By Jordan Sapir
The moms of the blogosphere have spoken. They’re burned out. Each and every one of them is doneso. We can’t take it anymore, they type as they angrily thrust at the keys of their laptops whilst breastfeeding, preparing a meal, and meeting a deadline, melodiously drowned out by the cries of sticky-fingered toddlers, over-stimulated school-aged children, or ravenous teens. As I read each article on my lady throne with numb legs, the feminist beast, who lurks in my inner cranium, crammed underneath my crown and ego, is furious. I sit there, as echoes of “Mommy” progressively come nearer. The rage subsides, and fear takes over. The classic fight-or-flight response attempts a coup d'etat of my emotionless sphere. Nope, nothing left, just anxiety, fear, and loathing. This is all too reminiscent of my postpartum days. I was homebound, sleep-deprived, and isolated. I’m now feeling a sort of PTSD that I’m accustomed to ignoring. My body no longer actively responds to the alarms from my nervous system. There is a system failure. I am so beyond any comprehensive defense mechanism innate to my body that the only thing I can do is sit there, naked, numb legs, pasted to the porcelain— immobile. My tears begin to well up. The scenario is all too familiar.
I am livid, scared, and depleted beyond comprehensive. Not a thought in my mind, just pure and utter exhaustion. The incessant pounding and eventual tiny fingers in the crevice of the door incite movement. “I’m here,” I manage to utter through the thin walls. “I’m done.”
“I’m done,” I repeat. “I’m done.” This rings true for nearly every mother in my social realm. We keep saying it, but no one is listening. We are no longer capable of holding it down or standing up. Everything, including my physical response to the stress that Covid has brought upon me, is indicative of someone who needs help or at least a break. With no end in sight, I attempt to battle my own body’s reactions to stress with caffeine and humor. Because on the other side of all of that fear is love and a bit of cynicism.
The indisputable, unconditional love that I have for my family somehow invokes energy from the depths of my inner soul. That animalistic trait brings out the combination of fear and love that keeps me in motion day after day and night after night.
We’ve been saying it for centuries. Now that we have a platform, we continue to bring home the message. Every TED Talk ever echoes: Moms are TIRED. The sad truth is that no one is listening. And even worse, we judge our fellow mothers in ways that allude to our toxic internalized sexism. We are not above comments about the single mom in the room or the SAHM mom with a nanny. “What does she have to complain about?” Then there’s the “How could she leave her kid in childcare all day?” mom and the Hot Mess who is shamed for her chaotic ways. The truth is, there is a little bit of each of those moms in all of us. The SAHM yearning for her past achievements, the working mom wishing to stay at home, and the on-the-edge mom hoping that someone hears her cries for help through the bathroom door.
It’s time for a change. It’s time for communities to find viable solutions to support mothers—all mothers. The inequities that this crisis has given rise to are present in each and every one of our lives, but in regards to mothers, go unheard into the void that is online media. It can’t be that we all have unsupportive partners, assuming one is there at all.
With nothing but the granite tiles to reverberate our fears and disdain, we are left with more responsibilities, stress, and feelings of loneliness.
In my constant drive to succeed, to be the “fixer,” in my role as a maternal advocate, a Black woman, with the weight of the world on my shoulders, I deem myself useless. Unless there is a radical shift in societal norms, this job will become increasingly impossible. It’s time to get back to the basics of women’s rights, for the unequivocally, indisputably necessity for balance and fairness in society. As defined by Amnesty International, “The right to live free from violence and discrimination; to enjoy the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health; to be educated; to own property; to vote; and to earn an equal wage.”
When we speak about getting back to the basics, a woman’s right to accessible mental healthcare is at the top of my list. We love our children to the point that we would run ourselves into the ground caring for them; some of us do, yet we shouldn’t be required to.
As we enter the second month of our second lockdown here in Germany, elections weighing heavy, with a female chancellor on her way out of office, we are faced with the desperate need for change, but first—coffee.
I want the memes to stop saying This Too Shall Pass, Hang in There, and We Got This. We don’t have this. What we have is a system that allows the vast majority of the population to expect mothers to do the job of an entire household—for free.
Jordan Sapir
Jordan Sapir, mother of two glitter-laden girls, 4 and 6, studied Journalism and International Political Science in NYC, a place she once called home. She can slaughter five languages fluently. She has worked in a newsroom or two, walked a catwalk or three, and is all for an impromptu adventure. Having traded in her Prada for pretzels, the founder of Über Moms lives in Munich, where she is a stay at home mom and studying to become a certified nutritionist. She is a mommy on a mission and wants to help fellow mothers raise healthy happy families, and beat a PR here and there.