Screen time is not the problem. You are.

how parenting has become a series of one-uppings & a reminder that we possess the power to redefine it.

I don’t know why I feel like I’m the only one who can see it sometimes. The only one who’s standing at the doorstep of a burnt building - the steel frame still in tact, with metal, and mesh, and vinyl melting down the side. Just standing there. One hand, dropping the champagne flutes I dug out of my top cupboard - now cracked, and just as worthless as they ever were. The other, barely clutching a housewarming basket full of fruits no one would have liked - spilling, tumbling all over the pavement. I shouldn’t have even brought the damn basket. I’m the one who’s new here. Everyone should be giving me fruits.

I came to this doorstep wanting camaraderie. I came here ready to celebrate with those who’ve gone before me. But that’s not what I got. Instead, I’m in equal parts awe and disgust, peering in at what they call the village of motherhood. Moms - shaming other moms for their choices to feel better about their own, while parading as “communities.” Creating the very division they detest, left and right, over how they choose to parent or how they might define themselves as one. I’m not just talking about the division of disagreement, but downright public shame being cast from all angles for things that really just do.not.matter.

I keep seeing this recur around one topic in particular. Like a resilient weed breaking through the crack in my sidewalk. It’s people, and pages, and posts, and people sharing the sentiments of other people and THEIR posts, that parents who let their kids have screen time are just the worst thing since unsliced bread - practically pure evil. Absolute scum of the earth. Real monsters. Okay - maybe that’s a tad embellished, but that’s exactly how these posts are meant to make you feel as a parent. They’re labeled as: inept, incapable, less-than, ruining their children’s lives and eyes and health and sleep and social skills, and that they need to stop allowing it.

I’m not here to debate the pros & cons of screen time - I’m sure there’s something to be said for both sides. But I’ll tell you what I’ll stop - giving your message a swift virtual stomp every time it passes MY SCREEN - which was delivered to me through the very thing you claim to loathe, as soon as you start minding your own business. Or more politely - as soon as you stop judging, start empathizing, and realize there’s no singular, correct way to parent, and that one element of someone’s parenting doth not an entire parent make.

If you can’t tell - I’m a screen mom. Not in a radical way. You wont find me on the corner yelling: I screen, you screen, we all scream for more screens! But I support it, and I also know I’m not alone. This might come as a shock - but we’re really not that bad, or different. In fact, I don’t know if you knew this, but we’re moms, just like you. We care about our children, just like you. We don’t want to fight and we don’t want to be right, we just want to be - to raise our children and maybe not catch so much crap for it.

And here’s the thing - the problem that’s absolutely running rampant isn’t whether or not we agree on screen time. It’s parents suddenly becoming card-carrying members of the high-horse equestrian society, turning their noses up to any parenting style that doesn’t align with their own.

Work choices. Care choices. Lifestyle. Everything in between. And I’m not sure if it’s the lack of “instruction manual” or missing “infrastructure” surrounding parenting that makes us poorly form our own “performance rating system” to gauge how well we’re doing through the lens of ruthless comparison, or if we just have a bunch of immature mean girls who (debatably) grew up and are now in charge of tiny humans, but we all need to do better.

What we need to realize is that every one of us is doing the best we can for our kids, ourselves, and our families. We all have limitations, challenges, and preferences unique to our lives and our parenting - some on full display, and others you’ll never be privy to. I understand wanting to relate more closely to people in your exact situation, but we don’t do that through tearing everyone else down. We do that through connection, sharing, and building a relationship based on our ideas, experiences - our hopes & dreams.

Every day, we hold the power to repaint the picture of motherhood - parenthood, even. So, the next time someone shows up at the doorstep looking for connection, be the one to greet them with open arms, not the one to slam it in their face. And to adopt & adapt a very popular adage - “be the parent you wish to see in the world.”

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