Monday, March 24, 2014

Why I Won't Tell You: "You're Going to be a Great Mom."

So we're acquaintances or maybe even friends and you find out you're pregnant. Everybody's congratulating you, telling you things like "you're going to be such a great mom." Meanwhile, you hear nothing from me.


Here's why you won't:

Chances are your pregnancy isn't something I think should be celebrated. Are you in a stable, long term, committed and good relationship? Are you financially stable? Are you emotionally and mentally stable? Are you an independent adult who takes care of herself and is completely capable of taking care of another human being? Do you have health and dental insurance? Do you have a safe and comfortable home?

I could go on and on, but here's the point- if you answered "no" to any of those questions, I don't think you should be having a baby. If you can't properly care for yourself, you're not in a position to take care of a baby or child the way that baby or child deserves. Roll your eyes, get angry or defensive, insert cruel insults, whatever you like.

In my opinion, your child deserves a life more stable and happy than you're able to provide and at the end of the day, your child's quality of life is too important to me for me to go throwing out false compliments or congratulations.

Boom. It's out there. In the world. A little scary but completely honest. Real talk Monday.

xoxo,
Laura

PS. When wonderful people I know announce their pregnancies the story goes a lot differently. There's a lot of celebrating, jumping up and down, crying happy tears for them and congratulating. This approach of not congratulating a pregnancy only applies to situations in which that person isn't in a position to properly care for a child.

4 comments:

  1. I agree %100. I can totally relate to this amd see it all. The. Time. People think it may be rude when you yoir the only once not jumping for joy for so,exodus pregnancy...but when you make eye contact with that person, they already know you're right.....they are doing it for all the wrong reasons and they're probably going to suck at being a mom.

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    1. I would never tell a person "you're going to be a bad mom," I try to steer clear of being negative or mean at all. But I definitely won't congratulate them or tell them how fabulous it is because it most definitely is not fabulous.

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  2. I'm in a position where I can't have children at the moment. I agree that if the relationship isn't stable it's not right to bring children into that situation. However I think children can be happy in poor or less wealthy families. If everyone lived by the above I fear women wouldn't have had children during the war. Life was really uncertain and people were struggling financially. My grandpa was born in to a poor family in the middle of the blitz but his childhood was far happier than my gran's childhood where her parents were wealthy.
    For me as long as the relationship is stable that's what counts.

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    1. I see your point. I personally think that if you can't support yourself or a family, you shouldn't have one. I think being responsible, hardworking and getting your finances in order are really important. I'm also a tax payer though so seeing other people have several children who live off of my paycheck/taxes because they don't have one (or enough of one,) rubs me the wrong way. I'm all for responsibly having children and not believing that the government owes anything to you (to pay for your children.)

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Hello gorgeous, I love reading your comments!