You can work your hardest to be a great mom and still feel like a failure.  I don’t know why this happens, but I do know you deserve to feel supported.  You deserve to be uplifted by your efforts, not the final outcome.  Because there is no final outcome.  There is joy from the few compliments you receive from others, but why are those compliments quickly forgotten?  You remember all the criticisms and they become ingrained in your brain. 

I raised a child on the autism spectrum.  I am very familiar with compliments and criticisms associated with child-rearing.  I became very good at letting the criticisms roll off my shoulder and simultaneously cussing in my head.  The voice that dares to disagree with the advice.  All the clever comebacks came to me as I walked away from the judgmental mental case.  People would say, “You would be wise…”  That’s when I got good at tuning out the rest of the remark.  I need to be what?  Stricter?  More focused?  More disciplined?  I would like to be more rude!  But I couldn’t.  I would tell people my child was on the autism spectrum and it worked…sometimes.  I was not embarrassed by my son’s behavior.  I wanted others to know why he was sitting by himself pouring sand for hours.  If my son was innocently rude to another person, it was a relief to see an understanding look once I told them he was on the spectrum.  This is how I thought of the saying, “There Is No Normal.”  This is why I have called my website, “There Is No Normal.”  Can you imagine if all mothers looked at all children as not normal?  What if we started from the assumption that each child had special needs?  And guess what?  All children do have special needs. 

My mother always said, “Poor mommies.”  My mother looked at other mothers as victims.  We are not victims, but there are times when we are treated as such.  Have you been judged as a mother?  Or by your mother?  It is painful, but remember you are doing the best you can for your child.  There are so many ways to parent.  To me, I think not having a mother to guide you while you are raising your children would be harder.  Yes, my mother told me the reason I was having difficulty getting pregnant was because I had smoked pot – I almost fell over laughing, inside.  My mother, Bernice, was just doing the best she could with the information she had gained as a parent.  My mother passed away before pot was legalized in California.  Darn…I could have made a case for my infertility being caused by my AGE!