New Mummy Blog: When Did Motherhood Become A Competition?
Becoming a mother has completed my life in ways I never even knew it was incomplete before - from the indescribable love for those tiny fingers and toes and the first 'I love you' from my toddler to the whole new gang of mum friends and the deeper understanding of and respect for old friends already with kids, it's all stuff I now can't imagine being without.
[Copyright: Claire Sparks]
But while that's all rosy, unfortunately there's something else that seems to come hand in hand with motherhood that I definitely could do without. And that's the constant undercurrent of competition. It started before kids even came along, with the race that I didn't even know I was in; no one tells you that when you get married you are apparently stepping up to the starting line. So, when are you two going to have a baby? So and so had a baby by their first anniversary. And such and such was pregnant by the time they got home from honeymoon... It's a race that's impossible to train for and incredibly hard to deal with when you're trying and trying yet it looks and feels like everyone else is sailing past you towards a finish line that you can't even see from where you are. Even though they're not, of course. Many are battling just the same, with their own disappointment, their own heartbreak to contend with as they smile and laugh off those questions time and again. But I couldn't help but feel like I was in competition - and losing - when it seemed like everyone else got pregnant first. And then, when the miracle day came, when that test - possibly the 100th one I'd done - finally showed a positive result, the competition wasn't over. It has only just begun. For every wonderful new mum friend I am eternally grateful for, there was the toxic one who seemed to prey on everyone's insecurities (of which there are many, many, in the early days of motherhood). The one who somehow managed to always be saying, without actually saying, my kid is better than yours. Of course, once out of the newborn haze, I came to my senses and left that so called friendship behind. But even the kindest of friends can have a my kid's better moment. We wouldn't be human, and certainly wouldn't be parents if we didn't all think our kids are the best.
[Copyright: Claire Sparks]
It's not just friends either. The competition also exists closer to home. My husband and I try not to play it, but sometimes just can't help ourselves from resorting to a round of who had the hardest day. His 5.40am alarm, cancelled trains, work pressures, never getting home before 8pm and not seeing the kids awake from Sunday night to Friday night versus my up three times in the night to scare away a dinosaur, retrieve a teddy stuck down the side of the bed and to fix a blanket, a swimming lesson where the toddler refused to swim, a poo that somehow managed to escape through nappy and trousers and land on the high chair seat and spotted just as the baby's hand sunk into it, a dinner cooked and refused to be eaten and beds refused to be climbed in to. Both of us exhausted, there was never going to be a winner. But probably worst of all is the way in which I have felt in competition with myself. To be the best mum I can but still retain my own identity. To feel like I'm more than just a mum but also to defend being a mum, as a very important job indeed. To find my place in amongst the out to work mums versus the stay at home mums versus the mumtrepreneurs all over Instagram. Ah yes, the stay at home versus working mum debate. That's a pretty toxic competition in itself and it rears its ugly head a lot. But like everything in life, when someone else's choices don't reflect our own it makes us insecure and defensive about our own choices. Which is mad. Being a parent is tough enough. Wonderful, love-filled, joyous, fulfilling, challenging, exhausting, wouldn't swap it for the world but tough. So instead, shouldn't we help each other (and ourselves) out? Shouldn't we just embrace that it takes all sorts to make a world. And remember that as long as we're all doing our very best, for our children and for ourselves, then we're all winning.