The Mommy Forums

It's about time I made this post.  I've been procrastinating, always coming up with reasons to post something else, for fear of offending people.  But I've had a crappy couple of days, and I'm just gonna go ahead and be potentially offensive.

Without further adu, the pros and cons of mommy forums.

PROS
1) Adult conversation and interaction

2) Knowledge is power, and mommies are full of knowledge on every subject a la parenting that you could ever imagine.  From eating lunch meat during pregnancy to writing college essays for your teenagers, mommies know it ALL.

3) The ability to commune with adults who share your parenting beliefs and ideals.  A whole forum of people who are obsessed with baby names, love to breast feed, or had a baby born in or around April 2006.

4) The chance to show off how cute your kid is, and how advanced he or she is for his or her age.  This is also where you lament their delays, discuss their health issues, and (pretend to) celebrate the accomplishments of other babies, and lament with their mothers over whatever.

5) The opportunity to declare that you know the most about _____.

CONS
1) Is it really adult interaction if all you talk about is how your breasts are sore, and what color your baby's poop is? Shouldn't you be aiming for adult conversation about.. adults? Or at least adult situations and topics?

2) Does it count as conversation even when there is none?
Example A:
Mom 1: I am so mad.  This is why.
Mom 2: OMG that stinks, sorry.
Mom 3: OMG.  Here's what happened to me.
Mom 4: OMG.  Here's what happened to me.
Mom 5: Hey, mom 3, what did you about _____ in the situation you described?
Mom 3: Never checks the thread again, because she already read it once and responded and has no interest in what anyone else has to say on the topic.

Example B:
Mom 1: Can you please suggest baby names that fit these criteria?
Mom 2: Sure.  I like these names, and these.  And here's some random ones.
Mom 3: List of names.
Mom 4: List of names (a few of which are on the same list that mom 2 or 3 provided)
Mom 5: List of names that was mostly already suggested by the first three moms.
Mom 6: I didn't read the other responses, sorry for repeats! List of names that's already been 98% covered by other posts.
Mom 7: Has no original suggestions whatsoever.  Hope that helps!
Example C:
Mom 1: Who's baby is already ____?
Mom 2: Mine
Mom 3: Not mine
Mom 4: Long elaborate story about why her baby is or is not already ____.
Mom 5: Mine.
Mom 6: Mine
Mom 7: Not mine.
*Moves to a second page, and not one person comments on what another person has said.  Each person leaves an individual comment and moves on.

3) Bad Info. Mommies are full of knowledge, but unfortunately a lot of them are also full of crap, whether they know it or not.  Crap they pulled off Dr. Yahoo Answers, crap their parents and in-laws told them, crap their doctors told them.  They like to pretend they know what you're talking about, and when you tell me they are wrong.. well, see number 8.

4) Tunnel Vision. When you only talk to people who share your beliefs/values, you miss out on valuable insight into "the other side" and sometimes even become blinded to it.  You lose the ability to "think like the enemy" and understand their point of view.  Ever seen lemmings (start the video at 1:40)?

5) You have to put up with all the other show-off moms.
Example: Ichachekni (pronounced Ike) is already crawling!  I'm posting this to show off that my four month old is crawling, but I'm gonna end it with "who else is crawling?!" just so I don't look like a totally self centered braggart, even though I'm pretty sure my kid's the first to crawl, otherwise I wouldn't be posting.  How embarrassing if he was the SECOND!  Also, I will only be reading this thread to read the validation I'll get for my kid being the best already.

6) The Better Mom's Brigade.  You know exactly what I'm talking about.  The moms who only comment on forum threads where they can swoop in and show how much better they are at nutrition, discipline, being green, whatever the topic is.  They never admit they are wrong, and the only time they start posts is so they can prove how awesome they are by cleverly displaying how they balance their busy schedule or successfully discipline their practically perfect children.

7) Majority rules, and cliques prevail.  Mommy forums are JUST like high school.  Heaven forbid that you don't agree with the majority, are able to see the other side of a topic, or aren't a complete judgmental Nazi about your passion of choice.  You will be ostracized.

