Why ‘Having It All’ Is Burning Working Mums Out, and What to Aim for Instead

Somewhere along the line, we were sold a shiny promise.

You can have a career and be a brilliant parent.
You can be ambitious and present.
You can do meaningful work, earn good money, stay healthy, nurture friendships, keep a “show” home, look presentable… and do it all well.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m hugely grateful to live in a world where women can work, lead, build businesses and earn financial independence.

However, I call bullsh*t on “having it all”.

Trying to have it all is burning working mums out, and it’s not because we’re doing it wrong.

The Hidden Cost of Chasing “Everything” as a Working Mum

Let’s paint a picture.

It’s 6am. You’re exhausted because your brain refused to switch off sometime around 3.06am (after taking an age to fall asleep and an obligatory couple of child wake-ups). You navigate Lego, Pokémon cards and a growing mental to-do list before you’ve even made it to the shower.

Breakfast becomes a negotiation (always). Nursery and school WhatsApps explode. Someone needs a Roman costume, another empty yoghurt pot, and yet another glue stick (seriously, where do they go?). Your youngest hates their clothes and starts getting undressed. Your tea goes cold, the toast burns, and yes; we cry over the very real, very un-proverbial spilt milk.

You rush. You shout. You forget to pluck that coarse chin hair that appeared overnight. Your shoulders are already up around your ears and the working day hasn’t even begun.

Familiar?

This is not a personal failing.
This is not a time-management issue.
This is not because you “just need better boundaries”.

This is the mental load of motherhood colliding with ambition, alongside a cultural narrative that says you should be able to carry it all, ALL of the time.

I still call bullsh*t.

Why Overwhelm Isn’t a Personal Failure, it’s a structural problem

Many of us grew up with a very different model of family life. One where the logistics were simpler, expectations were narrower, and someone, usually mum, absorbed the invisible labour that made everything else work.

In my case, I have vivid memories of creeping downstairs in my polyester My Little Pony nightie when I heard the front door late in the evening, just to see my dad, back turned, in his business suit, eating reheated dinner. We all lived together, but during the week it was largely mum, my sister and me. That was normal, no sob story, the reality for many of us.

Now? We’re the generation of women expected to:

• build careers or businesses

• contribute financially (often from necessity, not choice)

• be emotionally available, calm and gentle parents

• manage households

• remember everything; from silly sock day to dentist appointments, birthday presents, Tesco slots and tiny nails that need cutting again

And still show up as composed, presentable, high-functioning humans.

No one said we needed to destroy ourselves in the process, but somehow, that’s become normalised.

And when it feels impossible? We turn the criticism inward.

Why can’t I cope like everyone else?
Why does this feel so hard?
What’s wrong with me?

Nothing is wrong with you.

Why ‘Having It All’ Is the Wrong Goal for Ambitious Mums

The problem isn’t wanting full lives, with work, children, money, joy and purpose.

The problem is that ‘having it all’ implies everything, all at once, forever.

It leaves no room for flexibility.
No room for change.
No room for being an actual human.

What if, instead of chasing an impossible ideal, we asked a different question?

What does MY all look like, right now?

Not society’s version.
Not Instagram’s version.
Not the version you think you should want.
Not even the one you wanted in your twenties.

Yours. Now.

From ‘Having It All’ to Living Your All

Living your all requires honesty.

To acknowledge:

• what you genuinely have capacity for at this point in your life

• what really matters (not just what’s loudest)

• what you are no longer willing to sacrifice

This isn’t about lowering standards or giving up ambition. If anything, it takes more discipline than trying to do everything.

The discipline to choose.
to say “not now”.
to say no.
to stop measuring yourself against a life you’re not actually trying to live.

The part most people miss? You can’t access clarity, fulfilment or sustainable success from a place of constant self-criticism.

Why Self-Kindness Is the Enabler (Not the Reward)

We often treat self-kindness as something we earn after we’ve done enough.

Once…

things calm down.
the kids are older.
work’s less intense.
we’re coping better.

But self-kindness isn’t all bubble baths and spa days, it’s a way of relating to yourself.

It can look like:

• not attacking yourself for feeling overwhelmed

• noticing when the mental load is tipping into too much

• making decisions based on sustainability, not guilt

• extending the same understanding to yourself that you give everyone else
  

I developed the Self-Kindness Matrix as a practical tool to help surface where we’re already showing ourselves kindness, where self-unkindness has become invisible, and where small, realistic shifts can make a meaningful difference without adding another thing to the list.

Because unless we interrupt the habit of self-unkindness, we stay stuck on the hamster wheel, telling ourselves “it’ll be better after this term / this project / this phase”.

It rarely is.

Fulfilment Without Burnout: Why Balance Isn’t the Answer

The goal isn’t perfect balance (it doesn’t exist).
Neither is “work–life integration”.

The goal is fulfilment without burnout.

That comes from living in a way that’s honest about your reality, aligned with your values, and kind enough to be sustainable.

That might mean:

• going all-in on work for a period, without beating yourself up

• deliberately pulling back somewhere else

• moving tasks to a partner, family member or friend; or removing them altogether

• redefining success so it actually feels like yours

You don’t need to survive your life.
You get to shape it.

If this resonates, remember: you are not broken, failing or the only one feeling this way. You are navigating an archaic system that expects far too much.

So I invite you to flip the narrative from having it all to living your all. Not about doing less or caring less, but about stepping into what really matters to you, right now, with self-kindness as the foundation.

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About Kim: Supporting Working Mums to Build Sustainable Success

I’m Kim, a coach, working mum, former HR leader and founder of Kindness for Success. I support overwhelmed, ambitious working mums to reduce the mental load, redefine success on their own terms, and move from frantic to fulfilled, without sacrificing their wellbeing.

If you’d like to explore what your all could look like:

• Kindness Kickstarter: a complimentary 60-minute 1:1 session, book HERE.

• Frantic to Fulfilled: my small-group programme for mums ready to build sustainable success

You can also subscribe to The Kindness Chronicles, my newsletter for honest reflections and practical tools for modern working motherhood, with self-kindness at the heart.