Uncovering the Roots of Self-Sabotage in Working Moms
Break Free From the Perfectionism That's Holding You Back.
Here’s How.
Jessica Anne Pressler, a licensed clinical social worker, unpacked something so many working moms quietly carry: self-sabotage rooted in perfectionism. She explained how the pressure to be the perfect employee, mother, and partner often traces back further than adulthood, back to childhood, where many women learned that love and approval were tied to achievement. That early wiring doesn't just disappear. It shows up later as guilt, self-doubt, and an inability to feel like you're ever doing enough, even when you're doing so much.
Jessica offered a path forward that starts with awareness, not perfection. By understanding normal child development, moms can release some of the pressure they place on themselves. By identifying emotional triggers and gently exploring their own inner child, they can start to understand why certain moments, like a screaming toddler, evoke such a strong reaction. And by making space for real self-care, not as an afterthought but as a priority, moms can begin to break patterns that no longer serve them. Healing isn't about becoming perfect. It's about becoming aware.
HERE ARE THE 3 KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM THIS EPISODE:
1️⃣ Perfectionism often fuels self-sabotage in working moms.
2️⃣ Childhood experiences shape adult patterns and reactions.
3️⃣ Self-care and self-awareness help break the cycle.
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“The healthier parent, the healthier child.”
Guest Appearing in this Episode
About Jessica Anne Pressler
Jessica Anne Pressler is a licensed clinical social worker who helps ambitious women, especially working mothers, understand the roots of self-sabotage and perfectionism. Drawing on her clinical background, she connects childhood experiences to adult patterns of guilt, anxiety, and overachievement, offering a compassionate path toward healing. Her work centers on helping moms build self-awareness and self-compassion so they can show up more fully for themselves and their families.
Traitor Within
Jessica Pressler
Full Transcript
Tia Graham (00:02.422)
Hi, Jessica. Welcome to the show.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (00:04.796)
Thank you so much. I am delighted to be here.
Tia Graham (00:08.236)
You have incredible experience. And to be honest, it was hard to choose what topics to talk about because you have a wide breadth of experience. But I want to just dive right in. And I want to ask how come parents, and in this case, working moms, self-sabotage and maybe start off by just talking about.
What is self-sabotage in the context of an ambitious working mom?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (00:42.866)
Well.
Part of it is probably perfectionism. I mean, I know that they strive to do it all. You have the, you know, I have this image of the teddy bear in one hand, this the briefcase in the other hand, and the computer under, you know, here. And then they're also trying to be a good wife potentially, or you know, whatever it is, they're just trying to do it all. I think that as if we're talking about moms, we are trained as moms to be everything to everybody and to hold it together. And although I
We're better now than we were when I was growing, you know, growing up and having my kids young, where we were not allowed to take care of ourselves at all. We do talk a lot more now about self-love, self-care, thank goodness. But I think that sometimes we feel guilty or we hyper focus on we're not doing enough here. We can't, you know, just we can't just do it all and we can't do it all perfectly, which really is impossible to do all of it perfectly. So it's kind of like giving yourself the permission to be
Tia Graham (01:24.302)
Right.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (01:43.342)
Okay, you know, to not always be it's okay. So self sabotage, I believe often starts in our childhood. I believe that we are navigating our
Tia Graham (01:45.774)
Like be like a C plus to not be A.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (02:01.615)
Childhood with not necessarily told exactly what to do. What I mean by that is let's say we're living in a home and we're not feeling so safe because we have an alcoholic parent or we just have a parent that travels a lot. So we figure out ways to make ourselves feel safe. So we may learn to be the perfect child. So we take that piece.
Tia Graham (02:02.923)
Yeah.
