A mom from Minnesota named Bridgette Armstrong is getting real about the struggles of being a full-time stay-at-home mom. She has been at it for over a year now and has recently been feeling at her wit’s end. She took to Facebook to share a post about the overwhelming feeling she was experiencing. “Everyone thinks being a stay-at-home mom full time is easy,” she writes.
“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 continues to write about the things that stay-at-home moms often neglect, including no alone time for themselves, no showers or changing clothes, etc.
Bridgette Armstrong gets brutally honest about the truth of being a full-time stay-at-home mom
“You forget what it means or feels like to be an individual, because your entire existence now revolves around that child,” Bridgette continues. “I was one of those people who judged SAHM’s, but I get it now … my house isn’t clean, I’m not clean, the dishes aren’t done, I have screamed already today, I have cried and I have felt so damn guilty that my child was here to witness it.”
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“I am alone and I am lonely. Check in on your SAHM friends. We are NOT OK,” she ends the post. The 25-year-old mom says she has received an overwhelming amount of negative responses to her post.
Her response is met with criticism. She just wants others to understand that being a stay-at-home mom is a job, too.
Bridgette talks to TODAY Parents about the stigma surrounding stay-at-home moms and what so many fail to understand about them. “It’s still showing the stigma that surrounds stay-at-home moms and how we shouldn’t complain,” she says. “But I think so many people — not just moms, not just stay-at-home moms, but parents of all shapes and sizes — have related to this because in a social media world, we are expected to show only the great parts in life. As a society, we forget that there are also bad parts and bad days, especially when it comes to being a parent.”
She lives with her boyfriend of eight years currently. Bridgette hopes that her message will help others understand better and hopefully check in on their stay-at-home mom friends. “I want people to check in on their mom friends because we are usually the last people to speak up about needing help,” Bridgette says.
It’s okay for moms to not be totally okay, and society needs to understand that
“As a society I feel like stay-at-home moms are pressured into feeling nothing but grateful that they get the opportunity to stay home — that we aren’t allowed to speak out on our bad days without someone telling us it could be worse,” Bridgette explains.
“I want people to realize that even though it can be a privilege to be able to raise our children full time, it also can be hard, and it’s OK to talk about it without feeling like you’re going to be told to suck it up.” Do you agree with what Bridgette has to say?