Mommy Wars

Mommy Wars

Up until about nine months ago I had no idea such a thing existed but it has become glaringly obvious that there is a vicious civil war going on between moms in this country, and I call it a civil war because we are fighting no one but ourselves. Of course this war is not being fought with weapons but with words, which can be lethal on a psychological level. And the battlefield is not found outside, but inside, in every home with children and even some without. As many of you know, the most recent debate stems from Time Magazine’s cover featuring a young, skinny mom breastfeeding her almost 4 year old. This initial shock may have died down with the general public over the past few days but the problem remains a constant battle between moms everywhere. Breastfeeding, daycare, stay at home moms, work outside the home moms, the issues never end. Moms are constantly finding something to argue over, something to cut one another down over, something to make them feel superior to one another over or at least something that makes them feel “better” than other moms. I’m only going to touch on two hot button issues but there are many.

Let’s start with breastfeeding. It’s a scientific fact that breastfeeding is the best thing for a newborn baby and is the best source of nutrition for a child up to one year of age (according to the AAP) and two years of age (according to the WHO). This is science people, facts are facts. Does this mean that there is anything wrong with proving formula to an infant or that you love your child any less because you chose not to breastfeed? Absolutely not. Alternatively, if a mother chooses to breast feed her child til he or she is three or four and self weans, does this mean she’s a bad parent or weird? Heck no. Breastfeed all you want, wherever you want, however long you want. Formula feed to your heart’s content. The way I see it, as long as your child is getting fed then there’s nothing to argue about and it’s no one’s business but your own. Now, do I think Time Magazine exploited the issue and chose a picture bases on its shock value? You bet your ass I do. Come on Time, we’re supposed to be making things easier for one another not trying to fuel the fire. On a personal/side note I would like to say that moms who do breastfeed should be praised not ridiculed. (But I stress, this does not mean that those who do not wish to bf should be made to feel inferior). I can tell you from experience, it’s hard and painful. Abigail and I are going on nine months breastfeeding, I’m really proud of us! My ultimate goal is a year and then we’ll think about weaning but we shall see. Side rant: America is far far behind the power curve on this one. I read somewhere that 2-3 is the average age a child is weaned from breastfeeding (around the world, not just the US). In European countries bf’ing is so much more acceptable than in the US. Here we see it as some sort of taboo act; we sexualize breasts and forget what they are really for. This is why we have issues with women being asked to cover up or go to a bathroom to feed their children. Guess what America, breast are for feeding! Personally I pump and bottle feed in public but that’s my prerogative and decision. No woman should be forced to pump, it sucks but I have to do it bc I’m away from my baby for nine hours a day. It is a woman’s right to breastfeed in public and as such she should be encouraged to do so and praised. Television shows like Sesame Street used to feature breastfeeding woman and took that opportunity to teach children about it. We should educate our children on breastfeeding, then maybe we wouldn’t’ have ignorant adults who tell woman to put their boobs away and stop exposing themselves. Ok rant over.

Now onto working. Ugh, what a mess. Working moms should never be made to feel bad for their decisions or made to feel like they are missing their baby’s childhood. Stay at home moms (SAHMs) should never be made to feel like they don’t “work” because Lord knows they do. I think SAHMs are amazing and work very very hard! I’m a work outside the home mom and I work incredibly hard as well. I work hard at the office and even harder at home. I like my job and I love my child. Do I wish that I could spend every waking second with Abigail? I sure do. I do get slightly jealous when I see friend post Facebook pics from Mommy and Me classes but I can imagine (and this is purely a guess) that they might get a little jealous too when I post about awesome/fun things I’m doing at work. I work because I have to (I just happen to thoroughly enjoy what I do) and that does not make me any less or more of a mom. Joe and I work to pay the bills, to save for Abigail’s college, and to put a roof over her head. But aside from financial reasons, I work because I am striving to be (what I believe to be) the best role model I can for my daughter. I want to teach her that you can really have it all. You can be a successful career woman and a mom; you really don’t have to choose. Also I put a lot of money into my education to get to where I am today, I don’t want to have to start all over in five years when Abigail goes off to school and I’m certainly not going to sit around twiddling my thumbs waiting for her to get off the school bus every day. Daycare sucks, I’d hire a nanny if I could but alas daycare is reality and I’ve accepted that. Abigail is doing just fine, she’s doing great actually. But the turth is it takes a village to raise a child. No one will ever love Abigail as much as Joe and I do but there are certainly people out there that are capable of helping her grown and learn on a daily basis. And she will grow up to be a successful well rounded intelligent individual, day care or not.

Whether you choose to co sleep, breastfeed, baby wear, stay at home, formula feed or push your baby around in a stroller, who cares?! That’s your right as a parent; you get to choose how to raise that child. As long as no one is harming their child then it’s really no one’s business. I think moms in American are doing each other a great disservice by inciting this mom civil war against each other. We attack each other as if we’re bitter enemies. There are so many other things out there that ARE actually harming out children on a daily basis. Maybe instead of attacking each other we should instead wage a war against poverty, drugs, child abuse or domestic violence. Let’s find a real crime and attack that or put someone on the cover of Time that sparks praise not ridicule. Abraham Lincoln said that a house divided cannot stand. We’re all in this together so let’s stand together. Parenthood is hard enough, the last thing we need is another enemy cutting us down or stressing us out, pretty sure parents are hard enough on themselves. We all have good days and bad days but in the end we’re all just trying to do the best we can for our kids. We need to strive to be more supportive instead of disabling. Let’s cheer on that mother that breastfeeds her child or that parent that works hard to put a roof over their family’s head. Let’s band together and stop wasting time attacking our allies, each other.

