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2 hours ago, SadieJane said:

If you are not a parent yet, and a mom is doing something you don't like, but is not dangerous, keep your mouth shut and walk away.  If you have tips to share, don't be overly aggressive with them, and remember, to err is to be human. 

 

This phrase  is weird to me. Could I do that if I were a parent? And are all women divided into the category of parent and not yet a parent? What about those of us who will never be a parent (and not all by choice, btw)? Where do we fit? 

How about take off the qualifier in this statement. If a person with a child is doing something you don't like, keep your mouth shut. Period. Regardless of who you are. 

Also, don't assume every woman you see in public with children is their parent. I was a nanny for a family for a couple of summers and very frequently in public with those kids but not their mother. I took care of my nephew nearly 24/7 every summer of his life until he didn't need a babysitter anymore and was constantly in public with him and was not his mother. In both cases, it was universally assumed I was the mother. Because apparently only mothers are in public with children. Especially if they are affectionate and/or competent with them--as the assumption was frequently explained away with that reasoning if I corrected someone. 

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8 minutes ago, SorenaJ said:

What if a parent was doing something illegal, but not dangerous ?

Notify the proper authorities? 

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If it’s illegal but not going to cause physical harm to a human being or animal, I mind my own business. It’s far too common for interactions with the police to turn violent, and I don’t want to be the cause of someone getting hurt or killed. I also don’t want to contribute to a person losing their job, home, or custody of their kids over some petty shit. 

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On 7/5/2018 at 12:57 PM, TuringMachine said:

Jessa's pretty funny

tumblr_pbdedu0jxi1wlhliho1_1280.jpg

I know I'm late to this, and I know that it's been said already, but Jessa's hilarious. I think she's the only fundie that actually makes me laugh out loud. 

It makes me wonder what she'd be like if she was born to a more mainstream family. 

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15 minutes ago, mpheels said:

If it’s illegal but not going to cause physical harm to a human being or animal, I mind my own business. It’s far too common for interactions with the police to turn violent, and I don’t want to be the cause of someone getting hurt or killed. I also don’t want to contribute to a person losing their job, home, or custody of their kids over some petty shit. 

At a place I worked A couple, A man and woman, were arguing with each other . No violence involved . Another person kept trying to get in there buisness ,trying to intervene ,wanting the employees to get involved and Getting upset when she was told there nothing they could do. Finally someone went up to them but they had calmed down. 

My co worker  who was a rough character said because of that nosy person the women might really get a beating now. 

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8 hours ago, louisa05 said:

Also, don't assume every woman you see in public with children is their parent. I was a nanny for a family for a couple of summers and very frequently in public with those kids but not their mother. I took care of my nephew nearly 24/7 every summer of his life until he didn't need a babysitter anymore and was constantly in public with him and was not his mother. In both cases, it was universally assumed I was the mother. Because apparently only mothers are in public with children. Especially if they are affectionate and/or competent with them--as the assumption was frequently explained away with that reasoning if I corrected someone. 

Agree. I'm not a mom (yet. I very much want to be, just not yet), but I am a teacher who has spent 4 years working with children from my job, four years working with children as a part of my education, countless hours babysitting cousins and neighbors as a teen, and currently take care of my baby niece so often that her mother jokes that I'm "generic brand mom." (As in, baby girl prefers "name brand mom" my sister, but generic brand will do the trick when she can't have the name brand). I really don't like this attitude that being a mom makes you an expert on everything child related, and that the rest of us poor childless women (whether by choice or not) just can't understand how to interact with children. I know that when I do become a mother it will change me in many ways, but at the same time, I don't think that giving birth automatically elevates you to child expert either. It just comes off as really condescending when mothers act like that around other women.

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2 hours ago, BernRul said:

It just comes off as really condescending when mothers act like that around other women.

I totally get that, and in many cases you are probably right. But sometimes when a woman who is not a mother says something about how to raise a child, it reminds me of how naive I was about raising a kid before I was actually raising a kid. I babysat from age 12, was a nanny in college, worked in a daycare...had tons and tons of experience with kids. It doesn’t even come close to raising my own. I’m still so so SO far from being an expert, but all the experience in the world doesn’t prepare you in the same way that having your own child does. There is also so much ‘advice’ going around sometimes it just be plain overwhelming to hear more, even if it turns out to be really solid advice. 

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I do hate seeing babies and toddlers with juice or soda in their bottles, I see all the time here but I'd never tell anyone to stop it, not my business. Letting a child try a sip of juice from an adults cup or eat a bit of ice cream is not going to do lasting damage but kids sipping juice out of bottles is a main cause of teeth rot and I know children who have had most their teeth removed due to decay. 

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18 hours ago, AnnEggBlandHer? said:

I totally get that, and in many cases you are probably right. But sometimes when a woman who is not a mother says something about how to raise a child, it reminds me of how naive I was about raising a kid before I was actually raising a kid. I babysat from age 12, was a nanny in college, worked in a daycare...had tons and tons of experience with kids. It doesn’t even come close to raising my own. I’m still so so SO far from being an expert, but all the experience in the world doesn’t prepare you in the same way that having your own child does. There is also so much ‘advice’ going around sometimes it just be plain overwhelming to hear more, even if it turns out to be really solid advice. 

