to think it's high time somebody started an "I'm an imperfect mother" thread on here? Jeeez the number of perfectly perfect mums on here atm is quite scary

[emkana]

Okay I'll start

I'm not a perfect mother because

I lose my temper
I let them watch x factor and the cube on a Saturday night, and don't even read them a bedtime story after
I've taken them out of school for holidays

I met a friend of my SIL's last week, she has 4 month old twin boys, a 3 year old girl and 5 year old girl.

The mother was very laid back, looked happy and even had make up on. I looked like a train had hit me for the first 6 months post partum. I was full of wonder and admiration.

What is some people's idea of a slummy mummy is different to others. I know for a fact that there are some MNers that would think I am the spawn of the devil for serving up pot noodles and haribos for dinner once (in my defence dd was about 12 at the time, it was a Friday evening and I was knackered!).

I let my children watch hours of tv
I hardly ever do painting or crafts with them
I let them have McDonalds once a week
I regularly give dd a cookie or pom bears when she is whinging just to shut her up
I swear in front of them sometimes
Dd's favourite meal is toast, cucumber sticks, a strawberry/raspberry amoothie and a cheese string and she eats it at least 5 times a week. Its a balanced meal right?
I bribe my ds (ASD) with twenty pence a day to be good at school.

In spite of all this I think I am an amazing parent. I am besotted with my children, I kiss and cuddle them and tell them I love them about fifty times a day and listen with interest to everything they talk to me about (or at least pretend to). Whatever else happens they know they are loved.

Melmog, don't be daft.
We all have different bugbears and different ways of coping.
Sleep deprivation is a beeatch, of course you're bloody knackered.

Gerroff, I remember going to a playgroup with DS1 when he was about 4mths old.
I remember coming home and telling DH about how a Mother of 4 (all pre-school age) had nail varnish on. I was completely in awe of her and her painted nails and could never see a time when mine would look manicured (they still don't but I am not well-groomed).

Melmog, sleep deprivation is the hardest thing to deal with. The DC sleep well now but I don't think I have recovered from those sleepness nights/early morning
I don't think anyone was having a go at you personally were they?

Of course none of us are perfect. Being a parent is exhausting and as soon as you add any other complication in there - relationship difficulties, problems with work, SN illness - it can be a bloody nightmare.
Not being perfect is ideal actually. I would hate my DCs to spend their adulthood trying to match some childhood idyll.
but we should all have our lines in the sand which we won't cross. At those moments I used to lock myself in the bathroom until I got my head back into a calmer place

My unperfectness includes DDs addiction to X-factor. Her fondness of the word twat . DS1 developing a begging tone when asking for clean pants and socks and grovelling around by the washing machine in hope he can find some. putting the children to bed ridiculously early when they were little, assuring them it was way past sleep time. And many more....

Just to clarify, having gone back and read the thread properly, I do not swear AT my dc or ever call them names. I do swear quite a bit in the car though .

If I see things developing from my negative behaviours then I do my best to change them, like the time I noticed that my ds was saying sorry for things that couldn't really be helped, obviously while not shouting at him my irritation was showing and he could tell. So now I make a big deal of telling him that he does not need to apologise for silly accidents that he couldn't help with a big smile on my face whilst seething inside as I clear up a half pint glass of chocolate milk off the carpet.

Until I was an adult I would apologise for the most silly things to people because of the ridiculously high standards I was kept to by my parents. I can't bear the thought of that for my dc. I was also called names ALOT as a child and you carry it with you forever.

Lizzy - lol at painted nails. I paint mine for weddings only!

I used to despair and be jealous when I went round to houses where there were kids and the house was immaculate. It is only really in the last few years that I could actually tidy the house and it would stay that way, not look as if a bomb had hit it within a day.

Cherry hope you are taking the p tbh

I just told ds2 to and have another race on mariocart so I could finish reading this thread

"FOR CHRIST'S SAKE STOP TALKING ABUT THE GODDAMN BLOODY WII! OR I WILL THROW IT IN THE BLOODY BIN! ENOUGH!"

It's rubbish to lose it like that, he's only six, the wii is rationed and exciting, and I feel really mean now, but it's a 30 minute walk home from school and all I get every day is "WhencanIplayWiiwhencanIplaywiiwhencanIplaywii?"

I disagree that a child shouldn't apologise for spilling chocolate milk on the floor - I would expect an apology. If I spill something and someone else has to clear it up, I haven't done it on purpose but I'm still sorry.

these threads ALWAYS go to rat shit

I must say it irritates the fuck out of me when people piggyback admissions of smacking etc onto these "light-hearted" threads

hitting your child/screaming "for fuck's sake" etc is NOT on the same scale as letting them eat Wotsits in front of the TV once, because you are too knackered to make a nutritious breakfast

my children eat mcdonalds, greggsd fruit shoots..... but also fresh fish, smoked salmon, anything else put infront of them (as long as we all get to slap the raw whole fish before sticking it in over )

i shout at them ALOT

never intervene when fighting as i've been too busy on MN to notice who was right and who was in the wrong.

jump for joy when they go to their dads so i can get pissed have "me" time.

often collect them from their dads after having absolutely no sleep the night before. park them infront of a dvd for that 1 hr i have to kill before we all go to bed at 7pm.

but..... my kids are much better behaved than other mums i know who ban sweets/dont allow fighting/dont allow tv's and only feed foods with letter g/

colditz I thought you were shouting at me then

As one of the people roundly slated on here for the heinous crime of saying FFS within earshot of my children, it appears a signifcant number of you think I'm a shit parent. Well, so be it. For the record,I don't think shouting at your children or (perish the thought) letting them hear you swear is bad - especially not when 5 year olds in my DCs school are saying to each other 'Fuck off you cunt' whilst their Boden clad parents, standing just out of earshot are back-slapping each other about how well brought up their no-TV watching, organically fed offspring are.

Meanwhile my boys are - at least in public - well behaved, polite, mature and confident. And they never swear, not even a bloody. Because they know these are mummy words and when they are adults, they too can use them.

I have a short fuse, am quick to anger but equally quickly it's over. I don't sulk, or seethe inwardly, and nor do my children. I had the best childhood anyone could wish for, and was closer to, and had a better relationship with my (now deceased) parents than anyone I know. They swore in front of me, swore at me if I deserved it. But I never felt they didn't love me, or that I was a bad person. In fact I had a very high opinion of myself as a child, and still do

I tell my DC every day that I love them, we are very affectionate and demonstrative with each other because for me the worst thing you can do is not hug and kiss your child- imo thats much worse than anything you might say to them.

But of course it's just my opinion. Please now feel free to all report me to Social Services for being such a shit and incompetent parent, or for not asking for help over my obvious failings

And just to be clear I'm not telling everyone to shout and swear at their children. only that if you do, in the heat of the moment:

a) it doesn't mean you are a bad person

b) you will not automatically have ruined your child's life/left them an amotional wreck.

I find the boden clad parents with the organic fed foul mouthed kids a bit convenient and highly unlikely .

I don't think swearing within earshot of your children is heinous

screaming "hurry up for fuck's sake" or just "for fuck's sake" AT a young child is pretty awful though

no amount of blustering passive-aggressive protestation is going to change that I'm afraid

i think there's a fair amount of smugness going on in mn threads. pulease. i don't think anyone is perfect perfect bloody nigella. can we all just take a chill pill and be a bit less judgmental????

We all judge it results in debate Without it mumsnet would be toast!