Competitive parent comments (just for fun)

[prettymuchapixiegirl]

A few that I've come across:

"I love the way your DS is happy sitting in the buggy. My DS is never happy just sitting there like that, he is so grown up and needs constant stimulation or he gets bored"

"Oh DS, look at that slop that Pixiegirl's DS is eating, you're wondering what it is because you only have big boy food don't you?"

"To be honest I'd much rather have a child who's more average, like your DS. I think being so advanced is going to bring my DS nothing but problems when he gets to school"

All said by a "friend" who is lovely in many ways but also very competitive and our meet ups are frequently spent with her reeling off a list of what her DS is now doing, or by her making out that there's a problem because she thinks he's doing things so early....

What competitive parenting comments have you all come across?

jeee - I did the same. DD was entirely unremarkable apart from her speedy teeth getting ability whilst everyone else's babies were 'doing' things!

It is all defensiveness.

If you feel the need to talk unprompted about your child and your parenting then you have issues.

The autistic child plus special abilities is a conversation I have about once a week. everyone says it with differing levels of sensitivity. Sometimes it is just their trying to find something to say that is faintly positive.

My favs which I use in rl all the time, are

' oh, autistic? Does he have a special ability or power - a lot of them do, like rain man'

A) yes > he can fly !

B) he is very gifted at farting. Taking the art to a whole new level..

Used the farting one last night actually

PMSL miggsie I almost coughed up a lung laughing at that! Thanks - needed a giggle this morning :)

LeQueen, I do not have the comfort of DD not being good at things. She is bloody brilliant at sports as well, and her art is fantastic I am told (I am rubbish at art and can't really discern these things). I have also been told she has a gift for languages (a french mum told me DD sounds french when she talks french). Luckily the other mums are really generous and kind and glad for DD, I often feel very self concious. My mum never liked what she referred to as "showing off" for children so I tend to get a bit embarassed.

Oh, and at the last prize giving at her theatre school when they said "the drama medal goes to..." I heard several girls muttering "DD's name" before it was even announced.

Sometimes I think that if anyone is going to break the laws of physics, it will be DD.

The friend I was talking about in my OP often makes out that she's paying me a compliment or wishing her son was still acting "like a baby" like my son apparently does, when actually she's just using the opportunity to let me know what her child can do. For example "Oh I wish my DS still wore nappies like your DS does, he was in such a hurry to grow up and get out of those things", so letting me know her son is potty trained etc etc

is anyone else feeling the irony?

Oh yes, I had blocked this from my memory but it's come to me just now that the same mum explained why said child would not eat fish fingers that I cooked because "they were not symmetrical enough and he doesn't like that".

I also add, she doesn't do this now. Bit of a shame as those little vignettes often lighted the darkness of those toddler years.

..and I also add she is a lovely person, I assume she was just a bit frazzled during this stage.

DH has just reminded me that there is a bloke he knows who is getting tennis lessons for his daughters (8 and 6) bacause even if they only get into the top 100 players in the world they cans till earn a good bit of money.
No pressure there then.

Generally they say these things because they are very insecure.

I did have a friend like this (no longer!)
My ds1 was born early with undiagnosed IUGR (was only 4.5lbs) and because of that had some developmental delay as a baby.

Her baby was over 8lbs at birth and put on over 1lb per week thereafter.

At their 8 week vaccinations her ds was 14lbs. Ds1 was 7 lbs (and had just been discharged from hospital after being on IV ABs for a strep infection in his blood)
I was so pleased he had finally hit the 7lb mark but she just looked ds1, nudged her dh and said "thats the one I was telling you about".

I cried all the way home.

Obviously, ds1 was quite behind her ds. EG: he didnt sit up unaided til he was 9 months.
We went round one afternoon to visit them and ds1 was crawling. Her ds wasnt. she was livid

Saw her again 3/4 week later (we had been on hols) and as soon as I walked in the room she said "look!" and proceeded to haul her ds up and march him across the room holding his arms above his head.

ds1 could drink from a proper cup by the time he was 2. Hers couldnt. It drove her mad

She actually told him that if he didnt learn he wouldnt be "allowed" to go to nursery

Dont even get me started on what she put the poor child through wrt potty training!

Very, very sad.

Her ds is an only - by design - and when I told her that I was expecting again after 2 very distressing mc she cut me off and said "you must be mad!" I didnt talk to her re; the pregnancy again.

