Dr. Jessica Kaffer, PsyD

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Dr. Jessica Kaffer, PsyD

Maternal Mental Health and Wellness

Education, information, and insight on matters of pregnancy, postpartum, parenthood, work/life balance, and beyond.

12/29/2025

Chronic stress doesn’t just make life feel harder, it changes how the brain operates. Research in neuroscience shows that prolonged stress suppresses activity in the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for planning, focus, impulse control, and emotional regulation.

For many mothers, especially those carrying high mental and emotional loads, this means everyday tasks feel disproportionately difficult. Decision-making slows. Motivation dips. Emotional reactions feel closer to the surface. This is not a mindset issue. It’s a neurobiological response to sustained demand.

Studies show that when stress hormones like cortisol remain elevated over time, the brain shifts resources away from long-term thinking toward short-term survival. Understanding this helps reduce shame and redirects the focus toward regulation, support, and realistic expectations.

Your brain is not broken. It is adapting to load.

12/26/2025

Rest is often treated as something you earn after productivity. From a mental health and neuroscience perspective, that framing is backwards.

The brain does not set effective goals from a place of depletion. Chronic stress and fatigue impair the prefrontal cortex, the region responsible for planning, prioritizing, decision-making, and impulse control. When this system is taxed, goals become reactive. They are shaped by urgency, self-criticism, or external pressure rather than clarity and values.

Research consistently shows that rest improves the exact cognitive functions needed for meaningful change. Adequate recovery enhances working memory, emotional regulation, cognitive flexibility, and creativity. These skills allow you to evaluate what matters, adjust expectations, and create goals that are realistic and sustainable.

There is also strong evidence from behavior-change research that people are more likely to follow through on goals when they feel psychologically resourced. Motivation is not built through pressure. It grows when the nervous system feels safe enough to engage.

If goal setting feels overwhelming, unclear, or forced right now, that may not be a discipline problem. It may be a capacity problem. Rest is not avoidance. It is preparation.

Resting before resetting is not lowering the bar. It is aligning your goals with how the brain actually works.

12/24/2025

Many high-achieving women assume that if their goals feel harder, they must be doing something wrong. In reality, it is often their capacity that has shifted... not their motivation or ability.

Capacity is shaped by far more than time or discipline. It fluctuates with life stress, parenting demands, emotional labor, hormonal changes, grief, health, sleep, and the season of life you are in. Ignoring those factors doesn’t make you stronger... it makes you exhausted.

Letting goals fit your capacity does not mean giving up or “settling.” It means working with your nervous system instead of against it. Sustainable progress happens when goals are flexible, responsive, and grounded in reality, not when they demand constant output regardless of cost.

January does not require intensity. Some seasons are for building. Others are for maintaining, healing, or recalibrating. Ambition can coexist with care when goals are allowed to breathe.

You are not behind. You are adjusting. And that is a skill... not a failure.

12/22/2025

Every January comes with an unspoken demand to reinvent yourself. New habits. New body. New mindset. New productivity level. As if who you are right now is a problem that needs fixing.

From a mental health perspective, this kind of sudden transformation pressure often backfires. Research on behavior change consistently shows that growth happens through small, sustainable shifts over time, not drastic overhauls fueled by guilt or urgency. When change is driven by self-criticism, it rarely lasts. When it is driven by compassion and readiness, it has a chance to take root.

You are not a project to be optimized. You are a person with history, limits, strengths, and seasons. Growth does not begin on January 1st. It begins when you have the capacity, the support, and the self-trust to move forward gently.

Instead of asking, “How can I become someone new this year?” consider asking, “What would support me where I am right now?”
Gentle evolution honors your humanity. Sudden transformation often ignores it.

You are already worthy of care, rest, and respect. Growth can come from that place too.

12/19/2025

Reflection can be a powerful tool for growth… but for many high-achieving women, year-end reflection quietly turns into self-criticism. Instead of noticing progress, resilience, or learning, the focus shifts to what wasn’t done, what fell short, or where expectations were not met.

Research on perfectionism shows that self-critical evaluation is strongly associated with higher rates of anxiety, depression, and burnout. Studies suggest that women are especially vulnerable to internalizing failure and minimizing success, even when objectively performing well.

