What do you ACTUALLY judge mothers on?

[Ketomeato]

Inspired by the child in the buggy thread, I realised I hardly judge anything really, mainly because I have an unruly child with additional needs so in our house, pretty much anything goes. You have to be kind, and you have to wear pants. And that’s it.

What does anyone actually judge about, regarding parents with young children?

I only have boys so what do I know, but I judge when little girls are in a playground wearing restrictive dresses and skirts and they can’t climb properly. I would say most girls are dressed like this - let them be freeeeeeeee

Smoking over their baby / kid and violence.
I was on a flight a month ago, a drunk and rowdy family went from happy chatty tipsy at boarding to drink and aggressive half way though then off their face with the woman hitting the husband round the head a few minutes before landing. All of this in front of a toddler and a six or seven year old. It was disgraceful.
Cabin crew did nothing and passengers were definitely scared to get involved and no eye contact was made.
If that's how they behave in public, I can't begin to imagine what their home life is like.

I have seen and heard mothers swearing and hitting their kids in supermarkets. Awful women. Poor kids.

My ex has DD at weekends and find myself too busy judging his parenting to judge random people and their kids.

I judge him for-
-Giving DD sweets at nursery pick up.
-Behaving as though her leg has just fallen off every time she falls and scrapes herself.
-Dressing her up in frilly, itchy, age inappropriate clothes.
-Talking to her in slang.
-Loud performance parenting and treating DD like she's the only child on earth.
-Treating her like a little precious princess who will collapse if she doesn't get what she wants.

Poor DD must think she's in hell when she's here because I'm pretty much the opposite.

Apart from that if I see someone smacking, I do judge that. And I did see a dad give a child no more than 9 months a CAN of Irn Bru in her buggy the other day and I couldn't help but judge and stare a little...

Also aware people will judge me for having a child with him, but I think everyone can be judged for something.

The family that live near my work don't use car seats, they run the Chinese but also have a taxi business on the side. Because they're using a taxi to drive around in apparently they don't need car seats, I've watched the toddler get in the front and the mum sit in the back with newborn baby. I tried to say something once but they speak really broken English and they just said it's a taxi over and over.

I try really hard not to judge people on the snapshot of their life I see, but this really gets to me.

You think your daughter must think she’s in hell because her dad talks to her in slang?! He sounds a loving dad who is well within the range of normal parenting. She probably loves going there.

Children who have the have baby teeth removed due to rotting. I went to school with a girl who's daughter needed 5 teeth out as she would let her drink fizzy juice and the poor thing was terrified. Would have been incredibly painful afterwards. Still makes me angry

Oh and the main thing I judge is the judgers. Load of self righteous nonsense on here which is absolutely not in the spirit of MN.

Reading through this list and I can confident say that half of you must judge the shit out of me.

Yes I've taken DS to McDonald's. He's two, we've been twice. But if you see me in there with him, how will you know if I take him there once a week or not?
He drinks juice too, not all the time, but again, if you see us with a cup/bottle of juice, how do you know that it isn't a rare treat?
I've also taken him to a nail salon before when he was little. Day before an event and all my childcare fell through. I thought a one off wouldn't hurt. But again, you see me in there once, you don't know that I don't do it every week.

I judge smoking, smacking and swearing...but even with swearing, I will be honest and say that I've let a swear word slip out around DS. He's even repeated it back to me. I was mortified but just ignored it because what else was I supposed to do?

Judge me all you like.

@mintcorneto I use to judge the parents of children who had to have rotting teeth removed but recently my 8 year old had to have one removed as she grinds her teeth at night which caused it to wear down and meant she ended up with an abscess even with good dental hygiene. I was gutted as it's such a long thing to explain to people and I felt really embarrassed. Any way all I wanted to say is we arent all crap mothers if our children have a tooth removed some times there is an actual reason.

Smoking

And car seats being used overtime as permanent buggys

Weekday - I was only meaning for those with teeth which have been rotted through bad diet/lack of hygiene. Totally sympathise with your situation

Smoking during pregnancy. Smoking around children of any age.

Setting no or loose boundaries for children, from any background, to varying levels importance.

Mothers who do not even let their baby have the benefit of the first bf/first few bf.

Saying this, I keep quite about my judgements because I'm certain that I too am judged as a mother.

Parents who don't believe education has any value and therefore don't support the school/teacher in any attempt to educate their difficult child. It must be the teacher's fault the child is badly behaved at school, even though the parent has told them school is a waste of time, and if they get in trouble Daddy will come and tell the teacher off for them.

People who don't use consequences for behaviour in a child aged 2 or more, just keep saying "please don't do that" twenty times.

Giving in to child's every whim and buying them sweets, toys, magazines every time they make a fuss. A toddler can understand "no we aren't buying a packet of sweets today because..."

You think your daughter must think she’s in hell because her dad talks to her in slang?!
No.... when she's with me she must think she's in hell because I don't give her everything she wants, I limit her intake of sugar, if she has a small fall I don't keep her off nursery, buy her sweets or get myself in a flap over it.

I'm sure she loves being at her dads.

@MoonlightBonnet that poster was saying her DD thinks HER house is like hell because her ex is so much more lenient and gives her everything she wants.

Aggressive continual swearing when young children around. Too much confrontational aggression around.

Parents in a pub, I don't judge. The parents who left their toddler in the Wacky Warehouse and then sat themselves in the adult only section I judged when the little one came round the corner minus his pants because his nappy needed changing.

Or the single dad who collects his daughter for their day together and spends it watching, 'stupid football' as the child called it.

My old neighbour with 6 children, on benefit day the eldest had to go stand in the queue outside the post office to save a place for mum who would turn up with the others and then take them to McDOnalds before the elder two took the younger ones to school - late.

The kids loved fruit and if I offered them any they were thrilled. Mum couldn't buy fruit because she didn't have a car. Except she walked past a green grocers to get to he post office and mcDonalds.

I know life cannot be easy with a large family but I still judged. She did lose custody of them in the end.

Swearing in front of the child , smoking , shouting at them really nastily in shops etc . And mixing patterns with clothing I.e Stripe top and spotty leggings 😆 last one is a joke :)

I will be honest and say that I've let a swear word slip out around DS.

I think that's very different to swearing AT a child.

Not using the appropriate car seats or seat belts in cars, taking videos/pictures of child in car whilst driving (see that a lot on Instagram).

Smoking near children / pushing a pram.

The wanky soft play parents who sit on their phone and don't even notice when their feral kids are biting/hitting/being nasty to others.

Naked / partially naked pictures on social media

Drug / drink driving - a few people from uni I know go out and do cocaine on a night out and then pick their kids up the next day and happily drive them

I used to judge the mums who came to collect their primary children from tea at our house, and who were too wet to get them out of the house if they objected.

I judge mothers who have children to crap men. Specially those who collect children from multiple loser Dads.
Protect yourself and the species.

-Smoking
-Smacking/hitting/swearing
-Juice in bottles
-Drinking/taking drugs around them
-A sugary dessert after every meal
-Sticking a dummy in a baby's mouth every time it vocalises, dummies for over 2 year olds
-Not protecting babies and kids from sunburns (I know accidents happen but not even trying to keep them in the shade or using appropriate sun cream)
-Not brushing their teeth
-Over 3 year olds in nappies unless they have SEN
-Ignoring children when they try to talk to their parents

How would you know wether a 3 year old has Special needs or not apples?A lot of special needs which can affect toileting are not diagnosed until long after 3'and you know some kids are just a little bit later,my oldest was 3 and 2_months before he was completely out of nappies in the day he's nearly 13 it's not affected him one bit .