TRANSCRIPT
Everything. Together. All At Once | Strategies to Handle the MotherLoad
Iva1:23
Hi and welcome to a new episode of the Mom Bosses Abroad podcast. I am here with my business bestie and co-host Desiree.
Desiree 1:33
Hi Iva.
Iva 1:37
And we are dedicating this episode to a topic that we wanted to talk about because it's been on our minds as of recently and it's all about you know the mental load or the motherload as sometimes it is called and we were discussing, you know what are some ways that we can actually go ahead and ditch the mental load and also going into the direction of how can we make motherhood fun again, because I have a bold claim about motherhood that was very central when I first started my business and it was displayed very prominently on my blog site and it was this vision and purpose for what I do and how I wanted to show up for myself, but also for the mothers and the women that I help and it was this: Reinventing what it means to do it all, have it all and enjoy it all while having fun along the way. And then when Desiree and I, you and I got together and we started to do the podcast, we incorporated as part of that ethos into this as well -it's part of the DNA, of the message that we want to continue sharing with everyone because I feel that there is definitely a crucial distinction between motherhood and the motherload and it's good to see and dive into this topic to understand a little bit better how can we unravel certain things for you today?
Desiree 3:17
Yeah, I'm so excited because this mental load shouldn't be what defines a mother, right people crack under pressure with this mental load that we will really define now and get into but it is exactly like you said we should be taking that off our shoulders and we should make motherhood fun because at the end of it all our kids feel how we feel. We mirror so much of what goes on inside of us to our children. Right so it is so important to recognize what is this mother load all about? How can we sort of lighten it so we can be essentially better moms and have more fun along the way?
Iva 4:06
Absolutely. Because that is the intention, right? We when we think of ourselves as moms and we put this vision of what we want to be experiencing with the kids as they grow up as we are navigating those beautiful milestones with them. We you know, we have this vision of us enjoying them, them enjoying us and we enjoy the journey so we want or we're coming from this place, I believe, for the most part that we want to be playful in our in our motherhood journey. But sometimes we can't fully access this place of enjoyment and fun when we are mothers. Because there's this invisible, emotional or mental load that that fills up our plates, the proverbial motherhood plate. And it's not fun. Sometimes we feel that it's been going on for years. And what we want to start off the conversation is by saying that, yes, I do personally believe that the mother load and fatigue is real, because it's all those little irrelevant things that no one else has to deal with. And they become almost unquantifiable. So it's like that space. I don't know if had if it has happened to you Des, but sometimes it's like a very busy day, but not busy in the sense that it was related to my work or my business or my clients. It was just busy in other things. And then when I sit down and I'm talking to my husband about what I did, I was like wait a second. I know I was busy. I know that I'm tired. I know what did but what did I essentially accomplish today?
Desiree 5:55
Right. Nobody felt so overwhelmingly busy in our mind, but explaining that to someone else, let alone a man let's put it that way. They just don't understand that either. Right and it's very hard to put it into words. Yes, it's true.
Iva 6:18
It is. It is. It's like getting that gift for that birthday party. And it's the commute to the toy store or whatever it is that you're going to buy the gift, is the choosing, it is the queuing to pay for it, is the wrapping it up. It's the coming back home. Like who quantifies that or who puts that as Oh yes, I went and I got a gift - that was a big check on my on my to do-list today. Like it's very It seems like almost like invisible like we did it. But we don't quantify it and therefore it's
Desiree 6:56
Like when I started thinking about this topic a little bit more knowing we are going to go into an episode with this. It's what I found is the term that I really like and you mentioned it just now it's this invisible Labor. It's the things you don't see, no one acknowledges and that no one really pays attention to. And sometimes I don't know if you feel the same if I there's no acknowledgement about it, it goes unnoticed and it makes it almost as if it didn't happen, but it did and it took up a time of my day. Who knows so it's quite frustrating or some people call it also the worry work- but it's your daily tasks and sometimes I feel very, very jealous of my husband because he has let's say he has a mission. And he goes out and says I must buy new plants for the house because he totally loves plants. So he'll do that. Right? That is his mission. He'll go out, get into the car and go and do that. But if I were to do that there is so much more thoughts and things I need to consider that go around that. And I may be doing a task like that on the sideline, because there is bigger things I need to do like picking up the kids from school or getting them ready or bringing them here and there. I might just underway go pick up a plant. And then no one really right wasn't really a point on the agenda. It just happened. We just did it. You know so often. I don't also get to celebrate like little tasks that I do or clap myself on the shoulder. And be like great, you. You wrapped that present beautifully because it just kind of happened while or maybe even doing something else or you're on a call with someone or it goes unnoticed almost doesn't it?
