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- [Announcer] Middle Ground
is a social experiment
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that brings humans with
opposing beliefs together.
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Please see the humanity
in each participant
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and as always, we encourage empathy.
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- There is a study that
showed like being a mother
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is two and a half full-time jobs.
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Like, we have to have
grace with ourselves,
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we have to, otherwise,
how will we get through?
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(gentle music)
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- [Moderator] Step forward
if you agree with the prompt.
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I envy the other side.
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- I got pregnant really young.
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I had my first baby at 19.
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I've never known a life as an adult
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without being a single working mom.
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Have I always wanted the
opportunity to stay home?
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100%, oh my gosh, like that
would be a dream come true.
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- My mom has always
been a stay-at-home mom
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and her marriage ended and she
had nothing to fall back on.
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So I always grew up saying, you know,
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I'm not gonna be a
stay-at-home mom, you know,
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I'm going to go to work.
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Me currently now, I just had my first son,
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not too long ago.
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I wanted to go back to work.
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My boyfriend, he works
in a corporate world,
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so he's able to take care of everything,
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and he told me, you need to stay at home.
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And I'm just like what?
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- I was working while I
was pregnant with my first.
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I let them know, you know like hey,
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so you guys are gonna have me back, right?
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And then I hit him up
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like a couple of months
after I have my first
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and they're like, we've
replaced you with somebody else
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and I was like, oh, dope, all right.
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We never really decided I was
gonna be a stay-at-home mom.
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It just kind of happened that way.
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I'm Dorys, and I'm a stay-at-home mom.
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I've lost a lot of friends to motherhood.
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As soon as I had the baby,
like people drop like flies,
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like everyone was at the baby shower.
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Everyone was at the wedding.
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Everyone was at this and that
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and as soon as the baby came, boop,
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they just dipped on it outta there.
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- [Moderator] And can we have
the disagreers step forward.
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- I was working when I
was pregnant a year ago
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and I let my partner know, I
don't wanna go back to work.
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I wanna bond with my child
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like I wanna be able to breastfeed.
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And then I did go back to work,
but I just couldn't do it.
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I'd rather deal with
my baby yelling at me,
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throwing stuff at me than
the customer, you know?
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So I was just like, I
can now let the job know.
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I was like, yeah, you know,
I'm just not gonna come back.
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- I'd have to say I'm very fortunate
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in the aspect of that I
have a flexible schedule
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as long as I work 40 hours a
week, you know, that's good.
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So I don't have to miss, you know,
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if my daughter has a presentation
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or it's bring your mom for
gingerbread house making
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for Christmas, you know.
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I find so much joy
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and again, I'm very fortunate
to be passionate about my work
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and love it that it doesn't
seem like work at times.
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And I can come home when needed.
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My name's Megan, and I'm a working mom.
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As a working mom,
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I take care of my mental
health by going to therapy.
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I take breaks when I
can by walking my corgi.
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I love the outdoors and
just listen to my body
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when I need a break.
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- [Moderator] Children need
a mother more than a father.
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- Of course, it's always nice
for Kids to have both parents
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and I'm sure there's wonderful
families with, you know,
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single parents or maybe a single father,
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but at least in those early years,
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I was more intuitively
connected with my children.
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I breastfed for four consecutive years
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which obviously a father cannot do.
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And that was a big part of the connection
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that I had with my children.
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And there is just something so fundamental
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about out being a mom
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and the connection that
you have with a child
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that is irreplaceable, so.
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- It's very important for the father
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to bond with the baby as well,
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not just the mother, you know.
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My mom was married to her husband
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which is not my father,
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but growing up I longed
for my father a lot.
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It's really important to have both sides.
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Even though I had a stepfather there,
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it's like, in a way
it's not really the same
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because I yearned for the connection.
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- I'd have to agree with that.
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I lost my husband been when I was pregnant
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with our second child to suicide.
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She'll just see photos of like her father.
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She'll never have a connection with him.
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And that, that kills me.
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Men are just as important.
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And also, you know, there's,
you know, gay parents
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we have caretakers, you know,
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it doesn't matter the sex,
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that person needs to
be in the child's life.
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- I was divorced when my
oldest had just turned three
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and my youngest was seven months old.
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And you know, my husband
decided that he wanted to leave
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and that was extremely
hard and extremely tough,
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but I was so determined to
keep a cordial relationship
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with their dad.
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They go see him like one evening a week
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and it's very important
for the girls to see
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that even though relationships don't work
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and even if you do end
up becoming a single mom,
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that you can still have a
cordial and a good relationship
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with the person that's gonna
be in your life forever.
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- Question.
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- [Kayla] Yeah.
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The arrangement that you have with your ex
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is that because he can
only do one day a week?
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- He could do more.
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- Oh, okay.
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- I've picked my battles.
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At one point in time
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you're gonna look back
and you're gonna realize
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some of the things he's missed out on
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and unfortunately, that's gonna be on you.
