The Hidden Causes of Mom Burnout: 3 Patterns Setting You Up for Exhaustion in 2026

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In this week’s episode of the podcast, I’m breaking down the three deeply rooted patterns that quietly lead ambitious working moms straight into burnout — the ones you don’t even recognize because they feel so normal. I walk you through why these patterns show up, how they drain your energy and joy, and what needs to shift if you want 2026 to feel calmer, more spacious, and actually aligned with your priorities. If you’ve been ending your days exhausted or feeling like you’re carrying the world on your shoulders, this episode will help you finally understand why — and what to do about it next.

Topics in this episode:

  • The real reason burnout builds without you noticing 

  • The 3 patterns keeping working moms overwhelmed 

  • How mindset + emotion shape your daily habits 

  • Why changing a few core beliefs unlocks real balance 

  • What you must shift in 2026 to feel present, rested, and in control

Show Notes & References:

Transcript

Intro

Here's the truth. Burnout doesn't just happen. It builds slowly and quietly through patterns we almost never notice while we're in them. If you're ending this year feeling stretched thin, resentful, or like you're constantly pouring from an empty cup, you're not alone. And most importantly, you're not doing anything wrong.

In this episode, I'm sharing three deeply rooted patterns that push working moms towards burnout long before they realize what's happening. These are the patterns that make you ignore your needs, override your limits, and keep you pushing long after you've run out of steam. And once you name the pattern, you can actually change them.

If 2025 took more from you than it gave, this episode is your invitation to take your power back. Heading into 2026, are you ready to dig in? Let's get to it.

Welcome to the Ambitious and Balanced Working Moms podcast, your go to resource for integrating your career ambitions with life as a mom, I'm distilling down thousands of coaching conversations I've had with working moms just like you, along with my own personal experience as a mom of two and sharing the most effective tools and strategies to help you quickly feel calm, confident, and in control of your ambitious working mom life. You ready? Let's get to it.

Hello. Hello, working moms. I am writing this podcast episode on a very brisk December morning as I am taking a walk and really thinking about you and thinking about all the extra things that happen during the holiday season and like, what's really going to help you right now. Right? I want to help you not just have an amazing holiday, but have a really amazing, ambitious and balanced 2026 as well.

Why You Can’t Wait Until January to Make Changes

And so that's what we're doing right now in this episode, and really through the month of December here on the podcast and in my ambitious and balanced community. We are talking about setting ourselves up for success in the coming year. Because if you wait till January 1st to really start thinking about the habits and behavior changes that you really want to make in life and how you really want to live, like you're going to be behind when January 1st comes along, right?

And so last week on the podcast, we talked about the three signs that indicate that you are likely going to head into burnout in 2026 unless you change some things, and they're not the usual ones. So you're probably going to want to go back and listen to that at certain some point.

Your 2026 Reset and Holiday Strategy Support

And I also announced last week if you heard that I am leading a 2026 Reset workshop. That's going to be this upcoming Thursday, December 11th at 1:00pm Eastern time. Yes, there's going to be a replay, but you're going to want to sign up in order to get the link to that. And I really want to encourage you to come live. This workshop is going to be taught by me. There will be time for question and answer. There'll be time for some coaching, some special things if you show up live. So you're going to want to make some time for that this upcoming Thursday the 11th. And be sure to invite some working mom friends as well.

I am also still taking a few holiday strategy calls. These are one on one calls with me. They're 30 minutes long. We're talking about having balance and sticking to boundaries during the holiday season. I tailor that conversation to you. All these things to say, there is so much opportunity for you to get support right now. All of those links are in the show notes to the 2026 Reset workshop, to the balance and boundaries holiday call. You're going to want to sign up for both of those if you have not already.

