The Netmums Podcast - S17 Ep9: Being a mum whilst running a country with Jacinda Ardern

Episode Date: November 11, 2025

This week on The Netmums Podcast, Wendy Golledge and Alison Perry are joined by the remarkable Dame Jacinda Ardern, former Prime Minister of New Zealand and author of the memoir A Different Kind of Power. In this episode, Jacinda shares her unique experiences of balancing motherhood with the demands of leading a country, and parenting while in the public eye. Jacinda opens up about the emotional juggle of early motherhood, the challenges of maternity leave, and the guilt that often accompanies working parents. She discusses her new picture book, Mum's Busy Work, which addresses the struggles parents face in managing work and family life, and how to communicate these challenges to children. In this episode: The realities of being a working mother in a high-profile role Managing ‘Mum guilt’ and expectations as a parent The importance of sharing the parental load between partners How to maintain values and kindness in parenting Advice for new parents returning to work after maternity leave Jacinda’s book, Mum's Busy Work, is an inspiring and heartwarming book about the relationship between a working mum and her daughter. This episode is sponsored by Aldi Mamia Stay connected with Netmums for more parenting tips, community support, engaging content: Website: netmums.com / Instagram: @netmums  Proudly produced by Decibelle Creative / @decibelle_creative

You're listening to the NetMum's podcast with me, Wendy Gullich, and me, Alison Perry. Coming up on this week's show... I remember realising after the fact when I came to write a different kind of power, my memoir, thinking about this fact that if there was any point in my life where I would be able to put the mum guilt aside, surely it would be the time when I was running a country. But before all of that, this episode of the NetMums podcast is brought to you by Aldi Mamia. One of my favourite things about being a parent is when clever people come up with genius solutions to problems we have.

Oh my goodness, me too. Like, can we please give a dame or a knighthood to whoever invented those little syringes for kids' medicine? It makes it so much easier to look after poorly little ones. They also make great water squirters in the bath, don't you know? But I digress. A big problem many parents have is leaky nappies. So to solve this, Aldi's award-winning nappies now have dedicated. boy and girl, pee zones.

Peasones? Tell me more, Wendy. Well, did you know that girls tend to pee more in the middle of their nappy, while boys usually pee more to the front? Aldi Mamir nappies now have uniquely designed pea zones to draw liquid across the entire core of the nappy to enhance absorption. Clever, huh? Oh my goodness, love that. I'm also a big fan of the leak lock pockets to help contain per blowouts

and the 360 degrees leakage protection. And the nappies are really comfy and a flexible fit. They are. Plus, they're dermatologically tested and suitable for newborns. Brilliant. They've thought of everything. Get your Aldi Mummy and Nappies in store now. Hello, folks. Welcome back to another episode of the NetMum's podcast. Alison, how's your week? Well, Wendy, my kids are on half term at the moment.

We get two weeks half term, which I shouldn't complain about because it means that we get one less week in the summer, which I'm on board with, because the summer holidays, frankly, are too long. But I've just packed my younger two off to soft play, and I've had to kick my teenager out of the living room where she was watching Harry Potter so that I could do this. And it's just a bit of a juggle during half term. It's just always a juggle. The half school holidays and a full-time job are not friends, whichever way you cut it. It's just a pain. It's stressful, isn't it? I think that possibly our guest might have a thing or two to say about this topic.

I think she might. I think she might. Do the showbiz intro. Well, today we are joined by Dame Jacinda Ardairn, the former Prime Minister of New Zealand, who became a global figure for her compassionate leadership and calm handling of crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic. Since stepping away from politics in 2023 to spend more time with her family, She's written her memoir, a different kind of power, and now a new picture book, Mum's Busy Work. Now, this book explores the push and pool that so many parents feel when trying to juggle work and family.