Can you put granola in ice cream?

I’m a crunchy mom…I’m a hippie, tree hugging, granola mom.  Ok maybe I’m not that extreme but for some moms out there I would be considered a little different and here are three reasons why or at least the top three things people give me a funny look for:

1)    I breastfeed (tmi  maybe but I just don’t care anymore).  Someone asked me this once and when I said yes they looked at me funny and said I didn’t take you for the type.  I don’t know what that meant but I found it slightly insulting.  Admittedly this isn’t too extreme (none of these things are) but for some reason breastfeeding has become not the norm over the past decade.  Anyhoo, I decided while I was pregnant to at least give it a shot.  As with all other major decisions, I left my options open, meaning that I decided to try everything (except cloth diapers) and see how it went.  Well I was lucky to be able to breastfeed without too much trouble.  Abigail cooperated, I cooperated, it all worked out.  Well then the question arose of how long I was going to do it.  I decided to divide and conquer, a month at time.  Well I made it through the first six weeks which if you've ever done it then you know the first six weeks are the hardest.  so I set my goal to three months then six months.  Well it will be six months on the 19th and everything is still going very well so I have actually extended my goal to a full year (to be perfectly honest I’ve actually challenged myself to do it for a year).  This is the “extreme” part for some people.  They look at me and say “A year?!” as if that’s too long to breastfeed but it’s actually the American Association of Pediatrician’s recommendation.  Sidenote: the World Health Organization recommends two years. And trust me there are a great many women out there who do it for much longer, God bless ‘em.   I like breastfeeding. I like knowing that I am doing the best thing for my baby.   It’s hard, but I like it.  I like the time I get to spend with Abigail while doing it.  It’s her and me time, it’s time I get to just relax and cherish my baby girl.  It’s nice that no matter how crazy life is I know I get to spend quality time with her at the beginning and end of every day. (Pumping, on the other hand, sucks entirely.)  Selfishly though this has made my baby weight fall off like whoa.  I'm actually only a few pounds shy of pre baby Gretchen, eventhough I'm far from feeling like pre baby Gretchen.  It all evens out though becaue I am CONSTANTLY hungry, some days it's actually worse than when I was pregnant.  Abigail is eating more now and my body is working overtime to keep up with her, hence the two chocolate chip cookies I ate today and the ice cream i eat every day around 3pm...

2)      I make my own baby food.  Ok so apparently this is trendy now and we all know how trendy I am so of course I went out and bought the Baby Bullet and immediately began pureeing my own baby food.  So far so good, we are taking it slow.  Sweet potatoes were a bust, but pears, bananas, and avacados havee been a big hit.  I know exactly what Abigail is eating.  I like picking the best fruits or veggies and preparing them myself.  This way I know she’s getting organic and we’re not going broke while doing it.  It’s quite easy and actually fun…

3)      I’m an attachment parent type mom.  I don’t believe in the Ferber Method more popularly dubbed the “Cry it Out” Method or CIO. Don’t get me wrong, the thought’s crossed my mind several times and we even tried it for about three minutes once, then caved.  I believe in cuddling and holding and coddling and spoiling my baby girl until she can’t possibly be cuddled/coddled/spoiled any more.  I pick her up every time she cries and don’t put her down til she stops.  Abigail is not a “cryer” she's more of a "whiner," so I'll def. let her whine fof a few minutes but if she turns to crying then I pick kher up.  She cries when she's sick (who doens't) or when she's so extremely tired that she can't seem to sleep (still have trouble figuring that one out) but other than that she doesn’t really cry that much, maybe for a minute or two here or there but we’ve been really lucky with her.  So when she does actually cry I get upset too.   A piece of me crumbles when a little tear falls out of her little eye.  (Side note, did you know that babies don’t actually have tears until they’re like three months old.  When they do start to develop and you see one leave your baby’s eye it will break your heart.)  Now I say this knowing that my baby is just shy of six months old and there may come a time when she screams for attention.  At that point I will most definitely need to reassess our current parenting “method.”  Many people on the message board I participate in talk about how they are working on their babies sleeping through the night.  Well Abigail doesn’t do this yet and I’m not going to force her to.  She goes to bed at 7, sleeps til 6 and wakes up once to eat.  I’m good with that for now.  In my opinion if she wakes up then clearly something is wrong, ie she’s hungry or she needs a diaper change.  It’s the least we can do to take ten minutes to feed or change her.  Now in all honesty when I’m up at 3am feeding her I definitely consider “sleep training” much sooner.  But it’s working for now so we’ll reassess in a few months. And yes I am exhausted. This is all part of the “Winterer: I don’t know what the hell I’m doing so l’m gonna try this” Method the Joe and I have created.  I’ll be sure to expand on the specifics of this at another time, is actually pretty easy.

So really the only thing holding me back from being full on granola is my repulsion of cloth diapers (please don’t take this personally if you use them, more power to you) and the fact that instead of driving a Subuaru Outback I drive a gas guzzling SUV, but it’s a crossover SUV so I think that counts for something. Also I’ve recently started wearing my Danskos again that has to gain me some hippie points…

Alrighty well I’m pretty sure I’ve offended enough people today

*Note: I really dont mean to offend anyone or critique anyone's parenting method (ie cloth diapers,formula, etc.).  Different strokes for different folks and we all gotta make it through this parenting/baby thing the best way we see fit.  I'm in no way, shape, or form equipped to cast judgements on anyone :-)