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- Yeah, you can't make that up.
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- I'm Kayla, and I am a working mom.
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I do feel a lot of pride
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in the fact that I can raise my children
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while still providing fully for
them by being a working mom,
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but it doesn't ever take
away the guilt that I feel
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about having to leave them to go to work.
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It will continue to be an ongoing struggle
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that I have to deal with internally,
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but I feel like I'm slowly
making peace with it.
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- [Moderator] I am providing
a good example of motherhood
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to my child.
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- It's me who pays the bills.
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It's me, who, you know,
got the house for us.
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I take pride in that and
also my work, you know.
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I work in social services
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and I love coming home and
telling my children what I saw
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because it's all real life
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and telling them to be
grateful for what they had.
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And yes, we've been through,
you know, loss in our family.
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Being a widow at the
age of 22, I'm 25 now.
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I didn't want others taking care of me
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and I know that's not what
my husband would want.
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And I'm again, proud out of my
work so my children can see.
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- [Anu] You should be proud.
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- Yeah you should be.
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- I think I'm conflicted about this one
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because I was raised
by a stay-at-home mom.
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So I wanna give them the
stay-at-home mom experience
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without compromising on my career path,
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but there's a cost to everything,
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and one of the costs is
I'm always stressed out.
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Am I setting a good precedent
by trying to do it all?
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Or should I scale it back?
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Or is scaling back showing them
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that you have to scale
back when you're a mother?
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So it's, there's a lot
of internal conflicts
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so I don't know if I have a
good yes or no answer, but.
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- I haven't been able to
successfully get that balance
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between work and my life at home,
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and I feel so bad because like you said,
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I feel like I take it out on her.
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And I love her so much
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and I just don't want her to feel
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like I'm upset with
her, cause it's not her
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and I know it's not her,
but I'm working towards it.
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But I'm really hoping that I
can do that for her one day.
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- And even just being open
at an age appropriate level
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because I think everybody feels the guilt
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of losing their patients with their kids.
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Mom's human and saying sorry.
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- She knows you love her.
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There was a study that
showed like being a mother
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is two and a half full time jobs.
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So like we have to have
grace with ourselves.
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We have to, otherwise
how will we get through?
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- [Moderator] I am working
toward my dream life.
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- Well, me and my fiance,
we both work full time.
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We're both trying to help
each other move forward
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in our career so that
we can have enough money
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so that I can stay at home
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and be a stay-at-home
mom with my daughter.
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- I actually started
working a housekeeping job
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when my oldest was three
months old in a hospital
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and I've worked my way up
over the past nine years.
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I feel very accomplished,
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but I've never wanted
to work in a hospital.
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(laughter)
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Like that was never
something I wanted to do.
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I was about to go to like
an acting observatory
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and then I found out I was
pregnant a month later.
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And I'm really lucky my two, my two girls
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are also obsessed with theater.
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And so as long as, you know,
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as long as they still are into it
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that's something that we kind
of have as a dream together
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which is like really fun.
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But me working this job,
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even though it's not never
what I expected of myself
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it's still giving me a springboard
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to be able to pursue what
I'm more passionate about.
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- So I'm doing school online
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and taking care of our seven month old son
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while my boyfriend is
away and he comes home.
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He in a way is like, when I tell him
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like my dreams is to become a, you know
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a college profess and I'm a history major
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and I wanna get my PhD.
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And he goes, you could do, go to school
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and you think you can go to work?
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I say yes, I can.
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I can do whatever, like I set my mind to.
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I always wanted to work
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and show my son or show
even my little sister
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is like, even though
I'm a stay-at-home mom
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I'm still doing what it
takes to achieve my dream.
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My name is Aliya, and
I'm a stay-at-home mom.
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Do I miss life before motherhood?
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I can't give you a committed answer.
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It's complex cause I did feel, you know,
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that there was something
missing before motherhood.
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I feel like it made me more
clear minded of who is around me
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cause I feel like before,
maybe it was foggy.
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Didn't know my real friends,
my real family support system.
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I just feel like being a
mom now helps me understand
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who's on my team and
who is not on my team.
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- [Moderator] I was affected
by postpartum depression.
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- With my oldest daughter,
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people always talk about
like once you see your baby
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it's gonna be a love
you've never felt before
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and I didn't feel that, like I loved her
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and I knew that she was mine,
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but I didn't feel that
instant connection, like bond
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that everybody just talks so much about,
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and I felt so guilty.
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- For me from, with my
first, when she was born,
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I actually had the opposite experience.
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They brought it to me,
she latched on right away
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and then, you know, as
I was breastfeeding her
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she wasn't making eye contact with me
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and I was just, just little
things were starting to pile on
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that I was noticing about her
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that just kind of made me wonder
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like, huh, like, well,
that's a little different.
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So as she was getting older
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just little things kept piling on.
