That's not that's not what you
want to show up as. It's giving us an opportunity to
reflect and to realign. So it's about if we can,
stepping back and being like, all right, what what happened
there? What happened?
What went wrong? OK, I was rushing.
I was doing this. I wasn't regulated.
(13:44):
It gives us an opportunity to make change for next time.
Amazing. So good.
Guilt doesn't usually just happen in silo.
What follows guilt so closely isshame.
OK, so this idea guilt comes in and says, look, I didn't parent
how I wanted to then I don't want to yell at my children, and
(14:05):
I did. Let's look at that.
Shame comes in and says, you yelled at your children, you're
a bad mother, you can't do this.You should know better.
This sort of idea, guilt looks at the the behavior at the
moment. Shame attacks your identity.
OK. So it's a really distinct
difference, but they go so quickly together and it's about
(14:28):
trying to separate that. And I'm sure easier said than
done, especially from here on our comfy podcast catch.
But when you're in the moment, it's just.
It's so it feels almost instantaneously and I think it's
a lot of I don't want to discount the work that can go
into this. This is something that as a mom,
(14:49):
very like on a self disclosure, I'm working out a lot in my own
therapy because of you know, we're our own childhoods, our
own things that shape, which again, I'm sure we will
definitely unpack these things can be there and sew ingrained.
So even though I know it, and I remember saying this to you last
time, even though I know it, even though I know better, it
(15:12):
feels like it happened so quickly.
The shame spiral, the shame feeling makes us want to
hideaway guilt, wanting us to approach, to make repair, to
make it better. Shame makes us want to hide And
that's what happens. There's a big difference in then
how we show up. Yeah, so interesting.
And I feel like all of us go into motherhood, career, any
(15:36):
life endeavour thinking that I want to do better because I have
these new tools, these insights.I've been to therapy or I've
got, you know, this, this understanding of moving forward
and doing better than what has happened in my past.
But things like social media, I think can inspire.
(15:58):
They can educate, but it can also probably make us feel like
we're drowning with information of, again, that word should, of
everything we should be doing and not only bombarded with
information, but conflicting information.
Yeah. What do you think the role of
social media is on new moms or parents in general and guilt?
(16:22):
And can it ever be a helpful resource?
Look, I think it can and I I think you put it in there it
beautifully. It's it can give us all of this
information, but it can give us all of this information.
It's this double edged sword. I think social media can be
incredible in giving us a sense of connection.
We can see someone else struggling and we can go, oh,
(16:45):
OK, cool. I really resonate with that.
Or maybe I'll try that. Beautiful.
For me, I think I, I have got twins and I didn't have many
people around me that had twins.So I was looking for that sort
of connection or just someone else to be like, oh, OK, cool.
That person's also juggling too.So I think there's a beautiful
(17:05):
sense of connection in that. However, most of us logically
know this. We are seeing a highlight reel,
we are seeing a carefully curated photo, real TikTok,
whatever it is, even if it's designed to be real a day in the
life, it isn't. You also don't the.
(17:26):
Amount of moms I see that like film themselves waking up in the
middle of the night to feed their kids and I'm like, hang on
a second you set that camera up,you got back into bed, you then
got up and I'm like, I think theidea of getting up multiple
times a night is exhausting in itself, let alone the theatrics
of it I'm like, let's just thinkabout how you actually film
(17:49):
these day in the. Life.
It absolutely blows my mind actually.
I remember waking up in the middle of the night and I would
be feeding a baby and I had to between.
So I had luckily I also had company.
Mind you, we weren't talking because it was just like this
and I would fall asleep and I think a lot of parents can
resonate with this. You'd wake up in a shock of
being like, do I still have the baby or have I put them back in
(18:12):
the usually they're back in there, but I was you don't even
know where you are, let alone sorry, setting up a tripod.
It is just absurd. So I mean, hats off to them in
one sense, but let's just make it a not lower the bar, like
just a realistic bar. This is not happening.