Growth does not come from relentless self-evaluation. It comes from compassion, integration, and perspective. This year asked things of you… emotionally, cognitively, and relationally… that may not show up on a checklist.

Before you rush into goals and resolutions, pause and look at what you carried, what you survived, and what you learned. You adapted. You endured. You grew in ways that are not always visible.

You did enough. And you are allowed to let that be true.

12/17/2025

Many women are carrying more than is humanly sustainable, and they are doing it quietly. Research on emotional labor shows that women, particularly mothers, take on a disproportionate share of invisible work: managing schedules, anticipating needs, maintaining relationships, and regulating emotions for others.

Studies from organizations like McKinsey and Deloitte consistently find that women are far more likely than men to feel responsible for household management, caregiving, and emotional coordination, even when working full time. This constant “background work” significantly increases the risk of burnout, anxiety, and emotional exhaustion.

You were never meant to be the default parent, emotional anchor, organizer, problem-solver, and peacekeeper all at once. That level of expectation is not a personal failure… it is a systemic overload.

Burnout is not a sign that you are weak or incapable. It is a sign that the load has exceeded what one person can reasonably carry. You deserve support. You deserve rest. And you are allowed to set the load down without guilt.

12/16/2025

High-achieving women often feel intense pressure to “finish strong” as the year comes to a close. There is an unspoken message that December should be about tying up loose ends, exceeding goals, and proving productivity right up until the last day.

But research consistently shows that this pressure comes at a cost. According to data from the American Psychological Association, women report higher levels of stress than men, and working women are significantly more likely to report feeling chronically overwhelmed by expectations. End-of-year deadlines, performance reviews, and holiday responsibilities compound that stress rather than relieve it.

December is not a deadline for your worth. You do not need to compress twelve months of achievement into four weeks. Slower endings are still valid endings. Rest, reflection, and restoration are not signs of disengagement, they are signs of sustainability.

Productivity culture often ignores a basic truth: depleted people do not thrive. Rest is not a reward for finishing everything. It is a necessary part of long-term success and emotional well-being.

12/12/2025

We often think holiday magic comes from big events, impressive activities, or perfectly curated traditions.

But child development research shows something different: kids experience magic through sensory memory, not elaborate effort.

Warm lights.
The smell of cookies.
Music playing in the background.
Cozy blankets.
A predictable ritual.
A parent who feels present and connected.

These are the anchors of childhood… not perfection, not complexity, not a packed calendar.

Children build emotional memories through sensory cues and connection. That means the magic you’re hoping they feel is already happening in the simplest moments.

You don’t need to perform to make it magical.
You just need to be with them in ways that feel warm, familiar, and safe.
That’s where the magic lives.

12/11/2025

Parents often expect school breaks to feel relaxing… yet many describe the opposite: more meltdowns, more emotions, more chaos.
There’s a developmental reason for that.

Kids rely heavily on structure, predictability, and routine to stay regulated.
When school ends, their world suddenly becomes noisier, looser, less predictable, and more stimulating.
Even “fun” things can overwhelm their nervous system.

A few things that contribute to meltdown season:
• Less routine
• More sensory input
• Higher emotional energy at home
• Decision fatigue
• Family events and crowds
• Excitement mixed with overstimulation
• Saving their “big feelings” for their safe person

Their behavior is communication:
“I’m overwhelmed. I’m adjusting. I need support, not shame.”

School break meltdowns aren’t a sign that your child is misbehaving or regressing.
They are a natural response to shifting rhythms and shifting environments.

Your job isn’t to prevent every meltdown…
it’s to guide, co-regulate, and keep the environment steady while their system recalibrates.

12/10/2025

December amplifies the mental load in ways most people never see. The lists, the planning, the anticipating, the emotional management… it’s not just holiday prep. It’s cognitive labor.

And it is real work.
Not a personality trait.
Not “what moms are good at.”
Work.

You deserve acknowledgment, support, and opportunities to share the responsibility.
Sharing the load isn’t weakness… it’s how families stay healthy.

Address

15508 W Bell Road, Ste 101/414
Surprise, AZ
85374

Website

https://www.docmompsyd.com/

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