Jacinda, a warm welcome to the NetMum's podcast. Thank you so much for having me. You really appreciate it. And I am happy to talk about school holidays. How do you juggle it yourself? It's a bit of a struggle The great thing about holidays in New Zealand Is that the school holidays

Coenside with the Christmas break The big school holidays And so for the most part Parents are off at the same time As the really long school break And so as a result There's not as much of a culture Around camps

And school holiday programs To the same degree as where I've just been, which is the United States, where summer camp is a whole thing. But they do get three months in the summer. But the kids all just get packed off, don't they? Oh, yeah. It's so long.

It's June to September. It's such a long break. But, yeah, I think I know a lot of parents who really try to at least have a couple of weeks, but for a large amount of time, just out of necessity, they go off to camp. Yeah. Who can take a quarter of the year off every year,

just to chill with their kids. Yeah. You can see why summer camp is such a big part of American kids' lives. Yeah. Yeah. So let's go back to 2018 when you became only the second leader of a country to have a baby while in office. Knowing as we do what it's like to have a baby, it's an emotional vibe, what was it like to do that while running a country? Yeah. You know, I hate to distill down parents.

in this way, but so much of those early months are just logistics. The logistics are, you know, so, so challenging, particularly if you're trying to breastfeed and you have poor supplied in the logistics, include that painful sterilisation pumping routine as well. And so much of my early parenting memories are the juggle. And feeling that, feeling two really overwhelming emotions. One, that I was trying to do everything, but I was doing it badly. I just wasn't, there wasn't, I wasn't succeeding.

I never nailed anything. And the second was just this overwhelming sense of constant gratitude that I had for, in particular, my mum and my partner, you know, because I was so aware of the fact that, you know, not only was I not nailing anything, I definitely wouldn't be, be surviving if it wasn't for them. So those of my overwhelming memories. Of course, the joy. The joy as well, but all of these other emotions.

I think so many people will be able to relate to that feeling of not feeling like you're doing either thing particularly well. But, you know, you took six weeks maternity leave and I'm really curious to know whether you were able to switch off from work in that time, knowing that your deputy was in charge, or did you have one eye on the emails and, you know, feel like you had to kind of keep an eye on what was happening? I definitely didn't switch off. I was absolutely keeping an eye on things. And so really, for six weeks, I didn't have an obligation to be in the office or make public appearances, but I was still getting papers and still had the odd teleconferences

and there were still phone calls and things. You know, and that's, to be fair, that was my choosing as well. I think if I'd said I wish to be completely out of, you know, just to scream myself off, I think people would have facilitated that, but I just didn't feel like I could. My deputy prime minister was the leader of a smaller party. He was a coalition partner. And so I felt an extra sense of obligation just to keep to keep across everything. Yeah. I think I'd have Clyde, if somebody had said to me six weeks after giving birth that I had to do something involving my brain, how and earth did you prepare for that? And how did your partner feel about becoming the default parent to your child? Well, he, I mean, I felt, you know, he was, he was there

all the way. It wasn't as if I was the dominant, you know, carer and then suddenly there was this transition from day dot he was, he was there, he was bathing, he was, he was, he was feeding because I had to have, we had to use a mixture of formula and breastfeeding. And so he was a hands-on active peer, and it was just, that six-week transition was more, okay, now I'm going to be located somewhere else. And he was bringing Neve over on the feeding schedule and so on. And so, and in many regards, that part wasn't jarring because he was a constant presence. and the brain side of things, I think because I was so overwhelmingly aware of my physical

readiness, I focused a little less on whether or not the fog had lifted. And I, you know, I was an older mum. I had need at 37. When I went back, I was, by the time I went back to work, I had my 38th birthday. And, you know, probably wasn't fully aware of. of all of the impacts at the time. I now have since realized I've probably had a prolapse,

but I couldn't stand up straight. And, well, I didn't feel like I could stand up straight. And so my biggest worry was, what if I don't look normal? What if I go back and I seem a bit stooped and I'm walking a bit slow and I seem physically as if I'm not strong enough? I worried about that.

