If I asked you to picture ‘a good mum’, what does she look like? Maybe a woman surrounded by a flock of laughing, well-fed cherubs in spotless Zara outfits? Maybe she’s serenely breastfeeding in a dark nursery or drinking a hot cup of coffee and reading a book while her child peacefully naps (for more than 20 minutes). 

When I ask myself the same question, the only tangible quality I can pin down is her smile. My imaginary ‘good mum’ is smiling. This smile doesn’t just capture her happiness, of course, because the best moments of parenting are often so much more complex; hidden in the creases and corners are amusement, contentment and excitement too. She smiles at her partner, at strangers, at her reflection and, of course, her child.

But how realistic is this? 

Before I became pregnant, I imagined I’d have a vaginal birth. When I was diagnosed with complete placenta previa, meaning there was no safe exit for either her or me, I had to adapt to the idea of a mandatory early C-section. I remember going to a hypnobirthing class the morning after I found out, and for the first of what would become many times, realising I was different from all the other women around me.

I excused myself, cried in the garden outside and considered asking my husband to come and pick me up. The lovely instructor found me and promised that the course would still be inclusive to me. She was true to her word, but when I look back, I realise that I was experiencing, for the first time, feeling like I was doing motherhood wrong.

I had my daughter in the summer of 2021, and that feeling of motherhood failure returned just three days after she was born when her healthy birth weight plummeted, prompting a return to hospital 48 hours after we’d been discharged. The condescending ‘breast is best’ scolding engulfed me, but so did the sight of her suckling desperately at a tiny bottle of formula in her dad’s arms. Breast isn’t always best, I realised in that moment. 

Before I became a mum, I envisaged combination feeding (a mixture of both breast and formula milk) to allow me to give my daughter what she needed from my body while also being able to return to work and provide for us all financially. I’d planned to step away from work for roughly four months, but once I was no longer tied to the restrictions of breastfeeding, our planned family dynamic was able to change. I did my first afternoon at work when she was 10 weeks old, and I was quickly back to working three days a week after that.

Meanwhile, the mums I took a parenting course with were still on maternity leave. I felt alienated from them and the conversations that filled up our group chat; I felt that brick wall again – first I couldn’t contribute to their shared experiences on vaginal births and recovery, then about breastfeeding; now, I couldn’t relate to their long, exhausting weeks alone with their baby but together in their camaraderie.

The version of motherhood that I was living looked nothing like what I had expected, nothing like what I was seeing around me, and it didn’t fit with the ‘good mum’ picture I had painted in my head. It’s not surprising that the isolation I was feeling easily made space for doubts to creep in. “I’m doing this all wrong,” I heard the voice in my head say again.

Now that the baby days are behind us, I find myself wondering if it’s time to stop trying to be the mum in the picture books, the mum with the Zara-clad kids? And whether it’s time to be the mum that real life asks me to be, embracing the warts and all, thus redefining what a ‘good mum’ is in my head?

Anna Mathur is a psychotherapist and author of several books, including Know Your Worth. She is a mother too, and tells me: “It’s important to put the metaphorical blinkers on and work at investing in our own versions of motherhood, rather than using that energy to try and replicate that which we see around us or the visions we had in our minds. As we begin to recognise that these don’t fit with our reality, there can be a grieving process. 

“This might sound like a bad thing, but it can actually be a positive, freeing process. It encourages us to find ways to orientate ourselves in the motherhood we have and accept it, rather than see it as conflicting with the one we had imagined.”

So what can I and all the other mothers who are feeling alienated from their own expectations of motherhood – be that as a result of returning to work, being the secondary carer or otherwise – proactively do?

“I recommend asking yourself, ‘What would I do, or what decision would I make around my parenting, if nobody knew or cared?’” Anna says. “This shines a light on how much of the decisions we make are informed by what others might be thinking or doing. We are far better focusing on making decisions that fit best for us and our families than berating ourselves about the present or ruminating over the future.”

“Watch out for the ’shoulds’, too,” Anna adds. “If you find yourself making statements about how things should and shouldn’t look or feel, ask the questions ‘Why?’ and ‘Who says?’”

Who says a vaginal birth is the only real birth or breastfeeding is best or a working mother is an absent mother? Certainly not me. Those are the voices of influences around me, but I’ve come to realise they’re not my voice.

Now, after nearly two years of being a mum and speaking to a spectrum of mothers around me, I’ve redefined that picture of a ‘good mum’ in my head. Gone is the serene breastfeeding to lullabies image, and I’ve done away with the idea of clean-clothed cherubs frolicking in a picture-perfect setting. I now believe a good mother is someone who has good days and bad days, but really does try to absorb the happiness from all around her: not just her motherhood experience and her child, but her work, her adventures, her education and her lifestyle. Of course, there will be sad days and angry moments, but that ‘good mum’ in my head is always striving, not just for her family, but for herself… because she values herself just as much as her dependents. 

The realisation wasn’t like a light switch flicking on. I wish it had been so clean-cut. Instead, it was this slow, dawning acknowledgement that I had a choice to do things differently. Now I can take the energy I was putting into performing the ‘good mum’ routine – and the worry surrounding it – and put it into making a life where I smile as much as possible. 

If a good mum is a content, happy one, that’s who I want to be. The rest is really just background noise. 

Baby on the Brain: The Returners is a podcast brought to you by Stylist magazine dedicated to the big life questions you face when you’re a new parent navigating a return to work. Click here to listen to the latest episodes. 

Images: Getty