Farming after baby: the guilt, the exhaustion, and what actually helps
Nobody tells you what it's actually like to farm after having a baby.
They tell you it'll be hard. They tell you to "sleep when the baby sleeps" (as if the animals will feed themselves). They tell you to enjoy this time because it goes so fast.
But nobody tells you about the specific kind of unraveling that happens when your farm business was your first baby.
And now there's a real one.
The before and after
Before baby, you had a rhythm. Maybe it wasn't perfect, but it was yours. You knew when you'd be in the field, when you'd do bookkeeping, when you'd prep for market.
After baby, there is no rhythm. There are only scraps of time and the constant calculation of what you can squeeze into them.
You find yourself writing marketing emails at 2am while nursing because that's when your hands are free and your brain is (sort of) working.
You learn that you can pack the truck for market with a screaming baby strapped to your chest. It's not pleasant, but it's possible.
You do the math on everything: Is this task worth starting if I might have to drop it in ten minutes? Can I do this one-handed? How long until the next nap?
The tasks that fall away
Here's what happens: you stop doing the higher-order thinking work.
The strategic planning. The bookkeeping. The marketing. The projects that require focus and uninterrupted time.
Because you might get interrupted at any moment. And the cost of breaking focus on deep work is so high that you stop starting it altogether.
Instead, you do the interruptible tasks. Washing eggs. Weeding. Organizing the barn. Things you can drop and pick back up without losing your train of thought.
The problem is, those interruptible tasks don't move your business forward. They maintain it (barely). But the growth work? The CEO work? That keeps getting pushed to "when things settle down."
Things don't settle down. Not for a long time.
The identity loss nobody talks about
Before baby, you were a farmer (or rancher). That was your identity. Your thing. What you did and who you were.
After baby, you can't claim that identity full-time anymore. You're half-farmer, half-mom, and somehow failing at both.
You resent (secretly, guiltily) the people who tell you "it's okay, you have other priorities now." Because it doesn't feel okay. It feels like losing yourself.
And you resent (even more secretly) that the farm kept demanding things from you when you had nothing left to give. The animals don't care that you were up all night. The customers at market don't care that you're touched out and have zero social battery. They still want to chat and ask questions.
The farm was your first baby. And now it feels like you're abandoning it.
Drowning in plain sight
Here's what no one sees:
The house is a mess. The baby is screaming. You're behind on every single thing that matters. And you're standing in the middle of it thinking, "I am doing nothing well."
Not the farming. Not the mothering. Not the marriage. Not your own basic needs.
You are drowning, but it doesn't look like drowning. It looks like a woman with a baby on her hip, doing farm chores, showing up to market, keeping it all going.
From the outside, you're doing amazing. From the inside, you're falling apart.
What actually helps
I'm not going to give you a productivity hack or tell you to wake up earlier. (You're already not sleeping.) Here's what actually helped me:
Lower the bar. Way lower.
Your pre-baby standards are not your postpartum standards. You're not the same person with the same capacity. Stop measuring yourself against who you used to be.
Protect the non-negotiables, let go of everything else.
What actually has to happen this week? Do that. Let the rest go. Not forever. Just for now.
Stop shaming yourself for avoiding deep work.
You're not lazy. You're protecting yourself. If you might get interrupted at any moment, it feels safer to not start the important thing at all. Why pick up a ball you're just going to drop?
But here's the cost: the CEO work never gets done. So instead of fighting your reality, work with it. If you have 15 minutes, do a 15-minute task. Save the deep work for the rare protected windows — and stop beating yourself up in between.
Batch the deep work for your best hours.
Whenever those are. Maybe it's during the longest nap. Maybe it's when your partner takes the baby. Guard those hours ruthlessly and use them for the CEO work — not the egg washing.
Get help before you're desperate.
A housekeeper. A mother's helper. A neighbor who can hold the baby while you pack for market. You don't have to be at rock bottom to deserve support.
Talk about it.
With other farm moms. With a coach. With anyone who won't just tell you to "enjoy this season." You need people who understand that this is genuinely hard, not people who minimize it.
It does evolve
I won't lie and say it gets easier. It gets different.
The older kid challenges are real too. There’s the constant pull of feeling like you should always be somewhere else. With your kids when you're working. Working when you're with your kids.
But that first transition? When the farm was your whole identity and suddenly you can't access it the same way? That's its own particular kind of grief.
You're allowed to grieve it. Even while loving your baby. Even while still loving the farm.
Both things can be true.
You're not failing
If you're reading this at 2am while nursing, eyes half-closed, wondering how you're going to do tomorrow:
You're not failing. You're farming after baby. It's one of the hardest things you'll ever do, and you're doing it.
Not perfectly. Not the way you used to. But you're doing it.
That counts. Even when it doesn't feel like it.
You're doing a great job. Even when the house is a mess and the baby is crying and you can't remember the last time you finished a thought.
If you need support figuring out how to run your business in this season (without losing your mind), I'm here. I've been there.
Schedule a free chat anytime at FarmCoachKatia.com/work-with-me.