Tia Graham (02:11.202)
Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (02:24.879)
Because we want to please our parent, we don't we don't want to be abandoned and we take it into our adult life. So, what does the perfect child mean as in a grown-up? It means the one that works 24-7 but and doesn't sleep because during some of that time she wants to be the perfect mom. So and doesn't want to maybe get help from other people. So, how do we self-sabotage? We work
hours more than we can balance our life because we want our boss to think we're perfect. and then we feel that other parts of our life is not getting you know their ne their needs met, but you're not getting your needs met either. Or we put we go we go to every single game that the child is and not get other things done when the child would have been okay when you only came to three out of five games. You know it's it's
Tia Graham (03:19.949)
Right.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (03:20.743)
just expecting so much of yourself that you're not you're not taking care of any you know anything right or yours or yourself and people will get sick.
Tia Graham (03:31.17)
And people get sick. So I can relate to so much of what you said. and so as a child, this this perfectionism or this drive to be good, to be a good child, right? Which then is connected to safety and feeling loved and feeling secure, we bring into our adult life, even though we are.
Safe. I mean, we're where I'm assuming, right? These are people in their their where they live and everything. They they are physically safe. And there isn't, you know, they're they're not living with their parents anymore, right? So it's like, okay, you're you're trying to be perfect and good for whom? And you mentioned like your boss. I think, you know, trying to be the perfect mom is like you're trying to be perfect for your children or wife, like there's all these external.
People. It started off as you're, let's say you're doing it for your parents and it was a coping mechanism as a child. But then when you're like externalizing all of this, like you said, you're gonna become sick or you are gonna be like, you're gonna have anxiety, you're gonna get depressed, you're gonna like lose it, you're gonna, you know, there's the it's gonna come out because it's it it's too much. Like just as you're talking, like it was, yeah, it's too much.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (04:56.453)
And those messaging and modeling from children too. What if, you know, you're you're told that you can't rest? You know, you have to get A plus, you have to get A plus. And now you are, you know, it's it doesn't feel comfortable to take that time that you need to maybe go to therapy or meditate or do any of this self-help stuff. So, you know, we have these mixed messages out there, right?
Tia Graham (05:18.903)
Yeah, interesting of like, yeah, like the mess the messaging or even even if you don't say it, but just that like signaling that like you can't rest, you need to like keep going. and I will say, you know, I've I've said this many times, like there was it was almost a decade where I really struggled with this of just this like not feeling good enough. And so much of it was related to, yes, my childhood, but also because I have a child who has
has it has a disability and has different challenges. And so, and I didn't know she was had a disability until she was seven. So for a good seven years, I was like, it must be me. So a lot of like, I'm not good enough because my kid is is has has has challenges. And I've I've done a lot of inner work of like, yeah, even if she has challenges, I am good enough. And you know, like that that disconnection from external measures of
of your value and of your worth, right? Like you don't get your worth from your boss or get your worth from your child. It's it's already there. get it from yes. Yes. It's never gonna work. It's externalized. Yeah. Because things you're not yeah, you're not in control of it. So how do our own emotional histor
jessica anne pressler LCSW (06:24.082)
Really have to get it from within. Because when you define other people for your self worth, it's never gonna it's never gonna work. It just can't.
Tia Graham (06:44.425)
shape the way that we raise our children. And what exactly do you mean by our emotional histories?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (06:51.014)
So back to what I was saying. So when we are in a ch and when we're young, we watch our parents, we learn to self-regulate, for example. We learn we learn about our self-worth. If we have a parent that says to you, it does that says to you that hears you, then you say something to them like, I love to dance. And you you compliment the child on their dancing. You don't tell them, well, no, you should be doing tap dance. And if you do tap, you know, you don't. It's
So you are a child who feels good about them. I'm sorry, you tell me the question again. I just lost it. I'm sorry.
Tia Graham (07:29.205)
Yeah, no, no, that's okay. How our how our emotional histories shape the way that we raise our children.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (07:37.211)
Okay, sorry. So it's how you're so you learn from your parents. You learn as I mentioned before, messaging and modeling from your parents. You learn how to self regulate from your parents. They're kind of you mirror each other. And if you have parents that aren't able to do that, then you may not be a person that can self regulate in your adult life. And as I Right.
