May 20, 2026
May is a beautiful, complicated month. We celebrate mothers. We also honor Mental Health Awareness Month. And for many women—whether they're moms, stepmoms, grandmothers, foster moms, or caregivers who've never given birth—navigating personal needs while tending to everyone else can feel especially heavy this time of year.
Here's what I hear in my therapy office in Jupiter, Florida—especially around Mother's Day:
"I feel like I should be doing more."
"I'm exhausted, but I don't have the right to complain."
"Everyone else seems to handle it better."
Sound familiar? You are not broken. You were handed an invisible script—one written by generations of gender norms. For a long time, women have been told how to behave, how to look, how to succeed. And more recently, we've been told how to do it all without breaking a sweat.
Be a present mother. Build a career. Stay fit. Stay kind. Keep the house in order. Be grateful. Don't ask for too much.
That's not just stressful. It's a recipe for eroded self-esteem.
In therapy, we work to separate what's actually true about you from the stories you've internalized. The first step? Recognizing the difference between what's genuinely yours and what was handed to you by a culture that rarely asks if the weight is fair.
Here's what the data tells us, according to the Maternal Mental Health Leadership Alliance (2024): nearly one in five women experience a mental health condition during the perinatal period. That's roughly 800,000 moms in the U.S. alone. And while the country's maternal mental health grade has bumped up from a D+ to a C-—progress, yes—we're still far from where we need to be. These conditions are the most common complication of pregnancy and childbirth, yet research suggests up to 85% of affected women go undiagnosed and untreated. One study found that moderate-to-severe depressive symptoms jump from about 10% during pregnancy to nearly 17% in the second year postpartum (Putnick et al., 2020).
Also? Data from the American Psychological Association (2023) shows women are way more likely than men to report feeling exhausted (67% vs. 53%), and burnout hits 45% of working women compared to 38% of working men.
This is not a personal failing. It is a systemic one.
And here's something I remind my clients often: you were never meant to carry it alone.
Mother's Day holds up a mirror. For some, that mirror reflects gratitude and joy. For others—including caregivers who don't technically have the title "mom"—it reflects losses, longings, resentment, or roles they never chose. Both experiences are valid. Both deserve space.
There's a hidden mental load—a kind of motherhood pressure cooker. I hear mothers and caregivers describe a background hum in their minds: tracking school forms, grocery lists, appointments, the emotional temperature of the home. Research shows that invisible work is linked to burnout and lower life satisfaction, especially when no one acknowledges it (Dean et al., 2022). Therapy gives you words for that experience, and a place to build strategies for sharing—or reclaiming—the weight.
If you're feeling the quiet weight of "should," here's where to start.
(Spoiler: It's not "doing more.")
1. Notice when "should" enters the conversation.
How often do you say "I should have…" or "I should be…"? Try this instead: Could I have done things differently? Possibly. Did I do my best with what I had? Probably yes.
2. Seek support before you feel like you're drowning.
You don't need a "severe" diagnosis to benefit from therapy. If you feel sadness, anxiety, or numbness more days than not—that's enough of a reason.
3. Ask for help with specifics—and accept it.
Instead of "Can you help more?" try "Could you handle bedtime tonight?" or "Can you pick up groceries after work?" Small, concrete shifts can lift a huge weight.
4. Normalize "not fine."
In my office, we don't pretend. We sit with the hard stuff. And honestly? That honesty is often the first step toward real relief.
If you're a mom—or anyone carrying the weight of caring for others—struggling to hold it together, you are not alone. And it's never too late to ask for help. So here's your permission slip: set down the "should" for a minute. Breathe. And tell one person the truth about how you're doing. That's not weak. That's how you start carrying it differently.
Where the numbers come from:
Maternal Mental Health Leadership Alliance (2024), American Psychological Association (2023), Putnick et al. (2020), Dean et al. (2022), and Earls & Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health (2019). Full citations available upon request.