Babies are like Jesus. Harmless on their own but their fan clubs will drive you nuts.
Mummies. Yummy mummies. The mommy club.
Anyone who has a username containing the word ‘mum’ needs a fierce slap.
Hayyyyyyy it’s me ShaylasMum81
Oh hi, it’s Mummy0115
Crazy_Mum73 in the house!!
When did women stop being people? Why is my Facebook feed that was once full of posts from intelligent, funny, witty women now, ‘Look at my new Thomas shirt’?
I don’t want to be facebook friends with your kid. If I did, I would be asking them what they thought of that shitty restaurant I tagged them at or laughing with them about the photo I posted of them. Wait, what’s that? I didn’t tag them at a restaurant or post a photo of them? Oh.
Hey baby, I don’t care that you cut a tooth. All babies cut teeth for God’s sake. I do, however, care if your mum cut a tooth. That’s impressive.
I don’t care that you wrote your name. You’ve got years of writing your name ahead of you. I’m not impressed, I’m sorry. And why? Because it is nothing new. IT’S A NORMAL FUCKING PART OF THE GENERIC LEARNING PROCESS. Write a book, then we’ll talk.
I miss my friends. I miss being able to call them. I miss not checking what time it is before I call for fear that I’ll wake the small human, or worse, wake the tired parent. I miss not being terrified that I’ll be popping by at a bad time or interrupting an important poop training session. But mostly, I miss the conversation. Adult conversation about sophisticated things… like shoes and cats and Nutella.
Go on, insert some bullshit line here like ‘My kid likes shoes and cats and Nutella’. I dare you.
Ladies, you are people. People. Why, when you have a baby do you deny yourself an identity? I get that they can be all-consuming but the fact that you gave birth and have another person around you all the time does not define you. You are an adult human in real life in the world. You made it this far and now all you can talk about is the person you made?
I made a cake last week (which took a lot more effort than being fertilised, I can assure you), but I’m not going around yabbing on about it and posting statuses on its behalf. ‘Oh look at my pretty pink frosting and my rainbow sprinkles! Aren’t I adorable?’
It is the fear of losing my identity, my personality and my brain (yes, I have heard of the term ‘baby brain’ and it terrifies me) that makes me wary of ever having children. The people who push parenthood so hard, like hardcore ‘Bible Bashers’ just don’t seem to realise it is having the reverse effect. And it’s not just Jesus and babies. Just like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones, I might have considered giving it a try if the world didn’t revolve around it and shove it down my throat.
Please, for the love of God, tell me something, anything, that is just about you. Who are you? Where the hell have you been?
McFly Undone 
Oh my god YES! All these things! I’ve only got 2 female friends who’re partnered without kids. And it’s lonely. And sucks.
It totally does! I mean, losing a friend to motherhood is tough – there is definitely a grieving process involved!
It is hard being the observer. I think raising a small human is one of the hardest and most amazing things in the world so people want to go on and on about it. Like I think my cat is most super amazing cat on the planet and I post about her all day. Or when I was training for a half ironman I posted about that all day. Some of my friends have gone gaga while others have remained the same. A friend I run with every saturday has a one year old. We talk about her work, her training, her relationship, her career AND her child – all the elements of life. And others seem to lose themselves and forge a new identity of being a ‘mummy’ only. At 33 I am seeing the mums come out the other end, of having one or two kids, then after a year of two they eventually realise that they need their own life again for their own sanity. So friends I have ‘lost’ into the baby fold often return. Stick it out and don’t give up on your friendships.
That’s great advice. I love my friends and I’m genuinely happy they’ve made more of themselves… And if they’re still my friends after this post then that’s a bonus! I’m like Larry David. I’m a friend to the end. A person literally has to die for the friendship to end haha
I know I’m one of these assholes, but I still love you between the hours of 5am and 6pm.
