Two stories.
The first takes place at the pediatrician's office. It was an exceptionally busy day and Hayden had the luck of sitting next to a 7 month old boy. They were chatting it up, screaming and laughing at each other when I noticed the young dad slapping the baby's fingers out of his mouth each time he attempted to suck on them. The baby didn't seem to notice much, but clearly, it was unacceptable in their family to suck your thumb or any other finger for that matter. I remembered how proud I was when Hayden started sucking his fingers and was automatically offended by this kids parents. I looked down at Hayden happily sucking on all 4 of his fingers at once and wondered, what was this dad thinking of my parenting?
The next story is one many of you already know about. It takes place at the women's lounge in Nordstrom. I was feeding Hayden his bottle of formula when the lady sitting across from me looked me in the eyes and said "So, you already gave up on breastfeeding, huh?" I was enraged at her allegation because, clearly, she had no concern for my feelings, especially the fact that I had to stop breastfeeding due to Hayden's weight loss. She had no idea how her judgement was a direct and hard blow to me and my parenting skills. She had no idea that the lactation consultant had been over twice, or that I became so obsessed with pumping 5-6 times a day that I was missing out on time I could have been playing with or holding Hayden. She had no idea, but she still judged me to my face and it hurt.
The point is, whether it is within the mind or it slips out of the mouth, your parenting is judged more than anything else you will ever do in your life. Even more than high school kids judge each other! And while we are busy silently or openly judging each other, we should be supporting each other, because in all honesty, parenting is damn hard. It is not intuitive, it is trial and error and stumbling on the best thing that works for your family. It is not what your mom did or your sister did or your friend did, it is what you figured out for yourself and your baby. And in the process of figuring it out, we all make mistakes and we all look like terrible parents in someone else's eyes.
So I have vowed not to judge other parents-no matter what kind of "bad parenting" they exhibit. I realize that my parenting will continue to be judged: when Hayden is crying in a restaurant or having a temper tantrum during his terrible twos or spitting up all over the place, but other people's judgment doesn't make me a bad mom. As long as I know this, I think we are going to be OK.
The first takes place at the pediatrician's office. It was an exceptionally busy day and Hayden had the luck of sitting next to a 7 month old boy. They were chatting it up, screaming and laughing at each other when I noticed the young dad slapping the baby's fingers out of his mouth each time he attempted to suck on them. The baby didn't seem to notice much, but clearly, it was unacceptable in their family to suck your thumb or any other finger for that matter. I remembered how proud I was when Hayden started sucking his fingers and was automatically offended by this kids parents. I looked down at Hayden happily sucking on all 4 of his fingers at once and wondered, what was this dad thinking of my parenting?
The next story is one many of you already know about. It takes place at the women's lounge in Nordstrom. I was feeding Hayden his bottle of formula when the lady sitting across from me looked me in the eyes and said "So, you already gave up on breastfeeding, huh?" I was enraged at her allegation because, clearly, she had no concern for my feelings, especially the fact that I had to stop breastfeeding due to Hayden's weight loss. She had no idea how her judgement was a direct and hard blow to me and my parenting skills. She had no idea that the lactation consultant had been over twice, or that I became so obsessed with pumping 5-6 times a day that I was missing out on time I could have been playing with or holding Hayden. She had no idea, but she still judged me to my face and it hurt.
The point is, whether it is within the mind or it slips out of the mouth, your parenting is judged more than anything else you will ever do in your life. Even more than high school kids judge each other! And while we are busy silently or openly judging each other, we should be supporting each other, because in all honesty, parenting is damn hard. It is not intuitive, it is trial and error and stumbling on the best thing that works for your family. It is not what your mom did or your sister did or your friend did, it is what you figured out for yourself and your baby. And in the process of figuring it out, we all make mistakes and we all look like terrible parents in someone else's eyes.
So I have vowed not to judge other parents-no matter what kind of "bad parenting" they exhibit. I realize that my parenting will continue to be judged: when Hayden is crying in a restaurant or having a temper tantrum during his terrible twos or spitting up all over the place, but other people's judgment doesn't make me a bad mom. As long as I know this, I think we are going to be OK.
OK, so I choose to focus on the very cute video instead of your horrible (clearly!) parenting skills. Stupid other people, anyway. (Did I say that outloud?)
ReplyDeleteThank goodness! The videos have come out much better than the photos, else my photography skills would also be judged (poorly)
ReplyDelete