Or is it a
support group?
When you’re a parent, you’ll
usually fall under certain category and later be “judge” for it.
If you’re a Stay At Home Mum (SAHM)
– the label is you’re a sell out and a disgrace to feminist everywhere for
chaining yourself to the kitchen and your kids
If you’re a Career Mum (CM/WM) –
you’re deemed to not care about your child enough to give up your career to be
there for their first step, first word, second smile, 50th poo (you
get the drift)
The war between these two is an ANCIENT
one but still ongoing. I can imagine 1000 years ago a cavewoman who decided to
hunt a T-Rex getting the evil eye from her homey (cavey) counterparts who is
deemed “weak” for staying in her hole. I’ve been on both sides of the spectrum (albeit
a shorter period on the SAHM side) take my word for it- either way is
difficult.” whatever works for you and family la kan?
Today I want to talk about the Super
Mummy Vs. Bad Mom Club (BMC)
The “SUPERMUMMY/SUPERDADDY” – who seems to be be able to do
EVERYTHING right, their children are not only well behaved, breastfed till they
are 4, speaks in 3 different languages, eats everything on the plate (from oranges
to kumquat to octopus legs), extremely discipline, never threw a tantrum, do
not eat any form of junk food,sodium, gluten, sugar and non-organic ANYTHING
and always immaculately dress . They also NEVER scream, shout, and smack their
children because for some reason time outs always worked.Their problem is just one:
THEY FREAKING JUDGE EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE WHO DOES NOT DO THINGS BY THEIR
BOOK
The BAD MOM/PARENTS: They take “short cuts” in parenting (i.e.
bribe their kids with sweets so that they’ll stop crying or give picky eater
whatever they want as long as they eat). Their children has tantrums, extremely
clumsy, uses binky/pacifiers, not diaperless by the age of 2, watches TV and
play with IPads (it’s a long list of offences) The parents “discipline” their
children by screaming, shrieking, meltdowns etc.
My confession? I’m one of them
Actually the BMC are not made of
bad mothers. Far from it, because most of them are awesome parents who chooses
not to do things by the book or based on “what’s in”. The best thing about the
members of BMC is that they’re extremely helpful and tends to judge less. It is
easier to “confess” to them without feeling like a total failure.
I choose NOT to talk about some
of my “real parenting” issues with just about anyone for the simple reason that
they judge and sometimes make unfair and thoughtless comments. Some won’t even
let you “complaint” because they’re all “sapa suruh have banyak kids” (Someone
actually said this to me) At that time I wanted to retaliate by saying “I was
ready to have a SECOND child but Allah gave me THREE, are you suggesting that I
blame god?” Of course I didn’t but that is beside the point. The point is I
need people who “get” what I’m going through and can give useful input
Alhamdullilah… I have a few of
them in my life: my mummies friend from my Dino years, mummies friend at work
and mummies mates from Twitter and Blog. I may not have a gabijilion of them
but the one that I have really do help me a lot. At the same time they also
teaches me empathy and understanding.
Take this scenario for instance.
When you see a Kancil with let say 4 kids in them some of whom may not be in
car seats the “supermummy” would say “How irresponsible, they should get car
seats for all the kids or have someone with them all the time”.
The BMC would reason out “Ok that
is dangerous but maybe they don’t have the budget to buy car seats, maybe they don’t
have someone to help them out etc BUT I do wish they put on safety belts on the
kids though”
The problem with SOME “Supers” is
they come from overly privilege families, where money and help is NEVER an issues.
They set such high standards for themselves, which to me is good but the
problem is they try to impose the same standards to the society at large (which
is annoying). There is no one size fits all solution for everyone. Quoting Tolstoy-
Anna Karenina “All happy families are alike, unhappy families are unhappy in
their own way” – Everyone has their OWN problems, you don’t need to add to it
and make them feel bad.
What sparked this long winded
blog post?
This Yahoo Entry (Click). What the parents did may be humiliating
but I seriously think it was done without malice and due to extreme
helplessness on their part. I don’t agree with them being labeled as “worst
parents ever”. Quoting someone from the comments section "Good parents
worry about outcomes. Bad parents worry about their children liking them”
Finally, my assessment on “super
mummies” who never had a bad day? In the era of Instagram and FB where you can
pick and choose pictures to portray you in the best light and where you can
easily censor the REAL happenings at home even nut jobs like Kim Kardashian can
be a contender of mother of the year.Fullstop
Have a great weekend everyone…