No deal. I wake up at 7:30 and get home from work at 7. How very convenient for you…
Too funny! I think I am a culprit now and again, so thanks for the reminder that no, people don’t care that my kid just ate a coin and i’ll be excavating for buried treasure in his nappies for the next few days. The warm and fuzzy kid stuff does make me do a little vomit in my mouth occasionally though. I hope my non-babycentric friends can hang in there while I go through this antisocial stage of life – I think we all come out the other side eventually, right??
Definitely! I can tell you’ll be ok… you know the warning signs! But seriously, your childless friends really do love you and they’re all waiting patiently for you to do what you’ve gotta do. We (childless people) get it, we really do. We just wish you parents were lavishing that attention on us instead! 🙂
Haha! I certainly get it. Also thanks for the reminder to stop harassing people with pics of my kid all the time 😉 I certainly wish I was able to do my own thing more and spend more time on my own goals etc so I have more to talk about with people than just the kid, but since my time right now is mostly caring for my child, posting pics to instagram etc is my way of reminding myself that I’m still doing something important, even though it might not look it to a lot of people, and also of feeling visible when I often feel the opposite. 🙂
You are definitely doing something important, Christine. A child needs their parent close to them, there’s no doubt about it. But for the sake of sanity, we all (child or no child) need to do our own thing, something that’s just for us. You’re not invisible! 🙂
It’s the sleep deprivation. It literally makes you crazy. You go from a normal 8-10 hours sleep a night to 1-3 hours sleep a night, week after week, MONTH after MONTH, and it consumes you.
You cannot think about anything except WHY AREN’T THEY SLEEPING?! and GOD, I WISH I COULD SLEEP. And with the last vestiges of your brain you struggle to work out WHY the kid’s not sleeping and it obsesses you. You study it, you stare at it, you think if you just cuddle and kiss and give it everything it wants, it will GO TO SLEEP. And it’s all you can talk about and think about and you become an obsessed slave to its whims and then, in an inevitable twist of sanity you FALL IN LOVE with the object of your torture, you shout its merits from the treetops and engage in competitive mummy wars and you dress it in silly outfits.
All the while you’re still struggling with two hours sleep a night. It’s messed up. Pity these people!
Hahaha now THAT’s an explanation! And another reason I should never have kids. No sleep = run for cover everyone within a 5km radius. 🙂
Oh my…I so hear you!!! If it’s not that, it’s photos of them and their partner — like they’ve lost their own identity! I don’t get it at all. Like you, it’s one of the things that scares me from ever having kids {that, and my job has made me very wary!!!}. I have so many friends on my FB now whose main profile photo is that of their child. I just don’t get it!!! It’s like they cease to be themselves post-kids!
Can I get an ‘Amen’?!!
Ha this is precisely why I don’t talk about my kids. Like, even to my family! I once read a quote where a woman told her kids she thought they were the most utterly wonderful thing in all of creation, but nobody else on earth gave a shit. Paraphrasing totally mine, but sentiment the same! i don’t care about other people’s kids, I KNOW they care 0% about mine! (although mine are better)
Haha… but you do have ‘mama’ in your username!
Replace the word baby with cat. See what I did there.
Oh if only we could replace ALL the babies with cats… 🙂
*cough* there are house-daddies too, y’know… and a great many of us miss our friends as much as we miss our sleep, our sanity and our sleep. But trying to make a better human is kinda cool.
It’s honestly way easier to hang out with other parents, who understand how nuts shit is with a larval human, and who have the instincts of “fuck, watch out for your wine glass, that rubbish bin & that cat food” & who don’t give you shit cuz about bailing “because it’s nap-time” (which is also the only time we have to do ANYTHING, and by ANYTHING I mainly mean SLEEP).
Some parents are just nuts about being parents, and that is boring. Some of us are just dormant & waiting to come back.
I personally keep telling people “I’m retired from public life.”
I feel like bailing because it’s nap time is a perfectly good excuse – parent or not! Retired from public life… Now that sounds amazing!