Tia Graham (07:59.448)
Parents were
jessica anne pressler LCSW (08:01.914)
And as I mentioned before also, if you are are learning to be the good girl, the perfect child, the in order not to upset your parents so you don't get abandoned and you take that into your adult relationships, then if you're not if if you feel and you're worried about abandonment and you feel that your let's just say you're in a your your child wants to spend more time with their friends, then it's like an emotional wound to you. Why are they
rejecting me why are they abandoning me i mean you can have these feelings and not understand what they're coming from and it's often this part of you as a child that hasn't yet been sued self you it was self-suot to like we talked about going within you're relying on your child for your validation for example
Tia Graham (08:50.731)
No, and there's to the extreme, it's like the people that follow their kids to college. They like move, right? It's like, no, no, no, like you let them go, let them fly.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (08:56.774)
Yeah. No.
I always said fly. I always said the ideal parenting. Well, there's a lot of ideal parenting, but part of it is what you can get them to a place where you can say, Fly. which you just did. I'm here. You know, you're that safe base. I'm here, but I'm now you have the skills to be and and you know, to just be you. It's allowing them to be whoever they are, not what you tell them to be. You know, you have to get some boundaries and a safe place to do that and a safe place to come back, but it's really just letting them be.
Tia Graham (09:08.481)
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Tia Graham (09:23.245)
Who there?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (09:29.904)
themselves.
Tia Graham (09:31.16)
Right, right. So if if someone listening is going, hmm, like I'm not sure I'm aware of all of the emotional histories. Like, okay, yeah, my maybe my dad yelled a lot, or my mom wanted me to get straight A's, or my parents got divorced and there was tons of conflict and you know they
I think we're all very aware of like all the things that happened. but as I'm listening to you, I I almost want to, I wanna like, how could I become more self-aware of my emotional histories? Because my girls are now preteens and they're definitely pulling away, like, mom, no more like hugging when you say like that's embarrassing, mom. Like at school. And I'm like, okay, yeah, okay, you're right.
you know, all all the different things and to not take it like, I'm not love they don't love me anymore, where it's like, no, no, no, they're becoming a teenager. Like this is absolutely developmentally appropriate. so yeah, how do you think we can become more aware of our emotional histories? I think that will help us be more aware of like why we are the way we are now.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (10:32.826)
Excellent.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (10:38.162)
Right.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (10:50.34)
I agree. just before we go there, I want to just point out that becoming educated in normal development is important also because
Tia Graham (10:58.081)
Becoming educated normal development.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (10:59.954)
about development, about stages of development. Like you just mentioned, it is normal when you're a t a tween or a an adolescent to separate. That is it is normal to have some push and pull with your mommy daughter, for example. You know not easy, but it's normal. So you know they're they're trying to figure out who they are. So that's one piece so that so people don't take it personally. And the other piece is take the time because a a healthy parent is a better parent, take the time to go back into your
Tia Graham (11:12.674)
Right.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (11:29.948)
childhood and to figure out and it isn't about blame and it's and I want to you know it's not about blaming your parents or not having compassion toward them or compassion to yourself it could be a anything you know it's just an understanding it's gaining an understanding of why you act the way you act and sometimes you may look at your child and for example they do something that you start feeling shame about and really
realize that it's not about your kid, this is about you, something that you were, you know, that came up in your childhood that's popping up. Things don't just go away. And it takes work and it could be painful. It may not be. sometimes, you know, we could take ourselves back to a a time which maybe, but it takes work. But it I can tell you when you're at the other end it's worth it. As a person, as a partner, as it really in any relationship, you know, friendship, anything in work.
Tia Graham (12:21.773)
Mm.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (12:29.905)
and as a parent because I mean it sounds like a cliche but the healthier parent, the healthier child.
