I, Jackie, have never been one to pull any punches. I rarely hold my tongue. I, essentially, do not have a filter between my brain and my mouth, and I am about to make it rain with the realness.
There are very few things in the world that offend me. You can say just about anything about anything, and I will not be upset. I may ask a few questions, make a weird face, and tell you why I think you're wrong, but I almost never take it personally or worry about it more than 5 minutes after it happens. But, sweet readers, something has happened to me a few times over the passed few weeks that's really bothering me, and if I can't talk with you about it, I don't know who I should talk to.
It's been hot in New York. This kind of hot...
I have basically wanted to peel my skin off and lay in front of our window unit air conditioner. I want to set the a/c at 60 degrees, but I also don't want to have to sell all of our possessions to afford the electric bill. You're picking up with I'm putting down, I'm sure.
Anyway, I was taking the Bird out to the pediatrician on Wednesday. It was pretty hot, but definitely not over 90 degrees, and the humidity was pretty thick, but definitely not as bad as it has been. There was a pollen alert for Kings county, but not an air quality action alert. I know all of this because I checked the weather on my phone before I got Bird ready to leave the house. I dressed her in this...
a sleeveless, one shoulder, paper thin romper. I dropped her into the ergo, with her cute little legs sticking out, slapped a light pink polka dot sunhat on her noggin, and headed out the door. We were both a little sweaty - mostly from being so snuggly up against each other - but no more than on a normal day. There was a breeze as we walked the 3 blocks to the subway station, and headed underground. The train came quickly, it was a chilly air conditioned car, and our sweat all but disappeared. We played a quick game of peek-a-boo, went through a rousing chorus of bunny foo foo, which is Bird's favorite song, switched trains... everything going smoothly.
We exited the air conditioned train into a muggy station, and Bird was still all smiles despite the ick factor. She was smiling at people walking by us and generally being lovely - like she does. We got up the subway stairs, and that left me panting and sweating, but only because I'm still grossly out of shape from being too broken post-delivery to exercise.
I digress.
I get about four steps away from the station when I felt someone staring at us. I turned my head and peeked out of the side of my large sunglasses, and there was, in fact, an older woman staring at us. I sort of nodded toward her and smiled, mostly because Little Bird was grinning like an idiot at her. I figured she was charmed by her, as everyone usually is, but nooooooooo. Oh how naive I was, my dear readers. Oh how simple I was being...
This woman, whoever she was, came up to me, touched my arm (which is not something I'm okay with) and said, "You know, it really is far too hot for that baby out here today. It's really irresponsible to have her out of doors. I don't understand what could possibly be going through your head. What kind of mother are you?"
I was gobsmacked. Struck entirely dumb. This almost never happens to me... A witty retort is usually flying out of my mouth before I can control it, and it almost always includes a four letter word. In fact, other times that I've been told that baby shouldn't be outside (for example, twice when I was walking my dogs for approximately 7 minutes outside, on my street, on a hot day, and once when I was taking Bird to a breastfeeding support group shortly after she was born (it happened to be snowing)... because I needed help learning to FEED HER!) I have thanked the woman (it's always a woman) for her unsolicited advice, turned on my heel and walked away, one time shouting back and forth with a particularly aggressive advice giver.
This time, however, I was struck stupid. Everything was exacerbated by Little Bird pushing out her lower lip, pouting, and then starting a screamfest. (Sensing the change in my energy, perhaps?) The woman looked at me like I was burning her with a branding iron, like she wanted to pull out her cell phone and call CPS to have her taken from me on the spot. I stood there, mouth agape, until my brain caught up with the situation. It took me a minute to gather my thoughts and I said, "Well, we are on the way to the pediatrician, and they didn't call me to cancel our appointment because it's just too hot to be outside with a baby for a five minute walk from the train. And if they didn't call to cancel all of their appointments for today, because it's just far too unsafe for babies, then it must be just fine. Unless you are a doctor, which I assume you're not. Thank you for your unsolicited advice."
I may have called her a bitch. The world may never know.
I was steamed, ya'll. Totally angry. I forgot about it for awhile while we were in the office, and then we did some fun stuff at school with B afterward, but as I was laying in bed that night, I just kept replaying it over and over in my head.
Why do people, almost exclusively women who are not toting children around, feel the need to give mothers advice that we really don't need? What goes on in their minds that says, "Hey, I'm going to bother that girl, who has a 12 pound sack of humanity strapped to her front, and tell her what she's doing wrong! Maybe I'll even make her doubt her ability to be a good mother! I think this is a great idea!!!"
It's really not.
I am super sensitive to the heat, I am practically translucent and I burn in about 6 seconds without sunscreen on. I am always conscious of Little Bird's skin, because it's just as light and sensitive as mine. She also gets cranky when she's really hot, so I know that we need to be out and back in fast. We can't stop our lives completely, hide in our apartments, and never go outside with the baby just because it might be hot, or too cold, or raining, or windy. The entire exchange with that woman took longer than the walk to the doctor's office from the subway. She effectively doubled our sun exposure by stopping us. And I, tough gal that I am, wanted to crawl into a hole and die.
How is it that strangers can make us feel like subpar parents? I don't even know this woman. For all I know she's never even a held a baby in her life. I know what I was doing was totally right - I had the appropriate sun gear on, we were both hydrated, I stuck to the shady sides of the street... everything was going great, until someone who has never met us makes a choice to say a hurtful thing to a vulnerable stranger.
I am still trying to figure out why her words affected me so much. I'm sensitive, I always have been, despite my tough exterior, so I might take things harder than the average overworked, underslept mom. Who knows?
Has anyone ever given you unsolicited advice? Has anyone ever really hurt you with their opinion? How did you handle it, what would you have said, and did it change anything about your choices? Do people expect us to hide inside and never get "normal" things done - like head to the post office/bank/doctor - just because we happen to have baby with us? I'm of the mind that lives don't stop when babies join us. We have to have balance! We have to feel free to just go outside - even for a walk! We can't be chained to our couches... it's not good for our mental health, and it's certainly not good for baby.
And for the record, Bird's doctors appointment was excellent. She's healthy and perfect as ever!