In my experience, a lot of the people who butt in and give mothers advice like that are mothers themselves. The Internet and society in general seem to have created a lot of "sanctimommies" who try to act like they are the best parents and anyone who acts differently is doing it wrong. It's one of the things I'm least looking forward to when I think about having kids in the future.

I don't know if this was obvious from my other post, but I do think that mothers get unfairly scrutinized, and I don't think it's anyone's business what a parent does as long as it isn't harmful to the child. 

My problem was mostly with how some mothers use their status as mothers to act like they are the only ones who can talk about children. I get that having your own children changes you, but at the same time, it doesn't mean you know more than a pediatrian, or child psychologist, or a teacher, who are all highly educated in areas of child development and up to date research. Being a mom doesn't automatically make you give good child rearing adivce or know the stages of a child's mental development. To act like only moms can comment on what's best for a child is condescending (and I mean the general you, not you specifically).  Truthfully, no one should give unwanted advice whether they're also mother or not. 

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On 7/6/2018 at 7:21 PM, Nargus said:

Being pregnant (with a very wanted baby) has made me even more pro-choice than I was before. 

oh, God yes. I am six weeks pregnant (!!!!!!EXCLAMATION MARKS!!!!!) and frankly feel like I've been poisoned - it's like groundhog day, going to bed every night feeling reasonably OK and then waking up puketastic at 6am with crushing inevitability. Obviously it's early days, but I would not inflict this on somebody who did not want it, and however anxious I am about the survival of this little baby I'm growing, I STILL don't believe it has more rights than me.

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I HATE mommy shaming,  I never say anything to another parents, especially strangers. It really isn't our place to say anything most of the time. The ONLY time I've ever stepped in was YEARS ago when a mom was about to spank her son for peeing his pants.  I had heard this kid whining about having to go potty for 10 minutes and she kept telling him he was fine.  Well the cries kept getting more and more frantic and I was like, geeze lady he obviously has to go (I said this to myself), and then I heard him start crying and she started yelling at him and I watched as she was about to spank him, I stepped in and said "Lady I heard him tell you and BEG that he had to go potty for nearly 10 minutes and you ignored him, you don't get to spank him because YOU were to lazy to take him to the bathroom" Then I told the little guy not to cry he just had an accident and they happen. His mom was kind of mortified and then I told her I know kids are annoying you probably asked him earlier if he had to go and he said no only to tell you 5 minutes later he did/ I've been there and it is frustrating, but kids are kids and we have to deal with their stubbornness.  She did shock me by apologizing to her son and telling him she should have listened, she smiled at me and took him to the bathroom, I'm assuming to clean him up and change him.

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20 minutes ago, allthegoodnamesrgone said:

she smiled at me and took him to the bathroom, I'm assuming to clean him up and change him.

This made my blood run cold. I've witnessed the other side of your story, and what happened in that bathroom wasn't what you think. I did call 911 after I left the bathroom. It was that bad. :(

 

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This discussion is interesting to me. I personally haven’t been shamed by other moms (thus far - partly because I don’t share much on social media), but I have felt judged by non-parents. For instance, last week. I mentioned in another thread that my 19 month old daughter was extremely clingy with me at a party we attended with friends and family. Normally I don’t mind, but it was hot and humid as fuck and she felt like a tiny furnace. Every time I tried putting her down she’d cling harder and refused to put her feet down. It was really annoying at the time because I was so uncomfortable, but pretty funny in retrospect. I finally got a moment to myself only to hear her start screaming and crying because my BIL (who doesn’t have kids) picked her up. He didn’t put her down until the fourth time my husband asked him to (and he was practically yelling it at that point.) Husband reamed BIL out, BIL got a bit pissy, and then BIL apologized when he realized just how furious I was. 

BIL’s wife (who, again, has no kids or much experience with them) almost accused my kid of doing it for attention and attempted to claim it didn’t happen the way it clearly did. I truly doubt she meant it the way it came across, but it felt judgmental as fuck and we didn’t take kindly to it. I (politely as possible considering my kid was crying hysterically) explained that kids that young aren’t capable of purposely manipulating situations like that and that I clearly heard husband ask four times for BIL to put her down from across the yard. She stopped talking after that and that was the end of it. But yeah, I honestly felt judged for comforting my child who had made it clear previously that she was not comfortable with close physical contact in situations like that.*

I’ve also dealt with our group of friends giving each other little looks when my daughter has acted up around them as well (BIL and his wife included.) We are the first couple to have a child in our group, so I think a lot of that is because having a small kid around all the time is a new thing for everyone to get used to. Our friends all adore our daughter, which does make it easier when that does happen. We know at least one of the other couples wants kids in the future (they’ve been very vocal about that), so I just remind myself that at least the two of them will get it at some point and it should hopefully be a little easier once they do. 