So I would do these walks around that I would really focus on trying to get my posture back, get my sense of physical well-being back, that I didn't worry about being exhausted. Now, you famously described Clark as not a babysitter. Do you think that the world would benefit from more mums and dads sharing the parental load more evenly, especially in those early days? I felt like actually in a way that it was pretty. probably insulting to him to describe him in that way, you know, because he's obviously,

obviously, you know, we were parenting together. In fact, he was really the lead. So I felt like it diminished his role. I know people will push back on it for a range of other reasons, but for me it was a disservice to him. What I found really interesting, and I can't speak to any other country but what I found really interesting was that in New Zealand I would notice men would come up behind him and kind of you know behind a hand would say I did what you're doing too and it was almost as if it was something they wished to keep quiet when when I thought it was something they should be proud of especially when they would always be quick to point out that they had the greatest relationship with their kids as a result and I thought that was

wonderful and shouldn't we showcase more of that? We talked a little bit earlier about feeling torn between work and family. How did you navigate that kind of the guilt you were talking about earlier and that tension when Neve was little? When she was small, I probably consoled myself with the fact she was small. You know, that I, you know, one of the downsides of one of the policies that I focused a lot on was children's policy. So I knew a lot about attachment. And I knew that if she felt connected to her parents, she felt that trusted, you know, that sense of, you know, constant connection to even a one caregiver, then that was incredibly important. And that would, that would, that would prove to be a solid foundation.

I hoped that I was building it with two, but I, but part of me thought, well, as long as we get attachment right for her, and as long as I can as much as possible be at least semi-consistent in my, in my presence with her, then that's something. But I could mentally, you know, convince myself of that. it didn't change though the way I sometimes just felt so my rational brain was saying she's going to be okay she's going to be more than okay but my emotional pull was saying you should be you should be around more you should really be nailing this breastfeeding you know this is so important for her you want to hit six months of breastfeeding at least you need to focus more on this

why isn't this working? You know, so I had a constant struggle within myself between my rational brain and my emotional sentiments. Obviously, you had a very important job. Do you think that that made that struggle easier in your head a little bit to justify? But also, isn't it interesting that you don't really hear dads talking about how they have to justify how important their jobs are, you know, in terms of going away? It's something that us mums probably overthink a little bit, don't we?

We do. And I'm almost in a place now, and not to generalise too much, where I just think, you know, that's not to say that somehow dads aren't feeling enough. We just happen to carry this in a particular way. And so right or wrong about that, it just is. But on that first point you make, gosh, so true. I remember realizing after the fact when I came to write a different kind of power, my memoir, thinking about this fact that actually if there was any point in my life where I would be

able to put the mum guilt aside, surely it would be the time when I was running a country. It's a pretty good reason to not be at home or missing the odd thing or what have you. and yet it never went away. There's actually something that is almost just makes me feel a little bit better about that. It tells me that there's probably never a moment where it necessarily goes away. And so that's maybe just when you have the beautiful humbling experience of becoming a parent, you're also handed your little jar of guilt. And that little jar, it doesn't disappear depending on what you're doing it.

It's just there. And I think the best we can do is say, well, I have this jar. Now I just have to give myself some grace and be a little kinder on myself because you know now that it doesn't matter what you do. It's just the price of being a parent. did you receive much criticism about your work family balance and what was that like to deal with because it does feel like everyone likes to judge the mums and I'm sure you got your fair share of that oh I'm sure I did I did a pretty good job of filtering it out though I think when you know that

that kind of thing's going to come I mean also keep in mind I wasn't married when I had need and so I think there was a part of me that thought there's just going to be some things there's going to be perhaps, you know, some people might have views on that. Some people might have views on whether or not you can be a mother and prime minister at all. Some people will have views on whether or not you can be a working mother at all. And so I think I just came at it with an assumption that people would have their views. And that actually the best thing I could do was just demonstrate what was possible. But I think the thing I became more focused on would be the mums and selves who might come up to me and just grab the arm and say,