Iva 8:54
Yeah. Do you feel that this has to do with possibly like the gender related or cultural expectations or gender roles that we bring to the table meaning to your point, right, like wrapping a gift and wrapping it well. It's a given if somebody wraps the gift in a way that you don't find suitable for you, it's like wait a second. Even with all the things that I have to do, I would go out of my way to make sure that it's done properly and sometimes it feels I don't know this is just a bit of my perception that for men, they do live a lot on this of this space and it's
Desiree 9:41
too much sometimes
Iva9:45
It's a bit wrinkly, the paper or the paper that I'm choosing is wrinkled, but no matter it's going to be wrapped and you're like how can you use that paper? Maybe you should go and get like a nice one. And so we add that then that one more step like that one more element. But you know, moving a little bit out of out of this one scenario, right, like going back to, you know, to this mother load aspect, one of the things that I think that you and I were discussing a little bit before we started to hit record was that there are things that make up the mother load in a very external type of way, as you say, like very tangible things like you know, doing the laundry but then you notice that there's like a huge stain on something and you're just like I cannot just throw that in because maybe it's not going to come off so I now need to soak it, now I need to you know, there's like a few more steps that come in before I'm able to say okay, the laundry is taken care of. And there's the internal aspects of the mother load as well that as we were saying, men might not like we mentioned because either biologically or physically, they will never be able to understand like breastfeeding, or, you know, the whole aspect of am I producing enough milk or not enough or what is going on and then you're going into that mother load but in the internal way,
Desiree 11:06
And the consequences of it like what if I don't? What happens then what if I do what do I need to do differently?
Iva 11:16
Exactly. It's the worry, you worry or now like yeah, the worry work. So now you're going into the space of I need to provision not only for what is happening now. I also need to provision for what is going to happen in the future.
So one example that I have on this that I also wrote about at some point but today you know we're sharing it as a conversation and it's a bit like a case study. I'm going to use it like a case study. I love you. I love you husband. If you ever listen to this episode, but here's what I feel is very important when it comes to the mother load is the owning off certain tasks and chores. And the reason why I say this is because the owning of it in my viewpoint needs to complete a full cycle of that task or that project. So this is my case study on it back in the day, and still to this day, sometimes not as much anymore because we have talked about it and we have gone through some of the steps that I that you know we'll share today. Just as that like a recap. But what used to happen in the past was oh, you know, Honey, can you help me bathe the kids? So what does husband do? Husband goes and strips off the clothes, puts the kid in the tub, you know water is sprayed on them, you know shampoos, soap all those things. And then it's like, where are the towels? Can you get me the towels and in the meantime I am running because I thought I was offloading but now I'm running, picking up the clothes that are one millimeter away from the clothes hamper that's not even enough comfort. It's just like in the vicinity of it. It's like brushing the clothes hamper but not actually in it and I'm picking it out to put it away. I am putting out the pajamas at that time. I remember it was like the diaper cream, the diapers, you know everything that you need. So when you put the kid back on the changing table, you have everything at your arm's reach because you are finalizing this whole thing of I'm getting them bathed but they've also means you have to put the pajama on or the clothes back on you have to dry them with something in this case the towel like you have to take care of everything. And then for example, I remember that we used to have like a green alligator type of
Desiree 15:05
I had this before, I remember. Yeah.
Iva 15:11
And so you have to take it off the bathtub and hang it so that he wouldn't get moldy and so forth. You know what I mean? It's like all the steps that are also in the get the kids bathed. It belongs together, doesn't it?
