Subscribe to our

   eNewsletter

   mbh featured

   in the media:

   Women's Weekly

   ABC radio

Copyright © 2009

Mothers Be HEARD
All Rights Reserved

Mother of all Problems

an article by Kellee Nolan from Courier Mail

26 November, 2007

http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,22822583-23272,00.html

WE ALL know her. She's on billboards, advertisements, sitcoms and in images from across the ages.

From the Virgin Mary to the Meadow-Lea mum, she is everywhere; in our media, our culture, our hearts and our minds.

She is the perfect mother. Always pretty, smiling and loving, she gets everything done and never gets stressed, tired or grumpy, never loses control and, most of all, she never complains.

The only problem is, she doesn't exist.

And the fact that we expect her to is making mothers' lives hell.

The pressures of motherhood can often lead to post-natal depression, according to Adelaide academic Victoria Williamson and Post and Antenatal Depression Association (PANDA) chief executive Belinda Horton.

The illness is estimated to affect one in six Australian mothers and about 200 people call PANDA's helpline each month.

The lack of awareness of what mothers go through, and the inability to discuss it for fear of others' judgment, can imprison mothers behind walls of silence and happy pretences.

A mother's life is not easy. Ask any mum and she might tell you.

No matter how she does it – whether with much support or alone, another job, being easygoing with her children or being a take-no-prisoners disciplinarian – she is most likely finding life hard, her kids frustrating and her routine all-consuming.

She will love her kids desperately and do anything for them, but she also will long to be able to go to the toilet on her own, sleep through the night, eat her own piece of toast or go to the shops on a whim – the things she used to be able to do before she had children.

She may get tired, angry, fed up and depressed. She may worry that she is not doing enough with her children, not enjoying her time with them, while worrying she is not doing enough for her partner or being a sexual dynamo in bed.

She may also find she is not enjoying her life, not able to do the things she likes or work at the career she wants.

She is likely to feel guilty about all these things and will think that she is the only one feeling this way.

But she is not.

Experts say these feelings are common for mothers and yet they are not the images of the myth of motherhood we see reflected back at us from history, fables or media.

Horton, PANDA's CEO, says the losses involved with becoming a mother are not realised.

She cites the loss of finances, freedom, worker identity and couple time as examples of negatives that weigh up against the positives, such as developing an amazing relationship with a new baby.

"But when you balance it out as a loss-and-gain kind of equation and you end up with primarily a loss experience, then that becomes a grieving process," Horton says.

"So we tend to then joke that you don't send a grief card to a new mother, saying 'good luck dealing with all your losses'. So there's no acknowledgement that there's loss that comes with having a baby."

At Victorian-based PANDA, trained volunteers and staff work through such issues with women and their families experiencing post-natal depression.

Williamson says her 2005 study of 12 women with post-natal depression found they felt pressured to live up to media images of the perfect mother.

She says the mothers would pretend things were happy, like the scenes depicted in family commercials, when actually they were feeling dreadful.

"They would have the experience of wearing a mask of perfection, which would usually slip, because you can't sustain that forever," Williamson says. "If you've got depression, there's only so long you can pretend to be happy before that cracks."

She said in one of her case studies, the woman's husband found her lying on the ground sobbing, unable to function.

"He basically scooped her up and took her to hospital, where she was diagnosed with post-natal depression and she was in hospital for a couple of weeks."

So what is the day-to-day reality mothers find so hard?

Endless changing of dirty nappies, feeding children, cleaning up after them, dressing them, playing with them, spending long days at home alone with them and sorting out fights and tantrums.

Then there's all the usual household chores – all done on broken sleep – while for others it is fitting in the above while holding down another job.

Williamson believes new myths continually have been pushed on to women since the 1950s.

In the '50s, it was the myth of the perfect happy housewife, followed by the '70s career woman, the '80s superwoman and the 1990s beauty myth of looking like a thin catwalk model.

