Let’s all agree that while motherhood and family life is all sorts of lovely, it can also feel pretty darn stressful.
You know, between juggling your own work and drop-offs and pick-ups and ballet classes and dentist appointments and so on and so forth, on top of cooking dinners and doing laundry and generally just trying to keep all those balls in the air at all times.
However, as it turns out, it isn’t the kids that stress us out the most, apparently. According to a survey by Today.com, husbands may be an equal or greater source of stress for an alarmingly high percentage of mothers.
Yup – you read that correctly. It is the men that stress us out the most.
After surveying 7000 U.S. mothers, the study showed that the average mum would rate her stress level at an 8.5 out of 10 and that a whopping 46 percent of mothers felt that their spouses were a bigger source of stress than their kids.
Sounds familiar, mamas?
The problem for most of the mums surveyed is one many of us on this side of the pond also feel familiar with – feeling like there is never enough hours in the day to get everything done.
According to the results, three-quarters of respondents felt that most of the parenting and household duties fell on their shoulders in addition to working full time, while one in five mums said that not having enough help from their spouse was a major source of daily stress. “Even though I have a committed spouse, I still feel like all the pressure is on me to get everything done. I work just as many hours as my husband does, but yet I do all the scheduling,” said one anonymous commenter in the survey.
In other words – mums carry the majority of the ‘mental load’ that comes with parenting, and it is making us all feel pretty darned stressed out.
What do YOU think, mama? Is this the case in your house? Are you more stressed by your husband than the kids? Let us know in the comments or tweet us at @Herfamilydotie
