I have sometimes wondered if there is some sort of academy certain people go to where they learn how to say exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time. Initially it seemed to me that husbands attend this as some sort of pre-marriage training. I can now only assume that some mothers also graduate before bringing new life into the world.
I do love taking my little one to various gatherings with his peers but the interactions I have with the other mum's sometimes makes me wonder if it's all worth it. I have often left feeling like perhaps I am the only one with problems, or when I've really been struggling the only who feels that way. I blame the mum's who seem to have a gift for saying exactly the wrong thing. A shining example was one such conversation at playgroup on Monday. It went something like this..
Annoying mother: sounding astounded 'My baby (let's call it Fred, I'd like to give it quite an ugly name for the purposes of this as I'm not to fond of said mum), woke up last night'
Me: 'Oh, does he sleep through the night?' (stupid question, should know never to ask this by now but I'm a sucker for punishment.
Annoying mother: now looking and sounding astounded 'Uh yeah, does your's not??'
Me: 'Uh no'(already feeling crap about the fact I have had broken sleep ever since my morning sickness started, pretty much 15 months and counting now)
Now this is where perhaps some sympathy or thoughfullness should come into play. But noooo...here is her response 'Oh! Fred's been sleeping through the night since he was 8 weeks old!'
Bloody hell woman, could you not keep that information to yourself?? What makes you think I want to know that!!!???? But wait...she goes on...
'Oh! I thought all babies slept through the night by now'.
'NO!' I wanted to scream at her as I looked at her calm and happy face, not a hint of dark circles under her eyes 'YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A PARENT YOU STUPID COW!'. . All I managed to squeak out was some weak indication that she should be greatful.
And she didn't stop there....
'Oh yes, well you know (sounding a wee bit know-it-all) we always kept the lights down and didn't talk to him during the night.' .......Thank You Captain Obvious!! I reeeeeaaaaaalise that's what your meant to do, do you somehow think that I have not scoured every book and internet page that tells you how to get your baby to sleep through the night??? At what point did you think that I might turn ON the lights and CHAT with my baby to get it to keep sleeping, are you insane!!!??? Of course I didn't say this, I am far to polite (AKA chicken) this was just the 'rude' me that sits in my head and is too scared to pipe up until later when I am regaling someone else with the story.
By this time I was almost considering if anyone would notice if I strangled her half way through the singing part of the session. And seriously, wouldn't it be nice sometimes if the intensely rude part of us just said what we thought? I could have been all cool calm and collected and said something like 'Oh well, no wonder your baby has such a flat head, it's from all that sleeping'. Oh my goodness, I could never say such a thing but surely it would be just a teeny bit satisfying?
So there I was feeling miserable..again...following a conversation with another mum. And, yes, believe it or not it got worse. Knowing I had recently moved another mum asked me how it went. She too moved house on the same weekend so I was half hoping this may be the start of some sort of bonding conversation that would make me feel better. I told her the move was OK but we had ended up spending most of the day at the hospital as my son had a raging fever and was completely miserable, that we had lost countless hours of sleep and hadn't manage to unpack hardly anything.
'Oh' she replied, 'We had loads of help, got it all done in a day..pictures are even hung on the walls'.
I'm sorry what!? Why do you think I want to know this? I mean honestly where do these people come from? I much prefer friends who are having a way worse time than me as you know you're always going to feel better when you talk to them. I have a couple of them on speed dial, it's good for the soul and I highly recommend it. Much better than talking to those other silly cows. At least I've realised now that I have, by far, the cutest and most wonderful baby on the planet so all those well rested and organised mum's can just jog on. And even better, I've just found out my little one may be incubating chicken pox so perhaps I can place him strategically in my regular groups to pass the suffering on. Mwaaahhaaaahaaa
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