‘Jab khud Maa banogi to pata chaley ga!!’-

Ammi would say this quite often and we used to laugh it off when we were younger.

I remember once we went to Murree, we (siblings) tried to take a sneak peek down a high winding road which wasn’t secured by a railing. Ammi was terrified and even though Abbu was with us, she was constantly refraining us from moving ahead while holding hands of 2 of the youngest ones among us. The whole situation looked hilarious to us that time and we made fun of it.

Fast forward to today, I find myself doing the same with E when she attempt any such acts of bravery. Now I realized what Ammi has been warning us about in all these years.

It is a pity that even as a woman, a daughter is not able to understand a mother’s emotions. You know what’s worse? A Mother degrading another mother!

• Haww tmharay bachay ne abi bethna shuru nhi kiya? Mera to 2 months se beth raha hai
• Your baby isn’t potty trianed yet? Mine used to pee and poop on pot since he/she was 1 month old
• Hain? Ye abi chalti nhi? Mery waly ne t peda hoty hi olympic mai dor laga di thi
• Ye crawl nhi kr raha, kahin koi masla to nhi? Bachay to peit k ander se hi crawl krna shuru kr dety hain…
• Why is he so slim? Mera wala to itna healthy tha 6 months mai
• Mera bacha to first aya hai, what is the result of your kid?

Motherhood is not a race at the end of which you’ll be ranked on the basis of how well you and your kids performed, it’s not a semester by the end of which you’ll have to appear in an exam and excel in it.
It is a journey – of you and your baby. How can it be similar to your MIL, SIL, friend or even your own mother. Let’s make our respective journeys beautiful by taking it easy at times when we go too hard on us and our kids. If I talk about myself, I would like to go back in time and convey this to my younger self – I was too much under pressure with my first born and I really don’t know why? May be because of all these unrealistic goals set by the mothers around me or myself.
Let’s take a deep  breath and let the little one relax, let the babies achieve milestones at their own sweet pace. Let us all enjoy this beautiful experience of life because this too shall pass and believe me, time flies away too fast 😦

Too often we see mother in laws pressurizing their daughter in laws about how efficient they were in their times, Sister in laws giving unsolicited advice on how their brother’s wife should raise her children, friends bullying each other on the basis of how (well and better) their kids are performing – be it potty training or weaning, totally random ladies on a support group demeaning one another, sometimes even own mothers finding fault in their daughters’ upbringing preferences. ( P.S. All these situations are fictional and don’t fit on anyone I know right now).

If we remove the relations from above paragraph, we’ll be left with mothers criticizing, judging , disgracing and lowering each other.  What a shame!

While it might be true that all of the above mentioned women really intend to help but the choice of words can make any positive deed look ugly and offensive. As a mother, we all know that we need to be very careful with the words we use with the fellow mothers, especially with the FTMs or newbies. Even if we don’t mean to, we say things that have the potential to hurt the mothers(us). If someone is sharing her problem then lend your listening ears rather than bombarding her with the issues you have faced and making them feel that your problem was/is bigger than theirs. We need to show empathy towards each other because we all have been there at some point in our life. Remember, Only we possess the power to understand what she might be feeling at that particular time but mannn we gotta satisfy our egos, RIP doing a good turn. What do we get by doing so? Superiority complex, may be?

• Can’t we just stop doing this?
• Can’t we be empathetic towards each other?
• Can’t we just say to each other, “Hey fellow mother, you are doing great. Keep up the good work”?
• Can’t we be the reason of smile on someone’s face who is already feeling guilty enough?
• Can’t we just look up towards the brighter side rather than looking down upon each other?

This mother’s day lets pledge together to be kind to our fellow mothers.

• Let’s not humiliate each other whether we are feeding formula to the baby or exclusively breastfeeding.
• Let’s not pull each other’s leg on the basis of vaginal or caesarean delivery.
• Let the world know that “we have come to know what our mothers felt and we don’t find it amusing”

Happy Mother’s Day to all the lovely ladies, we all are doing THE BEST in our capability. Hang in there 🙂

Share this with all the awesome mothers you know and include them in the pledge.

Let #MothersSupportingMothers be the new trend!