I don't know how you do it all and I would be really quick to point out that I didn't do it alone I hated this idea that they might be presented with this role model of not what I hoped which was you can be a mum and have a fulfilling career

rather than you have to be a mum a caregiver run the perfect you know the perfect career path, be a daughter, a sister, all of the things on your own, because that was not me. I had Clark, I had my mother, I had my mother-in-law, I had my sister, I had my cousin, I had this beautiful village. And so to any woman who would say, I don't know how you do it all,

I would always say, I don't do it alone and neither should you. So as someone who parents, but also has a public persona, how do you navigate that balance of sharing the realities and the challenges versus only sharing the good stuff, I guess, and risking making it seem like a breeze, a bit like you were just saying. I remember thinking about that pressure, because on the one hand, I felt like I had to demonstrate that being a mother, and this is going to sound terrible, wasn't negatively affecting my ability to do the job. Because if you're only the second woman in the world to lead a country

and have a child in office, I just felt that extra role was a standard bearer of sorts that I had to demonstrate. This would not impact my competency. So I felt that, but that meant that I couldn't talk about the realities of morning sickness

or sometimes the tiredness or the physical effects. I couldn't talk about that. But I was willing to, I thought that was a fair trait but when it came to then when need was small I thought well actually there it's a slightly different balance yes I want to demonstrate I can still do my job but I don't want to hide that I'm a parent don't want to hide that I have this other important role in my life because actually she's a

really important influence and why I do my job and why my job is important to me and how we should think about the responsibility of leadership and so in a way It shifted over time, and it was, it did feel finely balanced, I would have to say, at different. But that's so much pressure to put yourself under. We, we as all mums put themselves under pressure, whether it's just that I can't go to Harvest Festival next week and I'm getting grief because I can't go. And that's a really minor thing. You're trying to run a country really well and not tell anyone that you actually want to go and be sick in your handbag. The pressure is so huge.

At any point, did you just think I'm going to pop with all of this? I certainly thought I was going to vomit a few times. I have a theory, and this might not. I mean, this is just my theory, so please indulge me for a moment. But I have this theory around stress and pressure, and it sits a little bit around that same idea when someone says, I don't know how you do it. And I, there would have been a time where I would have, if it wasn't me in the role, then I

watched someone else do it. I probably would have said the same thing. You don't know what you're capable of until you're doing it. And one of the reasons you are more capable than you believe is because we have this idea that stress can grow exponentially and pressure can grow exponentially when actually the pressure and guilt you feel about going to harvest festival actually might feel exactly the same as some of the pressure and guilt that I felt, even though it was on, you know, for a different set of things,

stress and pressure doesn't necessarily grow exponentially. It can feel the same. And so I think we sometimes, when we're outside of a situation, think that the person over there is having a completely different experience. It can often feel the same. We're all having a human experience in parenting, and it doesn't get exponentially worse or better, depending on your job or your status.

that makes so much sense I'm interested to know what kind of chats have you had with Neve more recently I'm guessing that you've read the book with her your picture book not your memoir do you think

that she has an understanding of why Mum had to work so much to the degree that you could at that age I think and I think for anyone who reads Mum's busy work I would then love

I would love them to read the memoir because I do talk a bit more about that process of what it is to try and explain to a child why you're doing so much in a way that doesn't make them feel like they are of any lesser importance to you than the thing that you're doing. I grappled with that a lot and the enormous gift that Eve gave to me even as a small child. She made me realize how much I was creating a set of assumptions about how she viewed that dilemma which she in the end in her own small child way

really challenged for me so it made me realize how much of the guilt she wasn't putting it on me so much of it just came from within was my own and I was almost placing it on her whereas it was my own burden it was my own burden to carry

she now I think I think she understands to a certain degree, but I think only time and probably in the same way that I only fully appreciate the struggle when I had my daughter. I don't actually expect her to fully appreciate that until she has her own children

if she chooses to. Just a reminder that this episode of the NetMam's podcast is brought to you by Aldi Mamia. As well as award-winning nappies with P-Zones that enhance absorption, we love Mammaeer Wipes. plastic-free and gentle enough to use on your little one from birth. They make nappy changes so much easier. Heads to your nearest Audi store to check out the entire Mummaia Range.

