Nearly three out of four Idaho moms said that being a mother is the most important part of their identity.
At the same time, more than a third of Idaho mothers say their communities do not provide the support they need to be good mothers, and nearly half of Idaho’s mothers say they do not feel comfortable asking for more help or support in their day-to-day activities.
Can we solve some of the world’s problems by focusing on helping out Mom?
Shannon McGuire thinks so.
McGuire, of Boise, is the founder of Supreme Moms and Spark! Strategic Solutions, which recently partnered with Gallup to produce the “Built with Care” report, a first-of-its-kind deep dive into the experiences and needs of Idaho mothers.
“It’s a smash-up of mental, emotional well-being and mom power,” McGuire told me during an interview at a coffee shop in downtown Boise.
The report surveyed 4,000 Idahoans, and the findings are both illuminating and concerning.
Three out of four Idaho moms say they can’t make time to take care of their own emotional well-being, even as they serve as the primary source of support for family and friends. More than half of working mothers (57%) reported feeling tired or burned out and 51% saying they wish they had more help.
“Something’s off here,” McGuire said. “We need more joy, fun and love. I think that’s a problem.”
That focus on joy is what makes McGuire’s work unique. She deliberately chooses to highlight what unites us.
“I get a number of folks sometimes that’ll go, ‘Well, you don’t want to just focus on moms. You’re gendering, and you’re being very exclusive,’” McGuire said. She pushes back on this notion, arguing that investing in mothers is an investment in entire families and communities.
“I scratch my head and I go, we live in a time where I, as a Black woman, can have my own complete group over here, but I can’t do the same for moms?” she said. “If we want to really have equity, I think moms have that last hold that we really need to focus on and invest in.”
The “Built with Care” report is more than just a collection of statistics. It’s a call to action, a roadmap for supporting the backbone of Idaho’s communities. McGuire said she sees it as a crucial step in addressing broader societal issues, particularly youth mental health.
“I get approached a lot for youth mental health, and what are we going to do?” she said. “And I say, let’s invest in the moms.”
I’ve written before about adverse childhood experiences , or ACES, which can be anything from experiencing or witnessing violence to having a parent incarcerated. It’s stunning how the number of adverse childhood experiences a person has is directly proportional to negative outcomes later in life, whether it’s obesity, addiction, even imprisonment and higher death rates.
Reducing adverse childhood experiences dramatically reduces negative outcomes.
Focusing on moms is a good place to start. Everyone has a mother, right? What if we made sure mothers were taken care of, from feeling safe from domestic violence to having affordable child care, health care and mental health services?
McGuire may be on to something here.
What struck me, though, in my interview with McGuire is that joy isn’t just a slogan; she lives it. She walks the walk.
Supreme Moms has “a simple mission: to spread more joy, fun and love in the world.”
As a Black woman living in Boise (she moved here from Los Angeles 16 years ago), she simply chooses to ignore racist jerks.
As a woman with a traumatic childhood, she chooses simply to move forward and live her best life with a contagious smile on her face.
She has a relentless optimism with a simple goal of fostering unity.
Her goal may seem daunting.
“I want to live in a world where 8 billion people live more days feeling good about being themselves,” she said. “I want people to have more joy, fun and love. I want there to be an increase in kindness and people being able to trust each other, turn to each other for help, less division in families, more collaboration politically.”
Sounds like the Idaho Way, if you ask me.
And from what I’ve seen of McGuire, I think she just might be able to achieve it.
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