Friday, March 22, 2013

The Bad Mom.s Club

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…

3 comments:

twayblade said...

irsa has a carseat. and i put it on the front seat which has airbag. and she is not even sitting in the carseat. she would normally stand facing the windscreen in front, enjoying the scenery. that would be the only way i could drive the car with her. in peace.

that makes me an ultra super bad mommy of the century according to the mommy club. oh damn.

~f@R~ said...

I'm guilty of the same, because short of buying a new car (or lorry) our Alza can't fit 3 cars seats (so Ryan x use his anymore) and the humongous double stroller :p Don't really care about the people judging either unless they plan to sponsor me with a new transportation hehehe

Anonymous said...

Any parents who cares is a good parent