Can You Opt Out of the Anxious Style of American Parenting?

I tried, and this is what happened.

You can’t see it in this pic, but I might have a white-knuckle hold on balance and happiness.

“There’s an Ongoing Naturalization of Parenting as Exhausting and Stressful, Particularly for Mothers,” writes cultural studies professor and notable Culture Writer Anne Helen Petersen in this week’s edition of her “Culture Study” Substack.

Petersen is referring to the recent Pew Research Center study on American Parenting.

Can you relate? I can relate. As an exhausted and stressed-out mom in the US, I moved my family—my American husband and three boys nine and under—to my native Scandinavia, the world’s happiest and most balanced place, to learn another way to do this.

What I discovered in our five months in Finland was so life changing, that I started this Substack (first one here) as I way to share Scandinavian mindfulness and lifestyle hacks so we can stop naturalizing the exhaustion and stress, and cultivate Nordic-style balance and bliss anywhere we are.

What I find so fascinating about Petersen’s piece is that what she suggests as a solution to the exhaustion and stress is very much in line of how I decided to do this thing called motherhood upon returning back to the US.

But, I quickly realized, changing things just for our family did little in the larger context of our lives—as the social landscape around us wasn’t always as interested in these little life upgrades as we were. Let’s unpack this.

“Concerted Cultivation” Style of Parenting

Reflecting on the PEW study results, Petersen says that the stressful American parenting experience is especially true for “bourgeois parents”—which, without connotations, essentially means middle and upper class parents—whose parenting style could be defined as “concerted cultivation”: “loaded schedule of activities, “playdates,” enrichment, and, eventually, an overarching orientation towards elite college placement.”

This rings very true. Even though I grew up in Scandinavia, I had my children in New York City, after which we have continued our American journey in Connecticut: two places where one could say, parenting is concerted cultivation on steroids.

When I compared my Stateside parenting experience (and really, entire lifestyle, including work) to my Nordic friends, I couldn’t quite understand why they didn’t seem that exhausted, or bothered by so many demands. Why did they look so stress-free?!

I mean, weren’t we all supposed to be burned out—while boasting about our never-ending 24-7 mom-hero, have-it-all, do-it-all, all-sacrifice but all-worth-it lifestyle not just to everyone around us, but also on social media?

In her Substack, Petersen suggests a seemingly simple answer to this phenomenon—which is also what I found to be the reason Scandinavian moms, and parents, don’t feel that stressed out or feel the need to push themselves and their kids so hard:

“If we want parenting to be easier, less fearful, less exhausting, and more rewarding for all — then bourgeois parents have let go of their white-knuckle hold and, quite frankly, do less of it.” She adds: “I can understand how hard and abstract this advice can feel — and how we’ve been socialized to understand “less” as somehow “letting kids fall behind.”

Can Less be More, in the US too?

A valid counter argument to this is that in Scandinavia—where countries offer the best benefits in the world to parents and kids—you can’t really “fall behind.” So, it doesn’t really matter if you do less. But, let’s assume that for the American middle and upper classes, to a certain extent, “falling behind” doesn’t mean you can end up in the gutter, but rather it means not keeping up with the rest, or the parents.

Then, what happens, if you stop trying to keep up?

Upon returning back to the US, I continued my newly adopted Scandinavian philosophy of just enough, nothing too much, and actually stopped trying to keep up.

How did it go? I must say, leaning into the balance, and out of the “concerted cultivation” has been much harder than I had hoped it would be.

6 Week Update on 3 Ways of “Doing Less”

Based on the PEW study, these are some of the reasons parenting is anxiety-ridden and overwhelming in the US. And here’s how I tried to override them:

Getting Dads Involved: sharing Childcare Tasks

I wrote about this at length here. In an effort to more equally share the visible and invisible work related to our three boys, my husband and I agreed he will take on school related tasks this year, and sports scheduling.

As soon as we got back to the US, I was—kindly, I must add—added to “mom” text chains for school and sports. I was immediately welcomed back—into the mom mix. I suggested we add dads to the groups as well—and it didn’t go down so well.

I mistakenly assumed that other moms, like me, might welcome the change, and wanted to not only share more of those tasks, but perhaps naturalize more of dads’ involvement—and I also knew my husband might be more motivated if he wasn’t the only dad.

It was suggested to me that dads wouldn’t have the time, or the interest, to participate, and a few of my dear friends, when prodding a bit more as to why, said that it was them, the moms, who always handle all of the family scheduling and school stuff, that “you just get it done,” and you “tolerate it”. And look, I understand this view point well. It’s how I used to think.

I must say I momentarily felt bad by not wanting to “tolerate it” anymore, and perhaps, after living in Scandinavia, I no longer felt it needed to be “my job” and that it would be OK if I—by taking that off my plate—use that time to pursue my work instead or even just relax.

Maybe, we are not at the stage where we can be normalize the “class dad text chain” or dads doing family scheduling yet, but even opening these conversations in our own family, can lead to more balance—if you crave it.

Easing Education Goals

We are in a tremendously lucky position to have been able to consider both public and private elementary schools for our children, and recently toured many.

I wrote about trying to find a school for my kids in the US last week here, inspired by how my kids mainly just played in their school in Finland—which I wrote about here. (Learning later and learning through play is largely credited to Finland’s outstanding results as the one of the best education systems producing the best results in the world in the international PISA rankings).

In short, I surprised—shocked—many an administrator and principal by asking if we could essentially deprioritize academic excellence by prioritizing happiness, knowing that the two don’t cancel each other out:

“In this school environment, could my child just enjoy learning, and could we not put that much emphasis on performance and test scores, and could he get by without having tutors outside of school hours, which are common, to boost academic performance?”

While every school wants their students to be happy, the more relaxed attitude on learning was a concern to most schools I talked to: I was frankly told that it would either likely or definitely make them “fall behind”.

While I feel confidence in the Scandinavian way of learning, these educator responses were terribly concerning to my American husband, who, having grown up here and having found success in the American system, had more faith in that. Are we playing dice with our kids, if, in the US, we opt for “less”?

More Free Play vs. Daily Activities

Also, after returning back to the US, we cut down our kids’ scheduled activities to one of their favorite sports each. I figured, it would be fun for them to have more time to just play with their friends after school, ideally outside, Nordic style—something they loved doing in Finland. Except that, near us, in the US, when you reach the ages of 7-9 years old, with very few exceptions, no other friends are available to play. They are all in scheduled activities. And, just scheduling a friend to come over to play—became a massive job in itself.

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Will I continue trying to do less?

My efforts to continue my newly achieved anxiety and overwhelm-free lifestyle, and to apply my Scandinavian lifestyle hacks into our American day to day, are clearly easier said than done. But, I do see that, even if my progress to do less—to just “be more”, to enjoy life and parenting more, to avoid exhaustion, and to feel less stress—is slow, it’s still progress.

I’m hopeful and confident that as I keep normalizing new ways of living my—our—life with Scandinavian mindfulness, I’m also providing a way for others to dip their toes into this too, to see if it could be a fit, and provide them too with more balance and bliss.

Sometimes though, just like with a cold plunge—which I persuaded a new American mom acquaintance to try with me today—you just gotta go all in at once: breath through the initial discomfort and shock your body and mind to happiness.

Can’t wait to discuss this with you! What feels more comfortable, doing less or doing more? Will kids miss out (in the US) and fall behind if you do less? Can doing less also set kids up for success—and get moms into the stress-free zone?

Please consider sharing this with your friends and social circle—for less anxious motherhood for all:-) Thank you!

x Annabella, come find me on Insta for more.