Katie Holmes on being a single mum

A lot of single mums can relate to Katie Holmes’s fears about not being all things to her daughter Suri, 8.

“Am I enough? Am I doing enough? Have I seen her enough?” she says to People magazine. “Guess what? You’re not enough, she hasn’t seen you enough, you’re horrible: That’s how it can feel sometimes.”

In August she spoke about her extra challenges – trying to keep things normal when she and her daughter are the focus of paparazzi: “I try to do what [my family] did for me for my little one.”

She famously fled from her marriage to Tom Cruise in 2012, but “I don’t want that moment in my life to define me, to be who I am,” she says. “I don’t want that to be what I’m known as. I was an actor before, an actor during and an actor now.”

The 35-year-old has a few projects coming up – a dark comedy, Miss Meadows, and she will repeat her performance as Jackie Kennedy in another TV drama, The Kennedys: After Camelot.

Now, raising Suri on her own, she gets help from her mother Kathleen and a nanny, but also has lots of friends with children of all ages and “I lean on them.”

“So I do have help, yes, but it’s your baby, you know?” she says. “You want to be the one who is there.”

When she doubts herself, “You really need to support each other, help people through whatever it is they’re going through – whether it’s ‘My kid just threw a tantrum’ or ‘I was late for graduation’ or whatever it is, you know!”

“I think we all need to just ease up,” she says. “Ease up on the expectations, and the worrying. We’re all trying to do the best we can.”

“You do the best you can. Some days you feel really good about yourself and some days you don’t.”

Do you ever feel like you’re being a horrible mum? What do you do to get through it? Let us know in the comments below!

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38 Comments

- - ella12 said
  - 10 Jan 2018
    11:44 am
Thanks Katie, I so can relate.

- - Danielle said
  - 30 Jan 2015
    10:59 pm
“Ease up on the expectations”, I like that.

- - stepmom107932 said
  - 17 Dec 2014
    5:11 pm
yeah its hard to realise you cant be the one and only to be there for your kids and you need others to help

- - jessmumof3 said
  - 14 Dec 2014
    4:32 pm
Single mums and dads do have it much harder but all parenting can get difficult at times

- - mom94125 said
  - 11 Dec 2014
    1:51 pm
yeah i do agree that single mums do a great job!

- - mom57808 said
  - 08 Dec 2014
    3:35 pm
way to go Katie,, but the nannies are a big bonus hey

- - mom109463 said
  - 03 Dec 2014
    2:17 pm
Lovely to read a story about Katie, unfortunate that marriages break up but there are always 2 sides and I am sure that her 1st thoughts are with her child.

- - Karan said
  - 02 Dec 2014
    12:51 pm
i really like and admire katie holmes but this article is laughable. katie is in a position where she can take suri to work with her if need be, she can afford nannies, housekeepers etc. the majority of single mums dont have millions of dollars in the bank, they dont have a nanny and they might not have a mum

- - mom59055 said
  - 30 Nov 2014
    10:16 pm
still dont get why she married tom cruise.

- - cloverstorm said
  - 03 Nov 2014
    3:50 pm
I’m sure we can all relate to that feeling at sometime.

- - rovermum said
  - 03 Nov 2014
    10:38 am
Often times I feel like everything is not enough. I share these thoughts with my husband and we remind ourselves we are more than enough. Our son is well rounded, polite, respectful, a really good kid. And that’s enough!

- - mom92217 said
  - 01 Nov 2014
    8:32 pm
The best thing she did was get away from Tom
- rachkap replied
  
  01 Nov 2014 , 10:25 pm
  Totally agree with you here!
- - kozack said
  - 01 Nov 2014
    8:22 pm
i think all us mothers even fathers think this throughout our childrens lives,we all want to be the best parents we can be.

- - meedee said
  - 01 Nov 2014
    1:28 pm
Ive never felt that I was a horrible Mum….I have had days where ive been low on energy and felt I could do better if i had been able to sleep the night before ….things like that but ive never been into bashing myself up over how i functioned as a Mum. I always told my kids that i was never a perfect Mum but Every day I always give it every ounce of energy that i had and i did my best…some days were better then others.

- - busy little bee said
  - 01 Nov 2014
    9:00 am
I think all parents writer single/de facto or married working or not working as them selfs this question.
They way I look at it times when it gets busy and hard is. In doing this to help set them up for life and not every thing is going to be there way.
Yes there is times I wish I can do more but I teel my boys I’m only human and as long as I make it the Very important events and am home every night to tuck them in to bed and feed them then I’m doing ok and they have a clean set of school uniform for the next day. As I’m a working studying mum whom also has to juggle 3 lots of specialists and Drs and all the othere day to day things. As long as the boys now I love them we are doing well.

- - damish70 said
  - 31 Oct 2014
    11:02 pm
I always feel I’m a horrible Mum

- - mom82590 said
  - 31 Oct 2014
    9:30 pm
yes I feel like a horrible mum sometimes. I am a bit of a perfectionist which does not help. I just tell my self I am doing the best I can, and that you don’t have to be perfect.

- - tammykilby said
  - 31 Oct 2014
    8:36 pm
Oh I feel like this all the time but then I think I love my kids an this is why sometime we don’t get along but in the long run they will thank me for it..

- - mom101330 said
  - 31 Oct 2014
    7:17 pm
Good on her for keeping it real. Not one of these mothers who think they know it all.

- - mom59055 said
  - 31 Oct 2014
    6:59 pm
i love katie. huge dawsons creek fan. still not sure why she married tom cruise though