Desiree 15:24
Yes. Yeah. It all belongs
Iva 15:29
It's like this. It's completing the cycle. But for my husband it was like, it was an eight I remember that I wrote a blog post on it because I detailed the steps that he did. And he was like five, and then I detailed the steps that I took whenever I would do it and it was like 13 because I completed the whole cycle and this is a bit where we go into okay, you're not actually helping me. We are bathem them together. Or I’m your assistant because now you're calling for me to help you get you know the clothes, where's the diaper? Where's this? Where's the towels. The towels? Oh my god that one? Pet peeve that I used to get because I'm like are you kidding me? Like at least you should have that.
Desiree 16:17
Get the message on, like ready say in the hospitality industry. Get everything that you need ready? So you can do the work and then you can exactly you can roll out and roll it back in. It's Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah.
Iva 16:34
And, and you know, there's also a couple of things that I was being about where I feel like statistics are on our side like this is not Des and Iva having a conversation because we felt that that time didn't go as planned for us. These are things you know, for example, there's a book called Through The Labyrinth by Alice Eagly And Linda Carly. And one of the things that they write about is that increasing the number so I'm quoting from the book right now, but it says “Increasing the number of women who can successfully have children and maintain their employment depends on men becoming more equally involved in the domestic sphere. Currently men do not fully share domestic responsibilities with women, even though they share more of their domestic work than ever before.” So there's that and then there's also a statistic by Darcy Lachman who's a psychologist in New York City, and she wrote in The Washington Post, “Employed women partnered with employed men carry 65% of the family's childcare responsibilities, a figure that has held steady since the turn of the century.” Now I put employed women also in that category, yeah, kudos, you know, business owners. And even if you don't have a business and even if you don't have like a nine to five, you know, you, you are still shouldering a lot, a lot.
Desiree 18:10
Absolutely. I still agree with you. And it's often like that's why we call it as well the mental load, right? It's not about the physical tasks, but it's like the worry comes with overseeing these tasks. That is what creates that load, and that heaviness and that worry work. Right? And it's really not about doing the task. There's a lot of tasks to do. Definitely, absolutely. 100% But it's the constantly thinking about these tasks and planning them out in your head. Yeah, all the steps and the preparation and what goes in with all of that. That is where the real load comes in. Right? And it's like so I like I love your anecdote and we've laughed so much about this already. And I laugh about it because I it's so familiar to me, right? But it's also like for me, I always notice my mental load the most when we're planning to go out for the day and my husband he's also very hands on and you know, helps me get the kids ready. Once I lay out the clothes. He gets them all ready, you know and everything and then they're like, Okay, and then I'm, of course I'm being the assistant exactly like you said, I'm the assistant and this whole helping to get the kids ready scenario. And then it's like, okay, now put on your shoes and your jackets and let's go to the car and I'm like, Wait, stop. I was assisting you in the things that you said you would do. Now I kind of need to get myself ready as well. I need to get the bag ready to take out, I need to get all of these things I need. First of all, these will get myself ready. Okay, then do that. I asked him where's the bag? Oh, where are the water bottles for the kids? Where's the snacks? Where's the wet wipes?
Iva 20:11
We'll figure it out.
Desiree 20:12
We'll figure it out of diapers. Is that all there? What about the toys? What if you go for a restaurant? Do you have the drawing pens in there? I do have the little notebook. Like all the things we need. And it's that's what stresses me when we get out because I think about so many things and we're going to be out really late. I'm going to prepare something at home so when we get home that we can quickly get them ready and off to bed because tomorrow's school and it's like we think about it so many more steps in advance as well. And then there is like oh, let's go to the car. It's like no, let's not go to the car yet because unless you want to wait in the car for at least 15 more minutes. Go ahead. But there is still a lot to do until we can physically leave.
