Any-Mom » It Takes A Mom To Know A Mom

It Takes A Mom To Know A Mom

12.18.2008 | Author: OrganizerMom | Posted in Pick Your Battles

Note to self: Do not complain about the hardships of being a parent to childless friends.

I did just that recently, telling BeautifulSuccessfulThinFriend about my son’s need to interact with me every waking minute.

“Well, you wanted him,” she said unfeelingly.

Of course I wanted him. I also wanted braces, but that doesn’t mean I have to enjoy everything about them.

Goodness knows I’ve sat through enough of her venting about her family. She was married for 7 years and had 3 stepchildren so she’s not really exactly childless. I guess the difference is that the kids were never really hers. I mean, she didn’t birth them or anything. She didn’t marry the man to get the stepchildren. The stepchildren came with the man and she had no choice in the matter. Maybe she thinks that people who actually birthed their own children relinquish the right to complain about them.

BeautifulSuccessfulThinFriend’s husband did not even have primary custody so my friend only had to have the kids every other weekend and one evening during the week. Later, when the kids were older, they spent one week with the ex and one with my friend and her husband. She complained about the cooking and cleaning she had to do and how the kid care was just eating up her entire life.

Now, I’m a good friend, and I try to be supportive, and I understand that my role is to listen and empathize. So I never pointed out that the kids went away a week at a time!!! What was so bad about a week on, a week off? When my son was a toddler and we were new parents, my husband and I used to joke that we needed a couple of ex’s to take him off our hands for a weekend. We would have KILLED for an entire week to ourselves.

So for her to imply that I had made my bed and now needed to lie in it seemed completely obnoxious, considering the time and effort I had put into not telling her she didn’t know how good she had it.

But as I said, I try to be a good friend to her, and a big part of that means not stirring things up. So I just lamely agreed that, yes, I had wanted him and then redirected the conversation by suggesting that she, better than anyone, must know about the sacrifices we make for our children. She launched into a long rant about how her step kids don’t appreciate anything she did for them and I tuned out and resolved to limit my parenting complaints to my mom friends.

I guess it takes a mom to know a mom.