8) No confrontation without drama.  Mommies don't go to mommy forums to be told they are wrong.  They do not want to hear it.  They want to be validated in their choices, no matter how foolish.  They want someone to tell them that what they did is okay, because they lack the confidence in themselves and their parenting abilities to just KNOW it's fine.  Or, more likely, they know it's actually not fine, and just want to be lied to or reassured by other people who screwed up, too.  But if you ever DARE to tell them the truth, even nicely, all heck breaks loose.  Suddenly they are the victim, and you are the heartless be-yotch who judges everyone needlessly.  It's pretty much impossible to tell someone you disagree with them without people immediately complaining about the levels of drama.

9) Trolls.  Do I even have to go into this one? You get sucked into the tragic personal life of someone, your "heart breaks for them" and you "spend hours thinking about them all the time" because you're such a super awesome person to invest in complete strangers that you really know nothing about, and SURPRISE! They were lying.  Now you're heart broken, ruined, and can never trust a complete stranger with a keyboard ever again.  The shock. The horror. The repetition.


10) Other attention seekers (that aren't trolls).
Example A: We've decided to name our baby the most popular name from 2010, and we simply CAN'T think of a good middle name!  You guys should suggest popular and generic names for us to consider, because for some reason browsing the internet, the SSA top 1000 names, or investing in a $10 book of 100,000 baby names would just be too much work.

Example B: Does anyone know anything at all about this somewhat mundane topic I'm asking about? I don't want to Google because I'd rather interact with these people on a forum, so please tell me about this stupidly obviously topic.

Example C: OMGosh, guys.  I had sex, and now my period is late, and my boobs are sore.  Am I pregnant? I know I could just go to the dollar store and get a stick and pee on it, and that would answer my question, but I'd rather ask a bunch of other women to tell my fortune over the internet and decide whether or not I'm pregnant! Respond to my post so that I know you care, even though I'm being ridiculous.

Example D: I am such a bad mom because my kid managed to do something that every child does at some point (roll off a bad, trip and hit their head on a coffee table, eat yellow snow, etc etc).  Please respond to my thread and tell me that I'm not a bad mom for letting something perfectly normal happen to my child, even though I know that other people on this forum have also let this happen.  They aren't bad moms though, just me, because I'm bad.  Please tell me I'm not!


And there you have it, friends.  Why I hate mommy forums.  Maybe I'm just too cynical, past my mommy forum prime. Maybe I've been doing it wrong (hey, I'm not afraid to admit that might be the case).  Maybe I just never managed to get so invested in strangers that I was appropriately devastated by their sudden but inevitable betrayal, or maybe I'm just too fond of looking stuff up on the internet before asking obvious questions that I could find the answer to in 30 seconds.

My confessions:
I am ashamed to admit that I did some of the things above - I have succumbed to number 4, and I have pleaded for my fair share of attention.  And I'm not gonna lie: I learned a lot from mommy forums, and I met some super nice people that are still my friends on Facebook.  I said they have their uses in the Pros column, after all. ;)

I Am a Perfect Mother

I raise my voice too often.
I hate cleaning, and therefore
My house is not spotlessly clean.
I loathe soccer games.

I raise my voice too much.
I don't have enough patience.
I long for date nights, and
Laundromat nights.

I reach the end of my rope too often.
I hate it when my kids try to help with chores.
My kids always need a bath,
Even if I just bathed them.

I feed them processed food sometimes,
And don't always cook elaborate meals.
I let them watch TV
and climb trees.

I recognize their needs and
Meet them when I can.
I recognize their wants
And try to fulfill them.

I love them unconditionally
Always, forever, and beyond.
I play with them.
I teach them things.

They are the reason I breathe
The reason I get out of bed.
I will never hurt them.
I will always try to keep them safe.

I will always do the best I can,
And I will take care of myself so
I can always be here for them.
I teach them skills and manners.

