To think most working mums are overwhelmed?

This is going to sound awful but I can't help but hope that my kids aren't going to want to do a load of extracurriculars that we will have to facilitate on top of everything else. I don't mind after school clubs so much but I do see some friends struggling with the ferrying around or having to hang out somewhere in the evening with a younger child for the duration for example and I'm dreading doing the same.

Yanbu.
It probably depends if their partner takes equal responsibility for mental load / parenting / housework. However, as the majority of men don't share it equally then the mum is picking up the slack. (In real life equal men like this are as rare as rocking horse shit, on MN they seem to be everywhere 🤔).

The word I use is relentless. Monday -Friday is nonstop with work, school, housework then fitting dinner around taxi-ing children to various clubs and activities. I have also taken on some evening work to help pay for mortgage increase which doesn't help (from home so no childcare needed). It’s just me too. Sometimes it just feels like a treadmill, so constant and if you stop everything just falls over.
Laundry is my nemesis…. If I miss a day I’m fucked for the week!
I purposely have never booked regular kids activities at the weekend, but it’s inevitable that sometimes they have events that take this time too (thank god neither of mine do football as that seems to consume the weekends of some friends)

I went back to work part time after having a baby. Although I would say being at work with someone else looking after the baby was actually easier than being at home full time!
For me it was a busy time (I was also a carer for my Mum) but rarely overwhelming. But I think perhaps I have an attitude that there are only so many hours in the day and I can only do so much and I'm not going to beast myself to have the perfect life and tidy house.

I’ve experienced this too. Being in an unhappy marriage and feeling the full mother load was so stressful there are periods of my kids’ childhood that I just don’t remember. I’m now a single parent to a tween and two teens, my career has soared since leaving my marriage to the extent that I’ve gone from part time admin to senior leader in 5 years, but I don’t feel any of the chronic stress that I used to. Life is mostly a joy- aided by the fact I get regular breaks and time to myself in a way I never did in my marriage!

I think the vast majority of working mums are busy to the point where there is little slack in the system, certainly and a lot are overwhelmed. Whether you are overwhelmed partly depends on you though: your circumstances (do you have a supportive partner/do you have money?), also your temperament and whether you enjoy working or not. I personally would find not working more stressful than working.

Also you have to consider the counterfactual. The alternative is being a SAHM and while this has its advantages it’s certainly not for everyone. Nor is it particularly stress free and that’s before you get to the financial side of things. It’s extremely risky not to have your own financial independence.

I think we need to be careful about the narrative that we are all just too busy and need to chill and step back a bit. There are very valid reasons to question the huge overload of stuff women have to deal with but let’s please not default to this “women can’t have it all” narrative.

Until my youngest DC was 7 I worked part-time (3 days a week) which I think was manageable. DH and now teach full-time. We are all good for the holidays but term time is impossible. My DC are older (11 and 13) but it was actually easier when they were little in nursery, although so expensive. Now there are activities to manage, school clubs and events, INSET days etc. Our older DC has ongoing physical and mental health struggles. We don't have family nearby and I've had to leave her home alone all day several times because of work.

Wish DH and I coukd drop a day each, which would just about be manageable financially but my school won't hear of it.

This is a tiny thing, but I work from home, with lots of Zoom client meetings. Sometimes (rarely) DH brings me a coffee if the meeting is 2 hours long. Female clients especially always coo and croon that he is so lovely - how lucky am I?

He overheard one the other day and his chest puffed up with pride. I felt like shrieking: Man, no one has ever cooed at be for bringing you tea in bed every single day for thirty years. He hasn't had a full time job since DC were in junior school. yet he's the prince of men for making the occasional cuppa. The imbalance drives me nuts. I almost said to my client, don't indulge him in this myth that if a man does once what a woman does habitually he is some sort of prince. DH is a good man, but he really buys into that shit and it makes me growl.

Meanwhile, women, as OP says, are run ragged from the expectation they should do three jobs perfectly: full time work, housework, childcare.

I voted its not just you!

Not everyday is overwhelming though, and sometimes weeks go by where everything is busy not fine. I do like the interaction outside the home though and prefer working to staying at home and just the children as my only focus. In an ideal world I would work part time, perhaps five shorter days.

Sometimes I feel like I am only just coping though!

Perhaps it's not compatible to have two working parents who work out the home full time, but there is no reason being a mum and working can't be compatible if the dad has flexibility. It doesn't have to be the mum who does all the things that can make life overwhelming. I've got one at school and one at nursery and work 4 days. I'm honestly not overwhelmed because my husband does loads, including all school and nursery admin which seems almost unheard of. School and nursery know to ring him with issues not me. I've never taken a day off work because my children are unwell, for example.

Totally overwhelmed. Mothers are expected to work full time and never let having children interfere with shifts and professionalism, but to be on time to collect children from school half way through the afternoon or to drop into school three times a day to administer medicine (stupidest rule ever), to do all the housework because men don't see the dirt, and to spend quality time with their children.