Iva 20:58
Yeah because also one thing that you said in this scenario is so true. It's like when we just want to wing it right? When we say like okay, fine, I don't take the water and I don't take the snacks or I don't I don't like pre-emptively prep for you know what's going to happen next in the next few hours because we're going to be away or whatever. You know that you will have to also carry most of the burden when the kids have the meltdown, you know when they didn't have the blanket that they needed to take the nap and that's the one that they liked napping so if they don't have it becomes so difficult to know you have a cranky child and you are away from you know the safe space of home and so forth and so forth and that I can go on and on but that we are to everyone who is listening. But I want to dive further into one thing because now that we have really like set up the stage for this aspect like yes, we know that it's real. We know that it happens we have experienced it in so many ways. One of the things that I feel comes into play with this so this is like the pain aspect of it. But really what's on the other side and I feel that you will resonate with this is that we want to avoid like in the long term like our long term vision for what we want to be as moms of how we want to be showing up of like what we want that you know end results to look like is we definitely want to avoid making or loved ones, especially our children, the residual beneficiaries of our time and energy because when we're not giving them priority as often as we will like, definitely plays into this sense of disconnection and emptiness within us, right? Which is not allowing us to be present playful and to be having fun because we're also worrying as you say, and we're trying to take care of all the other boring, like practical issues of the equation, but we're not we have this sense that okay, we did the family outing and like three thirds or three fourths of the way. I was either planning or I was organizing or I was getting everything ready or I was like trying to prevent all these things. But it feels like what was the time that I actually got to enjoythem and enjoy the moment or, or to give them like that.
Desiree 23:30
Yeah, it's so true. It's so true. And yesterday, actually, I saw this really cool reel on Instagram, and I snapped a quick screenshot of it, but it's really true and it says here's the best piece of mom advice I've seen. And the backdrop is a super messy full on messy like table and craft table and all that. If you're home with your kids all day, you can't possibly be all three. One fun and present, two productive, three relaxed and recharging. That is not possible. So pick one and own it for the whole day. And I thought that was really cool. I don't know if I can pull it off because I was also having a problem with if there's a super messy table. I am at like tendency will be like just to clean that as I go along. So I need to learn because kids will not remember if the table was clean. They will remember if we actually sat down with them and crafted and painted and we're fully present and we're telling each other stories and it's like we almost tried to do everything at one time. And that's where the frustration comes with. My house is neither a clean it's a neither have I sat down and spend time with my kids and neither am I relax or recharge. And I think at the end of the day, that's where my mental load gets very heavy. But it's true when you just pick one it doesn't have to be like that every day right but sometimes to relieve you for a portion of the day. I think it's the whole aspect and bring it at home to being in harmony. Is that play room clean? No. Did I have an amazing time sitting down and building this huge LEGO fort with my kids? Yes. Where we giggling and laughing? Yes. So was I in harmony Yes.
Iva 25:29
And I love that key word that you used in what you read about pick one and own it for the rest of the day. Because the own part the ownership aspect or the decision to say like, okay, it's gonna get messy. Let's say you know today's all about I don't know today as you say we're going to do the crafts and glitter is going to be all over the place. Not only on the table, but part of the couch the cushions the clothes, whatever that is right. If you are then going to own that moment of joy and relaxation or connection by you know, muttering under your breath later when you're vacuuming and you're like, oh my god, you know, it's just Yes, more mess right? It's like it came at the expense of me cleaning now it's 10pm and I'm still here, you know? The glue like taking it off, whatever. Then as you say that wasn't owning it, that was just trying to be all the things at the same time which leads to the same place of you know, it's like this stop and go is like okay, yes, but then I'm complaining because it also feels heavy to do the cleanup. And I guess that there is that amazing, powerful mental component of directing your mind and saying no, I'm going to own this. And just like I own having fun with them and making all the mess. I can also own the fact that I will clean up and I will be okay about it. You know, maybe I won't clean up as thoroughly because it's not clean day for me or whatever right? But I will just clean up enough to give me that it's
Desiree 27:11
Not a total bombshell.
