Who are these mums???? (Jokes but slightly serious)

[sunshinewithrain]

To you, the mum I see on insta and fb.......
You have been having nights out from your baby being very young, you have lovely hair and make up, you go to work, you have holidays abroad, your kids have their hair done in plaits or other fancy up dos, u put pictures up expressing your love for your wonderful husband/partner....... u probably got pass tickets and could afford to......
Who the f*** are you?
I'm struggling to make ends meet, my partner is as much use as a chocolate fire guard, I only work 34 hrs a week yet can't keep up with house jobs, I've just tried baking for the first time with my 2 year old, I literally turned my head for one second and half the pack of sugar was added and there's flour everywhere 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I lady washed my hair 4 days ago ......
But I know she's 2 (nearly 3) and I'll never get this lovely time with her again ❤️
Oh and I don't grass tickets...... and tbh I can't justify the prices but I'm crying my heart out and looking back in anger all the same 😂

I know someone just like this. Her life is Insta perfect. She’s gorgeous, always posting lovey dovey posts about her perfect DH. They wear expensive clothes and cars, and all the latest gadgets. On her DC’s birthdays they have the house professionally decorated and have a show stopper birthday cake, piles of presents plus a big party (more decorations etc). You’d think they were millionaires.

IRL she’s constantly slagging off her useless DH and threatening to divorce him. Her parents are always bailing them out because they haven’t got a pot to piss in and are drowning in debt. Take it all with a pinch of salt. SM can be truly pathetic.

A real man makes his own luck - there is a lot wrong with that concept but also a lot right. Luck is generally where preparation and opportunity meet - if you ignore massive red flags pre-marriage it’s highly unlikely that you will end up with a decent husband.

There are obvious exceptions where women are preyed upon by abusers and narcissists who play the perfect gent before marriage and then later unveil their nastiness but my guess is that the vast majority of women married to useless men are not being abused.

Idk

Like you, I can’t speak for others. But I do think it’s a bit smug when some (I’m not saying you) tell OPs that the difference is the other women “chose a better husband than you did”.

There’s so much luck involved. And I don’t believe that all those whose husbands turned out well were actually looking for the signs and weighing them up. Most people just fall in love.

But yes, it’s very frustrating when people post on here “oh my boyfriend/ partner / husband is so awful because (insert abuse behaviour)” and then go on to have kids with them.

I think “a real man makes his own luck” is true for many things - it’s going to be true to a large extent in things like careers - but I think it’s much less true in matters of love.

I have always had quite a pragmatic approach to relationships. Love is not always everything.

I've walked away from people I fell in love with because the relationship wasn't right. One of those said he wanted to marry me. I saw what my life would be like with him and it wasn't going to be good.

I fell in love with DH but before I married him I had to be sure that life was going to be what we both wanted it to be. If it hadn't, for either of us, we wouldn't have taken that next step.

I disagree that being happy that you choose a man who you knew would be a good long term partner and father is smug.

It wasn’t luck that I decided to have children with a man who had the same long term values, goals, aspirations and a similar family outlook as me.

I see so many women I know well bumbling along and then being surprised when their husband and now father of their child does exactly what he’s always done all along.
Didnt do the chores before, it didn’t matter there were only two of us.
Always ditched her to see his friends at the last minute, he’ll be different when it’s his family.
Doesn’t ever consider her needs, oh he’ll mature.

Maybe here’s an analogy.

A man wants a woman who has a high sex drive and values physical intimacy. In the first few years of their relationship she gives out all the signs of this. They have sex all the time. They are sexually compatible and have a similar outlook. They even have the ‘chat’ about how things will be in the future when they’re married, and she says she will always make sex a priority as it’s important to her that they have this closeness.

Then they have kids. She doesn’t want sex any more. She just can’t be bothered. He is gutted. Pleads with her, says he isn’t happy. She doesn’t change.

Did he choose badly? Is it his fault he chose a shit wife? Did he miss the signs?