The Patterns That Must Change for a Truly Balanced 2026

But that leads us to the topic that we are going to dive into here today, which is really about identifying the patterns that need to change in 2026 in order for you to deprioritize work while still feeling and being really successful. So that you can walk in from the office into your home life without feeling like you are still in work mode and you're able to actually be fully present with your kids even at the end of the long workday. And so that there's time on your calendar for you to take care of yourself and have more fun and laugh more. That is what an ambitious and balanced life really is.

And what I like to tell my clients is that we all tend to live in about three patterns, if you will, that sort of get in the way of us experiencing that ambitious and balanced life that we want. This has at least been my experience with my clients, right? Like I've coached literally over 250 working moms in helping them find balance. And I find that we identify just a handful of patterns that we have to work on in coaching together to really help them achieve their goals and their ambitious and balanced life that they want.

Why Change Feels Overwhelming (and Why It Doesn’t Need To)

And the reason I say this is because I know so many women out there that are experiencing signs of burnout or exhaustion or stuckness. Like when we start to really dig into what's going to be required in order for them to achieve their work life balance goals and be more present for themselves and their family. Like, when we really dig into that and figure out what it's going to take for them to live life the way they want to live, and the habit changes that are going to be required, right? They start to get really, really overwhelmed because it feels so big and it feels so hard and it feels like so many things have to change in the process.

You Don’t Need to Change Everything — Just a Few Key Patterns

But the reality is, for most women, we don't really need to change a whole bunch of things. We're not talking about like 20 things that need to change in order for you to achieve your goals and experience more balance. We're talking about just a handful of things, like key patterns that when you change them, you sort of open up this floodgate of possibility, right?

When you shift just these few key things that we're going to dive into here today, I'm going to explain it to you. I'm going to walk you all the way through that. But when you change these key patterns, everything becomes more manageable. The ability to prioritize differently, joy becomes more accessible to you, rest becomes more accessible to you, all because you really shifted at the core the things that needed to be shifted, right?

Doesn't that sound more manageable to you?

The Three Most Important Patterns You Must Change in 2026

So, just to be clear, now listen up. If you've sort of tuned out a little bit by this point, we are talking about the three most important patterns that you need to change in 2026 in order for you to achieve your work life balance goals. Okay?

So before we actually get into those three patterns, let me just talk about what the pattern is to begin with and why we even have them, right?

Why Patterns Form — and Why They Block Balance

If you have listened to this podcast for a while, you know that I talk about work life balance in a very practical way, right? I teach about the proper way to prioritize your time and yourself. I teach about systems and the importance of really having clear vision for yourself and goals and for your career goals and how important sort of that vision process is. I walk you through that. I teach you how to delegate. I teach you how to put up stronger boundaries, right?

There's very practical tools and strategies to achieve behavior change in your life. Because if you don't wake up tomorrow and actually do something differently in your life, then you're never going to achieve anything different, right? You literally—it's literally going to be Groundhog's Day tomorrow if you wake up with the same exact behaviors and habits that you have today.

However, to achieve behavior change, like in order to create new habits, to prioritize in a different way, to change the way you calendar, to actually hold to your boundaries, to actually take time for yourself and to not schedule over that time, and to stop working at night after the kids go to sleep—like, to actually make the behavior change in any sustainable way, you also have to change the fuel behind those behaviors, which is your mindset and your emotions. Right?

The Three Interconnected Patterns You Must Shift

These three things are all very interconnected. We know this from behavioral science, from, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy is based in this idea that our actions are all connected to our mindset and our emotions. And so when we're talking about patterns, I'm talking about changing the thoughts, feelings and behaviors, right? That is what is required in order to achieve sustainable work life balance. Sustainable being the key point there, right?

And that's what we're all about here in this ambitious and balanced community. I want you to learn how to prioritize yourself no matter what your circumstances are, no matter how busy life gets or what season we're in, or whether it's the holidays or Q4 or you're on vacation, right? I want you to feel absolutely in control of the way you spend your time, your energy and your goals all of the time. Right?

