The Mommy Wars

I just barely got back from registering Addison with her preschool and going to an open house to meet her teachers and all of that business. Addison was pretty much barfing from excitement the entire time. I, however, was not. While Addison was led off to one of the classrooms to play with her new classmates and teachers, I was in another classroom filling out registration forms, contact sheets, immunization records and all of the rest of it. Apparently the procedure was that you sat in a waiting area to fill out the paperwork, and then brought it to the front desk where you handed in your cheque, talked to the teacher a little about your child and moved on. In the course of the morning, I realized something: I don't like other moms very much.

Don't get me wrong. I have lots of friends that are moms. But we all seem to share the same imperfect attitude about motherhood. Yes, we all love our kids, but that's not IT to us, you know? While I was in there I listened to about 1,000 other moms talking about how gifted their children were, how they've STRIVED to teach them how to read Shakespeare by age three. I saw some moms that had MAJOR superiority complexes when it came to their children, and themselves. It made me want to punch everyone in the room. Sometimes I want to be like OKAY! WE GET IT! YOU LIKE YOUR KIDS! omg. One lady decided that HER child was so special that under the question "Are there any things you'd like your child to learn this year?" she wrote an answer that didn't take up just the three lines that were provided. No. She filled out the entire section, and then flipped the page over and filled out the entire back of the page as well. WHO DOES THAT? Another one, so desperate for human contact, sat at the desk to fill out everything, and then have a fifteen minute conversation with the teacher about her child, while the classroom filled up with everyone else, just waiting while she gabbed. One, when her child was climbing onto the block table, sat with a frozen smile on her face while the teacher had to tell her kid to get back onto the floor. And I knew what she was thinking. "Um, is she reprimanding precious Tayslie? Maybe this isn't the school for us..."

I hear ALL THE TIME about moms who feel lonely, and who feel like they don't have a social life. After my experience, I can see why some mother's have that problem. They alienate other people. I was sitting there, mentally stabbing everyone in the eyes, thinking wow, I could never be friends with anyone in this room. In fact, they were instituting a school-wide mom's night out (not GIRL'S night, MOM'S night) , and had a sign up sheet, and I could not bring myself to do it. As much fun as a night out talking about our kids sounds.......

So LADIES. Do you want more friends? A better social life? The get an identity. One that doesn't just boil down to you being an overworked, car-pooling, soccer mom. Evaluate your style of parenting, and if it isn't up to par with the other moms, shrug and say, "Meh, I'm giving it a good go." Answer only to yourself. Admit to yourself that sometimes, your kid is not the cutest/smartest/funniest child in the room. In fact, sometimes he's just average. And average is pretty awesome. SO RELAX.

If you don't, I WILL judge you, and joke about you with my friends. And I will not attend your mom's night out, because I'll be too busy enjoying my family, rather than overseeing them. And then, I'll write about you on my blog. And you'll feel bad about yourself. DO YOU REALLY WANT THAT?