I enjoy following mommy pages that allow fans to send in questions to be posted by the page admins for other fans to answer. It's fun to give advice and be able to interact. But the post I saw today just irritated me. A fan decided to write in to basically ask for permission to pass judgment on her friend. She wanted to know how old is too old to breastfeed because her friend still breastfeeds her 2 1/2 year old. Who cares what your friend does? The question and the answers had absolutely nothing to do with her life or her own parenting, so why ask it? To get other people to bash her friend, so she would feel more empowered when she, herself did it. What other possible reason could there be? It doesn't matter what you or I think; the fact is that if it's working for her friend and her friend's child, then what difference does it make to you? This coincides with the breastfeeding vs formula feeding debate. I will be the first to tell you that I chose to formula feed because I'm selfish. I am! I've chosen to give up my body, my sleep, my time, my sanity, my life! to have children. The one thing I want to preserve (as much as possible) are my boobs. But that doesn't mean that's the reason you chose to formula feed. My decisions have no weight on what your decisions are. None whatsoever. So why the hell would I judge you for making a different decision?? In all my selfishness, I think breastfeeding is a beautiful thing and it makes me proud when I see a woman breastfeeding in public because I know how nasty and downright judgmental people can be. You don't know that woman's story, nor do you know that child's story, so take a pill, calm down and let nature happen. I mean, you eat in public, right? If you don't like it, look away. Keep your dirty looks or mean comments to yourself.
My other gripe for today is regarding how women give birth. I chose to have a c-section for my last pregnancy and am choosing it again for this one. My reasons don't matter. Not to you, anyways. Why do people try to belittle me and make me feel bad for those choices? I had my first son naturally, so I know what it's all about. I'm not making my choice blindly. But, in all reality, it doesn't make a damn difference to you whether I'm choosing it blindly or not. I'm the one that's left with the longer recovery time and the visible scarring. Not you. I'm a strong person and really couldn't care less what other people think of me or the way I parent, but I feel bad for the mothers who do. There's a large number of women who actually do feel bad about what others say. They don't have to explain themselves to you. Even women who are forced into c-sections for medical reasons are made to feel guilty about it because of this stupid public stigma that makes absolutely no sense.
And I'm not even going into it about co-sleeping.
The point is that we all have our own personal opinions about how to properly parent, but until you're in another person's shoes, back off. Unless you're seeing a child is clearly suffering from mistreatment or undernourishment, relax. Clearly, people are allowed to say whatever they want whenever they want. But does that mean you need to be rude and demean someone for making different choices than you? No. Like I said in my very first post, parenting is hard enough as it is. Don't make it harder for each other.
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