Tia Graham (12:36.685)
Right, right. Yeah, that's the same. And what you know, a huge message of the Feel Good Club is, you know, prioritizing your own well-being, whether that's spiritual, physical, emotional, relational, you know, that that yeah, like we want our kids to be happy and well. You know, we need to take care of ourselves. And, you know, as working moms, the calendars are so full with just working kids, and of course we need to sleep.
but like taking that time and not feeling guilty to whether it's like you said, meditation, whether it's you know, I'm a huge believer in therapy, whether it, you know, it's time with girlfriends, what like anything that you need to do. and so taking the time to just reflect on our childhood and kind of the what was sort of the emotional state with the parents and how you're feeling of just like just kind of more of that awareness. Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (13:34.547)
And have an understanding and have an understanding of the triggers. And and have and what happens when you're triggered? What happens when you find yours yourself maybe not as regulated? you know, a child is screaming next, you know, in the other room. And right, right, super triggering. And so what does it do to you? does it bring up shame? Does it bring up anger? Does it bring up what am I doing wrong? You know, fix
Tia Graham (13:35.862)
I think is
Tia Graham (13:39.689)
Understand triggers.
Tia Graham (13:51.775)
Super true.
Tia Graham (14:01.759)
Anybody feel safe as a kid when someone was screaming? Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (14:03.984)
Right.
Exactly. So you know take time to just, you know, recognize it and you know, because most likely it's happens it's a pattern, it's gonna happen more than once. And if it does, then I would suggest, you know, learn about yourself. Learn about the inner child do the inner child work, you know, do the trader within work. Learn about yourself because it's again, it's not it's about having self-compassion. It's about you know the the way that you're acting, especially if there are survival mechanisms from your childhood that you're bringing into your adult life. it's
not it's not about blame, it's not about fault. It's about self compassion, learning and making changes to make every your life
better, you know, healthier and and then you're you know, it's also about intergenerational trauma. You know, we do we do continue that. You what you what your child will see your reactions, you'll see your they'll see you dysregulated. They'll see what happens when you're that way. They'll you know they'll learn from it. They'll copy it. They'll you know they'll absorb it. So
Tia Graham (14:54.101)
These are yeah.
Tia Graham (15:02.369)
Right, right. Right. I have several questions coming up. So, but just to f a a really, really good tip for for the beautiful working mom who's listening is to make a list of your triggers, whether it's from your spouse, from your kids, just and you know, could be like physically what your environment looks like triggers you, just anything. Just like take the time to do that. And then it's kind of this like open awareness of
Let me let like how does this connect to my to my old childhood and how does it connect now? And doing it with with self-compassion and and kind of curiosity as opposed to like you said, shame. okay, so one question I want to ask you is and this is a personal question, but I'm sure several canals listening can can relate to it, is there was a period where I was very, very triggered because my daughter would have.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (15:50.45)
Mm-hmm task.
Tia Graham (15:58.594)
you know, was was very dysregulated, like having meltdowns and screaming and things like that. And I was it was very, very triggering to me. I was not able to stay calm. and I did a lot of deep inner work so that now I am able to like I am able to co-regulate. I stay self-regulated. Like I have, am I perfect? No, no such thing. But like, you know, really, really transformed. I have a I have like a worry of like, God, I there was there was a lot of years where I couldn't.
Is that okay? Or or the fact that I am now, can I like make up for it? I guess that's like quite
jessica anne pressler LCSW (16:35.642)
Yes, you can always do that. And you know what you're teaching your child something too. You're teaching your child that it's human, that it's okay to make mistakes, that you c it's okay to learn from mistakes, and and then this is what we can do now. this is how we can you know, what I've what I've learned. You're
human. I mean and then so when they make mistakes they won't be full of shame. They won't beat themselves up for it. They'll say, Okay, I can make a mistake. That's okay, I'm human and and but now I know better ways to do it because I watched my mom.