It is, look, yeah, it is a highlight reel again, Even if
(18:33):
it's saying, oh, I'm experiencing guilt or I'm doing
this, we're still not hearing the inner thoughts of someone.
We're still not having that shared.
So I think that that's a really important thing.
I think there's a comparison that just happens.
You only have to look in the comments section of any TikTok
or Instagram to see it. You go in there and a new mom
(18:57):
has been having trouble with, say, her baby sleeping.
And so she's like, oh, cool. Last night I put them in a
swaddle with their arms out the comic.
Don't do that. That doesn't work.
It's not safe. It's this, Have you tried this?
Have you done this? I know you don't want responses,
but. And it's just like your head
will explode. Your head will explode with so
much information. I think, yeah, it's just, it is
(19:21):
a beautiful place, but it's a really scary place.
One thing I think I wanted to share with you as well, when I
was like prepping for this podcast, I went on to TikTok,
any excuse really. And I looked up mum Gil and I
was met with some beautiful, like really nice, honest sort of
(19:42):
examples of it. And that was lovely.
I was saying really shocked. I came across this TikTok of
quite a well known author in thesort of Wellness space speaking
about mom guilt. And it was this sentiment that
if you experience mom guilt, just stop.
Just don't. It's not good for you.
(20:03):
Second to that, your children will be miserable and they will
suffer if you are experiencing in that.
And I was a bit like, oh, OK, that.
Now I feel guilty for feeling guilty.
I went to the comments and that is exactly what was written
there. To me, this is the beautiful
part of social media. It's the epitome.
(20:24):
You can't get it right. You now feel guilty for feeling
guilty, you feel guilty for not feeling guilty.
It's just everywhere. So I think it's like use social
media, but you need limits and limits her heart as a mother who
is feeling like they're drowningand using it as an escape and
connection. You can't any longer curate your
feeds. The algorithm is feeding you.
(20:45):
So set limits. If you find you're scrolling at
night while you're feeding, maybe a book, maybe ATV show,
what else can you do so you're not flooded.
The best thing here is to check in how you feel after you've
consumed it. That's a really good flag and I
spoke to a friend who has a new baby recently and she said she
(21:05):
conscious she found herself in that sort of spiral and she had
to just unfollow a whole heap ofaccounts, which I was proud of
her for putting up that kind of boundary and having that
self-awareness. But again, easier said than
done. Yeah.
And I think again, social media is now designed that it's like
it doesn't matter if we don't follow, Tiktok is going to give
it to us. Yeah.
So it's just trying to have thatawareness about it, either pre
(21:29):
or when you're in a state like it's hard to have that when
you're sleep deprived. Yeah, yeah.
Why do you think it's so hard for mothers in particular to
take some time away from their kids and have solo time?
Because I think it's ingrained to be a good mother means to be
selfless self. And let's put good in adverted
(21:51):
comments. Oh, please.
Sorry. Yeah, but yeah, thank.
You good call. Yeah.
Yeah, it is. It is this idea from society
that it's like we need to be self sacrificing.
We need to be available all the time.
We are the one that has the answers.
It means that to step away takesalso so much preparation and
(22:12):
it's just, it's looked at like it's a treat.
What a treat. You've got an hour to yourself.
How great is that? To me, it shouldn't be like
that. To most people it shouldn't be
like that. It should be a non negotiable
thing. It's often, again, I hear this
idea that it takes more work to leave.
So yeah, cool, I'm going to go and meet Ash for lunch, but now
(22:34):
I've got to do XYZ to make sure that my baby or my child is
looked after, right, whatnot. Again, society, it feels
selfish. It doesn't feel worth it if it
takes that much mental load. So I think it's it's, it's
wrapped up in so many things, but it really comes to this core
that it's like we should always be available.
If someone's listening and they're like this feels like a
(22:56):
friend of mine or this feels like my partner or it feels like
myself, what are some things they can do to sort of make that
possible, like that solo time possible?
Is there anything we can do to call on our village or our
support network? I think one of the things is,
and I found this really useful, is actually voicing it.