Iva 27:14
Right exactly. And this is a little bit what I want to offer as well like a roadmap for offloading certain, you know, mother load responsibilities that seem to land on our plates. And that we are seeing and looking at our husband's like okay, there you are with the phone, sitting there. Not on purpose, by the way, because sometimes they don't have the level of awareness of what's happening around them. And we just want to be a little bit more effective and a little bit more assertive in the way that we are bringing on this shared responsibility aspect to the table. Right. So there are some pro tips that I would like to share first in terms of you know, before you start communicating this to your spouse. The first one is if you're constantly keeping score you've already lost. Okay, we cannot start a conversation with husbands or spouses and say “These are all the things I do and you're doing nothing. And now I want to tell you what I want to do next” because obviously it's not opening the gates for the honest open dialogue that this topic needs. Second, you want to avoid feeling that resentment monster, right, which comes with keeping tabs of all the wrongdoings or the perceived wrongdoings from the past and then this happened you know, two years ago and six months ago and yesterday at 4pm and stacking them up in your head because it also leads to a major blowout. There comes a point where you just like keeping it or keep repressing it thinking that you'll deal with it later. And we're not voicing it enough. Or we're not honoring that moment of saying like “Hey, this, you know, it didn't land well for me like this. I don't appreciate or this this happening does bother me.” And so we blow out later. That's also not going to help, right because it's not going to make the other person want to help us. Even though we're like “yeah, we're in this together, right? This is as much your kids you know, your home like all the things are also as much yours as they are mine.” So those are the two main things that it's good to start from a neutral base and give yourself space to get there as well because this will really create that sense. Of okay. We're going to talk about it and the person on the other side is going to feel more receptive to what you have to say. So this is you know, about one set the stage, right.
What do you want, for example, the next week or the next month to look like for you, you know, paint a clear picture that what do you want to offload and be specific and don't make like a kilometer long list because that's also going to like overwhelming everyone else, but just be like, Okay, what are two or three items that really would make a big difference for me because either I don't enjoy them, or because I feel it's their turn to take ownership. So affirm it, just like you were saying, you know, are you choosing this for yourself then then affirm that it is possible, to light and the mother load and have fun as mothers. If this is on the worry side of things where you feel that it's internal as well. Then a little bit more self-care, a little bit more rest will go a long way in helping you create that space. And manage those expectations with your partner when you start to talk to them because managing men thrive on clear, precise instructions when we say can you help me with the dishes? They're going to help in whatever way they feel helping with the dishes is going to look like and he can go into any arbitrary direction. But if you're going to end up resenting them because you said well, I asked him to help me with the dishes and “look what they did”, then most likely is because our husband was not given a clear set of instructions and I know this is a little bit like oh, we need to spoon feed them. Yeah, and this is like one pro tip pack that I have. What I used to do now is that I have SOPs,
SOP lists. So yeah, like in business have you have like standard operating procedures. So every time we would go to the beach, I made a list of all the things that we needed to take for the kids for the waves for like every possible scenario may hit, you know, like Scenario A, Scenario B, scenario C, whatever. And I will make the whole list I will write it down. And I will take a picture of it. And then next time that we would go to the beach, I just bring that list out and I'm like husband, I'm like okay, do items one to five. And then I'll take care of six to 10 but then you don't have to rewrite it again. You know how we're always like we write is
Desiree 32:47
like the packing list like when I pass it you can forget for a ride.
Iva 32:53
So a way that you can help them helping you, like help me help you type of situation is refer to a list that you have done already that you have put effort, time energy, focus into it like you have detailed it for yourself because you want to remember right when you went to the park, that time you didn't bring the breadcrumbs and then the kids were crying because everybody else was feeding the ducks and they weren't feeding the ducks and it was like a three hour tantrum. And you're like that was painful for me. So bread crumbs is in that list and you make sure to add it and the next time that you're like we're going to the park Okay, what am I missing? Oh yeah, the breadcrumbs. What am I bringing in for the ducks because you remember those things that the husband is not going to be aware of that that for them? Yeah, that was a tantrum. But I don't even remember, right. So you take out that SOP type of lists and you can make them you know, for the week or for a particular setting, right like for example I had one to go to the beach specifically and he knew what he had to take and what was on that list. So this is what I mean about make a list and check it twice right? And encourage your spouse to start small, you know, select three to four things that you can delegate to avoid that overwhelm and also you know, talk to them this is a dialogue This is not like ordering someone but is this you know have a dialogue on considering schedules, preferences, you know, seasonal variations, like where are they on their work load for example, is it going to be late nights so then, if it's late nights, I cannot offload my time for them. Right. But what can I do you know, how can we make this you know, in a way that works?
