Monday, April 28th, 2008...9:12 pm
Happy or Selfish?
by Stacey
A researcher from the University of California Berkeley and mother of two, says that moms do their kids a favor when they make time for themselves. Hurray! According to this blog post by Christine Carter executive director of the Greater Good Science Center, happy mothers may make happy children.
Carter says she regularly takes time to do the things she loves: traveling for work, exercising, painting, and hanging out with friends. Her parents and husband pitch in when she’s off doing something other than parenting.
I do feel guilty about taking all this time to myself. Am I being selfish? Should I be making more personal sacrifices for my children? Would my kids benefit from more time with me? Would they be happier or better prepared for adulthood if I joined them riding bikes at the local elementary school instead of painting on Sunday afternoons? (Or is it narcissistic to think that?) I even feel guilty that I’m privileged enough to make such choices—that financially I can afford not to work full-time, that my parents are nearby and often pick up the kids from school while I’m off running or am in LA, and that my kids have a very involved dad who picks up the slack. Shouldn’t I be doing more of the parenting myself?
Should she? This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately as I’ve thought about going back to work. I loved having a career before I had kids. Since then, I’ve felt like I should be at home with them. But part of me is languishing without work outside the home.
Although I haven’t seen good research to substantiate this theory that mothers’ happiness directly influences the happiness of their children, a fairly extensive body of research has established a substantial link between mothers who feel depressed and “negative outcomes” in their children, like acting out and other behavior problems. As you might imagine, when we mothers feel depressed it is not good for our children’s happiness.
She says maternal depression affects kids in two ways. One is direct—maternal depression actually seems to cause behavior problems in kids. The other way is that depression can also affect the way people parent—making their discipline less effective, for example—and so it creates behavior problems in kids that way as well.
Depressed mothers tend to be less sensitive and proactive in responding to their children’s needs, and they are less likely to play with their children in emotionally positive ways. The children of mothers who are chronically depressed—those whose feelings of sadness and despair persist—perform more poorly on tests of school readiness, they use less expressive language, and they have poorer social skills. And it isn’t just depression: anxiety in mothers is associated with increased anxiety in children.
Her advice to mothers is to take care of yourself, “knowing that when you do the things that nourish you as a whole person—one with more interests and needs than just being a good parent—you are also doing something good for your children.”
Last week I was offered a full-time job that I accepted. Come June, I will be a policy analyst at a think tank in Seattle. I’ll post more on my transition to a working parent as it unfolds.
For now, let’s talk about mother-guilt and this question of why we feel like we should be there all the time with our kids. Can a village raise its children or should mothers be there every step of the way? For many, there isn’t a choice. Families need food, health insurance, and a stable place to live. How do our working mothers feel about this issue? I’d love to hear from you too.
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8 Comments
April 29th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
That sounds like a cool job.
I went back to work full time after four years. I had only intended to take a single year off, but then one kid turned into two.
Although I am tired, and sometimes I worry that I don’t have enough energy at the end of the day, I know that I have much greater patience at home, and I enjoy the weekends with them so much more. Not being with them 24/7 gives me the opportunity to step back and see how things are going and strategize better ways of dealing with our most significant challenges.
April 29th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
Thanks for commenting, Lisse. I appreciate hearing that you’re happy with your decision to go back to work. I hope I am too!
April 30th, 2008 at 7:47 am
Hi Stacey, congrats on the job and good luck with the transition. I think another positive thing about not spending all your time with your children that I haven’t seen discussed much is that it provides your children the chance to bond closely with others besides their parents, such as a nanny, grandparents, or whoever is the primary care giver during those hours that the parents are not there. Given that our children’s choices of friends and eventual partners in life etc., are going to be based on their experiences with the people they are close to in childhood–and I do think that’s true in many ways–I think it’s positive for them to have more than two positive models of close relationship. For example, our nanny is a very different person from me — much more patient, less likely to fly off the handle, more willing to spend half an hour to make it a block and a half if that’s what the kids want to do. She knows different songs than I know and plays different games with them in the bath. I think that my kids are lucky to have the relationships they have with me and my husband, plus the chance to deeply love and be loved by our nanny as well–in addition to the other nannies they always play with. It gives them closeness to, empathy with, and a deep understanding of a greater variety of people than if I was home with them all of the time. When my two year old lists her best friends, the list always includes our nanny plus the other two nannies she sees on almost a daily basis, each one of whom has helped give her so much joy and confidence. Also, the relationship they develop with the grandparents when I’m out of the picture is much more intense than when I’m there. At the same time, part of the pain of being back at work is accepting that your children are being cared for and relying on someone other than you for large parts of the weekdays, and that they are having their own busy days without you–and which, besides making the choice of what their circumstances are going to be, you can do little to control.
April 30th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Hi DCSlugabed,
Thanks for your thoughts. I agree, our experience with nannies has been nothing but really positive. Sage still loves and is close to Anna, who cared for him two years ago. That relationship is deeply important to him and to us and we value her so much. I am more sad for me that I will miss the time with the kids. But as our friend Cristina pointed out to me this weekend, all of the benefits of going back to work lie ahead and remain unknown to me right now. I’m left now thinking about what I am giving up and hoping that it will be worth it. I do think that in the end I will be happy with this decision.
April 30th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Congratulations on the job - it sounds exciting. I have been pretty much continually happy balancing work as a civil rights lawyer (something I wanted to do from pretty early on) with being a mom. There are ups and downs of course, but both my kids seem to be thriving. I agree with dcslugabed that it’s wonderful for kids to learn from early on that there are other adults besides their parents who love them, and that the world is a happy place even when mom/dad are not around. My youngest has a whole life with her nanny and other kids/nannies in her playgroup - they all went to see the cherry blossoms recently on the metro, something I wasn’t up for doing myself. And my older one loves preschool and is really blossoming there and learning to navigate group interactions/learning in a mixed-age setting that i know I could not teach him. It can be harder for me to justify time to do other stuff like exercise or see friends sans kids since I feel I don’t see them enough during the week, but even though my kids are in fact the center of my universe, i don’t want them to grow up thinking the world revolves around them. So when they were crying when I left them with their dad to go to the gym the other night, I went anyway, not just because I needed the exercise, but because of the message it sent that other people’s needs matter too. Let us know how the new job is - it’ll be a shock at first but I bet you’ll be happy with it in the long term.
April 30th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Hi Julie! Thanks, I’ll definitely keep you all posted on the new job. I don’t start until the beginning of June so I’ve got a few weeks to get my professional wardrobe in order and take care of those pesky house projects I’ve been putting off. And I absolutely plan to keep exercising (am I delusional???)!
April 30th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
I must admit I get the most exercise during lunch during the work week - my gym is two blocks from my office. Occasionally I get a run or yoga either Saturday or Sunday (never both), but unless the kids are napping, I feel guilty. We are going to try a bike ride this weekend with one kid in a bike seat on each of our bikes - maybe that’ll be our new weekend work-out? I’ll be thinking of you in June - your brain will be happy but heart a little sad I’m predicting.
April 30th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
I think you’re right about how I will be feeling. I’m already feeling that way about it. Have fun on the bike ride!
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