Why mums need less judgement and more ‘maverickness’!

Isn’t it time we stopped judging each other? And instead celebrate the weird, wonderful and maverick ways we are all brilliant mums!

Working mum vs stay-at-home-mum. Breastfeeding vs bottle feeding. Baby-led weaning vs purees. Mollycoddling vs tough love. There are so many different ways to raise a child and be a mum. And somehow, all of them seem to come with judgement if you make the ‘wrong’ choice.

In fact, we think there’s a bit too much judgment about being a mum in general. Too much certainty that, unless you parent just like me, then you’re wrong. And not just wrong, you’re potentially damaging your child.

You don’t have to look far to find media articles and blogs fuelling the divide, and pitching one ‘tribe’ of mums against the other. Just look at this selection of articles (warning, reading them may raise your blood pressure!):

And who can forget the media gift of the late Peaches Geldof fighting the attachment parenting corner against Katie Hopkins on live TV?

Let’s stop judging and start celebrating

Wouldn’t the world be a much better place for us all (and our children) if we stopped judging each other so much? Because we’re all trying to do the same thing – raise happy, healthy children and stay sane. We just happen to make different choices along the way. And that’s fine.

Surely we all have enough to contend with in battling a lack of sleep, toddler/teenage tantrums (and every age in-between), reduced career opportunities and a ravaged post-baby body, without turning on each other too?

Imagine if, instead of judging each other, we accepted that being a mum can be hard (as well as gloriously amazing) and celebrated the many creative ways we are all doing our imperfect best to get through these years in one piece.

Maverick Mum celebrates every way we parent

That’s one of the reasons why we loved notonthehighstreet.com’s 2016 Mother’s Day campaign #MaverickMum. Maverick Mum celebrates all the weird and wonderful ways mothers do it ‘their way’.

The campaign eschews the idea of a cookie cutter mum, and instead encourages mums to just be themselves. It’s motherhood without the filters; the veil of acceptability we all try to draw over our choices and actions in fear of judgement from others.

Maverick Mum proudly owns the ways we all cope with motherhood in all our beautiful, maverick ways and says goodbye to judgement for good.

Celebrate your maverickness

So stop berating yourself because your home isn’t perfectly tidy or you haven’t cooked a 12 course gourmet meal for your kids, and instead congratulate yourself on just being the best mum you can be – a Maverick Mum, if you like. Whatever type of mum that is.

This article was sponsored by notonthehighstreet.com but all opinions are our own!