So I think it's fair to say that you were Prime Minister at a time when there were multiple crises going on in the world. It was a very bad run. Yeah, you picked your timing. But your leadership approach emphasised kindness and understanding and you were commended internationally for that. How do you bring those principles into parenting at home? You know, I think, I think actually that's where you're more consistently challenged. It's not that it's harder, but you're consistently challenged to maintain

your values and parenting, aren't you? It's not a nine to five. It's not a, you know, on this decision or that decision, it is every single hour of every day. And, you know, I I again come back to that word of grace. I think the most important thing is our intention and our effort towards doing the best we can to live a set of values and teach them to our kids. But we also, I think, want to teach our kids that we're human, they're human. We teach them that, of course, that it's okay to learn and it's okay to make mistakes. And so often it's about just giving that grace back to us.

ourselves. And so I think that's probably the thing I try and remind myself. That's so true. That's so true. Now that Neve is seven. Now, I always say that between seven and ten is at the golden age for parents because your kids are old enough to hang out with and they understand things and you can have fun, but the teenage hormones haven't kicked in yet. I am slightly eating my words. I've got seven-year-old twins and I'm reflecting on what I've just said and think, it doesn't feel like the golden age to me right now. But does that in any way reflect? year-old experience of parenting right now? I remember I once had one of those apps that was like,

was it called the Wonder News or something, one of those apps that, you know, you would open up and you'd look at where your child was and it would tell you what you should be expecting at a time. There was something reassuring about seeing these patterns. And maybe it's because it actually just reminds you of the normality of whatever experience everyone is having. that actually this is just the process,

the process of growing, the process of parenting. And so I think I almost take everything, though, still though, I still remind myself that there's, oh, there's the terrible twos, and then there's the threes, and there's always something

that someone is going to tell you about an age and a face, and that there's always going to be a little uniqueness to whatever situation you're in. And so instead, just, How do we instead remind ourselves that regardless of whether it's two or seven, the bulk of the time we'll get to spend with our kids? The bulk of it is in those first 16 years.

And then after that, everything starts to decline. So I try and think of it in that that like 85% of the time I'm going to spend with my child is now. And that I try not to get too sad about that. because actually when I think about it, it makes me sad. But it also makes me appreciate that even if that time is spent with her being grumpy with me in her room, I'd rather that opportunity than the distance that I know that is just a part of growing up in the future. So just that's the perspective I try and hold to. See, I always think five was golden.

Five was for me. Five was the golden age. So many time trauma. Five, Wendy. you have got the real tinted glasses on. Maybe. So what does a perfect weekend look like for you as a family now? What's the kind of...

Let's put your rose tinted spectacles on. What do you do at the weekend? You know, I might make some pancakes. I've finally nailed down a good pancake recipe. I'll say I'm not going to eat them and then I'll eat half. standard, including Neve's leftovers. We might go to a park. Neve's a big outdoor, a big outdoor kid.

You know, we might roam through one of Neve and her dad's favorite things to do is roam through a market. And then, you know, Neve and I have, I think we're a bit similar in that our way of switching off and winding down as to watch a movie or something so we do a bit of that together. So we might have a movie night all. something like that. Very normal things. Very normal things. Sounds lovely. Looking back at how

you came to become Prime Minister, it does read like a series of happy accidents. Did you ever have a moment of imposter syndrome and think, I don't know if I can do this? Or do you mean apart from every single time something happened where I had? Because it was the, it was the norm as a to the exception, the most obvious being the moment where my boss, the leader of the New Zealand Labor Party, seven weeks out from the election, eight weeks out, says to me, I don't think privately in his office, I don't think I can do it, I think maybe you might need to become the leader and run in the election. And I was 37. I was trying to have a baby. He didn't know that. I felt completely ill-equipped to do the job. But rather than roll all of that out, I just

