My life is actually great, thanks

Negativity abounds these days. On the news, in the media, practically everywhere you go. It is so easy to let the negativity get to you, to make you feel like crap about yourself, about your parenting, about your kids.

Comparing ourselves to others is what we do. Try as you might, it is nearly impossible not to compare your experience in life to that of others. Take, for example, the recent trending topic of Mommy Wars. I'll give you my experience to consider.

My husband and I were blessed with a perfect little boy, our first born. He never lost weight, ate like a champ, hit all his milestones early. At 3.5years, he is often mistaken for a child a couple years older, both in looks and in his communication and motor skills. Brag, brag... I was new to the whole parenting scene with him. None of my IRL friends had kids, so I sought out a local parenting group. I wanted to know if we were normal, if I was doing a good job, if I was "succeeding".

I did not like the group, AT ALL. It was a constant brag fest, and I lost a few friendships over people lying through their teeth about how well their children were excelling. I didn't like how so many people thought they needed to augment the truth, to make their BABIES seem better. As babies, these children were already having to live up to unrealistic expectations. I stopped going to the meetups, and stuck to my online due date group, a group of women I bonded with over our pregnancies, deliveries, and following years. It was nice to have a group of women to go to, who could answer my questions on any issues, breastfeeding questions, baby poop, you name it. And, if I didn't want to participate in the race to meet milestones (milestones J was meeting anyway) I didn't have to.

We were blindsided when my pregnancy with our second child hit a rocky road. She was born 8 weeks early, presenting 4 weeks delayed on top of that. In the NICU, I started comparing her to other preemies, wondering why she wasn't orally feeding when they were, why she didn't cry, why she slept all.the.time.

We got an explanation, by way of her being diagnosed with a genetic disorder, when she was four months old.

Until then, I'd relied on my online mama group (a new one I'd joined when we first found out we were pregnant with E), but by the time we got her diagnosis, I didn't feel right bombarding them with my questions. Besides, I told myself, they couldn't possibly understand what we were going through.

I sought out a diagnosis-specific support group. It was easy to find, and populated by almost a thousand individuals. I thought I had found a haven, a group of supportive people who would hold my hand and tell me that everything was going to be alright. I expected that they were going to be as amazing as my two due date groups had been. Holy cow, was I ever wrong. My joining the group turned out to be a tremendous mistake.