How to Manage Anxiety as a Mom

The prevalence of anxiety in mothers in this generation is staggering. Whether it’s due to chaotic lifestyles, poor diets, or lack of spiritual and relational connection is hotly debated. I tend to think it’s a combination of all of those things and more. For many of us seeking to raise our children to live in a healthier way, the task seems insurmountable at best. With so little real connection and community, dealing with anxiety as a mom is common and difficult to overcome. But with Christ, there is a way to overcome and live in victory.

Steps to dealing with motherhood anxiety

1. Recognize the problem

Learn from my own mistakes: don’t ignore the warning signs that you are trying to control everything. Admit when things are not going well, you’re stressed out, and surrender the situation to the Lord. You might also consider cutting out some voices that are speaking into your life. In the current information age, it is so easy to find thousands of different opinions on a single subject. But we get to choose who we listen to. We don’t have to be at the mercy of the internet. We can choose to silence some of that noise and only listen to voices that we trust.

2. Envision what you want to be instead

There is always hope with Christ. He is able to transform us into whatever He has called us to be. So if you’ve been a mom that frantic and never spends time playing with her kids, you CAN begin to be different. Dream big. God can do big things and we don’t have to settle for victim mindsets and missed potential.

3. Make a plan to become that woman

Once you’ve sought the Lord on what kind of woman He wants you to be, begin to craft a plan to go from anxious mom to victorious motherhood! Time blocking, saying no to more things, asking the Lord to help you desire to be more tidy, or a combination of all of those things are all great tactics. Think practically about how you can work to become the woman God’s called you to be. Keep in mind that whatever physical strategies you use, only spiritual work with bring about lasting change to your character. God wants us to work hard, but He is the One that ultimately does the transforming.

4. Embrace your God-given instincts as a mother and be confident

God has given you everything you need to be a mother. You can trust your instincts and intuition. Now I’m not saying you can trust your fear, so don’t take this as a license to worry about everything or to be reckless. What I am saying is that managing anxiety as a mom starts with allowing the Lord to direct your steps rather than a book or even a doctor’s order. Trust God and His leading in your life. He knows a lot more about your struggle and the right thing to do than even the smartest people out there.

5. Take your thoughts captive and live with joy

Day by day, stay consistent with the changes you’ve decided to make. There will still be hard days. There will still be temptations. It will take work and time to change the way you think. Give yourself grace and when you fall down, get right back up and try again. Being a victim to your struggles will never get you anywhere. 1 Thessalonians 4:4 says “That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour.” Don’t be a victim, be a victor!

my start as an anxious mom

Pregnancy Fears

My personal struggles with anxiety started before I even had my first daughter. There are so many rules about what not to eat and what not to do in pregnancy. Needless to say, I was very intimidated at my first pregnancy appointment. I felt fragile, and like pregnancy was going to destroy my body and my health. I was afraid to work out too hard, walk too long, eat too little, not eat enough, or eat the wrong things. There are a lot of good rules to follow when it comes to being pregnant but for the vast majority of “problems” there’s not really anything you can do or not do to avoid the circumstances.

One of my biggest pet peeves with the current medical system in the United States is this idea that everything has already been discovered by doctors. Women’s health specifically has atrocious care and poor maternal outcomes. We are constantly fed the lie that drugs will solve our problems – whether it’s PMS, pregnancy issues, or labor. These assumptions are based on the idea that doctors are the gods that know what to do in every situation, rather than the omnipotent God that created everything. Don’t get me wrong, medicine has its place and I’m thankful for it. But its a tool, not a way of life.

So, although I can’t blame anyone else for the way I chose to think, I can’t help but think that the way we currently view women’s health is not very helpful for letting go of fears and trusting the well stewarded body that God has given us to do what it ought to do.

Raising a “Perfect” Child

Alongside trudging through the emotional chaos of pregnancy, I began mentally preparing for child-rearing by reading books on sleep and child training. While maybe 1 or 2 are still helpful and relevant to me today, the majority of these books essentially touted the idea of creating a perfectly well-mannered baby. They said, “if you do this, baby will do this,” as if every baby is a robot that has no variance.

I was so confident going into it, but then I started trying to nurse. Then we brought her home. Then we tried to go to sleep. Nothing was as easy as these books promised. I still, to this day, don’t know of a baby that sleep 1.5 hour segments more than once per day.

Not only was I blindsided by the individuality of my baby but I also felt more compelled to be a drill sergeant than a mom. Barking orders felt more important than communicating lovingly for the sake of not “spoiling” the baby. I was so far out of touch with my instincts that I had zero confidence. I didn’t know what I was doing and I felt like everyone else knew it too. Not to mention I was threatened by what others said and was constantly afraid of being apart from my baby. Now, I still don’t love leaving my daughter even when I have to but before she was about 8 months old I was legitimately afraid of her leaving me because I didn’t feel like anyone else could do things the right way.

The Nursing Saga

The fruit of all of my fear was that my milk supply began to dwindle at only 4 months postpartum. I’d sleep trained my baby at 2 months and was only allowing her to nurse at designated times. I had no idea when she was actually hungry or tired or just wanted to be held. She was a stranger to me because I failed to actually tune in to what she needed.

I sat in the lactation consultant’s office pouring over the protocol that I needed to follow in order to hopefully reestablish my supply. It was then that I finally accepted the fact that my tight grip on everything had failed. I’d focused so hard on trying to stay on top of things that I really had no control over even the things I could control.

To this day I am still working on uprooting that way of thinking with my daughter as I battle the tantrums and tears of toddlerhood. But the good news in my story is that God was gracious enough to show me where I went wrong and to begin charting a new course of peace. I am confident that with some prayer and intentionality, that can be your story too.

I hope this was helpful to your journey to move through anxiety and live in victory and joy through your motherhood!