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TIRED OF MOMMY GUILT? TRY THIS INSTEAD

 Modern Mommy Doc


PUBLICATION DATE:

Dec 22, 2017

TIRED OF MOMMY GUILT? TRY THIS INSTEAD

 Modern Mommy Doc

CATEGORY: PARENTING + MAMA WELLNESS

Mommy Guilt is one of the worst parenting tricks in the book. There you are, perfect little baby in hand and, wham, in comes Mommy Guilt, making you feel like a failure when you're not producing enough milk, taunting you when you leave your baby for the first time, gnawing at you, making you feel like you must not be doing enough to stimulate/soothe/protect/you name it your little one. At one point or another in your journey in motherhood, you're going to need some tips for avoiding mommy guilt.


And then? The day you go back to work (for all you working moms). And you wonder, "Am I the worst mom in the world for leaving my precious baby in the arms of someone else?"


Now, I am all about women meeting their full potential, whether as working or stay-at-home moms (or as not moms at all, for that matter). It's most important to do what works the best for all of us individually. Remember, I work full-time as a doctor. I love working. Still, it doesn't stop me, on some days, from feeling like a complete jerk when I walk out the door and leave my girls behind.


It's worse when they start to get a little older. My youngest daughter just turned one year old and she has perfected the "Mommy don't go" cry which usually consists of, "mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom" over and over again while she clings to my pant leg. It reliably happens when I'm heading out to my job in the morning or when I'm all geared up to work out. It hardly ever happens to my husband (I'm sure it does, I just don't notice it because I only have room in my brain for my guilt, not his as well). It's enough to make me cry in my car occasionally.


What are my choices?


Choice ONE:


I could -and I have in the past- just decided it's not worth it to feed the non-mom parts of me. I could decide to only go to work every day. To come straight home or go straight there all week long. I could never take the time to hang out with friends. Or never take an adult vacation. To never feel like I'm inconveniencing my partner or other caregivers.


It's an option I see a lot of parents take. I could do it, too. But I know where that path leads me, and it's dark and lonely and kinda muddy in that river.


Plus, the mom guilt itself doesn't serve me well. I'm less physically and mentally healthy, I'm faster to get irritated and lose my cool with my kids. I'm, let's face it, a pretty sad example of the balance I hope my girls will have in their own lives.



Choice Two:


I could figure out what the real issue is, what scares me so much when I prioritize myself as much as the other people and obligations I have. Here's my real worry: I'm deep down fearful that it will, in some way, mess my kids up. That they'll internalize a message that they don't matter to me.


Now that we're really getting to the heart of it, what is the evidence that working or taking some time for self-care (I'm not talking about going out every single night 'til dawn. I’m talking about taking consistent time for yourself to re-group and re-boot) actually damages our kids? Wait for it... It's not there.



Three things that actually do really matter:


Providing consistency. Tons of families come to my clinic asking about family dinners. They've heard a lot about their importance on social media and in books they've read. The truth is, family dinners are just one example of providing times throughout the day and week that our kids can count on. Kids thrive on routine. There are always times we have to make adjustments, but if you build in planned times to connect that your kids can count on, that is more important than you being physically present with your children 24 hours a day.


Being focused. It's so much worse to spend all day on your smartphone while your child tries to get your attention than to take care of what you need to do in a chunk of concentrated time and then give our kids the undivided attention they deserve. Make the time you spend with your children purposeful instead of distracted and you'll enjoy it more and not wish you were somewhere else the whole time. If you've taken your own time to take care of yourself, this won't be such a challenge.


Allowing other caretakers to be equal players who provide that same level of consistency. Nine out of ten weekends in our house, my husband makes waffles and takes the kids to the park while I do something solo. The next morning we switch and I do something special with them. Both of us get our time to re-boot and we're less resentful of each other's free time. Plus we get some individual moments with our kids to make memories.


Mommy (and Daddy) Guilt is hard to kick, but the reality is, it just doesn't do us any good. Take care of yourself, so you can take care of the other people in your life with an equal measure of love and commitment.


Want more mommy self-care help? Click here to download our free guide.