laid out to him all of the practical reasons why that was a bad idea. We'd already taken the campaign photos and put up the billboards. That's how far along we were. He and I standing side by side, me, his loyal deputy, it seemed like a crazy proposition. But a week later, he came to work and he quit and he nominated me. And so I had, of course, that imposter syndrome has never left me, ever. And so it was writ large at that moment in time that the only thing that really out did it

was that sense of responsibility. It kicked in pretty quickly. And so we just had to get on with it. I feel so reassured to hear you say that actually because so often you ask someone about imposter syndrome and they say, oh no, I don't believe in it. So actually, hearing you admit that you had it, and have it. I'm like, oh, okay. I feel better about that. I don't know that it goes, I don't know

that it goes away. I think it dips and wanes, sure. It might be times where you feel you have more of a confidence gap than others. But, you know, one of the things I spend a bit of time trying to write about was I always saw it as an affliction, you know, this, this weight, you know, it's called a syndrome, you know, we make it sound like an illness. And yet when you think about, if you have impulsive syndrome. There are things you do about it. You don't just sit and exist with it. You'll do something about it. You might really prepare for a role or do your research on something to make sure that you know what you need to do. You might get some advice from other people. You'll bring a bit of humility to what you're doing. They still make you better. They make you better in a role. They make you better as a leader. So I think the ticket for me was not seeing it as a weakness anymore. love that so now that you've stepped away from the mega job do you ever miss it motherhood oh no I'm still doing that no the mega job no the mega job I know it was being cheeky oh the mega motherhood is the mega job it is the mega job I thought you just couldn't understand my stupid

accent no no it's being cheeky so do you think do you ever think oh god I miss those days of being prime minister or you like thank god I'm not doing that anymore. I think it's possible to feel both at the same time, you know, because there are things I miss about that role. I miss just the people I worked with were incredible. I know politics gets a fairly bad rap and often for good reason, but I worked with people who were true public servants who were there for all the right reasons.

And I loved working with them. I miss just even on the worst day, you still have. the power to do something. You have the ability to change and fix a problem. You know, as difficult and as intransigent as it might be, you can do something. And in a world where so often you feel so powerless, that is a, that is such a gift. And I never, I don't think I ever took it for granted. But I also don't regret the decision.

And I don't wish to go back. So I think it's possible to feel both. Finally, Jacinda, you know, you've talked a lot about, showing yourself grace, which I think is so powerful. What advice do you have for someone who is listening who's about to or has just gone back to work from maternity leave? And is feeling all those feelings of guilt and being torn that we've spoken about so much today, you know, showing grace. Is there anything else that you would recommend that they do? I find it really powerful to think about some of these challenges from the perspective of our own children.

You know, when I, when we, when our sons and our daughters, are in the same position as us in the future when they are either having children of their own and perhaps choosing to or choosing to or having to reenter the workplace. What do we wish for them? We probably wish for them that they feel that it's okay, that the kids are going to be okay, that they can build that loving attachment and they can have fulfilling careers, that they can do both of these things. That's what we'd want for our kids, I'm sure of it. And so how do we give that to ourselves? And I find that a really helpful way to think about

these things, because I know what I want for my daughter, and it shouldn't be too much to want the same for me. Thank you so much for coming to join us and for negotiating the joys of technology to be here and chat to us today. It was an absolute pleasure to meet you. So nice to chat with you. Thank you so much for having me. And as would say New Zealand, Kierkaha, go well. Seeing back to you, I'm not going to attempt saying that.

Please don't. I'm going to say Cheerio like we see in Scotland. Please do. Please do. Cheerio. Don't forget, you can get in touch with us on all social channels, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, just type in Netmums and you'll find us.

And if you liked what you've heard today, we'd love for you to give us a five-star rating. Press the follow button and share the podcast on all your socials.