(23:19):
I feel really guilty. Or even if you're not sure if
it's guilt, I feel really uncomfortable about leaving
understanding what it is. And I think this is a really
important differentiation is, isit guilt?
Is it grief? Because it's also, let's just
acknowledge it might be that youfeel guilty for leaving your
child, whatever that's sort of wrapped up in, or you may not
(23:42):
have done it before. It might be really hard, you
might not necessarily want to. They're two different things.
Being able to voice it and to talk about it I think is so
important. Having someone that you care,
care for, you trust, I guess, tolook after your child is really
important. Again, it's like starting slow.
(24:03):
Don't expect yourself to be ableto go out there for a day and be
like, see, it's done. It's like start slow, start
small. The other thing here, actually,
it's so important. This idea is like, take time for
yourself. You'll come back recharged.
You don't always come back recharged and don't cue the
guilt that you should have. You may just come back.
It might be better, it might be the same.
(24:24):
That's OK. It's still a learning curve.
It doesn't mean don't do it again, but it's like lowering
the expectations, verbalizing what's going on for you so that
one, either you can challenge itor someone else can challenge it
and support it for you. A certain personality types more
prone to this I'm I'm just thinking of a whole host of
(24:45):
people and myself and I feel like we all want to see do
experience everything the world has to offer and we want to do
it at a really high level. Is that kind of a personality
trait that then once you become a mother just like magnifies
this guilt of Oh my God, I'm nowsacrificing aspects of my
(25:07):
career, my health, my relationship, and I'm also not
being a good mom. Like talk to me about who we
should be looking at for most. So definitely look, I think and
it's probably going to unfortunately be a lot of the
listeners, it's those of us who are high achieving, those of us
(25:28):
who are more of that sort of perfectionistic or aiming for
that we're going to struggle with the concept of good enough.
It doesn't feel natural. I don't know about you, but most
things in my life, and it feels funny even saying this, but I
will say it is most things in mylife.
I have been able to set a goal, to work hard and achieve it.
I've been able to get good at it.
(25:50):
Or if I don't, I'm thinking of surfing here, which I was failed
miserably at. I stopped doing it.
Yeah, I don't have to keep going.
So it feels really uncomfortablefor me when I'm not just
naturally good at it. So yeah, we've definitely got
that sort of idea of like more of our our high achieving
people. We have got unfortunately as
(26:12):
well. And I'm resonating with this
people pleasers, those of us that struggle with boundaries.
It's not always this idea of like we struggle saying no.
Sometimes we want to say yes to everything.
We actually don't know where ourlimits are.
So that's a big thing as well. Again, with people pleasing here
or boundary setting, we're goingto have to say no to our
children or we're going to have to sometimes this is a big one
(26:35):
that comes up, drop them off to daycare and they're going to be
screaming and crying and we're still going to have to go.
That is going to tug on everything.
Again with that, people pleasingboundaries.
Also people that are sensitive or feel things deeply, that's a
big one. There's other things like our
different mental health struggles.
We've got depression, anxiety, OCDADHD, all of these sort of
(26:59):
things that come in that mean that it can be that bit
trickier. There might be struggles with
organization, with planning. There might be rigidity or more
of like a proneness to I guess that like negative self talk.
This is not to be alarmed. OK, So it's not that it's like
cool, if you've got these things, just don't do not
(27:22):
procreate. It's like absolutely not.
It's these are strengths. These are beautiful things.
You want to do it right or you're more inclined to do this
in a certain way. We need to be aware about it to
be able to then meet up with compassion, with kindness and to
implement this stuff. The other thing I think is
really important here, Ash, is something I touched on before is
(27:43):
it's challenging for those of uswho maybe have been raised or
experienced different things in our childhood.
Maybe that's not always traumas,although sometimes it is.
We may be trying to unlearn or to change patterns.
OK, We might have been brought up in a childhood in a, in a
family home, for instance, that didn't talk about emotions and
(28:03):
so it wasn't safe to. So we're trying to challenge
that. We're trying to learn it at the
same time as we're trying to teach it.
