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Title : Thoughts for Thursday: Jack of All Trades, Master of None
link : Thoughts for Thursday: Jack of All Trades, Master of None
Thoughts for Thursday: Jack of All Trades, Master of None
Have you ever heard that phrase, "Jack of all trades, master of none?" That's me, and that's me in relation to parenting. I'm good at a lot of things, but not great {and I'm really bad at a lot of things, too}. I'm no master at parenting -- and newsflash: no one is.In the last month or so, I've had three different encounters with complete strangers telling me how poor of a parent they think I am; what they think I should do better; and insinuating that my parenting skills aren't up to their "master parent" level. I've gotten on Facebook and started looking at a news article posted by a local TV station about seasonal allergies, only to find someone leaving an uneducated, vicious comment about "vile" bottle feeding and how if people wouldn't "give up breastfeeding," their children wouldn't suffer from seasonal allergies. I've heard the rants from my girlfriends and myself alike about the mom at a particular beauty store who said her children would "never act like that" when her boys were playing on the floor in the corner while she was checking out, or the dad at Dairy Queen who told me I needed to "beat my children's {expletives}" for laughing and being silly over an ice cream sundae.
And to be quite honest, I'm downright sick of it.
And all of this got me thinking. Why do we, as women -- and sometimes men! -- shame other moms, put them down, and make them feel inferior about their parenting? Why do we make a fellow mom feel bad if her choices aren't the same choices we would make, whether it be breastfeeding vs. bottle feeding; co-sleeping vs. crib sleeping; making homemade baby food vs. buying it from the store; eating organic vs. not; a sleep schedule vs. not; and the list goes on an on forever. Just because you don't agree with them doesn't make them wrong. Aren't we all supposed to be in this together? Whether you work full-time, part-time, from home, are a homemaker or whatever combination you participate in -- you're a mom. And it's the hardest job in the world. And we need to be supporting each other. No one is a master parent -- no one.
I hear women constantly talking about empowering others and how, we, as women, should break the glass ceiling and be all, "I am woman, hear me roar." But, we do absolutely nothing for our case as women striving to be equal and powerful when we put our fellow women down, making them feel awful and like a bad mother, and acting like children ourselves.
I'm just going to say it. Apparently some moms out there in this world have just "mastered" the art of mothering and feel the need to let everyone know when others don't live up to their expectations. But why? When did we start thinking it's our right to tell others -- especially complete strangers -- what we think they should do, how they should parent, and what we think they're doing wrong? When did this become a "thing?"
One of my girlfriends said this, and it really hit home with me: "These situations are exactly the ones that make it so much easier to not get out and do things around other children, just out of fear that one of our children won't be a perfect angel, heaven forbid, and that we'll get crap from it from a fellow mom."
I have no other point to this post than to say this: we're all moms, and none of us are perfect at it. We sometimes yell, we'll sometimes cry because of how crazy are kids are being, we sometimes pour a glass of wine at 4 p.m. because darn it, we need it that day. On the opposite vein, we'll beam with pride when we see the owners of our kid's school at HomeGoods and they tell us how awesome our kid is at school and how helpful they are to others. We'll clap for joy when they finally recognize their first sight word. But yet still, we'll parent alone when our spouse is traveling. We'll deal with our kids pushing a stranger's kid on the playground. We'll be up at all hours rocking our sick kid, or comforting one who had a nightmare, or feeding one at 2 a.m. when the world is asleep. We truly don't know what another mom is going through, what's happening in her life or in her circle.
So, just do this for me, will you? The next time you see that mom in the grocery store and her child is throwing a tantrum on the ground, don't look at her with a side-eye and silently think, "My kid would never do that." {Because newsflash: they will. Parenting makes you eat your words more than anything in the world.} But instead, flash her a smile and maybe even say to her, "I've so been there. You're doing a great job." You never know what she may be dealing with that day and your kind words will make her feel like she's doing okay -- not make her cry in her car after struggling to load up her screaming kids and her groceries.
Let's support each other because, at the end of the day, we're all just a parenting jack of all trades and the master of none.
*Linking up with Annie, Natalie and Julie
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