I respect them, cherish them,
Adore them, live for them.
I am their mom and that means
I am a perfect mother.

This is pretty poorly written poem (it doesn't even rhyme, Kes!), but that's not the point.  I've said it myself, and I hear it all the time - "the perfect mother."  But I think we have a skewed idea of perfection in the mothering department.  You don't have to do everything right all the time, and you don't have to do everything the best.  Love your children, and do right by them.  That's perfection.

Gender Neutral Kids

Most of us probably remember the story of Storm, the kid with no gender.  If you don't, here it is.  I know it's old news, but this idea has come up a lot in my personal life, so I figured it was finally time to talk about it.

These Canadian parents are raising their child to be "gender neutral."  This is of course semi-ridiculous, as a child MUST have anatomical parts pointing to them being either male, female, or both, but never neither.  But the point of their "experiment" has nothing to do with biology and everything to do with society and it's effect on impressionable young children.

I have to admit, in most ways I agree with these parents.  The whole thing is not about dressing your son in dresses and seeing what happens.  It's not about teaching your kids that dressing "the wrong gender" is better, or that it's worse.  It's about letting your children choose, for themselves, what they want.  Yes, children need to know who they are.  They need a strong sense of identity, and a strong sense of self.  Doesn't it make more sense to let them form these senses on their own, rather than showing them how society thinks they should see themselves, and that's it?  Isn't it counter intuitive to make sure that their "sense of self" is what society wants, regardless of what they want?

These parents aren't keeping their child's gender from their child, or even from the child's siblings.  They are keeping the gender secret from people who don't NEED to know, because honestly, why does it matter?  And the answer is almost always "so I know what to buy."

Well, that's the point these parents are trying to make.  Why does the child's gender have to effect what you buy?  While they are infants they have no idea what boys and girls are, and don't give a flip what you dress them in as long as it's comfortable.  Babies are pretty androgynous to begin with, and no matter what you dress them in someone, somewhere, will always guess wrong.  So these parents buy what THEY like until their child is old enough to choose for him/herself.  This is the same thing parents of babies with a declared gender do as well.  No difference there.

Once the child is old enough to choose their own clothes, again their gender makes no difference.  As a friend, aunt, grandparent, you should buy what the child obviously enjoys wearing.  You've seen pictures of the child in clothing, and it shouldn't be too hard to figure out if the kid prefers jeans or frilly dresses.  Buy what the kid likes, not what you THINK the kid should like.

And toys.. ugh.  The idea of gender specific toys irks me so much I won't even rant about it, because it would take forever.  Seriously, buy it if it looks fun.  Who freakin cares if it's pink or blue?!

So why is this topic near and dear to me right now? Because my oldest kid, a boy, loves pink.  I asked him what color car seat he wanted, and he said pink.  Unfortunately, the pink was a lot more expensive than all the other colors, or I would have bought it for him.  We went to the store to pick out some new shirts, and he was drawn to the pink Dora shirts.  They didn't have any in his size, but I would have bought him a pink Dora shirt otherwise (we went with Red Cars, because red is close to pink).

Why would I do this? Because ultimately, my child's happiness is more important to me that society-pressured gender roles.  Who decided that pink was only for girls, anyways? Why does it even matter? The answer is simple.  It doesn't.  It NEVER matters.  And we should stop teaching our children that it does.

And maybe this seems petty to you, to be making a huge deal out of clothes.  But it's not just clothes.  Gender roles are constant in our lives and those of our children.  It starts with refusing to dress our boys in pink, then we're refusing to let them take ballet or musical theatre, then we're teaching them that those careers are only for women, and they should strive for more.  More? So women are only worthy of LESS? Yeah, it goes there.  And that's the problem.

I am against the idea of teaching my children they can't do things - any things besides child birth and peeing standing up - because of their anatomical parts.  It's a totally arbitrary system, and I refuse to support it any longer.  There was a time when I only bought boy clothes for my son, and girl clothes for my daughter.  And that time is over.  No longer will I teach my children that their gender is what defines what they can and cannot wear, do, and become.  Who's with me?!