These are really hard things andI think it's more about for me,
if this resonates with anyone that's listening, it's going,
hey, you might just need a little bit more support.
That might be therapy. It might be looking into, you
(28:24):
know, self help, self development.
It also might just be a little bit more self compassion that
it's like, gosh, this is really hard because of this.
Yeah, what advice do you have topeople listening that are like,
okay, I feel like you're talkingto me When it's the high
achieving perfectionist, set a goal, usually smash it.
Parenting is not so black and white and just kind of adjusting
(28:50):
to having that it's enough is OK.
I think one of my friends said rough, rough good enough like
and it's like stuck in my head, but that's that's an adjustment
and that is going to feel uncomfortable for a lot of
people. How do we get used to that?
I actually love that. That needs to be like the name
(29:11):
of the podcast app. So there's a couple of things
here and the good enough is a big thing that I want to talk to
you about. First of all, I think when it's
coming up in this feeling, we need to also tune into how guilt
shows up for us. It'll show up differently for
me, for you, for anyone else. For me, I, I feel this sort of
(29:32):
sinking tightness feeling and I need to start to go, ah, that's
guilt. There it is.
If I can name it, We talk about this concept of naming it to
tame it. That's so important.
You can go out. That's guilt.
That's you know, I know that comes from this place of TikTok,
the Bento box lunches. I should be doing that.
(29:53):
And actually I packed baked beans today.
I'll give you that one. It's like it's that that's the
comparison. Or it might be your own inner
critic, your own expectations here based on whatever.
I like to do this with a lot of things where it's like, let's
actually call it something. So it's like there's my gnarkey
mum voice, my gnarkey mum guilt.Sorry.
(30:14):
It allows us to diffuse from it.It's not you, it's guilt.
OK, so that's a big key concept here.
The other thing we can do here is then come back to your
values. I'm going to use, hopefully this
works. This idea that this morning I
did, I packed baked beans because I didn't have anything
else ready. I was worried that I didn't have
(30:35):
enough food for them, blah, blah, blah.
Juggling, juggling. You can hear me trying to
explain it. Yeah.
Anyway, the kids went with bakedbeans.
The guilt came up. Oh gosh, that's not what I
should have done. I should have had vegetables.
I should have had these. I should have been more
prepared. A little bit of shame, but let's
stick with the guilt. Coming back to my values, yes,
it's important for me to feed mykids good food and have
(30:57):
nutrition, but it's also important for me here.
And it's not a value around parenting, but to be regulated
and to show up for Ash and to show up for my work and whatever
it is, I can't have it all. So right now, that value has to
trumpet. Does that make sense?
We then need to go to the next sort of part of this.
What did you say? Rough, rough.
(31:18):
Good. Enough, Yeah.
Is this concept of the good enough parent?
So your friend is spot on with this.
This is a term good enough parenting.
It's termed by this man Daniel Widak.
I'm going to check this so I don't butcher it.
Winnacott, he is, from memory, apediatrician and he looks at the
good enough parenting. It's not about being perfect,
(31:42):
it's about showing up OK. We misatunement, making
mistakes, snapping at children. Whatever it is, it's actually
normal. It's common.
We don't want to really encourage it, but it's a part of
it that also helps children. It helps children to understand
(32:04):
frustration. It helps children to learn
repair. So the part of the good enough
parenting that we need to acknowledge here is the repair.
So with the good enough parenting, we're looking at this
concept. Of course, you don't need to be
perfect. You need to be consistently
responsive. You need to be attuned enough.
Enough is the key here, Ash. We don't always have to get it
(32:27):
right. Attuned enough to your child to
their core emotional and physical needs.
OK, so it's about being able to respond to your child's needs to
repair when we make mistake. So again, if we come back to
this idea, the baked beans doesn't really work here.
But say I yell at my child and it's like, oh God, that's not
(32:50):
quite right. It's not going to be incredibly
damaging for my child to be having a moment of where I've
lost my cool if I'm able to attune to them.