I think you need to give yourself some credit for the fact that you are working 35 hours a week with a toddler to bring up. I think you are underestimating your worth and you need to give yourself some credit. I think lots of people have help and much easier lives which allows them to put on this show of being absolutely in control. You are doing just fine, be kind to yourself

Ha ha! I know what you mean. Those moms. But the way I look at it, clothes are cheap today. Primark is getting better. And don't forget they're only allowing you to see the good bits. But I'm the same, I struggle to keep my house asthecially pleasing, I'm a teacher assistant so I'm busy. Lol. We really are. And holidays are once a year for me. I see so many go on at least four a year. But to me, they don't go anywhere interesting. Spain. No where else. I like Scandinavian countries and Eastern Europe.

34 hours is not an “only” it’s a significant about of time at work. Lack of partner and family support and income. Stop giving yourself a hard time you are doing amazingly well in challenging circumstances and prioritising time with your DD.

Get off FB and Insta.

Do not believe a thing you see on social media. Not a single thing. No one is posting the bad stuff. A lot of highly curated and fake. Truly, don’t even look and focus on making your own life easier.

This⬆️quitting social media will make you so much happier. I could not give a flying fuck what other people get up to. I got bored of all the fakeness on Facebook and Insta and even more bored of people posting what they had for tea or what they are doing at the gym.......yaaaawwwwn.
Be kinder to yourself. Being a full-time working mum is hard as f. Whether you get a good partner or not is irrelevant as mum's carry the mental load( organising birthday parties, Christmas, family presents, school routine and events,need I go on). You're doing great! 👏

We all know at least one mum who very carefully curates a photo. Each to their own, Don’t envy someone who puts time into dictating HOW her toddler picks daises. And remember if you want another’s life you won’t have yours.

Funny u call ur husband that. Pretty rude too. I have 4 children and with time my husband started helping more. He helps me a lot these days. I still complain cuz im a women and its tough being a mom. And I don't look glamorous everyday. I look respectable and put together. The ones posting all those things are trying ro convince themselves that their life is a smoother ride. It's baloney. Try to discuss responsibilities with ur husband and it'll be easier. Like maybe he should be responsible for feeding the baby or giving a bath

Remember that g-d gave u ur partner cuz he's good for you. I'm sure there are things bothering other women about their spouses too. Try to fix the problems rather than compare cuz that doesn't help at all...

I remember seeing a video about one of those momfluencers once.
The video describes this beautiful woman, her kid looks perfectly put together, they're by water, the mother takes time perfectly laying out their matching towels, the perfect water toys that match everything. The child's excited to play, but mothers setting up, setting up some more. The mother takes her photos, and then packs up and leaves. The child's had no time to play, and is distraught.

I remember thinking how sad and unfair that would be, and I think then and there I decided that I didn't feel bad anymore, my life doesn't look perfect, but my kids are pretty happy and we have fun and I wouldn't swap that for beautiful photos or a certain aesthetic

Every person who I know in real life who gushes about how much they love their partner on social media is in an unstable relationship. All the happy couples I know don't do it. All the volatile ones do, even if it only emerges once they separate.

And as others have said, it's often money and/or support. The women I know like this often have mums/inlaws who take their children overnight, provide free child care for them to work, go on child free holidays etc. We have zero support, our parents are either dead or live abroad and it can be quite hard to see others who get so much help and support, especially when they complain to you about how hard parenting is.

Mate, you know all those perfect Insta lives are fake, don't you? As fake as the filters these people use in their photos.

Social media is fake as hell, you can fabricate any situation you like and stick it on there. Their lives will be far from perfect. They either have a lot of credit or they’re very wealthy to afford the shit you mention. None of it means they’re actually happy though, rest assured. Stuff doesn’t make you happy.

This.

Everything I post on SM is true, but what I don't post are the tantrums, or the bags under my eyes after a night with a 2 year old climbing on top of me every ten minutes, or the pile of pots for washing up in the kitchen, or my over flowing laundry basket.

I don't stage photos, I just snap a few while we're out and about and post them because I live 200+ miles from my whole family and it's easier for me to put them on my FB page for them to see than send them all things individually. I wouldn't bother if we lived closer and could see them more in person.