Tia Graham (17:07.661)
So I guess to talk about that, like I realized I was doing something that wasn't with my values how I wanted to be, and like, okay, that's good. so how does someone, how does a working mom know or a parent know if you are parenting your child or children that you have right in front of you in your home, or if you are parenting your inner child?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (17:33.543)
Yeah.
So again, if things pop up, what's being triggered? If you have it you're in the grocery store with your child and they're having a temper tantrum and you're looking around and you're feeling all this, you know, shame. my god, they're gonna think I'm a bad parent. my, you know, I'm not doing the right thing. My guess is that's from your childhood. That's from your because objectively speaking, if I'm walking through a a grocery store and I see a child that's acting out, it's a child acting out. It's a meltdown. It's meltdown.
Tia Graham (17:53.429)
Mm.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (18:04.02)
So it's then to look at that. Where is that coming from? Why am I why am I feeling overwhelmed with shame? You know, why am I feeling like someone's gonna look at me and tell me I'm a terrible parent? You know, it's it's that's where you know it could your inner child work.
Tia Graham (18:22.775)
So are all triggers and parenting triggers and relational triggers like kind of the are they all connected to unresolved childhood experiences?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (18:26.138)
Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (18:36.538)
I think a lot of it's connected to unresolved childhood experiences. Of course, you can have other traumas in your life that also you can get triggered, of course. But I do think that, and again, it's not about saying you had a terrible childhood. It's not about saying it's just an understanding that because we, you know, it's a long time that you're using those coping mechanisms. So it's gonna take time to undo those coping mechanisms and change them where you kind of, you know, your way of thinking. But it very possible.
Tia Graham (18:44.609)
Right.
Tia Graham (18:52.215)
Right.
Tia Graham (18:58.945)
Yeah. Yeah.
Tia Graham (19:04.385)
Right, right. And it's and you when you wrote you used the word like quietly influencing. So whether it's like and you, you know, you wrote like quietly influencing how you discipline or how you communicate or how you regulate your emotions or how you do the family dynamics. besides triggers, is there anything, is there any other information or any other self-awareness pieces that
Where you would know like, this might be some of my childhood stuff.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (19:40.519)
Well, just again, paying attention. Paying attention to how you respond. Paying attention if you keep having a certain feeling comes up bec that doesn't really make sense or you think that you're exa that's an exaggerated feeling. you know, that it isn't n necessarily what you're feeling matches what is happening.
Tia Graham (20:02.785)
Got it. gosh, I can relate to that. Yeah, where it's like something happens but then there was the the emotional feeling that yeah, it's it's bigger than what it actually is. Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (20:09.468)
This is the maker.
Although you can look at two different ways because you look at at it as you're reacting and that goes back to your childhood, but also what if you're judging yourself when you should be reacting that way? That's also a piece from your childhood. Yeah. It's both ways. Yeah.
Tia Graham (20:24.269)
Mmm. got it. Of how you, yeah. so you have been a working mom for for several years. what advice would you give with everything you know now and you've done so much work, you know, what advice would you give to your younger working mom self, you know, with with everything you know now?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (20:50.898)
Mm.
Tia Graham (20:54.153)
and and I know that you are very passionate about your work and and you know, care about your work which which the listeners and you know and and I do as well.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (21:02.954)
you are what you just wanted p piece is that you can make mistakes, but teaching but teaching your children about the mistake and making changes is a really amazing teaching experience for them. it's okay to show sadness or it's okay to show f the way you feel, as long as you don't you're not super dysregulated, because that can be very scary for children.
Tia Graham (21:25.109)
Mm.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (21:26.044)
But it's okay you want to give permission to them to feel and to be able to right, right. it's okay to work. That don't you know to go through I felt very guilty about leaving and working, you know. It's it's okay to do that because you're show you're teaching them, you know, you're teaching them wonderful things about your job. You you talk to them about it, you know, you know, make it part of the family structure. and if and in regard to work, it's okay to
Tia Graham (21:29.335)
Permit how it feels.