Hey, that that wasn't OK. Mommy got frustrated then and I
yelled. I can see that that frustrated
you or scared you or whatever happened for you.
(33:11):
Mommy's really sorry. I needed to take a breath and
I'm here. Do you want to hug?
Whatever it is, it's about then meeting them at that emotion and
creating that space. That's really powerful.
It is. It's also really hard to
remember in the morning. So I think like it's something
we need to come back to and that's why those steps are
important. If we can come back to this idea
(33:33):
of like, sometimes it needs to be good enough.
We are allowed to then or allow ourselves to have more
compassion. OK, so it's like we're not
aiming for perfect here. We're aiming for attunement.
I think if anyone's listening and they're like, cool, this
sounds good. This sounds like something that
would resonate with me. I urge you go and look it up
more. Read about it, get into it
(33:54):
because it's a concept for me. I may not articulate it the
best, but it sticks in my head so much that it's like it's not
about these little things that might slip up.
It's the big moments and it's about coming back and making
repair. What advice do you have to
parents around the actual benefits of spending time away
(34:16):
from their kids? Because I think there's a lot
of, again, guilt and pressure put on to be there for your
kids, to shop for your kids to be there for every moment.
But surely there's a flip side as well.
There's got to be. There's got to be, there's got
to be everything. There's yin and Yang.
Like what are we? What are we?
And The funny thing with that islike, yeah, for everything,
there's yin and Yang. And yet for parenting, we don't
see it. You go to work and most of the
(34:39):
time you'll have a day off. You'll have a weekend.
Even during the year, you'll have a holiday.
We hope you go to the gym, you have a rest day.
These are just normal parts. No one goes like, oh, it's
ridiculous. You're having your Saturday off.
That's so bad. It's expected.
And yet with parenting, it's not.
So one, it's incredibly beneficial for us as parents to
(35:00):
have our own time, to regulate, to breathe, to have an identity.
Outside of that, it is, it's such a, look, we have the
mothers, we have this time when we're pregnant where we're
trying to adapt to it. But still, it's such a shift of
identity that we're thrown into.And I know we touched on this
last time about how long it can take for us to feel like
(35:21):
ourselves again. I don't actually believe we feel
like ourselves again. We have this new, improved,
different, whatever it is version of us.
We need the space to be able to find that.
OK, so there's that concept withit.
The other part here is the benefit for our children, how
children learn to become securely attached, OK?
(35:42):
It's about the fact that we are teaching them that mom or dad or
whoever it is goes and we come back.
And that's so incredibly important.
It shows that it's not about this constant proximity that I'm
always there for you. Again, it's talking about this
quality. When I am here, this is how I'm
showing up. Children weren't meant to be
(36:05):
raised in isolation. We had our villages.
I also get that this is such a privilege now, but I think it's
so important that we do call on other people, whether that's
family, friends, daycare, teachers, whatever it is, it
teaches our children as well about this, creating this
emotional safety. For me, this is something as
(36:28):
hard because I do have this belief that I should have it
all, I should have all the answers.
I should be able to do that. That's particularly how my mum
guilt shows up, is this idea is that I shouldn't have to ask for
help. So then when I do call on other
people, it feels really uncomfortable.
I acknowledge that we're workingthrough it.
One thing I like to remember here is that as my children age,
(36:52):
even now, they're going to need more than just me.
Heavens forbid they don't want to talk to me about something.
I can't understand why, but theymay need other people.
I don't have all the answers. I want to create this
environment where they know Ash.I can ask her about that.
You know what, Uncle so and so Ican go to him.
They've got other people in their circle that they feel safe
(37:14):
with. So to me, it's a big focus of
creating safety and that just helps me be OK sometimes with
stepping back. I think that's such a gift to
give to your children because itcan be easy to think that, well,
I'm their parent, they should come to me for everything.
But we know from our relationships with our own
parents that sure, there's a lotof stuff you can go to your
(37:36):
parent with, but then there's a lot that you probably would
rather have a slightly removed or different.
Yeah. And it's the same.
