Why I Feel Jealous of Other Moms (And What Helps When It Hits)
Last Tuesday, I stood leaning against the elementary school fence waiting for my 7-year-old, my gas station coffee sweating through the paper cup onto my palm, a peanut butter smudge blurred across the front of my gray sweatshirt. I’d already remembered I forgot the extra leggings she’d begged me to pack for gym, so I was already braced for an after-school meltdown before I even saw her. Then Sarah pulled up in her spotless SUV, her two kids in matching hiking boots and crumpled but stain-free flannel, fresh off a three-day kayaking trip at the national park up north. She waved me over, showed me photos of her kids spotting a deer on the trail, mentioned her oldest just moved up two reading levels at his parent-teacher conference, and invited us to her class bonfire next weekend. I smiled and nodded, and that familiar, ugly little twist tightened in my gut. That’s jealousy. I don’t like admitting it, but it’s there, more often than I’d guess most moms talk about.
I drove home, my daughter chattering in the backseat about her glitter art project, and I could barely focus on the road. Why can’t I pull off weekend trips? Why can’t I remember to pack extra clothes, or organize a class bonfire, or have a car that doesn’t have crumbs from three weeks ago stuck in the cup holders? When we got inside, I dumped my bag and scrolled my mom group Instagram feed while she watched Bluey, and the feeling only grew. One mom posted her color-coded, labeled playroom storage system. Another posted hand-screen-printed birthday invitations she’d made for her kid’s party. A third posted that she runs five miles before her kids wake up every single morning. I locked my phone and sat on the couch, convinced I was the only mom who felt this petty, this inadequate.
A few months back, I’d admitted this messy little feeling to my friend Lila during a park playdate, and she laughed and said she feels jealous of me. I was shocked. Lila has a steady full-time job with a great salary, her kids go to the fancy summer camp every year, her house always looks like it’s straight out of a catalog. Turns out, she’s jealous that I work three days a week from home, so I’m almost never late for pickup, I never have to leave a school event early for a last-minute work call, and I get to sit in on my daughter’s weekly art class. I’d never even thought to see my messy, inconsistent part-time schedule as something someone else would want. I was too busy comparing my behind-the-scenes to her highlight reel.
That hit home even harder a few weeks ago at my daughter’s rec soccer game. I’d chased her off the field three times in 20 minutes because she’d rather pick daisies along the fence than chase a ball, and I was red-faced and embarrassed the whole time. I kept glancing over at Mrs. Henderson, whose son always scores the first goal, sits still the entire game, never causes a stir. I was so jealous of how easy it all looked for her. After the game, she walked over to me, and said, “I don’t know how you stay so calm. My son gets so anxious before every game he throws up, and I spend the whole week stressed about it. I wish he’d just run off and pick daisies like yours, no overthinking it.” I stood there blinking, because I’d never once considered that the thing I was embarrassed by was something she envied.
That’s when I started putting together small, simple things I do when jealousy hits, instead of just spiraling into shame. The first is a 10-second fact check. As soon as I feel that twist, I stop and name three specific things I know about that mom that don’t show up in the highlight reel. For Sarah, that’s 1) her oldest has a life-threatening peanut allergy, so she can never eat out or order takeout, ever, 2) she has chronic back pain from a car accident that makes sleeping in a tent absolutely miserable, 3) she told me last year she feels like she never gets 10 minutes alone, because she’s always managing everyone’s schedules and diets. It takes 10 seconds, and it immediately cuts through that vague, achy jealousy. I’m not pining for her whole life, just the 30-second highlight I saw.
The second thing I do is open my notes app and write one line answering one question: What do I actually want here? Nine times out of 10, it’s not the thing the other mom has. Last week, I felt jealous of a mom who posted that she does an hour of nightly read aloud with her kids, and I’m lucky if I get 10 minutes in before my daughter is bouncing off the walls and I’m ready for bed. I wrote the question down, and realized what I actually wanted was 15 extra minutes of quiet after my daughter went to bed, which I got by leaving the dishes in the sink and sitting on the porch with a soda instead of scrolling Instagram. Another time, I realized I was craving more spontaneous fun with my kid, so instead of planning a big expensive camping trip that would stress me out for weeks, we set up an old tent in the backyard, ordered pizza, and watched a bad cartoon on my laptop. It was perfect, and it took 20 minutes of effort.
Jealousy hasn’t gone away completely. I still feel that twist some days, like last night when I saw a mom post about her kid getting into the district gifted program, and I’ve been worrying about my daughter’s math fluency for months. But now I don’t just sit in shame about it. I know it’s not a sign I’m a bad mom, or that I hate other women. It’s just a little signal that something is feeling off for me right now. Some days I work through it in 2 minutes, some days I still feel rotten for an hour before I remember my own tricks. It’s just part of this messy job, I think. No one’s life is as neat as it looks from the fence line of the school parking lot.
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