Finding the Perfect “Mom Friend”
It’s really hard to find a quality friend once you become a parent because let’s be real. We don’t have time. Between working (at a job or staying at home because being a stay at home mom is WORK), sports, homework, dinner, dishes, cleaning, bath time. bedtime and Netflix time before you fall asleep eating a bag of candy you’ve worked so hard to hide, having a friend is just... hard.
Of course you have “friends” on social media, but you never hang out. Sometimes I will talk to my husband and say “my friend so and so” and he has no idea who I’m talking about because well, this friend he’s never met because the friendship goes as far as Facebook.
There are a couple reasons for not having friends we hang out with. Here are a few...
The Friend with No kids
I had my first son at 20 and a lot of my friends didn’t have kids. I was the friend who had a baby when nobody else did. So I was sort of popular. “Oh my God your baby is so cute” then he would shit everywhere and the friend would say “I’m never having kids. Here is a plastic bag to throw that stinky diaper in”
Hey thanks.
Friends that do not have children do not understand why you have dark circles under your eyes. They don’t understand why you haven’t lost your baby weight and they most certainly don’t understand why you can’t find a baby sitter to go out to a bar.
Here is the answers
We don’t sleep.
Working out is hard.
And...
We don’t want to.
It isn’t that I wanted to give up my twenties, but I made a choice to have my son and I made the choice to not be able to go out every weekend. Now just because you have a baby doesn’t mean you have to completely stop having a social life however, becoming a mother gives you different priorities. My priorities changed.
The Friend with the Cleanest House
It isn’t that we don’t want to hang out with you, but we don’t want to come to your house. Bringing my four kids to someone’s house who is extremely clean is like taking them to a museum of glass. They are going to break something and I am going to apologize a lot. On the way to the house I’m stressing to my kids “please don’t break anything” and as soon as they walk into the house one of them will throw their shoes and hit a lamp, spill the coffee on a white rug, and tip a candle. Boom house is on fire. This hasn’t happened, but I fear it will. When your friend has kids please just do her a favor and go to her house.
The Judgemental Friend
Why would you keep in contact with someone who is judge mental? Who knows? But I’ve had a few. The judge mental friend has kids and thinks everything they are doing is right and you are wrong. They will offer suggestions on what you can do to become more like them. Their kids seem to be doing all the right things while your kids are being kids. You stay friends with them because you have history and you want to keep that friendship going. However, every time you hang out with them you think about how shitty of a job you are doing. Honestly you just hang out with them because you think it’s better than talking to a toddler all day long... realistically I would rather hear “Mom you’re beautiful” a thousand times over than hear “so are your children going to summer camp this year”
No my kid isn’t going to summer camp because it’s expensive and I like having them home every night.
No I don’t do hot yoga because I don’t have time.
Yes I work at a job because I have to.
Being judged by fellow moms is the worst and eventually you need to end that friendship because they will continue to make you feel like dirt all while they are building themselves up. That isn’t a friend. That is an asshole
And over time we will find..
The Perfect Friend
My ideal of a perfect friend is one who understands you as a parent. They know the struggle. You don’t have to apologize for your kids being a hot mess or yourself being a hot mess. You don’t have to see each other regularly to maintain your friendship because they know Mom life. When they come to your house they expect you to have crumbs on the floor, a kid running around with no pants, and you in your pajamas drinking the coffee you’ve heated up in the microwave ten times. They don’t expect baked goods. They just expect you to be you. This is the Perfect Mom Friend.
Realistically all moms could all become friends. We all share the same ups and downs being a mom. There are things we need to hear from other moms. Moms who have went through what we are going through and someone to tell us “everything is going to be ok” however, some of us don’t want to take advice from other moms. Being a first time mother I thought I knew it all and thought everyone else was doing it wrong. With growth over time and having a reality check I’m more open to advice than I ever have been because I have some great Mom friends.
This blog entry is dedicated to my sister, Kelsey and my best friend Candida.
