24 Seven May 2018

Renee Jensen
STOP THE
MOM-SHAMING
Every day on social media, thousands of
mothers are getting shamed. Do you know
who’s doing the shaming? Mothers! That’s
right. We, who should be supporting each
other in our shared journey, are out there
on Facebook tearing each other apart
because one mom feeds by breast while the
other chooses to feed by bottle. If you’re a
mother reading this, you know exactly what
I’m talking about and most likely have been
both the victim and the perpetrator.
Dads, I know you are rolling your eyes or
shaking your head right now. You have
probably listened to your wife rant or cry
about some total stranger who bullied her
on Facebook for feeding your kid chicken
nuggets.
I am a mother and I spend a lot of time in
various virtual communities. Each one serves
a purpose but there is a lot of unnecessary
mean girl behavior that goes on.
Why do we do this to each other? Why
can’t we keep our opinions to ourselves?
Why can’t we just scroll by when we see a
comment with which we don’t agree? Isn’t
this parenting thing hard enough without
hundreds of women in some random
Facebook group spreading grief over
whether or not a child is vaccinated?
Better yet, why do we even subject
ourselves to the negativity? Nobody
is forcing us to open our Facebook or
Twitter app. No one is forcing us to share
our domestic preferences with a group of
10,000 strangers.
Just like everyone else on social media,
there are many moms who are there “just
for the show”, for the pure entertainment
of it all.
Some moms are there because they are
unhappy with their own lives and “misery
loves company”. Harsh, but true.
Many mothers, like myself, are part of
these groups because we are craving
community. Even the unhappy ones are
as well. We need it. We want it. We are
searching for a place where someone will
wrap their virtual arms around us and say,
“I may not understand what you are going
through, but I get it. This mom thing can
be super hard. Don’t worry, we will get
through it together.”
Being a mother is one of the most
challenging jobs in the world. No one
else can understand the struggle of being
a mom except another mom. Why judge
each other when we spend most of our
lives judging ourselves? We are all guilty
of both. Maybe the judgment comes from
our own insecurities. Maybe, just maybe,
if we start to accept our own decisions as
“right”, we will not give others the power
to control how we feel about ourselves.
The next time you see a mother spilling
her guts on Facebook, I challenge you
to respond with love. I challenge you to
respond with, “I may not understand what
you are going through but I get it. This
mom thing can be super hard. Don’t worry,
we will get through it together.”
Renee Jensen is the creator of My Time-Out, an organization and community who supports positive mental health and wellness among
mothers. Renee co-authored Redefining Success: Real Women, Real Stories, Real Inspiration.
www.mytime-out.com