It's like, I don't have the answers for all of that, and
that's OK. That doesn't make me less of a
mother, a bad mother, but it's like, I'm going to just think of
something simple that's not evenemotionally.
If my child wants to ask me about Excel spreadsheets,
(37:58):
they've got the wrong girl. I need to create this
environment where they're supported in so many different
areas. And I think, look, again, I want
to acknowledge that it's not always easy.
I haven't struggled as much as Iknow a lot of friends have with
this separation, dropping a child off at daycare kicking and
screaming, it's really hard to remember that.
(38:19):
It's like I'm developing my community, but it is coming back
to that idea. It's like my child knows that
I'm coming back. They are learning that this is
this is. I am here.
I'm not abandoning them. It might feel like it in the
moment, but I will be back. I love that idea of community
and it's not like my hairdresseris also going to be the person
that does my taxes, right? Like we all have.
(38:42):
We try and surround ourselves with people that are able to
work to their strengths and their areas of expertise.
So gifting that to our child, I think that's a really fresh
perspective. It's the most beautiful way to
put it. And I think simple.
Yeah, beautiful. For some people, I know that
they have always wanted to be a parent, and when they become a
parent, their child is their number one priority in the
(39:04):
world. Beautiful.
If that's the case, it's not thecase for everyone.
And some people still have thesebig ambitions for career and
growth and things outside of parenthood.
Neither is right or wrong. But how do we hold space for the
multiple versions of ourselves? Yeah.
It's really, really hard. I, I think for me, I, I
(39:27):
struggled to conceive my children.
So I went through a big fertility journey.
I got my children. I was told I should, I'm so
lucky. I've got two of them.
And I was sitting there going like, yeah, what the hell am I
going to do with two of them? But this idea is like beautiful
now we need to be really grateful.
And I also was like, I want to go back to work.
It was really hard to admit thatI was like, great, cool, I
(39:49):
really want to do this thing forme.
It's the idea here, Ash, and it's very much easier said than
done, but it's like dropping thebinary.
It's like we, we don't have to have one or the other.
It's hard. And I I said before, I don't
really subscribe to the idea that it's like we can have it
all, but it's like we need to stop the expectation that it is
(40:10):
one or the other. We need to make it more of a
supportive environment. Is there some research around
how long we should ideally spendwith our children before going
back to work? Is there I don't know if there's
best practice or is it just a case by case basis?
Look, there's some research thatsays early bonding is important,
(40:31):
but again, I'm going to come back to that good enough sort of
side of it. And it's not like our good,
that'll be good enough. We can go back to work.
It's more of this idea of quality, OK, Being able to show
up and attune to your child is the most important thing.
I think for so many of us. We are looking for for an
answer, for a guide. And because we don't have that,
(40:54):
there's no instruction manual that says, OK, cool that six
months, at 12 months we shall begoing back to work and that's
OK. We then look externally.
We're looking externally. Well, she went back to work.
At this point, they work in the government.
They had 12 months off. They have this many times off.
Whatever it is, we don't know. It's really hard because we have
to then figure it out for ourselves in terms of the
(41:18):
bonding for your child and creating that secure attachment.
Again, your child one, they're so resilient, but it's also
about secure attachment means being available, being attuned,
coming back to them. It's not always about always
being present. It's about returning and
attunement. That's the key.
(41:39):
It's hard and you know, I mentioned this before, it can
often have a concept of like we're trying to return to work
for different reasons. Amazing.
I'm talking for me about wantingto go there for my identity and
my passion. That's fantastic.
Not everyone feels like that. A lot of grief can come with
this. I don't want to leave my baby.
I don't want to go back from matleave, whatever that looks like,
(42:01):
or paternal leave, whatever it is.
There's grief that can come withthat.
There can be financial burdens as well.
There's no right or wrong in terms of a rule.
Hard and hard and fast, but it has to be right for your family.
So I think it's, it feels like abit of a cop out of an answer,
but it's, I know that you know that that's the answer as well,
(42:21):
that it's like it's what works for you and it's knowing and
trusting that it's like when youare there for your child, the
quality of that relationship is the most important thing.
