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Maternal Gatekeeping And The Law-Mom

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts on motherhood in the legal profession, in partnership with our friends at MothersEsquire. Welcome Jamie Szal back to our pages. Click here if you’d like to donate to MothersEsquire.

Seven minutes into Episode 6 of Mrs. America (riveting show — go watch it!), feminist activist and head of the White House Office of Women’s Programs Jill Ruckelshaus returned home from a long day on the road to promote the Equal Rights Amendment. Instead of actually relaxing on the couch, however, she instead immediately began to worry that her husband had not properly taken care of their children in her absence. “Let me just …” she started to say, getting up from the couch. Her husband retorted, “If you want me to be in charge of the kids, you have to let me be in charge.”

That scene shot through me like an arrow.

I am one of the mere 22% of professional women who are married, mothers, and working while their spouse remains at home. A large motivation in my writing on motherhood is to help normalize the mother-as-breadwinner dynamic. To that end, you may have picked up on a theme to my articles: trusting your work-from-home partner. Confession time: it was so much easier to implicitly trust my husband and his parenting style when I worked outside of the home.

I recently came across the term maternal gatekeeping, which refers to moms who unconsciously discourage their partner by criticizing or casting doubt on the partner’s parenting, and trying to take over child care.

(Cue me, sheepishly raising my hand in admission of guilt.)

Pandemic parenting made my gatekeeping tendencies worse.

I thought the first few weeks of the pandemic were fantastic. I was home! I could help! (subtext: I know how to do this better). For instance, I tried to take over potty training, shouting from the home office, “Lady, pooping is awesome! Make a huge poop, and I’ll come put you down for naptime!” I tried to take over naptime, rushing upstairs to put her down. I set up awesome baking soda and vinegar experiments in the middle of the kitchen. It was great, or so I thought.

I have this vivid memory, about a month into the pandemic, of my husband saying to me in exasperation, “Just go back to work! Let me handle this. This is what we do every day.” Duly chastened, I retreated to our home office. Out of sight, out of mind for the toddler, right?

Recently, however, I asked him out of curiosity, what was it really like to have me home? I want to share a few of his thoughts.

Having me trying to butt in all the time was, he sheepishly shared, annoying.  It shook our daughter out of her routine. She wanted more of my attention, which I could not give her because I needed to work. So much drama ensued — she was crabbier, and cried more. She did not understand why I needed to go back to work. Toddler tantrums made his day and his role as a parent so much harder.

Remember those few times I tried to put her down for naps? Was it a successful effort? Heck no. The few times I attempted to put her down resulted in a toddler that refused to nap. As every pandemic parent learned quickly, the golden hours of naptime are sacrosanct. It is when we all accomplish actual work in a concentrated block of time. But because I disrupted our daughter’s routine, thinking that I could do naptime better, I ruined the golden hour for my husband, and his job.

Having me home and butting in left him irritated. It messed up what he was trying to do as a father. I distracted our daughter, which caused him to struggle to finish whatever task was at hand. Take, for instance, my not-so-helpful shouts of poop encouragement. Not once did they actually bring about the desired bowel movement. Instead, they brought on new wails of “I want my mama!” prolonging the already painful experience for everyone involved.

He also grimaced at the mere mention of my “helpful suggestions.” My husband found my helpful hints anxiety-inducing. The idea that he would have to deal with a nap-striking toddler off her routine gave him angst.  Needless to say, dealing with something that would inevitably cause even more disruption to his routine was not at all of interest.

My suggestions, he felt, were also far too involved. He saw every suggestion as requiring him to clean up a huge mess at the end (he’s right) and simultaneously deal with a cranky toddler (probably also right). The experiments or games were a lot of work for very little gain, in his opinion.  His approach to parenting is so much simpler than mine. I don’t mind cleaning up the big mess after a fun experiment. He would much rather have her out in the yard with the dogs hunting for frogs and chasing chipmunks.  Just as tactile. Just as engrossing. Just as likely to lead to shrieks of toddler joy. Far, far less mess. Far more in line with his philosophy of simplicity.

I admittedly hope that writing about my family dynamic, with me as the breadwinner and my husband as the caretaker, helps normalize the conversation for families like ours. But after all my “trust your partner” pep talks, to hear and acknowledge that I interfered was humbling. It took about a month for me to realize that the best thing for my family was for me to back off and get out of the way. Hard as it was, in complete honesty I will treasure the extra time with my toddler that working from home world has given me.  But going forward, I am working on taking my own advice: trust your partner.

Before I close, I would be remiss not to acknowledge the privilege I have to be able to have learned this lesson in the first place. The other lesson this pandemic has reinforced for me is the incredible strength of my fellow law-moms who are raising their children without supportive partners like mine.  Their dedication to work and family throughout these times is inspiring.


Jamie Szal is an attorney at Brann & Isaacson, where her practice focuses on assisting businesses in all aspects of state and local tax controversy, from audits and administrative proceedings through civil litigation. Jamie actively volunteers with the alumni network and Women’s Leadership Council of her alma mater, Trinity College, as well as actively participates in MothersEsquire, the Women’s Law Section of the Maine State Bar Association, and serves on the board of a dental-services non-profit in Maine. Outside of work, Jamie enjoys raising her fiercely independent, impish daughter; singing; and hiking around Maine with her husband, daughter, and dogs.