For many, it sounds like a dream. Getting to stay at home all day with the babies that you love. Having all the time in the world to cook and clean and keep the house in order. Getting to sit around while kids take naps, and always having designated alone time.
That’s what many people think when they think of stay-at-home moms. But one Minnesota mother is serving up a healthy dose of truth after sharing an honest post captured in a moment of overwhelm.
Bridgette Armstrong has been a stay-at-home mom to her 18-month-old daughter, Riley, for over a year now.
Recently, after a long day of feeling overwhelmed and lonely, Bridget took to Facebook “at her wits end” to shine a light on the stigma that surrounds being a stay-at-home mom.
“Everyone thinks being a stay-at-home mom full time is easy,” Armstrong wrote. “That we are lucky to be able to not have to work. That we are lazy. That it’s not ‘real’ work, so we have nothing to complain about. But the truth is, it’s f—— lonely and overwhelming.”
She goes on to explain that it’s rare for her to get any alone time—even as much as a moment to herself to scrub a little one’s soiled pants for the third time in a day. There’s always “someone crying or screaming at your leg.”
“You don’t get breaks unless they are sleeping; which even then you use that time to clean up.
You struggle to come up with ways to entertain someone for literally 12 hours a day every day.
You wear the same clothes that smell like sweat and tears for days at a time because it’s already stained and no use in ruining more clothes.
You forget what it means or feels like to be an individual; because your entire existence now revolves around that child.