My mum's life was far from great but she was a housewife. My dad's teahcing salary paid enough to keep a family of five in a big house (those were the days). And we played outside after school, at weekends, and in the holidays. She didn't have to entertain us or take us on endless outings. If she wanted to go to the shops - even if we were off school, really ill, she just went. No one judged. If babies screamed the recommendation was to put them in the garden for fresh air.

There wasn't the demand that every second of every day you should be in at least two places at once doing three things perfectly in the service of other people while paying half the bills on your much lower salary and by the way you're useless.

Completely overwhelming.
All the same things have to be done but its so much more.stressful to organise.
For eg doctors, one of ypu has to take time.off to bring them. Playdates are at your precious time at the weekend which is also your time for shopping/laundry/cleaning /visiting family.
You live in dread of hearing the words "I feel sick"
I am a teacher and I get 9 weeks off in the summer with my children(even when they were toddlers) and find that an absolute breeze compared to the hamster wheel.im on during term time.

Absolutely. It's easier with kids now 7 and 9 as they can be self sufficient around the house but the mental load I carry compared to DH is ridiculous. We both work full time yet I am apparently responsible for everything. I don't doubt my life would be easier if we split up but I don't necessarily want that to happen. I want him to do things without being asked. Sick of being the house project manager.

My eldest is 17 and I went back to work full time when he was 6 months old.
I don't think I was/am overwhelmed, I just feel like I have been exhausted for the last 17 years.
It doesn't help that although my husband is a 'nice man' who's 'heart is in the right place' has been painfully useless for almost 20 years!
We had no family support, no cleaner, I am the only driver and at times it has been a lot to cope with. I suppose I am lucky that I have managed without breaking!

Yes but it passes

This!
Having kids is overwhelming.
I was a SAHM and my DH was great at doing his fair share of the practical stuff. But I did the mental stuff and all the doctors/hospital/school stuff.
And yes, it doesn't stop once they get past 10. Mine are both at uni now and I've had a couple of the hardest years just recently, not helped by adding very elderly parents into the mix.

Yes, I am consistently overwhelmed.

Am sometimes envious of those I know who have 6 hours a day whilst their children are at school to do as they please (I still have to do the same amount of life admin/child admin/housework/extra curricular management as they do but have to fit it around working 8 hours a day).

Being a SAHP to children not in nursery or school is exceptionally hard work but I can’t see how it isn’t easier when your kids are in school/nursery 6+ hours a day.

My advice would be to phone the schools to get yourself booked in as soon as you've applied for a place. You can call to cancel the ones you don't get into.

I phoned the day after we had our place confirmed, and there were no spaces. Despite them telling us there was plenty of wraparound care available. Turns out there were only 10 places for Reception children, in a two-form entry school. Oh and they only run holiday club for half the school holidays. It's been stressful...

Yes, combination of work, domestic duty, lazy teens, messy house really drag me down.

I've never felt overwhelmed. I only have 1 child though which probably makes a difference. No family help at all, always worked.

i can’t vote because it’s not just you. Lots of people feel overwhelmed.

But I also don’t agree with your post.

I have never felt pressure to just be grateful and #blessed. Life has actually been easier as a single parent. Exh was actually great. He had a mental health crisis and never recovered.
Compared to how it was when he was ill and living with us it was a blissfully calm. Those few years were soul crushingly hard. Life feels quite easy. Maybe it’s just because it feels easier in comparison.

The kids are older now. One is an adult at uni. One a teenager and life is pretty good. But even when they were younger I never felt consistently overwhelmed or stressed out. Obviously, if work was very busy and there was stuff at home, then yes there would be periods where I didn’t feel I had enough hours in the day. But not all the time.

My career has progressed massively since I became a single parent. So I am now busier in that sense. But I think we are in a good routine now. Especially if I am working from home.

Life does get easier. As they get older. But I think a lot of the pressure comes from ourselves. When me and exh split, my aim was to get to a point where life was just better than what we had before. I didn’t put pressure on myself for the situation to be perfect or expect myself to be a perfect parent. Just have an overall better situation than we were in.

Yes and this feeling doesn't stop at 10. Mine are teens. I have worked full time since they were 6 months old.

I manage/ed with the support of extended family and having cleaners etc. I finally "snapped " last year and now work in a school. Which has its own demands but at least I know I have a break every 7/8 weeks. Managing annual leave with school holidays is very difficult.

When I saw the thread, my first thought was the, probably, 100s of threads on here where not only do dads not do their fair share of the ‘mental load’, ‘emotional Labour’, parenting and household/life chores, they actually cause more work in those areas.

My DH is actually on board with doing his fair share and sees himself as a feminist ally but I’ve had to work so hard to push him to actually do his FAIR share rather than just the obvious stuff like washing up after dinner.

Personally not for me. We both work full time, but our child is in nursery so it’s easier. We both do an equal share of care and house stuff. I wfh mostly so no added commuting times. I don’t find it stressful, I like it, we don’t have family help, but we do go and visit grandparents a few times a year.

It's definitely not easy balancing everything and I can imagine it is difficult with a full on job, a DH that doesn't pull his weight and kids that need you.