"So you've got women striving to be perfect in the workforce – angelic, happy, cosy mothers and skinny and beautiful and living in a home beautiful," Williamson says.

"The pressures are huge and then if you've got the post-natal depression symptoms, where you're anxious and you've got an avoidance of your baby and bonding has failed and you feel like you want to kill your child, that's a long way from these myths.

"And it's very hard for women to start admitting to them, even to health professionals."

So what needs to be done to help bring the reality of motherhood into the open?

Williamson says more education, support and realistic media images.

"I think firstly public education, about the reality of motherhood, so that those who don't become depressed, but are just struggling with the normal adjustment process, can have a realistic idea of what to expect, with some ideas of resources if they need them," she says.

"Women need to help each other more, rather than criticise each other . . . and media needs to give more realistic portrayals of motherhood.

"We need to debunk things such as the myths of beauty, the superwoman, the perfect mother."

Have Your Say

Latest Comments:

Yes of course, mothers are the only ones in the country to have anxiety, stress, failureand struggle.

Posted by: Ronaldo of Clontarf 12:13pm December 09, 2007

Hi Jo, These 'groups' you talk about don't say those things to make mothers feel guilty, they say them because those practices you mention such as breastfeeding, natural childbirth etc have been scientifically proven to be better for mother and baby. Not only are they better, but the alternatives can be dangerous and compromise children's health and wellbeing. If society provided better support and information on these issues, perhaps women wouldnt find it so hard. Breastfeeding and co-sleeping for a tired stressed out mum, is best thing you can do- no more disturbed sleep and getting up and down all night making bottles. Also if women's truly amazing abilities to birth and sustain a baby were really valued in our society insteadof being constantly undermined, I beleive this would also make a difference to rates of depression. finally, I just wanted to add that something that wasnt mentioned in the article is the connection with PND and traumatic birth, particulary traumatic caesarean birth. Lets get birth right, through an overhaul of the maternity system, one- to-one midwifery, inquiries into the medical proffession's un-evidenced based practices which do so much harm to women and babies, and we will have mums starting out their new life as mothers on a high, feeling empowered, safe, capable and in control. This would make a huge difference.

Posted by: Mon of 1:32pm November 29, 2007

As a mother of one, with a surprise number 2 coming shortly, let me assure you that the pressure is immense. All the well meaning comments about how wonderful it all must be don't take into account some women's reality. Some women do experience the joy and bliss, but there are plenty of us out there who battle every day to just get out of bed and live up to high expectations of what we should be feeling and doing. Both ante-natal and post-natal depression are insidious, resulting in you feeling like a complete and total failure as a human being. The hardest lesson we each need to learn and re-learn every day all over again, which many struggle to do (myself included), is that we have to meet our our goals and dreams, and not those of someone else.

Posted by: Susy M of Brisbane 4:02pm November 28, 2007

As a mother of one, with a surprise number 2 coming shortly, let me assure you that the pressure is immense. All the well meaning comments about how wonderful it all must be don't take into account some women's reality. Some women do experience the joy and bliss, but there are plenty of us out there who battle every day to just get out of bed and live up to high expectations of what we should be doing. Both pre and post-natal depression are insidious, resulting in you feeling like a complete and total failure as a human being. The hardest lesson we each need to learn and re-learn every day all over again, which many struggle to do (myself included), is that we have to meet our our goals and dreams, and not those of someone else.

Posted by: Susy of Brisbane 3:32pm November 28, 2007

I think some groups don't help the situation when they start arguments over individulat choices such as "breast is best", "give birth without drugs", "co-sleeping is best". I know women who have been made to feel failures because they haven't breastfeed their babies. Does the media / breast-feeding association ever publically acknowledge that there are situations where women are not able to breast feed and should not be judged?

Posted by: jo Dark of Brisbane 9:52am November 28, 2007

Thank God someone has finally done a study to determine how tough it is for mothers to feel perfect. In my case getting the energy up to continue breathing is tough.

Posted by: Perfect Mother of Brisbane 6:29pm November 27, 2007