Okay, so let's dig into the three key patterns. That is your thoughts, emotions and behaviors, right, that need to change in 2026 in order for you to achieve work life balance in the way that you want, to avoid burnout and exhaustion.

Pattern #1: “It’s Just Easier If I Do It”

Okay, pattern number one. It's just easier if I do it. That's really the mindset, right? That's the thought. And this is both a people-pleasing thought and a perfectionist kind of thought as well.

Right? It's just easier if I do it because other people might do it wrong or I'm just gonna have to fix it anyway. It's gonna take more time for me to explain it, so I should just do it. Or, you know, I don't want to burden anyone else. They're already busy, it's the holidays, everyone's exhausted, so I'll just do it myself.

This mindset is how women become the default parent and the default emotional regulator in their family. Right? Because when you tell yourself it's just easier if I do it or they're gonna do it wrong or some flavor of that, when you tell yourself that, right? What's the most natural thing for you to do? To do it yourself.

You don't delegate. You don't teach someone else how to do it. You don't let other people take on the responsibility for doing it or not doing it. You say yes to too many things. You don't let other people fail and learn from it.

And while this might have worked well for you earlier on in your career and in your life, when demands were more manageable, now they're not. When you think, I'll just do it myself, you feel in control, right? Like you're in control of the outcome of what you're doing. You're in control of if you fail. You're in control of the timeline, hitting the deadline, all the things.

 

Sylvia’s Pattern of “I’ll Just Do It Myself”

My client, Sylvia, she had this deep, deep pattern of I'll just do it myself, right? She had a super demanding job, or has a super demanding job. She's been very successful in it. It requires a lot of time, a lot of mental energy. She absolutely loves what she does. She's the breadwinner of the family.

But because she lives in this pattern, I'll just do it myself — and really, it's like, I should do it myself, that's another flavor of that — because she lives in that mindset and in that pattern, she takes on so much.

How This Pattern Shows Up in Everyday Life

She believes that she's the one that should be making the kids' lunches every day. She believes that they need to be doing homemade meals every single day. She believes she's the one that should be in charge of all of the details of vacation planning, of when the dry cleaning gets done, who's taking care of the dog. You know, with the holidays, it's like, I should be baking cookies with them instead of buying store-bought cookies, right?

At work with her team, as her team has expanded and expanded, she hasn't found herself delegating as much as she needs to. She just thinks, I should be doing this myself. They're so stressed out, I'll just do it myself. And so she finds herself feeling more and more overwhelmed as work expands.

And the result of that overworking, right? She doesn't take time for herself. Her team doesn't actually take responsibility and learn what they need to do. Her husband wants to do more but doesn't. And so they're in this perpetual cycle of her being the bottleneck because she thinks and believes that she just needs to be doing it all.

What Happens When the Pattern Finally Shifts

Now, of course, since we've been working together, we've been able to identify that pattern and slowly start to change that pattern. I'm very happy to report that she's made massive progress, is much more likely to delegate these days, really figure out what's important to her, let her husband take on things, let the nanny take on things — all because she's been able to shift out of this mindset and this pattern of belief that she's had that has said she's supposed to be doing it all, like to be a good mom, to be a good leader, this is what she's supposed to do.

So pattern number one that needs to change in 2026 if you want to achieve sustainable work life balance is: I just got to do this myself or I should do it myself.

Pattern #2: “Everyone’s Happiness Is On Me”

Pattern number two, everyone's happiness is on me. Now, this is deeper than just caring too much, right? Believing that everyone's happiness is on you is sort of this belief that your kids' emotions reflect your success as a mom. It's the belief that your partner's stress is yours to fix. It's the belief that your parents' holiday experience depends on you or your kids' holiday experience and happiness depends on you. It's the belief that your coworkers' frustrations become your own responsibility.

Now, you might hear this and think, well, I don't really know if I believe that. I don't believe that I'm responsible for everybody's happiness. But I want you to take a moment and examine this pattern.