*fist pump*

Car Seats Expire!

I know I touched on this briefly in my Car Seat 101 Post ages ago, but I feel like it needs to be revisited.

CAR SEATS EXPIRE!

Plastic degrades over time, especially when exposed to the elements.  Imagine that plastic play set you probably have in your back yard.  Left in the son for six years, it starts to get brittle, and it starts to break.  Car seats aren't much different.  We leave them in our cars where they end up baking in the 130 degree heat, or freezing in the -40 degree cold.  They are designed to withstand this abuse, for sure, but not forever.  The plastic deteriorates, cracks, and breaks.  The foam padding, after being compressed for ages, does the same thing.  I'll be honest and say that I have a hard time with the idea that the nylon harness also expires, but if you're buying a new seat anyways, why would you reuse the harness?

 

Most seats expire six years after the date they were made, NOT six years after you bought them.  While normally you will get a new car seat close to when it was made, it doesn't always happen.  If you bought it on sale, for instance, it may have been marked down due to an early manufacture date. You have to check the seat for a date of expiration or a date of manufacture.  Generally speaking, both are on the seat somewhere, usually on the bottom, or one of the side stickers. Sometimes you find a month, a day, and a year, and sometimes you'll only find month year. Graco is the only company where the seats expire at the end of the sixth year.  All other seats expire in the month they were manufactures (so my kid's Evenflo Tribute - pictures here - will expire in July 2014).

Sure, it's highly unlikely that your seat is going to magically disintegrate on the first day of the sixth year.  Here's a video showing what happens when a ten year old car seat is used during a crash.  The shell has degraded so much that the harness, while securely holding the child, rips through the plastic shell.  It doesn't state the injuries sustained by the "child" in this case, but I think it's pretty obvious that this is not a good outcome:

Yeah, this was ten years after, not one year after.  But without knowing exactly when the car seat went from a safe condition to this condition, it's just a better choice all around to believe the manufacturer.  I, too, wish they would publish this kind of information, or do more tests, or at least give us a CLEAR reason why the seats expire except "they might be broken."  but alas, this is all we have to work with right now.


Not all seats expire after six years, so here's a useful list.

Baby Trend: 6 years

Britax classic generation: 6 years
Britac new generation: 7 yearsYears for most
Britax Frontier specifically: 9 years

Chicco: 6 years

Clek: 7 years
Clek Foonf specifically: 9 years

Compass: 7 years

Cosco: 6 years

Combi: 7 years

Evenflo: 6 years

Graco: 6 years (December of the 6th year) for most
Graco Nautilus specifically: 10 years

Harmony: 6 years

Maxi Cosi: 6-8 years

Orbit: 7 years

Peg-Perego: 5 years
Seats manufactured starting 2011: 7 years

Recaro: 6 years

Safety First: 6 years for most
Safety First Complete Air specifically: 8 years
Safety First Alpha Omega Elite specifically: 8 years

Sunshine Kids: 6 years for most
Sunshine Kids Monteray: 8 years
Diono seats: 10 years

The First Years: 7 years

If your brand of seat isn't on this list, and you can't find an expiration date or a date of manufacture, please don't hesitate to post a comment asking, and I will find the information for you. =)

Keep your kids safe!

Mommy Martyrs

We've all met them - the Mommy Martyrs.  Those mom's who not only sacrifice constantly for their children, and fight conventions, but make sure that everyone knows about it.

I make sacrifices for my children - most mother's do.  We give up a lot of more mundane things, like time with our friends and husbands, or our bodies.  We let our brains turn to mush because the only conversations we have all day long are about Dora, the color and shape of poop, and what flavor jelly to use.

Many of us also fight popular conventions.  We refuse to turn our car seats around at 1 year, breastfeed, delay solids until past six months.  Maybe we didn't circ, or had a natural birth.  Awesome work!  Keep it up!  Buuut...

STFU.

Okay, so that's a bit of a stretch - no one actually says all that at once. But I have actually seen someone say "I read up on this topic while breast feeding my toddler.  I find it really interesting."

