It’s 6:59 p.m. and I’m power-walking the twenty feet from my backyard office to the house.
In that short stretch of grass, I shed one identity and step into another. Inside waits a one-year-old whose diaper smells like he’s been fermenting a new life form, two forever-hungry teens looking for snacks, and my partner—heroically holding it all together, equal parts loving, frazzled, and ready to tag me in.
That walk—sixty seconds, tops—is my commute. And it might be the hardest part of my day.
Because in that minute, I stop being Rachel the therapist—calm, composed, saying things like “let’s breathe through that”—and become Rachel the mother, whose own breathing now sounds suspiciously like swearing under her breath.
Welcome to my split-moon life.
The Rhythm That Saved Me
A few months ago, I ditched the patriarchal 9-to-5 and built a rhythm that actually fits my body.
I work in four-week cycles that roughly follow the moon (and my menstrual cycle, when the universe cooperates). Two weeks I’m the working parent; two weeks I’m the stay-at-home one.
When I’m in work mode, my partner takes on the kids and the house. He does the school runs, the toddler wrangling, the endless snack refills. When I’m in home mode, we switch.
It’s messy. It’s miraculous. And it has taught us both more about empathy than any couples’ retreat ever could.
The funny thing about switching roles every two weeks is that you lose the moral high ground completely. There’s no “whose job is harder” argument when you’ve done both in the same month.
You just nod knowingly as you pass each other the baton—him smelling faintly of sour milk, me smelling faintly of emotionally-drained therapist.
The Myth of the “Right” Mother
Here’s what I’ve learned: no matter which version of motherhood you’re in, someone (often an invisible cultural voice in your head) will make you feel like you’re doing it wrong.
Work too much? You’re neglecting your kids.
Stay home? You’re “wasting your potential.”
Do both? You’re just exhausted, which apparently still counts as failing somewhere.
That guilt isn’t natural—it’s historical.
When industrial capitalism separated “home” from “work,” it split care from value. Men’s labour got paid; women’s became invisible. Then patriarchy piled on moral pressure to perform motherhood as self-erasure: tidy house, cheerful smile, zero needs.
That conditioning still hums in our nervous systems. It’s why so many of us feel a low-grade hum of failure even when we’re doing everything humanly possible.
Take a breath.
Actually—do that right now.
Notice what pressure you’re holding in your mind.
Where is it sitting in your body? Shoulders? Jaw? The small ache behind your ribs?
Now whisper to yourself, love is the work.
You might not believe it yet. That’s okay.
Start in the body. Let one small muscle unclench.
The Split Moon
If I could paint my experience of motherhood, it would look like a moon half in light, half in shadow—one side lit by the glow of the Hearthkeeper, the other by the wild gleam of the Huntress.
The Hearthkeeper (Hestia) keeps the soup simmering and the small souls safe.
The Huntress (Artemis) runs free, aims true, needs space to breathe.
Most mothers I know carry both inside them, awkwardly cohabiting.
Some days Hestia wins and we bake muffins shaped like love.
Other days Artemis grabs the car keys, says “I’m going for a drive,” and doesn’t come back until she’s remembered she exists outside of providing snacks.
And still—some mothers are neither. Some are Builders, some are Nomads, some are quiet Guardians doing their work unseen. The point is, there’s no one template. The “good mother” myth is as fake as that Pinterest craft project that was supposed to be “quick.”
The Empathy Exchange
Switching roles every two weeks has made me weirdly fluent in both dialects of exhaustion.
When I’m the working mom, I feel purposeful, adult, caffeinated—but gutted by the missing. My clients get my best calm voice; my family gets the leftovers. I step out of my office, and my nervous system lags behind like a browser with too many tabs open.
When I’m the stay-at-home mom, I am knee-deep in mashed banana and tiny socks, somehow both overstimulated and under-touched. I love the slowness and the mess, but by day four, I find myself narrating chores out loud just to hear adult conversation: “Now we’re putting the laundry in the dryer, aren’t we?”
Both versions of me are real. Both are tired. Both sometimes fantasize about the other.
And if you relate—if you’ve ever scrolled job postings at 2 a.m. just to remember you have skills beyond wiping noses—or if you’ve ever cried in your car on lunch break because you miss your baby—please know: you’re not alone.
Small Acts of Body Belief
Take another breath with me.
Notice if your jaw is tight from clenching around invisible expectations.
Maybe you’re holding your stomach in, or your shoulders up like you’re bracing for another request.
You don’t have to fix that.
Just feel it.
Then try saying, love is the work.
Even if you don’t buy it yet.
Especially if you don’t.
You might find your body believes it before your mind does.
Let it.
Here’s a small experiment I give myself:
Every time I walk through a doorway, I take one conscious breath.
It’s my bell of motherhood. A moment to reset the nervous system, to remember that I’m allowed to exist here, too.
Ten seconds at a time, I return to myself.
The Real Work
It’s tempting to think that the answer lies in finally “balancing it all.”
But balance can often feel out of reach.
The real work is remembering that you are a living, breathing human being who loves her kids fiercely and sometimes wants to throw a toy truck out the window.
The real work is letting love be imperfect but consistent.
It’s admitting that motherhood is 80 percent logistics, 15 percent guilt, and 5 percent pure transcendence—and still showing up tomorrow anyway.
It’s forgiving yourself, daily.
It’s lowering the bar to something human.
A Little Grounding Practice
Wherever you are, pause.
Feel your feet.
Unclench your hands.
Imagine the earth under you—steady, unjudging.
Whisper, I am enough for today.
Because you are.
You’ll forget again in about four minutes, but that’s fine. You can remember again, too.
A Love Letter, from One Mom to Another
To the working moms, the stay-at-home moms, the single moms, the queer moms, the co-parents, the grieving moms, the trying moms, and the “holy-shit-how-did-I-end-up-here” moms:
You are doing sacred work, even when it doesn’t feel sacred. You are shaping worlds while running on coffee and chaos. You are both hearth and hunt, rest and motion.
You can commit to your growth as a mother AND feel love and compassion for the mother you are today.
You don’t need to be perfect. You just need to keep loving.
And love, my friend— love is the work.
If this spoke to something in you, there are a few paths you can follow from here:
Work with Me
Personalized therapy (in Canada) and coaching (worldwide) for deep, relational support.
The Wolfskin Project
A growing library of free resources for self-exploration, myth, and everyday magic.
Each door leads somewhere different. It is my hope that all of them lead back to you.
<3 Rachel
What are your thoughts?