Yeah, and I think it's nice to touch on that privilege, like
for work to be optional for one parent.
He's a privilege. Life is expensive, kids are
(42:43):
expensive, and so many of us have to go back to work full
time. Both parents, kids are in
daycare. And I think it's beautiful for
anyone listening that is in thatsituation to just be reminded,
like you said, it's quality timeover quantity.
It doesn't mean you're a bad parent.
It doesn't mean you're going to stuff up your children.
And as long as we can apply someof these principles that we've
(43:06):
discussed today, we can still give them a really beautiful,
secure attachment, healthy, happy life. 100%, I think one of
the big struggles, I've actuallyreally struggled with it this
week for whatever reason, the, Idon't know, Mercury's in some
space is that it's like I've just had really, really big
days. I've been getting home later,
(43:26):
picking the kids up later. Obviously it's darker, It's
getting darker earlier. So it already feels like we're
against the clock. I'm trying to get them in bed.
We're dealing with all of this and I'm a rusher.
The time. Time is never my strong point,
so. You were here early today.
Well, yeah, I don't know what what mess I left behind.
Let me just say that I, I, and now I'm like, oh, what a
(43:49):
compliment, thank you. To me.
I, I then struggle because, and this is where the mum guilt
comes in. And potentially it's not
necessarily the difference between mum guilt and dad's
here. But for me, my personality goes,
I've got to do this, I need to do this, I need to do that, I
need to do this. Let's get through it, through
it, through it. And I need to remember in those
(44:11):
moments about being able to stopand just be present.
I've got about an hour when I get home before the kids are
down and I want to spend that time with them.
Realistically, I can't leave allthose jobs behind and just sit
on the floor and do it with them.
We've still got to do things. So what I've been trying to do
is then carve it out. Can I then sit with them while
(44:33):
they're eating their dinner, noton my phone, not watching TV,
but just be with them or after bath and we've put their jammies
on. Let's find a book and read just
that book again. It's quality.
We don't need an hour there. That'd be ideal to have this
time where I'm there and I'm grounded.
I am this and I'm that. You come into my house at that
(44:54):
time of night. That's not me.
But if I can carve out those moments, that's what counts.
And when I go to bed at night and try to think of it's like,
what was lovely, Like what was nice today, it's like that just
that simple thing of, you know, pulling faces or trying to
understand what they're saying about their day.
It's like, that's the bit that says mom's listening.
(45:17):
Mom's here. She cares.
Everything we've discussed todayis beautiful in theory and easy
ish to soak up when I've had a good night's sleep before this.
For anyone who is in the depths of parenting right now and just
(45:37):
feeling like they're drowning inthis feeling of guilt, what
advice do you have for them? I just also consensually want to
wrap you up in a big hug and feel like it's OK.
I think the big thing here for me is like, you're not failing.
And then I again, like you said,Ash, it's so easy to say, but I
(45:59):
want you to hear it. It's like you are not failing.
You've never done this before. Even if you have other children,
you have never parented in this exact situation.
OK, It is hard. It is so hard.
The idea that we make it harder for ourselves with this
(46:20):
comparison, it's just it's so painful.
So you are doing the best that you know how to do.
I would be asking you to check some of those expectations to
come back to what's important for you to see if there's any
ability to lower the bar. I think it's about speaking
(46:40):
about it, but knowing that it's like it's feeling hard because
it is hard and you are doing thebest that you can do.
Great advice and I hope that felt like the beautiful warm hug
that we wanted it to feel like. For anyone listening, that's in
the depths. Tools, resources, helplines.
Where can people turn to if they're looking For more
(47:03):
information on this? There is so much, which again,
double edged sword. OK, so there's a couple of
things. We're looking at self compassion
here and I want to put this in the show notes.
There's a couple of really beautiful self compassion
practices. Even just simply Ash is being
able to step away. I always love to put my hand on
my heart, exhale. I probably shouldn't do it into
(47:25):
the microphone, but it's like taking a really deep breath and
saying like I'm doing the best that I know how to do can allow
us to just come back and pause for a moment.