.... Transparent much?  Kudos to you for breast feeding your toddler.  It's good for him, and it fights conventions (I'm generally ALL FOR fighting conventions).  But asking for a pat on the back in random places is too self serving for my taste.  That's not our job as mothers.  We're supposed to do what's best for our kids, not to get attention, but because it's best for them.

Don't get me wrong.  I love attention.  And I love when someone notices that I'm still nursing, or that I have two rear facing car seats.  Similarly, I would loathe it when someone comments negatively on these things (not that anyone ever has so far).  But I see no reason to mention that I breast feed in a Facebook group about car seats, or mention that my kid is uncirc'd on a JustMommies board about breast feeding.

And (here it comes) I roll my eyes at people who do.  Not all the people that do.  Just that ones that seem to need validation for every choice they ever make regarding their children.  Stand up for them, stand up for yourself, do your research, and make informed decisions.  You don't need people to constantly notice and tell you "great job!" for doing something you should be doing anyways.

/end rant

10 Things My Kids Don't Know About Me

There are more than 10.  There will always be more than 10, at least until I've moved on from this life.  But I think these are the ten that will actually affect them someday (some sooner than later).

1. I have a tattoo.  By the time they figure out what a tattoo is, I may have more than one.

2. I hate Dora.

3. I've "done that" with my husband more than the three times required to produce the children.

4. Going to the bathroom is actually very routine and mundane, even for me.

5. There are moms out there who make mac and cheese even better than I do.
5b. There are moms out there who never make mac and cheese.  Ever.

6. I've done things in the past that I may have to lie about when they are teenagers.

7. I wanted to name all of them something other than what they are named, and, for the most part, wanted their genders to all be opposite (of course I love them for the anatomical parts they have, but I'm just sayin).

8. I'm actually terrible at drawing Mickey Mouse and Phineas Flynn, and even more terrible at cake decorating.

9. I never changed my last name.

10. I think their boogers, however interestingly shaped they may be, are gross.

Calm Down. Deep breaths!

I'm not trying to pick on my friend here, but I'm gonna use her an example.  Sorry, friend!

While driving down the road, she sees a truck with a rear facing carseat in the front seat, with a kid actively in it.  Carseats don't really belong in the front seat, and especially not if there's an airbag.  Everyone can easily know this, because the picture on the visor looks like this:

Even if you can't read, or don't want to, it's pretty clear just from the picture, what you shouldn't be doing here, right? Okay, we're clear on this.  But an airbag can be disabled, or sometimes simply turned off.

So my friend sees this truck with a baby in the front, and becomes outraged.  So outraged that she wants to call the police.  And this confuses me.  First of all, she doesn't know that there is an airbag.  She thinks she MIGHT know, because she knows someone with a truck that's the same make/model, so she assumes there's an airbag and it's not turned off.

It's weird for me to think of myself as an optimist, but I guess I am.  We all make assumptions, every day, based on what we see.  While my friend assumes this car has an airbag, I choose to assume it doesn't.  I choose to assume that someone who will put his kid in the car rear facing, even when the seat CAN forward face, probably realized (because of the above warning) that you shouldn't do it with the airbag active, and has taken further steps to ensure the safety of his child (beyond just rear facing her).  I almost always choose to assume the best case scenario, and it confuses me why other people don't.

Do you WANT to be upset with this person? What will that accomplish? Maybe if you knew him, or know where he lived, or even knew his name, then being upset and assuming the worst would matter.  But you will probably never know if the truck had an active airbag, and if that kid was safe or not, so why waste energy thinking she wasn't, when you can just as easily think she was?  All yous are general - I don't think this friend even reads Momland (but if you are reading, I'm not picking on you, I swear!  You're just my most recent example!)

And the same thing goes for so much.
I choose to assume that a kid turned forward facing on his birthday was turned that way for the same reason I turned Luke around - the parents were concerned their child would aspirate the vomit that accompanied every rear facing car ride, and die.

