Mommies Only – The Child-Free/Mommy Feud: Will it (Can it) End?

I belong to a pretty awesome group of female bloggers. Each day, a new blog is featured and it’s a huge deal – like winning a Grammy. No really. It’s that big! We are encouraged to follow one another and support each other in our blogging endeavors. There are no caveats and no qualifiers as to why we should show our support for one another. We all share a common goal: to grow. Personally, I think that commonality should be enough. I have learned more from this community in a few shorts months than I had learned in over a year of blogging on my own. Sufficed to say write, it’s also been pretty awesome discovering women from all walks of life who I otherwise may have not gotten the opportunity to learn about.

Through one of the recent daily features, I began following one of the women’s Facebook pages listed as a Health/Fitness website. I genuinely admired her for kicking ass and being so dedicated. There were times she would get nasty comments from others who I felt were jealous she wasn’t making excuses, but instead making a tremendous effort to take care of her health and her body. She looks GOOD! When I told her not to worry about the naysayers, she gave me a thumbs up. I actually thought she was pretty likable. I didn’t know her, but I genuinely enjoyed following her page and learning the exercise techniques that worked for her.

Now to throw a wrench into things…

I’m not a biological mom. But I can certainly relate to feeling too busy and too tired to work out or to make my health a priority. I know what it’s like for my body to change, no –  not through pregnancy, but through a partial hysterectomy and also being in my later 30’s. I know what it’s like to get very little sleep because I’m on planes so often and in hotel beds forgetting what time zone, city or country I’m in. I can relate as a woman to the pressures of feeling we have to look a certain way, but instead wanting to be healthy. No. I cannot relate to being a mom. Nor am I attempting to try.

It seemed there was no issue with someone like me, personally child-free by choice, but also a bonus mom, following and interacting with her page. Until last week when she posted this:

I was surprised.

Women replied with things such as: “You think the world revolves around you,” and “You’ve never known what true undying  love is,” along with “You can’t really feel true love.”

Call me hypersensitive (no, really, it’s okay), but OUCH. And talk to my parents who were at every single one of my chemotherapy sessions. Don’t you dare have the balls to tell me I don’t know what true undying love is.

What if I had replied, “You have a real job,” or “You actually have a life.”??? I’m sure that would have gone over reaaaal well!

I was frankly surprised that she had posted this on her page given the fact she had received so much criticism from others. And to ‘keep it real”, here is what I actually wrote:

The couple of sentences that I missed (unintentionally) pretty much said I’ve admired her for standing up against people who were negative against her.

The rest:

To which she replied:

WOW.

“This.is.a.page.for.mommies. Why are you on it?” Sorry I must have missed the “Mommies only” sign where it said the page is a Health/Wellness website:

I let her know I would happily leave her page – which I did – and told her I was disappointed in her. Which I am. She went onto delete the original post and all of its comments then inundated me with private messages essentially threatening me and telling me her mom is a lawyer (to which I explained I could have her call someone in my family who is a law expert himself). She asked me if I’d go on a page about dogs if I didn’t have a dog (ummm why not?) and then ‘start trouble’. Hey! I’m also a US citizen and follow a blogger who writes about his homeland of Croatia. Maybe I should ask him if it’s okay? She told me there would be “repercussions” if I slander her page. Umm okay.

Did I seriously consider calling her out despite her threat to sick her mom on me (which frankly I could care less about)? Sure I did.

Instead, I have a question-the same one I asked her: When will we empower each other for our choices? She essentially opened up a bashing session even if she doesn’t want to see that. Oh and before you think I’m not not going to call out the child-free by choice crowd, I know we do it, too. Do I understand women who want to stay at home and raise kids? No. Do I think it’s great if that’s what you want to do? Absolutely!

I have seen this a lot lately. We tiptoe around the conversation because it’s such a hot topic. I find it a bit hypocritical that as a force women don’t want to be kept “down” yet we are the most guilty of doing this very thing to each other! Is it actually possible that the women who choose to have children and the women who choose to remain child-free can support each other for their decisions even if we can’t understand each other for our decisions? Please, you tell me.

Oh – and for the record, you don’t have to agree with me. You’re still welcome here.