The Mommy Wars Are Over & We All Lost

on May 4, 2011 at 2:15 PM

Man, I love a good mommy war. Breast is best! BF Nazis hate feminists! It's so invigorating, so totally ... well, crappy, actually. So I'm extremely happy to report that the mommy wars are over! Hooray?

Yes, if no one ever tells me again I'm ruining my baby by using a much more affordable -- and middle-class appropriate -- option of day care. But, eh, not so much since the reason these wars are over is that, thanks to a study by Inspiring Moms, they discovered that "2 out of 3 employed moms and stay-at-home moms actually share the same fears and feelings of self-doubt about motherhood."

Awesome.

Here's what bugging all of us:

65.3% of moms reported they don’t feel like they “are thriving as a mom!”
65.8% full- and part-time employed felt they are not thriving!
65.2% stay-at-home moms felt they are not thriving!

This "Motherhood Satisfaction" survey gives more insight as well as to what is making all of us moms feel crazy:

Not in Control: 63% of moms reported that they “don’t feel in control as a mom!”
Not Doing a Good Job: 62.4% reported that they “aren't satisfied that they are doing a great job as a mom!"
Not Reaching Full Potential: 61.7% of moms also reported they don’t feel they “know what it takes to reach their full potential!”
No Skills: 50.1% of moms “aren't confident in their skills as a mom!”

Yes, those are a lot of exclamation marks via Inspiring Moms. But that's probably because they want all of us who are feeling shaky to know they are here to help. Since some days I'm all thrive all the time, and some days I wonder what crazy person left these two helpless children in my care -- I decided to try out their balance MAP technique of helping moms (working and stay-at-home) get it together. You can try it too, and get a free sample and see how it can help you sort out what areas you feel strong about and what areas are "challenging" for you, as a mom.

Then we can all go back to trashing that workaholic who doesn't care about her baby, and her best friend the lazy bon-bon eating mom to one fifth grader who doesn't even have a real job.

That's progress.

Are you a satisfied mom?

Image via Sergey Vladimirov/Flickr

About the author April Peveteaux

writes about anything that gets stuck in her craw. A mom of two in Los Angeles, she can't believe she practically lives in the country now after attempting to raise kids in Brooklyn.

Filed Under: back-to-work, breastfeeding, maternity leave

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Comments (1)

Facebook comment from Leanne Carnegie

on May 4, 2011 at 3:09 PM

Yea, they're trying to sell a product, I wouldn't be surprised if those "results" are biased. This is not to say that a good deal of moms aren't unsure of themselves (which I actually think is a good thing... if you're "sure" and doing a crappy job, what is there to inspire you to do better?), just that I generally won't trust "statistics" from a biased source such as this.

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