Everyone's a Critic

My son was running around the house, butt naked and carefree, having flung his dirty nappy into an (upsidedown) heap on the carpet, leaving the fulsome fug of fresh poo wafting on the breeze behind him. I was in full chase, roaring at him to get into the shower NOW! when my partner said quietly, "You're always shouting at them."

His comment literally stopped me in my tracks. Of COURSE I was always shouting at them. They don't bloody listen. But his comment made me feel bad. REALLY bad. I suddenly found myself wondering if I was a good parent - because good parents don't shout at their children.

Having your parenting choices criticised starts as soon as their head is clear of your vagina. There's always someone around who is happy to tell you how to do it better. With my daughter, it started when she was about seven weeks and in the full throes of colic. Colic is beastly. The baby screams and writhes for no apparent reason for hours and hours every evening until that sweet blessed day when they don't (again, for no apparent reason).

My daughter suffered terribly from colic. Nothing Plunket recommended worked. Massage, warm baths, tilted cot, rocking, diet changes, nothing. One evening she screamed for eight hours straight. It was awful. Eventually at around 2am I stripped off her and myself and covered up with a soft blanket, belly to belly, skin on skin. And we both slept deeply and sweetly for around five hours. It was great.

The next day I happened to mention to a Plunket person my brilliant technique for settling my daughter. There was a disapproving silence and she said, very stiffly, "You shouldn't do that." That same feeling of badness washed over me but this time it was tinged with a little indignation. Where was she all those weeks when my baby girl could be heard over three provinces, face resembling a squashed tomato, back arched in a pose that would make a Yogi proud?  I never called her again.

(I did have marvellous success with Bowen Therapy. If you can get hold of a practitioner, do it, do it, do it. If you're living in Whanganui there's a practitioner who does Bowen free for babies because her own babies suffered terribly from colic and she feels sorry for mums. How nice is that? Click here to check out this awesome woman of goodness).

Then there was the time a mad old lady at the park told me I shouldn't put my girl on a backless swing because she was too little and she would flip off backwards and kill herself. I, who had been pushing my daughter on a big girl's swing for some weeks, was at a loss. Who was this person, this complete stranger (who was wearing Crocs and a tea-cosy hat for f's sake), to tell me how to play with my own child?  As I stomped her interfering face into the mud, I didn't feel bad at all.

In conclusion, I can only surmise that if someone you know and love criticises your parenting, it cuts deep. If a so-called expert tells you you're doing it wrong, you'll feel slightly less bad - after all, they may know a better way. But if someone you wouldn't be able to pick in a line up of random assholes criticises your methods, it's your god-given right to tell them to bollock off.

Now, where did my children get to? Excuse me. I think I may have to raise my voice.