Do you feel like a bad parent when your kid is having a meltdown for no reason or acting out in the store or struggling in school? Are you feeling the pressure to make the holiday season magical for your kids, right? So much so that it sort of robs you of your own joy?

These are indicators that you might be living within this pattern.

When Your Child’s Emotions Feel Like a Reflection of You

I remember my client Kathy — she was on this podcast several years ago. Every time her daughter cried and had a meltdown, and if I recall, she was like three years old or so, so it's a common time for kids to have meltdowns, right? But every time her kid had a meltdown, she felt like she was doing something wrong.

Right? Oh my gosh, she shouldn't be melting down like this. Why is she on the ground kicking and screaming? How do I fix this? I must be doing something wrong, right? It's my job to get her out of this state. Every cry would sort of trigger this like, oh my gosh, I'm not doing enough, I'm not a good enough mom.

I myself still experience a flavor of this with my kids even as they've gotten older. It's been a pattern that I've really had to work on for a long time. Like, my daughter is 11 and when she is struggling with friends at school, for example, I just want to call their mom and fix it for her. Right? I just want to make her happy again, as if her happiness or her lack thereof is my responsibility.

How This Pattern Shows Up at Work

And of course, these are home examples. But the pattern happens at work as well, right? At work, do you say yes to most meeting requests because you don't want somebody to be disappointed or you don't want them to feel like they're less important, or that you're not prioritizing their request?

If other people are working late, do you feel more obligated to stay on and available so that they don't feel like they're alone and so they feel like you're a team player?

Right? How often do you accept a sort of last-minute meeting request that steals away your workday — so much so that you likely have to log back on later to just finish things up, finish the things that you were trying to accomplish for the day?

The Cost of Feeling Responsible for Everyone Else’s Emotions

Look, I know that not all of these behaviors are associated with feeling responsible for somebody else's happiness or somebody else's emotions. There could be other reasons as well. But if you're really honest with yourself, how often are you essentially coddling other people so that they don't feel disappointed, overwhelmed, unhappy, put out, or unprioritized?

Have you said yes, for example, to some holiday commitments that you really don't want to go to because you don't want them to feel like they're not important, you don't want them to be disappointed over the holidays? Right. These are all signs that, at least in some part, you have a pattern of feeling responsible for how everyone else feels around you.

When you feel responsible for how everyone else is feeling around you and you don't want people to be disappointed and you want to make sure everybody's happy, there's this sense of obligation and responsibility that you likely feel. And the result of that is that you say yes to too many things. You don't delegate. You don't stand up for yourself. You schedule over time that you maybe have set aside for your own work or for yourself in some way.

Right. Taking emotional responsibility for other people's emotions and wanting to make sure everybody is happy around you is a pattern that leads to burnout — and it has to change in 2026.

Pattern #3: When Productivity Becomes Your Measure of Worth

The third pattern I want to bring to your awareness is the connection between your productivity and your worth. Right. It sounds a lot like, I should really be doing more or I should be doing it faster or I should be further ahead by now, right? All of these are really flavors of the same thing where your worth and your value and how you're viewing yourself is through the lens of how much you do, how fast you do it, and how well you do it.

And to be honest, this sort of pattern is like conditioning that at least in America starts really, really young, right? We are taught at a young age that more is better, achieving more is better, higher grades are better, doing it faster is better. And while of course none of these things are bad things in and of themselves, the problem is when those things become intertwined with how you view yourself, right? When your identity and your value become intertwined with how much you do and how well you do it.

The Rest Guilt That Keeps You Stuck in Overdoing

I had a client just the other day — I think it was in the Ambitious and Balanced cohort call, one of them recently — who said she sort of feels this deep sense of failure whenever she sits down to rest. When if she's not in this constant state of motion, checking something off of the list, then she is feeling like she's doing something wrong, right?

In other words, she's failing because there just always is more to do. And so she always feels like she should be doing something at any given time. And you can imagine what happens with this pattern. If you can't rest and you can't prioritize yourself or you feel extra guilty when you do that, you're probably not going to do that on a regular basis.