The Overwhelmed Working Mom Freebie

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About Our Guest: Whitney Casares, MD, MPH, FAAP, is a practicing board-certified pediatrician, author, speaker, and full-time working mom. Dr. Whitney is a Stanford University-trained private practice physician whose expertise spans the public health, direct patient care, and media worlds. She holds a Master of Public Health in Maternal and Child Health from The University of California, Berkeley, and a Journalism degree from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. She is also CEO and Founder of Modern Mommy Doc. Dr. Whitney advocates for the success of career-driven caregivers in all facets of their lives, guiding them toward increased focus, happiness, and effectiveness despite the systemic challenges and inherent biases that threaten to undermine them. She speaks nationally about her Centered Life Blueprint, which teaches working caregivers how to pay attention to what matters most amid pressure, at multibillion-dollar corporations like Adidas and Nike, and at executive-level conferences. She is a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics and medical consultant for large-scale organizations, including Good Housekeeping magazine, Gerber, and L’Oreal (CeraVe). Her work has been featured in Forbes, Thrive Global, and TODAY Parenting. She is a regular contributor to Psychology Today. Dr. Whitney practices medicine in Portland, Oregon, where she and her husband raise their two young daughters. About the Episode: Dr. Whitney shares the principles she's learned as a solopreneur in the health and wellness space, the failures she's faced, and the truths she wishes she would have known from the very beginning. 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By SYSTEMIC CHANGE 18 Apr, 2024
About Our Guest: Whitney Casares, MD, MPH, FAAP, is a practicing board-certified pediatrician, author, speaker, and full-time working mom. Dr. Whitney is a Stanford University-trained private practice physician whose expertise spans the public health, direct patient care, and media worlds. She holds a Master of Public Health in Maternal and Child Health from The University of California, Berkeley, and a Journalism degree from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. She is also CEO and Founder of Modern Mommy Doc. Dr. Whitney advocates for the success of career-driven caregivers in all facets of their lives, guiding them toward increased focus, happiness, and effectiveness despite the systemic challenges and inherent biases that threaten to undermine them. 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Episode Takeaways: This is not an episode about “how to grow a multimillion dollar business” or how to double your following overnight. I really shy away from talking about business because it’s disheartening to see that most of the people making online are people who are trying to teach you how to make money online. This is an episode that comes from many conversations I’ve had recently with people who are wanting to start a side hustle or even a full blown business, but are curious how to do that with the rest of life that’s going on around them. I’ve recently made a hugely drastic shift in my career and have moved from private practice into a company called Blueberry Pediatrics . It is a shift that still allows me to practice medicine as well as still running Modern Mommy Doc full time. The thinking behind this shift really is born out of these 8 tips I have about running a business while you’re working full time or maybe still taking care of your family. 1) Know your why. We’ve heard it a thousand times, but if we don’t know the driving force behind why we want to do a certain thing, it’s infinitely easier to stop doing it when things get hard. Ask yourself why you’re so committed to this one particular area. In my business, my why is to help, support, and encourage women (specifically working moms) so they don’t feel alone in their journey. So when I’m pulled away from my family for a time period or I’m exhausted from traveling, I remember the greater mission behind what I do. 2) Expect that you’re going to fail. I just pulled the plug on a project we had been working on at Modern Mommy Doc for two years: the Modern Mamas Club app. I thought it was going to be so valuable for moms, when in reality it was just duplicating what we already had. I learned so much through that process and at the beginning, I didn’t know what I didn’t know. Failure is a natural part of growth. 3) Prepare to invest in your business. With your time, with your money, with your emotions. People ask me how I grew and I told them it took a lot of time and a lot of my own money. There were times that that was discouraging, but because all of this was tied to my why, I was able to push forward. 4) Figure out what you can outsource and what has to be done by you. At the beginning you might not have any money to outsource with. But set yourself up for success and know what you’ll hand off when you get to that point. Don’t waste time trying to do it all. 5) Network based on what you love & pay for good PR. When you want to grow your business, network with the people that you genuinely connect with, not just because you might get a sale. Figure out who it would be mutually beneficial for you to get to know. And when it comes to PR, you’ve gotta pay to play the game. PR isn’t for instant leads, but is also a long game like networking. 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It reminds me that I’m so grateful for my job, that it’s flexible so that I work where I want, and that I’m in control of my life. A big way I do this is through a travel rotation with my kids and husband. Each trip I go on while consulting, I’ll rotate through taking one daughter, then the next, then my husband, then I’ll do a solo trip. These are trips they never would have been able to take on their own, and it’s a cool way my business gets to give back to my family. 8) The way you set up your business is a marker if you will be successful. Not the way you structure it, but the mindset you have around it. In fact, there are so many parallels between the way I run my business and the things I taught in my newest book, Doing It All: trying to build efficiency into how I do my tasks, batching my work, not spending extra time on stuff that doesn’t matter at all, swapping out for what others can do for me, pairing things that aren’t enjoyable with things that are, not letting things contaminate my time, and making sure my desk, home, and calendar are decluttered. More Blogs on this Topic: T he forgotten boundary: setting limits with yourself Thanks for the cookies in the breakroom, I’m still tired Wake up, working mama. Are you wasting your life? More Podcast Episodes on this Topic: T ranslating “mom skills” into “boss skills” How to be an ambitious, out of the box, career maker and an engaged mom How to claim your confidence as a working mom
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