Desiree 34:42
Wait, I love that. I love the setting the boundaries and the delegation and the asking for support in terms of a dialog. I think these are all amazing ways to make our load. Just a little bit lighter. If we can offload everything I'm sure but to make that lighter because the danger also is if I keep on carrying this mental load with us, it does lead to anxiety. It can lead to depression. Also many moms are feeling enough feeling they can handle it all. Because there's a lot that goes on up there.
Iva 35:20
Right. And the resentment aspect you know, it's like we were we secretly expect this person because we've been married with to them for X amount of years and we expect them to read our minds. The resentment aspect is like one of the four horses of the apocalypse when it comes to relationships. So you don't want to feed that one. What you want to do is you want to define the concept of what ownership means to them. What I did for my husband is that I shared I put side by side like the steps that he did for bedtime, and the ones that I did for bedtime, and how for me the 13 steps was how I consider my time to be completed. And so I discussed that with him in a way that when I say can you please bathe the kids so that they can visually see it and understand it's not just this and that it's like this other things that I also will like to bring into the mix. So for me that means lightening my mental load because I can completely forget about it. And you can break down the task for them in three parts. You can be like hey, pre plan, implementation and closing the loop. So for pre planning when I say bat time, first thing get
Desiree 36:38
The towels, towels.
Iva 36:42
Take out the clothes, you know make sure that the shampoo is in the right bathroom if you have more than one bathroom because sometimes that happen to you that they just take them to the first place. Yes and everything else and my hands are wet you know the kid is slippery, you know? And now you are the one that needs to like not burn what you're doing in the kitchen to go to the other place to get them the thing that they should have pre planned
Desiree 37:08
It's so true. It's so my works differently though. I think that's why I think mothers are completely amazing. We do have the capacity to have that sphere vision kind of thing. Right? But it's also I feel that a lot of moms would they complain about the danger again of like not offloading that is the sleep deprivation first of all, because doesn't that happen to you? Once your head hits the pillow boom, that list just appears in front of your eyes of all the things that you still need to do that you haven't done for today that you need to do tomorrow right? So I I've mentioned I use my use one of my magical essential oils too as an off button right. So that helps me but also to, to think about like I often think, Oh, I have a memory gap. You don't like I'm losing my memory. I'm getting older. I have no more memory. It's not the memory, that you're not losing your mind right but you're losing your memory thanks to the mental load. It is also one of those things and we need to just remember that, and I think nowadays a lot of people keep throwing the term ADHD all over the place and oh, I have this I have this. But I think honestly, a lot of times they're just describing having that mental load that mother load
Iva 38:41
It feels like having 40 tabs open on your browser.
Desiree 38:46
It absolutely and I don't think it's correct to always just say I have this disorder because it's a very it's it is a disorder you're talking about it's not it's like a lot of cases is not because it is the mother load that we need to tackle. I think we're blessed to be mothers. We have that vision of everything that we need to do, but we just need to make sure we recognize it, that we manage it correctly, and that we don't let it lead to burning out in that sense, right. And it's so beautiful what you said about all of your ways to kind of, you know, lighten that load. I think that's, that's amazing.
Iva 39:29
Ultimately, this is your unique journey and you get to hear reinvented and you get to define and choose what it's what it means to you to do it all but what is that all like you also get to choose you don't have to do it all you can do all yes that you are comfortable doing. You can get to have it all you can get to have all that you're comfortable having and you get to enjoy it all. You know all that you're, trying to enjoy and that you're willing to enjoy while having fun. And so this is just like, you know, a conversation on this to help you find that for yourself and for your families. So you've got this mama and we are here rooting for you
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Blogposts mentioned
Ditching the Mental Load in 2021 and Making Motherhood Fun Again - The Momergy Movement