Why This Pattern Makes Balance Nearly Impossible

And scheduling in time for things that are fun and indulgent and leisurely becomes almost non-existent because those things ultimately don't feel productive. Right?

So in a balanced life, there are times that you work and there are times that you don't. There are times that you are productive and there are times that you rest. It is essential to have rhythms of both. So if you're in a constant pattern of feeling like you're not doing enough, that you should be doing more, you're kind of a hyper doer. Unless you change that, it's going to be very difficult for you to create any sort of work life balance in a sustainable way.

I'm not doing enough, I should be doing more — it's a pattern that needs to change in 2026. Okay?

The Three Patterns Standing Between You and Real Balance

So we've identified three key patterns that need to change here in order for you to not end your day always feeling exhausted. For you to walk into your home life at the end of a busy workday and still have energy and presence to be with your family or so that you have a calendar that actually reflects your actual priorities, like time for yourself and your health and maybe even some fun where your internal dialogue feels more supportive and positive and you're feeling more balanced and happy in your life.

Three key patterns that need to change in order for you to unlock those things.

You’re Not Alone — These Patterns Are Learned, Not Personal Failures

Now listen, if you relate to any of these patterns, please know you are not alone. I wouldn't be talking about it as a universal truth almost if that weren't true, right? These are not personal flaws. These are structural, socialized, learned, and survival patterns that maybe at one time served you, but will no longer serve you if you want to achieve the ambitious and balanced life that you want.

The good news is that when you identify your specific patterns, that is really the first step to changing them, right? If we don't identify what those are, we can't do anything about them. Because true work life balance doesn't begin with your calendar. It begins with you identifying your beliefs and internal rules that you've been living by that don't serve you anymore.

Your Next Step: The 2026 Reset Workshop (Free + Live Coaching)

So if you want to learn more about how to actually shift out of these patterns, please please sign up for this week's workshop, the 2026 Reset. It's taking place on Thursday, December 11th at 1 Eastern Time. That's 10am Pacific Time. You're definitely going to want to show up live if you can for some Q and A, for some coaching. There's going to be a replay though of course if you can't make it or if you can't make it to the whole thing. You will find a link to that in the show notes. The workshop's totally free.

And if you are looking for a bit more one on one support — like you found that Thanksgiving was really challenging for you and you could really, you just use a really customized conversation — I am still offering a few balance and boundaries holiday calls. These are 30 minute calls with me where we are really going to dive in specifically to what's going on for you and what it's going to take for you to feel present and joyful over the holidays. You can find the URL for that in the show notes as well.

You Deserve an Ambitious and Balanced Life Right Now

Working moms, there is so much support for you but right now you do not have to settle, you do not have to stay stuck, you do not have to grit and bear it until vacation. You deserve the ambitious and balanced life right now. I'm here for you.

Keep showing up to this podcast. Share it out to some friends that you know that could use support this upcoming week and during this holiday season and moving into 2026, I've got you. So until next week, let's get to it.

Your Free Daily Kickstart

If you wake up most days spinning with a hundred different priorities vying for your attention, then the Daily Kickstart is exactly what you need. It's a simple six step process that helps you get your thoughts out of your head, reset your mindset and refocus on what actually matters.

It's designed to help shift you out of overwhelm and into confidence — calm, confident action — before the chaos hits. This daily practice is the same tool I offer to all my clients and it's going to show you exactly how to lead your day instead of react to it.

It takes just 10 minutes a day and the impact will ripple through everything: your mood, your energy, your presence with your kids, and how you lead at work. My clients indicate time and time again that this tool was the one that made the biggest difference for them and I'm offering it to you totally free.

You can download it by going to www.ambitiousandbalanced.com/dailykickstart. And of course, I'll have that for you in the show notes as well.

All right, working moms, let's get to it.

Rebecca Olson