The green eyed monster rears its ugly head every time I sit and scroll on social media. I am on it a lot trying to promote both my design business and my writing. Like many people, I scroll to escape. Instagram takes me out of the moment with my children, where I am exhausted and bored. It lets me look into other worlds and I almost always finish scrolling in a bad mood. I am deflated, fed up and worst of all I am jealous.
Why do they get to do x and y? How come they have so many likes? Why is x recommending that post and not mine?
Social media makes me feel terrible - but are my reactions trying to tell me something?
I used to feel that pang of jealousy when people announced pregnancies. That black and white scan photo of an unborn child framed with knitted mittens and a tiny hat. Photos of friends with growing bumps triggered me into a state of sadness, at the time I was single and even the idea of it seemed far away. With lots of friends and old colleagues taking the plunge into parenthood, I felt left behind, so much so I wondered if it would ever happen for me. But I knew from my reaction; the jealousy and the sadness I felt, that it was what was important to me; it was what I truly wanted.
It is other things I find myself jealous of these days, now that I have my two children. Are these new triggers what I truly want now? Or is it as they say that the grass is always greener, or you want what you think you can’t have?
I am deeply jealous of other mums and how they have got their shit together - even though I know it is social media and everything is curated and contrived. I envy the clean houses and the holidays abroad and most of all I envy the time they have away from their children. I envy their freedom. I envy their careers. I envy their space.
If the grass is always greener, then it’s no surprise that I would seemingly do a full 360 on wanting a family. I wouldn’t go as far as to say I regret having children, but I certainly have days where I would rather be somewhere else. Who doesn’t? It’s clearly a sign I am too overwhelmed and I feel trapped. I don’t feel like this everyday but on the worst days I find myself in a cycle of social media induced sadness, which leads me to crave more social media. I very rarely feel better off after opening that app.
I have talked previously about how I had given up my full-time job in branding & packaging to stay at home with the children because my salary didn’t cover the cost of childcare. I no longer have a Monday to Friday 9-5 and instead try to squeeze any freelance work I can get into my one working day, evenings and weekends. I am trying to scrape back some of my career in the margins of motherhood, and while I was hopeful that it would be a great opportunity, I am probably a little resentful that I wasn’t given much in the way of choice.
I am truly envious of career mums and their ability to go to work - to escape their brood and do something for themselves. Like many writers on Substack, I follow novelists and established writers on Instagram, Notes and Twitter and I envy their desk shots - their images in cafés where their current read is placed next to a frothy coffee. I have so little time for anything other than children, I find myself jealous of the fact that they can read at all.
On my work day, I do have these moments, but they are not as often as I would like and invariably when I scroll through social media it is when I feel most suffocated by my children. When I am trying to entertain myself whilst the children play Lego or sit transfixed by Peppa Pig, the windows into other worlds leave me feeling like I have lost my way.
When I gave up my job at the end of last year, I thought I wouldn’t miss it, but my jealousy of the career mum tells me that actually, I do. I may not miss that job but I do miss working. It is part of the identity I lost when becoming a mother, and because the amount of time I spend working is so little in comparison to how much time I spend with the children, I fear it is part of my identity that I am struggling to get back.
Similarly, I envy the writers have time to write. They are able to send manuscripts off to secure agents and this is telling that I believe if I had more time, I would be closer to doing this myself. Working on my book is on my to do list every week but it always gets pushed aside - the last priority on the list. I am much further behind than I would like to be. I have been writing it for five years. I am starting to think I will never get there. I know from these latest pangs of jealousy that I should prioritise it more. I know I will regret not finishing it and I know I will be letting myself down if I don’t try to get it published.
The green eyed monster I become when I see these posts is giving me an insight into my psyche - showing me what it is I truly want and when I do have such limited time available in which to work, I have to make decisions on what is best to prioritise, when. There is more pressure in a way, to give in to this monster, to try to give it what it wants.
Perhaps this is going to be the question that follows me around forever. Do I want to write, read or design (or draw or paint or knit, even) because I can’t do everything. Creating a balance between these two sides to myself is always going to be hard. I am learning, though, that I have to prioritise them both ( as well as love and care for my children) in order for either of them to get done. I am not going to be able to give as much time as I would like, but I can do my best.
There is a quote that struck me on journalist Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s Instagram from Sarah Ruhl,
“There were times when it felt as though my children were annihilating me (truly you have not lived until you have changed one baby’s diaper while another baby quietly vomits on your shin) and finally I came to the thought: all right, then, annihilate me, that other self was a fiction anyhow. Then I could breathe. I could investigate the pauses.
I found that life intruding on writing was, in fact, life. And that, tempting as it may be for a writer who is a parent, one must not think of life as an intrusion. At the end of the day, writing has very little to do with writing, and much to do with life. And life, by definition, is not an intrusion.”
Sarah Ruhl, 100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write: On Umbrellas and Sword Fights, Parades and Dogs, Fire Alarms, Children, and Theater
So this is life at the minute. The green eyed monster is not going to be tempted away for now, but I think if I listen to it, I can prioritise well at the right times and I can lessen the jealousy and the sadness I feel. What I truly want will change from day to day and in keeping in touch with my jealousy I will be able to find the right balance, for me - and perhaps that will be the key to finding happiness or contentment, who knows? I know I will get there eventually.
Do you struggle to create a work/children/life balance?
How do you decide what best to do with your “free” time?
What are the best tips for writing/creating/working with children?
Witnessing you in all of this. I have come to accept (not always with grace I have to admit) that this is a season of motherhood... and that people I see doing things I also want to do are either in an different season or have a different setup to me. I do love using that envy as a messenger though... and then tuning into whether it’s something I think I ‘should’ be doing or whether it’s something my heart truly wants. Often it’s the first one and I can then let it go!
Thank you for sharing honestly xx
You always speak so much truth (and often like you have an insight into my own brain!) 💘