Why motherhood can feel so overwhelming and how counselling can help

You’re a mother who loves your child deeply and yet you notice feeling anxious after having a baby, touched out, irritable, lost and no longer know yourself. And yet, despite these feelings being so big, so overwhelming, you’re afraid to voice how you feel for fear of what others might think of you. So it is that like many mothers, you experience all of this in silence. Suffering alone without the support you need.

As we come to the end of Maternal Mental Health week, it provides an opportunity to talk about why motherhood can feel so overwhelming, why support for mothers is so crucial and what it can look like.

Is it normal to feel overwhelmed as a mum?

While we are becoming more aware as a society of the signs of postnatal depression and anxiety, it can still be hard to accept the depths of those feelings in yourself, largely due to shame. Shame for what you might believe it says about you as a mother, for not ‘coping’, for not always loving something you might have longed for.

Writer Rose Stokes (and for disclosure, my friend!) writes with heartfelt honesty about her early motherhood experience, and the pressure she put upon herself to be a ‘natural mother’ - a myth she now realises “is a pervasive cultural notion […]: that some women are born to be mothers and do so with an almost effortless ease and grace.”

This image of the ‘natural mother’ can cause us to become overly critical of ourselves and of our feelings, refusing to accept those that we deem unacceptable. Pushing those feelings further down doesn’t get rid of them, but instead they build in silence, driven into feelings of shame and fear.

And perhaps you’re not in that first postnatal year but still notice yourself feeling overwhelmed or questioning whether you’re good enough. Sleep deprivation, the unknown fear or stress of returning to work, the strain on your relationship or feeling that you no longer have time for yourself can all contribute to challenges happening even years later.

When should mothers seek therapy?

Knowing when and where to get support is key for accessing it at the right time. Perhaps you know you are struggling with anxiety, feeling lonely or numb, or feeling unable to cope.  But maybe the signs are more deeply buried, desperate to be ignored. Instead, you might have a sense of being constantly on edge, that you can’t switch off even when your child is asleep or not with you, or perhaps you wake up in the morning and dread the day ahead.

In Bath, as well as therapy, mothers looking for postnatal support can access Avon and Wiltshire Partnership NHS Trust (AWP) Perinatal Mental Health Services: https://www.awp.nhs.uk/our-services/community-services/perinatal-mental-health.

How can therapy help mothers?

Therapy for mothers can be a crucial opportunity to explore feelings that might be experienced as shameful to say out loud. In doing so, mothers can understand the roots of their beliefs, be heard, both by another and by themselves, understand what their needs are and be challenged in their thinking about how they ‘should’ be coping. And while this can look like postnatal anxiety support, therapy for motherhood overwhelm might be beneficial long after the birth.

In counselling mothers are offered a space free from judgement, where they can rebuild their sense of self and identity, learn to manage feelings of anxiety and overwhelm, and process difficult feelings. What’s more, it’s a place to find self-compassion, to understand that motherhood often doesn’t look like society has told us it should, and with that learn to accept themselves as good enough.

Providing support for mothers in Bath

I offer counselling in Bath and the surrounding areas, including supporting mothers, both online and in-person. If you would like to book an introductory phone call, please get in touch via maddiechorltoncounselling@gmail.com.