Here are 4 practical tools to stop mom guilt in its tracks
Have you ever accidentally exploded at your child only to be plagued by crushing guilt directly after? Or maybe you’ve been fighting with your spouse when you realize the door was open and they’ve heard everything. Cue the thoughts of how you’re ever going to overcome mom guilt.
Let’s face it— regardless of how it shows up, the guilt of parenting weighs heavy… but is all of that guilt helping or hurting? If we so choose, every day there will be a new issue to feel guilty about and unconsciously, we fall into an unhealthy– not to mention, unnecessary– cycle of shame.
But are we doomed to feel this weight indefinitely? The short answer is no. By taking intentional steps to reframe your perspective, you’ll discover that small, steady shifts will help you to feel more centered, in control, and less guilt overall.
Before we explore how to overcome mom guilt, let’s explore just how guilt shows up in the daily life of a parent.
How Does Mom Guilt Affect Us?
Curious to understand how guilt is showing up for parents today, I polled my Thriving Toddler community on social media with ‘How does guilt/shame show up for you?’
The answers didn’t surprise me, as they’re the same thoughts that arise in my coaching and own parenting. The poll answers included:
- feeling guilty for fighting in front of our children
- a child’s speech delay
- leaving the house when they are upset
- feeling angry at baby for not sleeping through the night
- anger at partner for not getting up at night
- losing your cool
- giving one child more attention than another
- not being able to breastfeed
Sound familiar? In the survey, 30% said they felt guilty daily, 28% reported weekly, and 10% once in a while. In fact, 27% mentioned they felt their feelings of guilt were problematic and 100% wanted me to share the response to what made them feel guilty.
Can you guess the number one driver of guilt in parents? Yelling at children. So why do we lose our cool and perpetuate this shame and/or guilt cycle?
Mom Guilt vs Shame
First, let’s unpack the key difference between guilt and shame, and what makes it productive versus problematic.
With guilt, the focus is on behavior. It’s the discomfort we feel when we evaluate what we’ve done, or what we’ve failed to do against our values. It drives positive change and behavior.
On the other hand, shame shifts the focus to I am bad. The focus is now on the self, not the behavior. The result of shame-based thoughts is feelings of being flawed, and unworthy of love, belonging and connection. It is not a driver of positive change and can be incredibly corrosive to the sense of sense.
No matter how guilt as a parent shows up for you, by choosing these small, intentional shifts you’ll be better skilled at managing big feelings and learn practical ways to shift and manage guilt.
5 Steps to Overcome Mom Guilt
1. Build a Solid Foundation
Be intentional with how you build out a structure for your family. This means adequate time for exercise, sleep, nutrition, and rest for everyone. Not just your kids and partner— this is your reminder to put on your air mask on FIRST.
Make a ‘Joy List’ and jot down what lights you up. Put the list somewhere where you can see it every day and set an intention to incorporate as many as you can into your daily routine, beyond your tasks and to do’s.
Examine your current coping skills and how they are supporting you. How much alone time do you need to feel fulfilled and is there a way to block out your time so it supports that better? And remember, change evolves from small, consistent steps and not all at once, overnight! It just takes the intention to keep doing it consistently even if progress is slow.
2. Step Back and Reframe Your Thoughts
Aaron Beck, an American Psychologist, explains how the thoughts that impact our behavior also impact our moods. This is known as the cognitive triad. The cognitive triad helps us develop our belief systems about ourselves and the world. It’s also an important part of dealing with mom guilt.
The cognitive triad includes three types of negative thoughts that often occur in people that have symptoms of depression. These negative thoughts are about oneself, the world, and the future.
- Negative thoughts about oneself: This involves thinking poorly about oneself, and feeling inadequate, worthless, or unlovable.
- Negative thoughts about the world: This involves seeing the world as unfair, hostile, or filled with obstacles, and feeling like there are no positive opportunities or experiences.
- Negative thoughts about the future: This involves anticipating negative outcomes or expecting things to go wrong, feeling pessimistic or lacking motivation for the future.
We produce around 50,000 thoughts a day, and recent studies show that, on average, 40,000 of them are negative. But thoughts are not facts, even though we can interpret them as such. Choose to get curious instead of judgmental and ask yourself the following questions:
- Is there evidence to support your thoughts?
- Are you possibly engaging in one of the common cognitive bias that is unhelpful? A cognitive bias could include drawing conclusions from insufficient or no evidence, overgeneralizations, exaggerating the importance of an undesired event, or minimization, which underplays the significance of a positive event, or even personalization which attributes negative feelings of others to oneself.
Start by fact-checking and reframing some of the guilt statements to shift your mood immediately. Remind yourself:
- It’s okay to have time for yourself.
- Rest is rejuvenating. Rest makes me less irritable.
- I’m allowed to have time with my friends and partner.
- I create boundaries on what I say yes and what I say no to.
- I’m aware of my behaviors and I’m doing my best to regulate my feelings and mood by understanding I’m the adult to model self-regulation.
3. The Antidote for Guilt is Self-Compassion
What if you could step back and give yourself a little more credit? This is key to overcoming mom guilt!
Self-compassion entails being warm and understanding towards ourselves when we suffer, fail, or feel inadequate, rather than ignoring our pain or flagellation ourselves with self-criticism.
People that exercise self-compassion understand that life difficulties are inevitable, so they tend to be gentle with themselves when confronted with painful experiences rather than getting angry when life falls short of set ideals. How can you exercise self-compassion with one of the guilt scenarios?
4. Combat Perfectionism by Focusing on Values
When we focus on our internal values, rather than external, we create healthy patterning to build internal excellence. Be curious and open about your experience. People that experience less shame view mistakes and failures as opportunities for learning. Shame tells you that you are less than, or not worthy. It prevents you from recovering. It holds you hostage and ultimately kills creativity. But, how can we combat shame?
- Recognize shame and understand what it triggered. Don’t pretend it’s not happening or ignore the feelings that arise. Name it, feel it, get curious about what messages and expectations triggered it.
- Practice critical awareness with a reality check. Consider what you want to be and if it’s aligned with your values. Is it motivated by what you think others need or want from you?
- Reach out and connect with your community. Spend time building relationships that you can deeply connect with.
- Speak it into existence! Silence, secrecy, and judgment fuel for shame. When you feel shame, are you asking for what you need? How can you lean into that quiet nudge?
5. Build Trust by Regulating Your Nervous System
Don’t be afraid to exercise your power to pause. As many of us weren’t raised with an understanding of how to regulate our emotions and nervous system, we can learn this skill to impart to our children.
Here are some ways to regulate your nervous system and your emotions:
-Use humor by breaking up the heightened energy with a funny or silly break in the moment of frustration.
-Keep perspective. Remember where your child/children are at developmentally and that they don’t have the skills yet, and it is your job to model it for them.
-Make 15 minutes for yourself and alone time. Be still and practice paying attention without judgment.
Need More Help to Overcome Mom Guilt?
Hopefully, by now you can see that although parental guilt is completely normal, it’s the unnecessary weight that we put on ourselves and it’s hard enough out there! So remember, if you are reading this and got this far… you are doing a great job.
The key is small daily shifts that in turn into lifelong patterns that will pay off for decades and relationships to come— most importantly, your relationship to yourself.
If you need more support navigating your parenting journey, contact me to learn more about how therapy can help. Happy parenting from my circus to yours!
XO, Michelle