The only “mom friend” I have is my older sister. We’ve purposely been each other’s biggest cheerleaders because being a mom is really hard and everyone needs at least one non-spouse/partner person in their life who supports their choices completely (when it’s reasonable and safe choices.)

*I like to think she’s a true New Englander. She’s the type of kid who is naturally not comfortable with people touching her who aren’t her mommy or one of a very small group of people and who becomes much more reserved and shy in social situations like the party we attended. Her right to bodily autonomy and not feeling pressured into unwanted physical contact is extremely important to my husband and I, which is why we got so angry at BIL for not putting her down when she made it clear she wasn’t ok with him holding her. 

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I would not go so far as to see that Jess’s is more I trlligent than her sibs. I think she IS far more media savy, cunning, and confidant. I think some of her tools come from reading and hearing how beautiful others think that she is.

 

Jill’s confidence was shredded by the more negative comments about she and her husband.

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I think if Jessa was born in a more normal family she probably would have had a very successful career that she eventually would leave as her side job as a Social Media Influencer began to take over too much time. 

I can't stand when people snark on moms for what they are doing, unless they are really truly being negligent. My brother-in-law is bad about that. My mom also sometimes mentions she thinks our friend spoils her daughter (who my mom keeps one afternoon a week) and when WE had the kid for a weekend was wanting to force her to do something she didn't want to do - something that had NO importance whatsoever, mom just wanted to make a point. I told my mother it wasn't hurting anything for her not to do this thing, and that she needed to learn to pick her battles. My mom is better with her than she was with us when we were kids, but I grew up thinking my mom just really didn't like children older than toddler age, and I'm still not sure I wasn't right. 

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The only time I've ever stepped in was a couple of weeks ago, when I took a little guy to a family concert on the library lawn. It was a spread out your blanket kind of concert, but it was also okay for little people to move around. A mom with her small children was on a nearby blanket, and the kiddos were moving around. When I saw her walking but under two year old almost step on a bee, I told the little girl to wait and showed her the bee. The mom was a great mom, I just know that bees can be tough to spot from certain angles. She was very appreciative. I would also have been okay if she had said something to the 3 1/2 year old I took to the concert, if he had been about to step on a bee. 

Otherwise, I'm not one to step in.

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To be honest, when I saw a mother dip a pacifier in a liquor bottle to silence her kid I felt tempted to say something.

But I was not in my own country so I did not want to be the know-it-all-tourist.

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2 hours ago, SassyPants said:

I would not go so far as to see that Jess’s is more I trlligent than her sibs. I think she IS far more media savy, cunning, and confidant. I think some of her tools come from reading and hearing how beautiful others think that she is.

 

Jill’s confidence was shredded by the more negative comments about she and her husband.

This is what I've always thought :Jessa has a lot of social intelligence and possibly emotional intelligence. Jill is the one who applied herself to take a few college classes. I have every reason to believe Jessa is reasonably intelligent. She is most definitely savy.  I have not seen any evidence yet that she is particulalry book smart. 

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I once mentioned to a Mom that her kid was licking the metal fence, she huffily replied "HE!" My response "Yeah well, he's still licking the fence." No offense missus, I don't know what I said, your child is licking a public fence; might want to get on that. :doh:

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The last time I stepped in with a mom was to help wrangle a two-year-old who was booking it towards traffic. What is it with little kids running straight towards oncoming cars? At first I just sort of tried to redirect him by telling him to run back towards mom, but when that didn't work, I blocked his path and grabbed his shoulders long enough for mom to catch up. 

Other than that, I limit my involvement to making funny faces at babies on the Tube. 

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1 hour ago, Carm_88 said:

I once mentioned to a Mom that her kid was licking the metal fence, she huffily replied "HE!" My response "Yeah well, he's still licking the fence." No offense missus, I don't know what I said, your child is licking a public fence; might want to get on that. :doh:

I really don't get why people get so offended when someone accidentally calls their toddler/baby the wrong gender.  It's an honest mistake. At that age the kid doesn't care. And I mean, really...does it actually matter if your one-year-old has a penis or vagina? Is that really the most important thing about your baby? 

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9 minutes ago, BernRul said:

I really don't get why people get so offended when someone accidentally calls their toddler/baby the wrong gender.  It's an honest mistake. At that age the kid doesn't care. And I mean, really...does it actually matter if your one-year-old has a penis or vagina? Is that really the most important thing about your baby? 

I must say my 2 year old finds this to be very important.  He is oddly interested in who has penises and will point to people in the store and state if they do (which is super uncomfortable).  

I'm mostly joking, I don't think this is why parents care, unless the kid is the one to be like "I have a penis" which is totally possible.

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14 minutes ago, BernRul said:

I really don't get why people get so offended when someone accidentally calls their toddler/baby the wrong gender.  It's an honest mistake. At that age the kid doesn't care. And I mean, really...does it actually matter if your one-year-old has a penis or vagina? Is that really the most important thing about your baby? 

I didn't get it either. The fence part was what I was concerned with. #priorities 

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