Maternal burnout can develop when motherhood keeps asking more of you than you have the support or breathing room to give. Making sense of that experience means looking at the responsibilities and expectations shaping your mothering, and whether your own needs have a place in family life.
Longing for a few hours when nobody needs anything from you doesn’t mean you love your children any less. In my work with mothers, I often invite us to begin by exploring what has become too much to carry and what support is missing.
Understanding maternal burnout
Parental burnout describes ongoing exhaustion connected to the demands of parenting. It can often include feeling less emotionally connected to your children and feeling unlike the parent you used to be. A difficult afternoon or a period of tiredness does not, on its own, mean you are experiencing burnout.
Research on parental burnout offers a useful way of understanding this: difficulties can build when the pressures of parenting outweigh the support and resources available over time.
That perspective gives us somewhere useful to begin. We can consider both what needs to ease and what needs to become more available.
In everyday life, this might mean looking at interrupted sleep, financial pressure, a child’s additional needs, work demands, unequal responsibility at home, or the expectation that you should manage everything without complaint. These circumstances differ from one family to another. So do the possibilities for changing them.
Get curious about your idea of a “good mother”
The image of the endlessly patient, available and selfless mother can shape how we judge ourselves. Even when we question that image, we may still feel guilty whenever we don’t measure up to it.
A study of working mothers found a link between feeling pressured to be a perfect mother and greater parental burnout. That finding invites us to take seriously the expectations mothers are trying to meet.
Perhaps you believe you should do every school pick-up, enjoy every moment with your baby, or remain calm however depleted you feel. Underneath those expectations may be a wish to give your children something you missed, a fear of being judged, or an old habit of earning approval by being dependable.
We can approach these patterns with curiosity. There may be good reasons you’ve learned to try so hard, especially if being dependable has helped you feel valued or secure.
When a “should” appears, you might ask:
- Where did I learn that this is what a mother does?
- Does it reflect something I value, or something I fear others will think?
- Is it realistic in the circumstances I am living in?
“Good enough” can be a useful invitation to loosen impossible standards. It becomes more meaningful when we explore what caring for your children, and yourself, can realistically look like.
Make room for the woman who is changing too
Motherhood changes your life, and it can also change your relationship with yourself. This developmental transition is called matrescence.
In the early months, you may be adjusting to changes in your body, relationships, work and independence while learning to care for a baby. Later, your children’s changing needs may bring new questions about who you are and what matters to you.
A return to work, the school years or adolescence can each call for another adjustment. Sometimes these shifts overlap with separation, grief or perimenopause.
It can be hard to recognise your own changing needs when family life keeps asking you to carry on. You may keep measuring yourself against an earlier version of yourself, with different energy, responsibilities and priorities.
For some women, this realisation comes some time into motherhood. Being independent, organised and able to push through may have served you well before children. As the demands of caring grow, those familiar ways of coping can become harder to sustain. You might keep drawing on them for a year, two years or longer before noticing how much they are asking of you.
Being independent does not necessarily mean feeling empowered. You may be managing everything yourself while having very little choice about what you carry. Part of finding your footing in motherhood can involve reconsidering what strength means to you, including whether there is room to need others, receive support and share responsibility.
A question worth returning to is: What do I need in this season, and have I allowed that answer to change?
Look at the whole load, including what nobody sees
Support becomes more useful when it addresses the thinking and responsibility behind the tasks.
There is a difference between someone preparing dinner after you have planned it, bought the ingredients and reminded them, and someone taking responsibility for the meal from beginning to end. This is part of the mental load of motherhood: remembering, planning and keeping track of what needs to happen, even when someone else is doing the task.
The same applies to appointments, school communication, children’s clothing or organising care. Being the person who notices, plans and follows up can leave little room to switch off, even when others are helping.
Where it is possible and safe, a conversation might begin with: “I need us to share responsibility for this, including remembering and organising it.”
As I shared in my conversation with The Memo about overwhelm in motherhood, having a partner or family nearby does not always mean feeling supported with what you carry.
For some women, support is limited by money, distance, relationship difficulties or the availability of services. Asking for help cannot resolve every barrier. It may be useful to identify one specific source of relief: a shared school run, a regular meal, practical assistance or someone who can help you explore available services.
Make room for what you can realistically manage
A boundary can begin with acknowledging what fits within your life now. It may involve declining something, simplifying it or allowing someone else to take responsibility.
In everyday life, this might mean pausing an activity for a term, shortening a family visit, making weeknight dinners simpler or postponing a commitment. Your values can help guide these choices. If connection matters, what makes connection more possible? If steadiness matters, which expectations are making everyday life unnecessarily pressured?
There may still be guilt when you make a different choice. That feeling deserves attention, but it does not necessarily mean you have done something wrong.
In Can guilt ever be useful in motherhood?, I explore how guilt can point towards our values, while also revealing expectations we may need to question.
Find connection where you can speak honestly
Connection can offer relief when there is room for your whole experience, including the feelings you usually keep to yourself.
You may need someone with whom you can say, “I love my children, and I’m finding this hard,” without being corrected or reminded to feel grateful.
That person might be a friend, another mother, a facilitated group or a therapist. What matters is whether you feel able to speak openly and be met with understanding.
Sometimes, being able to say what you’ve been keeping to yourself offers relief, even before you know what needs to change.
Redefine strength to include your needs
Strength can include recognising a limit, receiving care and allowing yourself to rest before everything is finished.
In a moment of overwhelm, you might begin by naming what is happening: “I’m feeling overwhelmed right now.” If your child is safe and the situation allows it, take a brief pause. Feel your feet on the floor, look around you, or breathe in a way that feels comfortable.
Then ask: “What would help in the next few minutes?”
Perhaps it is water, food, a phone call or another adult taking over. A small pause may offer some breathing room. If you keep returning to the same overwhelming demands, those deserve attention too.
You do not have to reach your limit before seeking support
Support is worth considering when exhaustion, irritability or disconnection persist, or when daily life feels increasingly difficult to manage. You do not need to decide for yourself whether the label “burnout” fits.
A GP can help assess persistent fatigue and mood changes, including physical contributors and conditions such as depression or anxiety. Therapy can provide space to understand what you are carrying, explore the expectations shaping your choices, and identify changes that are realistic for your life.
You may love motherhood and find parts of it deeply difficult. Both experiences deserve room.
The place to begin is with one honest question: What am I carrying right now, and where could I use more support?
Further reading
If you’d like to explore some of these ideas further, here are a few places to begin:
- Matrescence Explained: My free three-part audio series to help you make sense of the emotional and identity changes that unfold through motherhood.
- Postnatal Resources: A downloadable guide to help you build your village in early motherhood, with recommended books, podcasts and mother-focused support. Services are mainly Sydney-based, with some online and French-speaking options.
- The daughter we meet in motherhood: A reflection on how our experiences of being mothered can shape our own mothering, including how readily we ask for help or make room for our needs.
For personalised support, you can read more about my motherhood therapy and matrescence support, available online and in Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs.
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Photo by Kinga Cichewicz for Unsplash