Tia Graham (21:47.511)
Mm. Mm-hmm.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (21:55.941)
also take time for yourself and you're teaching your children that something you know, look at e everything you're modeling for your kids. And you I'm I assume you want them to know it's okay for them to do that too.
Tia Graham (22:04.141)
Mm-hmm.
Tia Graham (22:09.579)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And did you ever struggle with working mom guilt?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (22:16.985)
Yes. I w w what some of what how I handled it was I I worked the hours that I worked and then I would I just didn't sleep. And then I would spend t the time I could with them when it when they you know, when I came home with them and then I'd start doing all my paperwork at like eleven o'clock at night and then go to sleep at two and then wake up at five and so I lost it that way. So I tried to my thing was I was because I had a work working mom who was never around.
Tia Graham (22:40.082)
my gosh.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (22:48.598)
And so I was gonna be the other mom. I was so so I so I sacrificed a lot of sleep. Yeah. So I didn't sleep. Basically I didn't sleep.
Tia Graham (22:51.341)
We were gonna be around maybe overcompensated.
So you didn't sleep. You know, sometimes I wish I was like you because I can't not sleep. Like if I don't sleep, I am a complete, you know, yeah. So my body because I'm so negative and so and like I'm like the most miserable person if I don't sleep. But sometimes I'm like, I kind of wish sometimes I could to be more productive, to be honest. Yeah.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (23:08.121)
but
Studies show that
jessica anne pressler LCSW (23:17.37)
Yeah, but you know.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (23:21.65)
No, but it's not a good it's studies show that you really need to sleep. You need to like your body needs to heal. So I'm not healing. I didn't heal.
Tia Graham (23:28.001)
They have and
No, I know, I know that. so if people want to learn more about you and also, yeah, where can they go to learn more about you? And then also take a minute or two to talk about your new book.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (23:48.163)
You for bringing that up. they can find me at Jessica Ann Pressler and across all social media. And jessicaanpressler.com is my website, and I come out with a blog every week, a new blog, and I have a podcast, Your Trader Within, which talks about the Trader Within. And people come on and tell us their own Trader Within stories, and you're welcome to come on if you'd like.
Tia Graham (24:10.177)
I would love to come on. I definitely c I definitely could talk.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (24:12.966)
Mm-hmm.
After and my book is called surprise Traitor Within but it's a fictional story about Cassandra who had a traitor within formed in her childhood and hers did not show up as a parent, but hers showed up as a in her romantic relationships. So she wound up staying in romantic relationships way longer than anyone should stay in it, and she did so because she was taught.
Tia Graham (24:35.093)
Mm.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (24:44.25)
To be the the quiet one, the fixer, the one that took the blame, the one that forgets to what happened. You know, someone cheats on you, you forget it. And she did it again and again and again and again until she discovered the traitor within. So it's a way of teaching the concept, but through fiction. So I my hope is that it will reach more people because people will hopefully buy it just to read it as fiction and then see themselves without even knowing it.
Tia Graham (25:09.815)
Right.
My gosh, every like 17-year-old girl, right? Like before NFL so much. I love that. I so so powerful and such a wonderful needed. but you know, society, cultural, we could we could do a whole podcast about that, about like how we are conditioned as as a you know, many, many girls and women and teens are conditioned to
jessica anne pressler LCSW (25:17.02)
Yeah.
Tia Graham (25:40.777)
want the attention and the validation from in and want the so my gosh. Okay, great. So is the trader within similar to the inner internal critic?
jessica anne pressler LCSW (25:55.974)
Yes, it can be. A trade an inner critic is an example of a trader within.
Tia Graham (26:00.685)
Okay, well I can't wait to read it. And well, Jessica, thank you so much for coming on the show. Personally, I got a lot out of it for for myself and I know that the listeners did too. And I look forward to talking again soon.
jessica anne pressler LCSW (26:16.892)
Thank you, and I can't wait to have you on my podcast.