And gold in the Mommy Olympics goes to you

I mentioned in my last post about the Mommy Olympics. A word that makes me blood boil and cringe. The Mommy Olympics (for those of you not familiar with the term) is when moms feel that burning desire to turn everything their baby/child (or how they are parenting) is doing into a competition. It's a race to see whose kid can accomplish whatever better/faster/cooler than anyone else's kid. And let me tell you, it's not just mom's that do this. I have an unnamed relative that is notorious for boasting about a child in their life in the attempts to outshine anyone else's child.

Now that I have Alaina, I have had one of each kind of child. Connor was "in front of the curve" and was doing and hitting milestones a little on earlier side and Alaina is "behind the curve" and hitting her milestones later. Connor doesn't stop, he is go go go from sun-up to sun-down. Alaina likes to do things in her own time. It's obnoxious that mom's aren't remembering that every child is his or her own person, absolutely perfect just the way they are. Parents (especially new moms) are so stressed and worried about whether or not their baby is developing as it is, the last thing they need is another mom criticizing or judging what is happening in their child's life.

I can honestly say I have been on the receiving end of unintentional baby olympics in life when Connor was born. A lot of us ladies had babies within a 6-8 week period and it was very easy to look at everyone else's child and wonder if your baby is on track. All that self doubt and analyzation crept in daily asking "am I doing enough," "is Connor being challenged enough?" Oh no, Baby X rolled, why isn't Connor rolling? All this undue pressure on myself made Connor's first year more stressful than enjoyable. Into his 2nd year, I started to relax, knowing he was fine in his own time and doing things the way he wanted to do them and with that reassurance I am not worrying about Alaina taking her time to do her thing.

I hear a lot of griping about women being hard on women and we are our own worst enemies...obviously that doesn't stop at mommy-hood. When we share that bond of having perfect, beautiful babies and could share experiencing the joy of motherhood we are instead judging, putting each other down, criticizing other kids and parenting skills. My hope is that I lift up other moms in their challenges that are sometimes different, sometimes similiar to my own. I hope that I find words of encouragement to lift up a stressed out mom whose struggles I don't understand because my struggles are different. I pray that I stop judging others and that others stop judging me on the basis of kids and how they act/behave and they way I chose to raise them.