There is an ever-growing trend these days regarding nonjudgmental mothering, regarding mothers helping mothers without setting standards and obligations. This, of course, is well-needed as mothers have been pitting against each other since the beginning of time. One mother is always putting down another, whether it is behind their backs or passive aggressively to their face. As much as we want to be supportive and understanding of one another, subconsciously, we project our insecurities as parents. Here is an example of what I mean:
I am a mother to an almost 5-year-old boy and I am a mostly optimistic person; I am empathetic and supportive. I believe in one's journey and their obligation to find themselves as parents, and as people. I, myself, sitting at a park, checking my emails, have been weary of judgement eyes. Although I have been lucky to date that I have not been judged openly, I still feel the insecurity of doing so, when in fact, I came to the park for a break - to allow my son to play while I check my emails from work and my business.
Yesterday, I brought my little boy to the park. As we approached, I saw two little girls, not more than 2 and 3 years old, playing together, tete-a-tete on the grass hill. I thought it would be an adorable picture, and as someone who is always looking for opportunities to take adorable pictures, I felt the itch. I looked over, about 3 feet from the girls and saw, who I presumed, was their mother. She had her phone in her hand and I thought she was taking a picture of the girls, but then I realized that she was taking a "selfie".
Immediately, my internal judgement alarms went off. Did she not see how adorable her children looked? Why was she not jumping at the chance to seize this moment and capture it forever? Was she really so self-centered that she cared more about taking a pretty picture of herself, most likely with the caption "at the park with my girls", to notice her two adorable daughters?
Knowing I had no room to judge, I moved on. I went and sat with my son, who'd brought at least 5 trucks along so we could make a "big pile, as big as the sky". The two little girls waddled over to see what we were up to, all the kids smiled at each other, and then the girls roamed away. While the girls played in the sand, their mother was sitting on the bench, about 10 feet away, on her phone. Again, I tried not judge, although I secretly wondered how long it had been since she'd looked up from her phone.
Roughly 5 minutes later, the littlest of the girls started walking towards the VERY busy road. The park is situated beside a community road where cars travel anywhere from 50 km/h to 80 km/h. Granted, the park is roughly 40 feet from the road, when I saw her going towards it I got nervous. I watched the little blonde baby to see where she was going, thinking that perhaps she would eventually stop at the fence, and also, secretly, wanted to see how long it would take her mother to notice. When the little girl disappeared behind the hill, I called for her mother.
"Excuse me!" I said, and she looked up. "She's leaving."
Alarmed, she jumped up, throwing her phone on the bench. "Oh, my God. I was just giving someone directions. Thank you!"
My heart panged. She felt judged, just as I had many times before. The fact that she felt the need to explain to me, even shortly, why she was on her phone made me feel horrible. She was young, younger than me, and she had no doubt experienced plenty of judgements in her lifetime, obvious by her reaction. She ran to her daughter, picked her up, and told her she couldn't walk away like that. She gave her a stern talking to, even invited the older sister over for the chat. I figured she would tell the kids to go play and she would then return to the bench and continue whatever she was doing on her phone.
But she didn't. Instead, she took off her sandals and ventured over to the swings, holding both their hands. She sat on the swing and her younger daughter straddled her, and they swung together counting. First, they counted in English. And then they counted in French. And then they counted in Spanish. Then the mother proceeded to explain words and phrases in French, getting her daughter to repeat her. Let me repeat this, this little girl was no more than 2. It astounded me that she could already count to 20 in 3 different languages.
And that was about the time I felt like a complete idiot. Here I was, sitting in the sand with my son, itching to check the beep that had come along 3 minutes ago, judging a woman that I had only been around for 5 minutes. A split second judgment made me see her as a young, careless mother who brings her children to the park so she doesn't have to entertain them and spend the entire time on social media trying to score a date. When in reality, she was probably at the park for the same reason I, as well as many other parents, come to the park - for a break. Because we need those sometimes.
Young kids expect mom and dad to entertain them basically 24/7 so if we can escape to the park where they may potentially meet other kids and play with them, then yes, I would jump at that chance. Then, for the first time that day, I can sit down, look through my work emails, reply to my boss's email she sent me 3 hours ago, or just surf the net for a measly 5 minutes and catch a breather.
I realize that not all stories turn out this way. Some parents are just like I thought this mother was, but who are we to judge? We don't know their lives, we don't know what they do at home, we don't know anything about them. Split second judgement is what is killing the bond mothers should be sharing with each other - split second judgement and insecurities.
Because do you know what I did the minute that woman left the park? I took out my phone and replied to someone who had posted on my Facebook. And that's OK. We're allowed to do that and no one should judge us for doing it.
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