I choose to believe that the majority of people don't know, rather than don't care.

I choose to assume that someone selling a car seat that expires in three months legitimately believes that someone will buy it only intending to use it for three months.  There are plenty of reasons to buy a car seat for only three months - vacation, spontaneous visit from family, a family emergency - and I also choose to assume that anyone who buys a seat that expires in three months will only use it for three, maybe four months (because let's face it, they don't spontaneously combust on their expiration date, but I wouldn't push it too far).

I've seen this quoted at 80%, 90%, and 95%, so I'm gonna go with 80% (again, assuming the best).  80% of car seats are used incorrectly, in one way or another.  Some misuses are more dangerous than others, but still 80%.  That means that whenever I see an occupied car seat on the road or in pictures, there's an 80% chance I'm gonna have a reason to be steaming mad.  And that's not counting the "misuse" that occurs when kids aren't even IN car seats.  It seems like a huge waste of energy on my part to get mad every single time.

Maybe I'll carry around little notecard print outs to stick on windshields in parking lots, or put a bumper sticker on my car, but I can't possibly get upset at every single case.  I have three kids, I haven't slept "enough" in over four years, and I have several other health issues that sap all my energy from me before I even get out of bed in the morning.

Maybe I'm too apathetic, maybe I'm not dedicated enough to my cause, or maybe I'm just too freakin tired to care, but I can't fathom getting violently ill every time I see a car seat misused, or a child in Publix who's parent isn't staring directly at them at all times.  Either way, I choose to get upset at the worst cases:

Assuming they drive like this (I choose to assume they don't), THIS would make me ill.

When there is obvious, without a doubt misuse that could legitimately risk a child's life in even the basic of colisions, I will get Mommy Bear Killing Spree Raging Mad.  Otherwise, I will silently throw up a prayer for the child in question, and then try to put it from my mind.  I guess I just realize that you can't save them all, you can't help people who don't want to be helped, and when there's nothing you can do about it, it's best to not think about it.

I have been known to go out of my to create a scenario in which something would make sense, just so that I don't have to get upset about it.  Daddy has baby rear facing in the front seat of a two-seater truck.  Well, that's obvious - it's the only car he has because the car with an available (safer) back seat is in the shop, or was just stolen, or wrecked.  He has no choice where to put his kid, and is doing the best he can.  I have other examples, but this is just long enough already.

I have a hard time understanding why people don't always agree with me on everything, ;) but especially on this.  To me, energy is precious - it is not something to be squandered fretting about things outside my control.  I wish I had the energy to fight with Craigslist over expired seats, but I will e-mail first, THEN flag.  I will always give people a chance to correct their own mistakes before doing it for them.  But that's a whole other blog post for a whole other day.

I've used car seats as an example this whole time, because it's the cause I choose to champion (seriously, you have to have noticed that by now, yes?), but really it applies to everything.  I pick my battles with my husband, I pick my battles with my children, and I pick my battles with the world.  There are stupid parents everywhere, and even the best parents sometimes make errors in judgement.  Sometimes choices are limited because of finances or other factors.

If someone's baby falls in a pool, I choose to think it was a freak accident until proven wrong.  I will not automatically assume this mother never supervised her child ever, and was a terrible, neglectful mother.

Someone's dog gets run over by a car, and rather than I assume this dog was always allowed to run loose, I choose to believe it was a one-time "oops, the kids left the door open" incident, until someone proves me wrong.

I don't get upset over parents who use leashes for their kids, or over parents who feed their kids solids at four months (I used to, but not so much anymore).  I don't get upset over parents who use walkers (I choose to assume they've taken precautions), and I don't get upset over someone getting an epidural, or even a repeat C-section as opposed to a VBAC.

There is so much REAL abuse and REAL neglect in the world, that these don't even register on my radar.  I hardly notice them, and make it a point to not get annoyed or upset by them.  I feel this keeps me sane.

If you're the type to get upset about these things whenever you see them, you should try it my way and see if you like it. ;)