Again, feeling simple, but it can be really important.
Self compassion is key here and there is a couple of key things
that I will drop in there in terms of books and whatnot.
You know, I'm going to say it, it's therapy.
(47:48):
It's therapy to unpack what's atthe core of this.
Like I said, I'm juggling with my own.
I'm struggling juggling with my own stuff at the moment of like
this shame of where that comes in, where it's ingrained from.
It's not as easy as just like cognitively challenging it.
Sometimes we need to understand where those patterns have come
from. The other thing here I think
that's important is the peer support.
(48:10):
Other mothers, even when we're talking about juggling work, we
so often have access to but don't use our peers.
We might be working with a mum of, you know, she might have
teenage kids, older kids, whatnot.
And I would urge you to turn to her and be like, what do you
think? Like how have you managed this?
What would you do? How what did you do different?
(48:32):
What worked, what didn't work? Turning to those people around
us for support, remember to takethings as a grain of salt, but I
think that that can be an important sort of tool to use as
well. There's a couple of books that I
like. 1 is The Mother Wound and 1 is Good inside, which I'll
link. These are beautiful sort of
starting points to look at that guilt, trying to shift it.
(48:56):
Curate your Instagram feed. Just where possible, these
algorithms are strong. Where possible, just make sure
you are really conscious of whatyou're absorbing.
I think is a big thing. One thing I think is simple that
I would like people to take away.
It's really hard to do any of this when we're not regulated.
(49:17):
There's a couple of things that's really hard to regulate
as a new parent. Sleep deprivation is one of
them, hormones is the other. I like to remind us, might
remind others, remind in therapymyself.
We're just little babies and babies need a couple of things.
Have we been fed and watered? Are we warm enough?
(49:39):
Are we comfortable? Do we need to be in a different
environment or whatnot? Do we need a cuddle?
Do we need comfort, and do we need rest, asleep?
Those sort of things For me is like, let's come back to that
and see if those needs are beingmet, OK?
It's this idea of keeping those core needs met before we can do
(50:00):
anything else. The other little thing here, and
I know that you'll laugh at thisor it's pretty true to me, My
mum used to always say to me with my kids when they were
young is like, if in doubt, put them in the bath.
There's something about water that can calm a baby so quickly,
and I'm pretty similar. Throw me in the bath, it's
usually not that. Throw me in the shower, let me
(50:22):
splash water and it allows me toregulate.
It allows me then to have that moment of self compassion, put
my hand on my chest, remind myself that I'm doing good
enough, and then come back and approach the situation
differently. And I thank you as always.
It's such a gift to have you here.
And I think our listeners are going to come away again, very
(50:44):
feeling, very seen, very heard and loved.
I hope so. And you've actually just got me
on the one of the most importantthings that I forgot.
Oh, sorry. Yeah, a little bit of spice.
A little spice. The other thing I think when I
mentioned on therapy there, and I'm sorry, Ash, I can hear
myself just talking so much. There is this foundation called
the Gidget Foundation. We will link it in here.
(51:05):
This is something that is only new for me.
I did feel a bit of guilt here. I was like, I should have known
this. I should have known this
earlier, but I know it now. It is this foundation that aims
to support parents both, you know, in the preconception
stages, prenatal, post Natal with therapy and resources.
I believe it's at free cost, telehealth, if not low, but
(51:28):
there is so many resources available there for parents.
It's also if you're struggling with things like loss of a baby,
miscarriage, everything in between.
This is a great place to start. I also think it might be a
little bit less confronting because you can go online and do
that. So to me, that was one of the
key things I wanted to share andI'm glad I didn't forget
(51:49):
completely that we'll add in because that is just, let's just
start that as a foundation. Yeah.
And maybe rather than scrolling social media, we should be
scrolling something like that. That's a little more evidence
based or yeah. Relevant.
Yeah, So, so important. Yeah.
And I thank you. Thank you, Ash.
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