So I’m not exactly an expert at all but I have been a parent almost nine years and just can’t remember it being like this when I had my first at all.
I have three dcs and decided to take my almost 3 year old to a baby/toddler group the last day. It’s been a long time since I attended one as my older two are in school and youngest goes to preschool .
There were a lot of mums there around my age (35) with their first child, some babies , some toddlers. The conversations were so competitive, I found it a bit crazy .
It was a really top trumps exercise. “Oh mine eats everything”, “mines always had 15 hours of sleep since they were 2weeks”, “my two year old is starting to pick up all three languages now” and on and on as on. I didn’t say much as tbh I found it just weird and it continued relentlessly the whole time. Two of my dcs were /a bit are appalling sleepers, we are talking years of frequent waking, if someone asked I was honest. I definitely struggled at times, I also love being a parent and adore my dcs. I did think if someone was struggling it would have been hard going to compete with the level of perfection at the group.
The amount of times I heard the words chilled and placid being used. I also had a relative visit recently with a dc the same age as my youngest and it was like some bizarre competition that I wasn’t aware of. Constant talk of how well they eat, how great they slept, how easy they were. My kids all eat everything, all sleep well etc but I’ve no inclination to go on about it.
It was cringey and painful tbh. I’ve started to notice it more and more with first time parents everywhere.
Is perfection just very in? I definitely do not remember this.