As I sat at the kitchen table, my daughter excitedly handed me a Mother's Day card she had made at school. “To the best mom ever,” it said. He went on to list Mom's favorite things. Next to Mom's favorite drink, she had written “wine.” I laughed, but inside I felt instantly ashamed and guilty. It struck me that my six-year-old daughter had grown accustomed to seeing me take the edge off my daily stress with wine. An ever-present glass of wine at the end of the day meant one thing to her: it was Mom's favorite drink. The way to deal with life as a mother. Mom's not-so-secret crutch.
That was six years ago.
Sarah Rusbatch has experienced first-hand how a glass of wine at the end of the day can turn into something more problematic.
This week I've been looking at the impact of heavy alcohol on Mother's Day. From catchy memes about “wine” to pajamas covered in wine bottles with the tagline “wine down time,” the message is clear: moms need alcohol to cope with the demands of their everyday lives. Being a mother requires wine as a reward.
Mother's Day has been insidiously intertwined with mummy wine culture and disguised as a cute, funny, female bonding novel. It's a culture that's not only normalized among moms, but actively encouraged, with Big Alcohol at the helm and plenty of moms who don't need to be told twice that they “deserve” that evening drink.
But the constant marketing of alcohol as a form of self-care, stress relief and an appropriate gift around Mother's Day creates a dangerous narrative.
Over the past 30 years, alcohol use disorder in women has increased by an alarming 84%. This disorder is defined as the consumption of 14 or more units of alcohol per week, roughly equivalent to a little more than a bottle of wine. If you're a gray area drinker, like I was six years ago, that's not a huge amount. Many mothers secretly drink much more than a bottle a week.
I know because it was me.
And now I see the consequences of Mummy Wine Culture's impact every day through the thousands of women I coach: anxiety, shame, burnout, and lost motivation. We don't have to be “alcoholics” for alcohol to still be stealing so much from our lives.
What is even more concerning is the impact Mummy Wine Culture is having on our daughters' role models. Research tells us that girls who grow up seeing their mothers use alcohol as a coping mechanism are four times more likely to develop an alcohol use disorder. They have never modeled healthy self-care. This highlights the intergenerational impact of unhealthy behaviors and the importance of setting positive examples for our children.
