Imposter Syndrome in Motherhood
Do you ever get the feeling that those who applaud you as a mother must not know how you really are? Do you ever worry that you’ll be found out and exposed for faking it? For not actually having all the answers and not actually being the competent, amazing mother people keep saying you are?
Image credit: Mary Kim Photography
If any of these sentiments resonated, you may be interested to learn more about imposter syndrome and what it means in motherhood.
Imposter syndrome, simply put, is a feeling of incompetence and having deceived others about your abilities or image. Imposter syndrome is most often studied in the workplace, and how it affects one’s own inability to accept or internalize outside merit or accomplishment. Instead, those who experience imposter syndrome insist that any accomplishment or success must be due to external circumstance, luck, or attributes unrelated to the person’s self.
In motherhood, imposter syndrome can manifest as a twinge of guilt or prickle of shame when others try to compliment your mothering, your home, or your children. It drives you to brush off the compliment, or redirect to something more worthy of their praise. It festers as you return to your typical responsibilities and see all the imperfections under your maternal microscope.
Many factors can contribute to this sense of self doubt and deceit. Comparing one’s own performance to what is so readily displayed on social media is a major contributor. Comparing home, family and self to family, friends and others in the real world also plays a role.
How to we combat those feelings? Is there a way to drum up genuine confidence in ourselves and our mothering?
One way to combat imposter syndrome is to cut it off it’s biggest source of fuel: comparison.
Easier said than done. Trust me, I know.
When one is able to accept the idea that they’ll never see the complete picture of someone else’s life, it makes comparison seem futile. And once comparison stops, you’re left with one thing. Yourself.
Being alone with your thoughts and insecurities can feel daunting. But never fear. When you are alone with yourself, you are always in good company.
Image credit: Mary Kim Photography
You are, as are we all, imperfect. And that is okay.
You are still the perfect fit for your children. There are so many ways they are thriving in your specific care.
What are those ways? Can you list them out?
What is it that makes you different from other moms? Have you asked your children? What do they like about you? What memories have you created together that is uniquely yours?
What you have to offer is so very different from what anyone else in the world can offer your children. That is exactly the way life is meant to be.
The person giving you the compliment knows you’re not perfect, and they’re giving the compliment anyway. Why not take it?
There are no true imposters here. We’re all doing the best we can in the imperfect way we know how.
Be kind to that mama in the mirror, she’s doing better than she thinks she is.