But they don't want to see the every day life stuff, only the happy, cute stuff. So I suppose other friends might think that's my life. Happy child, always out doing stuff, no problems.

I’m sure a lot of it must be fake? I mean if I think about it I only post nice smiley pictures of my baby on instagram and don’t mention the meltdowns, arguments with husband or the fact I only wash my hair once a week :)
and like others have said perhaps a lot of family support?
I’m also intrigued about those who work part time but husband shares childcare 50% ? Unless husband also works part time how is this actually possible? My husband earns almost triple my wage but his job is very high pressure, he’s out 7-7 mon-fri and a lot of the time has to take calls and emails in the evening as well. I’m going back to work next month doing 27 hours over 3 days so although it’d be lovely to have a 50/50 dynamic I’m not sure that’s going to happen when I’m off 4 days a week.

That’s one version of only seeing the best on social media, and what I’d think is the normal, healthy one. I used to do this too until my daughter banned me from posting any photos of her as she doesn’t want a social media presence. So now I don’t post photos at all.

The extreme is staging. I saw an instagram post by this woman in LA who was explaining how extreme it can be. Mansions hired for £90 an hour (use of the front and a room inside), Lamborghinis for £200 an hour, clothing, shoes, bags all rented by the hour … People purchasing luxury item shopping bags to pretend they have purchased luxury items for photographs to post. This influencer shows all this because she wants the masses of people without all these things to understand that they are not poor or failing in life. It is such an eye opener.

That’s the extreme, but normal people stage in other little ways. For example, would you take a photo with the tidy living room behind your kids, instead of a messy kitchen with plates piled up in the sink? I really don’t think you are so different to other Mums. People just put their best foot forward (or completely fake it! 😂).

I'm also pretty restricted with who can see what. It's literally just for family and close friends. If I have people on it because I know they'll cause drama if we aren't friends (CBA with the drama, honestly), they are set so they can't see most of what I post.

If I didn't have the restrictions as tight as I do, I wouldn't post anything of DD. It's literally a low effort way of sharing with my important people. Which means that if I forget to move the mess (or in a recent photo I posted, the Macdonald's nugget box from the boot of the car on our way to holiday!) it doesn't matter because people that see it know it's just real life and are just happy to see our family photos.

DH posts next to nothing. He only has FB, not even Instagram (I rarely post there either). Neither of us would care if it disappeared.

Editing to add: one of my friends stages in a totally different way. You can see all the mess etc, but she adds a long caption about what an amazing time they've had, how fantastic a dad her husband is, basically showing they're the perfect, albeit messy, family. But in private messages to me, she's telling me how there's been mega meltdowns, she's cried on the way home, her husband is sulking because he didn't want to go, or he's been at work 24/7 and been no help etc. Even the "real" looking posters are likely faking too.

Well we used the
P (Plan)
R (Routine)
O (Organise)
D (Delegate)
method, but this was a long time ago, aeons before mobile phones and internet and all the clutter that seems to surround young families these days.
I had also read something about choosing whether to have mornings or evenings. As I am a morning person, I decided that I would rather have my evenings "free", so children were fed, bathed, read to and in bed by 19:00 latest, preferably 18:30.
Obviously their routines adapted as they grew older.
I seem to remember doing a lot of meal planning and batch cooking until the children were able to help.
After a certain age, games and toys were always tidied up and put away in their allotted spaces before bed or when they were finished with, before anything else was started.
Writing that makes life sound very rigid and strict, but it wasn't at all because we started as we meant to go on and led by example. This meant things like good manners and good table manners were fairly easy to enforce/encourage.
Meals were always in the dining-room at the table and conversation was encouraged - important social skill!
But I definitely wasn't/wouldn't have been taking photos or filming everything and putting it in the public domain, which is why I think many people are so paranoid and anxious these days.

There's a lot of 'why did you get with him?' here, he probably didn't hold up a sign saying 'useless git who won't help out' when they were first together. Situations and people change along the way, not always for the better.