Working Moms Are Still The Primary Caregivers And It's Exhausting

I'm a full-time work-from-home journalist and a full-time mom. My husband does shift work, so in addition to balancing the demands of my writing, I'm also the primary caregiver and the one who really keeps the household running (errands, meal prep, cleaning and laundry). Because I work from home, I'm lucky to have a more flexible schedule than my fellow 9-to-5 working moms. I also have one child. I know how demanding multiple children can be.

Working mothers like me who are juggling full-time writing with running a household aren’t alone. In 2022, 42 percent of Canadians aged 15 and up provided unpaid care to children or adults, and roughly six percent were 'sandwich caregivers' caring for both at the same time (about 1.8 million people).

Women are more likely to bear that load—seven percent versus five percent of men—spending almost twice as many hours per week on child care and domestic tasks. Among women aged 45 to 65, 72 percent are both caregivers and employed. Nearly a third have missed a full workday, and some have stepped back from promotions or even left jobs, all while their physical and mental well-being suffers under the weight of this double shift.

"For so many, the crushing weight of trying simultaneously to excel as an employee and as a mother creates a deeply painful and problematic experience where moms feel like they're failing at both jobs," said Christina Page, Founder and Clinical Director of Whole Family Psychotherapy. "In reality, the systems in our society simply aren't set up to support mothers—not as parents, and not as employees."

Socially constructed norms

When I was growing up, my mom worked part-time two days a week. She was the one who cooked and cleaned, who helped with homework and organized birthday parties and holidays, who took us school supply shopping and picked us up when we were sick.

Moms were the primary caregivers and weren't often working outside the home back then. These days, with the rising cost of living, it's almost essential that households have two incomes, and yet, the child-rearing duties still seem to be primarily on moms.

"I think societal responsibilities fall on the moms," said Ottawa mom Danijela MacNeil, who has two little ones and works full-time as a paralegal for the federal government. "I feel like you hold yourself to a high standard when you're working and fulfilling all the roles and responsibilities of being a mom. I work all day and come home, and sometimes feel like I'm snappy and my patience is thin, and there's not enough time to do it all. The problem is that society is set up in a way that we can't have stay-at-home moms like we used to. I bet a lot of women would love to stay home with their kids in their early years, but it's hard in 2025 for anyone to be a mom because you constantly have challenges, with yourself, at work, and at home. It can be isolating and very draining."

Prioritizing men's jobs

Not only are moms exhausted from the constant at-work and at-home workloads, but they are also struggling with excelling in any one area of their lives. Getting ahead at work is a challenge because employers often overlook busy mothers for promotions—they presume they can't handle the added responsibilities at work. Also, because men often make more, their jobs are given priority, both at work and at home.

Summer is a single mom of two living in St. Hubert, Quebec. She said she actually took a demotion from work to accommodate her parenting responsibilities. "I had to change my view on what kind of job I can do, whereas their dad doesn't have the same restrictions," she said. "The school calls me first when there's an emergency, and I miss work to bring them to appointments. I was working at a call centre, but because I was getting calls from school and leaving early, I was at risk of completely losing my job, so it's very hard to manage that. I asked for a more flexible role, and I am working my way back up." She's also attending school part-time to further her opportunities.

Summer said she is constantly having to prove she can do her job, even though she has kids, whereas her partner and coworkers aren't put into that situation. "The people who were promoted before me are the ones who are more available, stay later, and are free for lunches. As a society, we're behind in that sense. As women, we've been raised to take on more, and men haven't. We're expected to take care of things, and men have been told they have to provide. We haven't had the same shift in conversation in expectations of moms and dads."

Moms are working twice as hard for half the recognition, and it's taking its toll

Many working mothers feel like they have to work twice as hard as their male counterparts or child-free employees to "make up for" their dual role as primary caregiver. "Despite a push for parental equity in the mental and physical load of caring for children, mothers still carry a vastly disproportionate burden when it comes to care work," Page said.

"Even when mothers return to work full-time, they often continue to carry the majority of the responsibility for their children's medical appointments, sick days, school events, and emergency care, and employers know this. The unspoken understanding is that mothers will be the ones leaving early, taking calls from daycare, or staying home with the sick kiddo who has hand, foot and mouth for the third time in four months."

She continued, "There's this impossible bind for mothers where their childcare work isn't valued by society, and at work outside the home, they are penalized for their parental identity and undervalued as a result. For so many, this leaves them unable to feel successful in either arena and can lead to low mood and apathy, or hypervigilance and over-performing in an attempt to feel valuable, leading to burnout or health issues."

It's about self-care

Monday Girl is a career platform and professional networking community specifically designed for women, and member Katrina F. Nguyen, who is also a mom, has found the group to be extremely gratifying in helping her figure out her role as a working parent.

"Part of the confusion I had as I navigated through both motherhood and my career was, how much am I allowed to care about work before I become a bad mother?" she said. "In my personal circles, I never really had any close connections to women who were moms and also career-driven. I knew people who belonged to either group, but not both, so I was constantly feeling disillusioned by what my identity looked like trying to be both a 'good' mom and also a 'good' employee... it felt like I could only be one."

The balancing point was about discovering that she didn't have to fit into one title. "One of the greatest things you can do for your children is invest in yourself," she explained. "It isn't just about what you do in your career, in motherhood, or even outside of that. It's about who you are constantly becoming. I think it's valuable to show our children that we don't need to be confined to a singular purpose or identity. Having something that is 'mine' has helped shape me and empowered my confidence to show up exactly as I am in every room I enter. We can exist in many spaces as many different things, and it's actually a very beautiful thing."

MacNeil added, "I wish I had the choice to be one more than the other, but unfortunately, we need two incomes. And it bums me out because it's a lot. Anyone who is a working mom, that's amazing because you're doing three full-time jobs: managing the house, taking care of the kids, and actual work."

"It's exhausting, and for me, it's about having a good support system," Summer said. "I've really leaned on family and friends. It's so hard to get 'me time,' and my mission is to have one day a month to focus more on myself."