Working Mom

When you're a mom you're a working mom, whether or not you draw an income! Maybe you work outside the home, maybe you are a work at home mother, or maybe you are strictly a stay at home mom. And no matter what, most moms, due to their "job", experience guilt, stress, and anxiety.

Work Outside the Home

There are numerous stressors you may encounter if you work outside the home. First, you may find that your morning and evening family routine is chaotic and hurried. Getting kids ready to go requires a lot of organization and planning and, as you know, can make for a crazy beginning to your day!

Your evenings may be filled with homework, family time, and decompressing from your day. But, with the limited time most working moms have to actually rest and relax at the end of the day, it can feel like you're going nonstop until bedtime. And then it starts all over again in the morning!

Maybe, as a working mom, you feel guilty that you don't have as much time as you'd like with your kids. Or maybe you feel guilty that you actually enjoy your time at work, away from the family. You may find yourself wanting to find a better balance between your work and family life. To get some great help and insight on a working mom's family, health, and career issues, click here.

Work At Home Mother

If you are a work at home mother, your challenges may be very different. For example, it can be difficult to get stretches of continuous work time with children at home. How often, would you say, are you interrupted during your work time to take care of child or other household issues? Interruptions like that can really hamper your efforts to be efficient and on task.

Do you have your own private workspace or is your work area in the busy living room? If you're having a hard time keeping little hands out of your papers and off your computer, it may feel as if your work is automatically devalued. This doesn't help your motivation, does it?

A big challenge for many work at home mothers is keeping work and life separate. It's easy to fall into the habit of catching up on work in your off hours, or making some extra progress on your project on the weekend, even if you wouldn't be expected to do so if you worked in the office.

Many work at home mothers have a difficult time setting appropriate boundaries between their work and the rest of their life. This can make every extra free moment a potential time for more work. Just the opposite can be true as well, making it difficult for a work at home mother to stay on task as she may be distracted by more interesting family or household issues. You can find incredible resources, networking opportunities, and advertising opportunities for work at home mothers at www.hbwm.com

Stay at Home Mom

If you are a stay at home mom, you may often feel that your contribution to the family is taken for granted or minimized. You may worry about this yourself or maybe your spouse has made comments. Stay at home moms often feel like their household chores and child raising tasks go unnoticed and unappreciated.

Or maybe you're feeling overwhelmed because you're just not able to keep up with everything the way you'd like. Maybe the laundry isn't always folded and put away, or the toys aren't picked up, or the dishes haven't been done for several days. Do you feel like a failure, or like you're not even able to keep your head above water some days? Self-imposed expectations that are too high and rigid can make a hard day even more difficult and exhausting for a stay at home working mom.

If finances are a worry for your family, you may find yourself asking these questions:

"How much extra money would we have if I got a job?"

"Am I pulling my weight around here?"

"Does my husband resent me for spending the money and not making any?"

"Am I wasting my education?"

"Does my husband recognize and appreciate what I am contributing to the household?"

Homemomma.com is a great resource for stay at home moms! It offers helpful information on all the issues that stay at home moms face...and it also provides some really resourceful money saving tips. I'm sure you'll find some really useful information, so check it out!

No matter your occupational status, as a working mom you may benefit from re-evaluating your priorities, improving your planning and organizational skills, getting your needs met, and communicating better with your significant other.

These can be challenging but doable tasks. And, when you discover the core issues and make an action oriented plan towards improving them, you will be amazed at the difference you will see!