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And then finally she started
to verbalize a little more
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and then she had five words
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and then she stopped
talking out of nowhere.
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Not even sounds, like nothing
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and I was like, what is happening?
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I just spiraled out of control after that.
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I was so, I'd never
felt anything like that.
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Like I've always been prone to anxiety
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but I'd never felt depression.
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She's autistic, so when
we got the diagnosis,
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I was kind of like, oh my God, you know,
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like I was so relieved actually.
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Like I'm just glad that now I know
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that she is neurologically
diverse, you know.
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- Before I did my own research
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I had family members telling me like,
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oh, you're starving him.
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You're not feeding him enough.
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You need to put that in formula.
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He needs to drink four ounces.
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Like I'm not producing enough milk.
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I try to tell people like
most part of it it's real.
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Like I'm not just crying to
be crying, it's like a lot.
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It still takes a lot, like
I lost my hair, you know,
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I was like, oh my gosh
I'm going bald, I had acne
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and it's still like going on.
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And you know, people
like, oh, well, you know,
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Tiffany you look nice,
but I don't feel nice.
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I'm Tiffany, and I'm a stay-at-home mom.
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The most important thing a
mother can do for their child
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is show them love.
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There's people out there
that don't get love
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and childs that don't get love
end up hurting other people.
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- It's a privilege that I feel
like I don't even think about
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because I didn't have to experience it
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and my heart goes out to you guys.
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I do think having a support system helped
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in the early stages of postpartum.
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- I would have to say that
this whole conversation
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underlines something that I
feel very fortunate about.
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I had the usual like ups and
downs with having a baby,
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but I had an amazing support system.
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I think this is a cry
for help from all moms
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like we need support systems.
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We need, whether it's friends
or moms or whoever it is,
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but we need help, we need support.
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I'm Anu, and I'm a working mom.
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- [Moderator] Do you believe
the government provides
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adequate support for mothers?
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- Hell to the no. (laughs)
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There is no paid maternity leave.
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Like I wanna yell this from the rooftops.
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We have, you know, paid family leave
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for when you have a surgery
or when you have cancer,
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all kinds of things,
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but why are mothers not
given the same, you know,
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the same support.
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I think it's ludicrous,
I think it's in unfair
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and it's infuriating.
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- [Moderator] I've always
wanted to be a mom.
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- For me many years ago,
almost five years ago, I think,
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I was pregnant at first with someone.
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When I announced that I was,
he wasn't happy with it.
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A lot of people weren't happy with it
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and telling me, you know,
you need to get an abortion.
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You need to get an abortion.
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Giving me a phone to
call planned parenthood.
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And when I went to planned parenthood,
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she asked me from one to 10,
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how badly do I want this appointment?
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I told her I don't want
this appointment at all,
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but I was scared.
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So I went through it and I was traumatized
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cause I felt like a choice
was taken away from me.
00:16:08
So years later when I was
pregnant with my son, Jayden,
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it was a no brainer choice for me.
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I love my son.
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I love my heavens baby.
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And I'm happy I'm Jayden's mom.
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I wouldn't want it any other way.
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- [Megan] Jayden's got a great mom
00:16:28
and I'm really sorry that
your voice was taken from you.
00:16:32
No woman should ever have that
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and it should be ultimately our choice
00:16:36
whether we want a child or not.
00:16:38
- Thanks you guys.
00:16:39
- My girls are everything to me
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and they bring me so much joy
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and there's no place I'd rather be
00:16:45
than snuggling with them under a blanket
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and watching Encanto
for like the 25th time.
00:16:51
(laughter)
00:16:54
Yeah, it's a good script,
00:16:56
but like, I'm just again so
lucky that these kids are mine
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and I wouldn't trade
anything for the world.
00:17:03
- I, like I said before, I've
always wanted to be a mom.
00:17:05
So the fact that I am a mom it's amazing.
00:17:11
My name is Kayla, and I'm a working mom.
00:17:14
- [Moderator] What is your
greatest fear for your child?
00:17:21
- My greatest fear will be
her losing me or my fiance.
00:17:28
My cousins lost their mom, my aunt.
00:17:32
So consistently I think about that.
00:17:41
- So that's not to say I
don't wanna be a mom now
00:17:44
that I'm already a mom,
00:17:46
but I just, I never
thought about it, really.
00:17:49
I got pregnant and I
was like, I'm almost 30.
00:17:56
If there's any time to have a baby
00:18:00
I think this is a good age to have one at.
00:18:03
And I should probably
just keep it, and I did
00:18:08
and it was impulsive and
dumb, but I don't regret it.
00:18:12
I mean, I love my daughter, she's great.
00:18:15
Now that I'm on this like
self-improvement journey
00:18:17
I hope that I can be the
best mom that I could be
00:18:23
with the circumstances
that I've been given.
00:18:28
- [Moderator] That is a wrap
on the group discussion.
00:18:30
(moms applauding)
00:18:33
(gentle music)
