Who are we to judge?

Every mum’s nightmare scenario is to know you are being criticised.  No matter what we do or how we do it, there will always be someone who thinks that we should be doing it differently.  I get that.  But being mean with it?  That I don’t get.

I have been guilty of it myself, before I had kids that is.  I can remember questioning why a mum would allow her kids to behave in certain manner that was so unruly, making a nuisance of themselves to those around them.  Now I feel so embarrassed when I think of these memories.  Now I completely understand that sometimes you just have no control of how your kids are, yet you can be judged by someone who has never met you, or seen you with your kids before on the three minutes that they spent in your company, which was the exact same moment your child decide that screaming as loud as they could would be fun.

Case in point being that Ian and I hated the thought of our daughter with her head tilted towards an iPad at meal times.  We naively thought that they should be educating the child how to sit and have an adult meal.  “They should be talking to their child,” I can recall saying to Ian one lunchtime when faced with a couple and a 2 year old.  How naïve?  Little did we realise (despite the knowing the fact) that a toddler just isn’t able to sit for long enough.  They get bored; they have such a small attention span, and get irritable…  NannyPad as we have affectionately nicknamed it, is regularly taken with us to restaurants.  If (shock, horror) we forget it, my iPhone is swiftly deployed once it becomes evident that our DD will not sit still much longer, so that Peppa Pig can calm here where all our attempts were failing.  Yes we do notice the disapproving looks from others but more often than not, they are young people who clearly don’t have rugrats at home.  It does though bug me on the off occasion when it is someone who does have their own kids with them at the time.  Our philosophy though is that if it means we can sit and spend the best part of an afternoon in the company of friends at a restaurant and enjoy the meal, so what?  More importantly, isn’t it better that the people on the table next to us are extended the same courtesy regardless as to whether or not we have a child with us?  Why should a child who doesn’t want to be there ruin their meal?

I don’t buy into this, “You aren’t teaching your kids the right way to behave at the table” rubbish that I have heard spouted.  In fact, because we regularly eat out our DD has excellent table manners for a two and a half year old.  She loves to sit at the table laughing and joking with the others who are there whilst she shows off to them, but for those long lunches… well NannyPad nannypad is great.

Being a working mother, we often have guilt.  Many of our friends have said that they just don’t bother taking their children out to eat, as it is just too painful a process.  Here, the culture focuses so much on eating out, and my time is so limited, that I don’t want to have to choose between friends and family.  Whilst I am not saying my friends are more important than my daughter by any means, within an expat community, your friends are an extension of your family.  I don’t want to leave my daughter with the nanny so I can take time out to catch up with people  - I am away from her enough as it is – so I do take her with me.  My friends love it as they adore my DD, and she loves it as she invariably gets spoilt because it is evident how much they adore her and want to spend time with her.  But why should I be judged for it?

I was so angry to see another working mother being judged.  This time, Victoria Beckham (and to an extent David) were being slammed for allowing their daughter a dummy, saying she “may, “get speech or dental issues”’.  Firstly, their daughter has busy working, yet involved parents who have the global media hounding their every move.  How unsettling must this be for a four year old?  Is it really any surprise that she may want a comforter of some description?  I see many four year olds with dummies, but because they are in the public eye, they are getting hit for it.  Why pick on the Beckhams?  This headline is really quite inflammatory and does cleverly succeed in gaining a high click-through rate for the ‘newspaper’ in question.  The way the headline is written highlights the ‘speech or dental issues’ over and above the ‘may’ and draws your attention to these words.  Salacious gossip springs to mind.  It was when I looked at the author of the article that I was initially shocked and then understood.  The showbiz correspondent, clearly career driven if you were to look at the LinkedIn profile, and highly intelligent, appears to not long have been out of university herself, placing her in her 20’s and (I am assuming) childless.

The sad thing is, that this kind of writing, whilst completely understandable and completely thoughtless at such an early age, and by someone who is as career focused as this lady appears to be, does working families such a huge disservice around the world as it only piles on the negativity that working families are striving to move away from.  It also places us back in stereotypical roles – The mother should be at home with her children so a child meets full western expectations as to how a child should be, and the father should work.  But no child is perfect and the writer will learn this soon enough.

It is great that this young reporter is forging ahead with her career and for women everywhere who have the determination to succeed, I wish her the best of luck with that, but by adding to the guilt and needless embarrassment of other mothers who have made it, she is setting us back.  Who is to say that VB is not sat somewhere reading that and comments ‘blaming’ (and I use that term lightly as I don’t believe there is any blame to attribute here), herself and her working for the negative reactions as I doubt highly she can be with her daughter every hour of the day to break the cycle.  Sadly, everyone somewhere will have something to say and it tends to be only the bad comments that you will hear.

If I were to have read something written like this, I would feel terrible.  Despite my putting myself out there, I still like to be liked; yet when you take someone’s children into the equation, you are quite literally stamping on them from a great height.  No doubt VB has toughened up to this sort of thing, but I would hate for any women to think that that is how they are judged.  She has built an amazing global business, investing her time and money into something that she loves doing.  She has to spend enough time away from her family without being made to feel that she isn’t doing enough in their lives.  Ultimately a happy mummy is a happy family, so why shouldn’t she be focused on something that adds another dimension to her life, as well as providing more security and a legacy for her family?

I don’t know VB so I can’t talk for her, but I do know that I can’t possibly be a stay at home mother.  I have tried.  It strained my relationship with Ian and made me resentful.  My daughter on the other hand loves to visit me at work, and will sit next to me in my home office with her laptop so she, “can work too mummy.  Just like you.”  Personally, I think this is a great mind-set for her to have.  It will enable her (I hope) to be just as driven as she grows up, but I also hope she remembers how far people have come so that women globally are able to have these choices, and not, albeit unintentionally, stab someone in the back for some clicks on a website. 

For the writer of the article, I only hope that in a few years time she won’t feel so judged when she is balancing a career and a family life.  Even worse, I hope she doesn’t get so worn down at trying to live up to her own expectations on motherhood, that she losses sight of her own dreams and aspirations, and gives up working completely.

Most of all, I just don’t understand why all parents aren’t just allowed to parent as they see fit.  Every family is different.  Every child is different.  To get through each day, you do what you have to do.  Who are we to judge if that is right or wrong?