I dont know why some people are like this.

I just know they are sad bitches.

JoanofArgos - Yes, I am! There's something quite brilliant about some of these 'oh, the pain of a genius child' posts.

I might start listing all my superior reading/artistic achievements as a six year old and then then counter them against the perfectly ordinary, happy but non-nobel-prize winning life I have now.

LeQueen, yes I will. I think determination to try is more appealling that being naturally good...putting in the effort is a good thing for kids and in DD's school they always encourage the one who is not naturally good on sports day. Huge cheer when small unco-ordinated boy catches the ball after 400 tries.

RMCW your ex friend does sound like she has a lot of unhappiness inside.

I do feel sorry for kids whose parents want to live their dreams through them. You are just setting your child up to feel like they are a disappointment.

ah well, i always call my kids geniuses. At least I'll have made them confident in themselves.

after all, if your own mum doesn't have an unreasonably high opinion of you, what chance have you got?

notes own mother generally presumes mollusc-like level of intelligence in self

I met up with a 'friend' who I hadn't seen for a couple of years the other day.

She asked about my foster daughter and I said she is doing really well, we arranged some piano lessons a year ago to help with her co-ordination and now she's going to do Grade 1 (no small achievement since she couldn't even wash herself properly or hold a thought in her head for more than a minute at a time when she first came to us).

"Oh" she said "musical ability is all inherited, I wonder which of her real family are musical"

and

My DD started crawling a couple of months before my NCT group friend's babies.

One of them was watching my DD and said "Oh, look she is crawling too fast, and moves too quickly, thats bad for them. My DS is waiting until he can do it properly"

I actually think it's a shame that parents can't boast or brag a bit about their children without feeling self conscious or being ridiculed. It's a very UK thing I think. It's particularly noticeable on the academic side. People seem happier to praise someone who is good at football/dancing/gymnastics or whatever but heaven help the child who can read early. It's a shame because some children may only ever be good academically and won't get the praise they deserve for it. :(

I am smiling at the thread.

I quite like to see parents proud of their kids, but some take it a wee bit far.

Miggsie was the physics woman not joking? It sounds like the kind of lame deadpan joke I would make, like when people ask me what language DD speaks and I tell them that her English vobabularly is particularly vast, but that grammatically her German just pips it at the post. She's one.

I have only come across one mother who is terribly competitive. She started an argument with a friend of mine about the waving abilities of 8 month olds. Apparently there are degrees of waving excellence.

The worst she came out with though was when she looked around the group and announced in a dramatic kind of stage whisper

'I am so proud of my daughter. Soooo proud. Is it
normal to feel like this? Is it?' and then proceeded to ask us all if it were normal.

Very uncomfortable. She looked as though she were able to cry. Those are her exact (translated) words. They are etched on my mind, it was all so freaky.

I sometimes wonder if she had PND or something and was overcompensating. I didn't think of it at the time and never see her now. I wish I had talked to her more.

I never do the competitive thing. My cousins do and its so cringy! I'm with the underplay crowd.

I have witnessed the "Tooth Envy" thing first hand though.

A group of School-gaters were trying to outdo each other with tales of gappiness. One turned to me and said "Oh Trolly I'm sure TrollChild will catch up soon" in a pitying manner. I couldn't resist replying.

"Well actually TrollChid lost his front tooth at the weekend. He collided with TrollBaby and it got knocked out.."

They looked a bit startled and changed the subject.

Also I was shunned for not joining the baby siging group.

My cousin was telling me how advanced her 8mth old was as he could "Let her know he was hungry"

I was, by not attending, severly damaging Trollbaby's developement as he would not be able to communicated with me as "Babies don't have voice boxes and vocal cords until they pass 1"!

How the feck do they cry then?!

Psammead - I've been wondering whether some of these comments are (rather good) jokes - particularly the one about waiting to crawl properly. I guess you have to be there.

Yours is a cracker

A little boast is fine in the right circumstances - my DDs and some of their friends are very keen on different sports, and their mums and I ask each other how they got on at the weekend, comment about little snippets in the local paper and so on. Then you have permission to be a little bit proud before you get over yourself and put the kettle on.

A colleague at work insisted that his daughter was talking - quite a few words apparently. She was 6 weeks old!

Loving this thread, but some of the things are just so thoughtless :(