I think two of the top basic traits of Moms are to (1)
Protect their children and (2) To judge other mothers. I don’t think we plan on
judging or even notice that we are doing it sometimes.Recently, I was at a play space where there was a young
child who was very physical. Now there is the usual play space roughness of
fighting over shared toys, aggressive bouncy house action, but this was beyond
that. Now I have no problem disciplining other people’s children when it is
obviously needed but this child didn’t care and continued his behavior the
entire time. His mother was actively watching him but he would just act out
randomly and frequently. His mother and I started talking (after he had pushed
Daniel down for no reason) and she expressed how she’s having a really hard
time with him and she was clearly feeling very overwhelmed. She talked about
how she knows that other mothers think that she is a bad mom. I can’t imagine
being in her position. It’s actually tough on both ends though. We both brought
our kids there to have a good time. I don’t want to spend my time watching
where her child is and if he is going to act out against one of my kids. She
wants to get out of the house and perhaps have an adult conversation for a few
minutes without having to stand guard over her child to make sure he behaves. I
honestly felt bad for the woman but immediately was thinking things like, “Well
if you just did XYZ maybe he wouldn’t do it.” I suddenly had a mental laundry
list of things that she should and should not be doing to “fix” her son. Now
for all I know, she could have already tried hundreds of things and nothing worked.
Perhaps, they have things going on in their home life that I can’t even
imagine. I’m glad she opened up to me about her frustrations because it opened
my eyes to the other side of the situation. Will it prevent me from judging in
the future? Honesty, probably not but it will at least give me some food for
thought. I think the bottom line is that it’s hard being a mom and it’s especially
hard being a mom who is in the spotlight.
