The pressure women take on from pre-conception, through pregnancy, birth, postpartum, work, relationships, ambition, identity, and the long, complicated process of building a new relationship with themselves.
It is not uncommon for women who are newly married to be asked when they are planning on getting pregnant, as though their body, timeline, and future have become open for public discussion. And then there is the age discrimination many women face: “Left it a bit late to get pregnant, didn’t you?” “Clock’s ticking.”
Then, when a woman does become pregnant, the pressure shifts. The commentary begins again. “I hope you’re planning a natural birth.” “Are you going to breastfeed?” “You don’t want an epidural, do you?” “You must be so excited.”
At Luminary Mothers, our view is simple: all births are natural. However a baby arrives, birth is birth. Women do not need their choices ranked, judged, or measured against someone else’s ideology.
And then comes the birth itself. So many women experience birth trauma, not only because birth can be physically intense, unpredictable, and frightening, but because too many women are not listened to. Often their requests are dismissed, their pain is minimised, their instincts are questioned and their consent is rushed past.
It is as though the woman did not just spend 20, 30, or 40 years in her own body. Suddenly, she is no longer treated as the expert in herself. Her requests become preferences. Her pain becomes something to manage. Her consent becomes something to rush through.
And then comes postpartum. The sheer immensity of what has just happened begins to land. A woman has given birth, but there is rarely much time to process it. Her body has changed. Her hormones are shifting. She may be bleeding, aching, leaking, healing, feeding, recovering from surgery, processing trauma, or simply trying to understand an experience she has barely had time to name. And all the while, she is caring for a new tiny human.
What comes with that is sleep deprivation. A loss of self. A changed body. A new identity. The unknown, every single day. The fear of getting it wrong. The pressure to know what every cry means. The pressure to bond. The pressure to feed. The pressure to recover. The pressure to be grateful. The pressure to look like she is holding it all, and better than ever.
This is why the conversation around maternal mental health has to be bigger than “new mum tiredness” or “baby blues” or “just a difficult stage”. It is being pulled in seven million directions while still feeling expected to seem like you are doing it all, and enjoying it.
Then come the pressures of work, ambition, maintaining relationships with others, and building a new relationship with yourself. Pressure to be a present mother, a committed partner, a reliable friend, a good daughter, a strong colleague, an ambitious woman, and somehow still keep a version of yourself intact.
And we are surprised that maternal mental health is an issue?
Maternal mental health is everyone’s business because mothers do not mother in isolation. They mother inside families, workplaces, hospitals, communities, cultures, and systems. The pressure placed on mothers does not appear from nowhere. It is built through the questions we ask, the assumptions we make, the care we fail to provide, the judgement we normalise, and the support we treat as optional.
So let’s stop that right now.
Let’s stop pretending maternal mental health is a private issue for individual mothers to quietly manage. Let’s stop reducing it to tiredness. Let’s stop acting as though pressure is just part of the job. It is not superficial. It is more than being a tired mum. It is about being pulled in seven million directions while still feeling the pressure to look like you are doing it all, and having it all.
It is about how women are spoken to, listened to, cared for, questioned, judged, supported, and believed — before, during, and after motherhood.
Because the issue is not that mothers are not strong enough. The issue is that the pressure is too much.
And it was never theirs to carry alone.
