It’s sad to say but mom shaming is pretty much an American — and maybe even international — pastime. Women have been chastised for everything from breastfeeding to eating a salad. If you’ve been paying attention, you’ll likely have noticed that the criticism is often unwarranted, unnecessary, and unhelpful. Still, the hits keep on coming.
One mom living in Berlin found that her habit of traveling alone, without her children, and partying has made her the target of ridicule. Thankfully, she shared that she’s unfazed.
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When Hamilton moved to Berlin, she noticed something different about the culture.
In a recent essay for Insider, Leah Hamilton shared that she, her husband, and their two children moved to Berlin in 2017. At the time, her son was 10 months old and her daughter was 2. Hamilton immediately noticed that clubbing was a huge part of European culture, and both she and her husband decided they wanted to partake.
“We began to explore the club scene and made friends with a number of other young parents who did the same thing,” Hamilton wrote. During the same time, Hamilton’s husband realized that there was a lot to explore. The family started taking vacations both with and without their children.
Although traveling without children is common in Berlin and other parts of Europe, Hamilton found that Americans were surprised by her new habits.
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People question if Hamilton's priorities are straight.
That’s when the mom shaming began. When Hamilton would share her solo travels on social media or on other online forums, her posts were met with questions. "Who was home with the kids while she was partying?" "Was her husband ok with her leaving him home alone with the kids?"
Others got right to it and asked Hamilton if her priorities were in the right order.
Hamilton was shocked. “I am married to a man who is a very present father to our children,” she wrote in her essay. “When I go out, he looks after the kids, and vice versa. If both of us go out, we obviously get a babysitter.” It was a simple answer, and one Hamilton’s husband has never been asked to provide.
Hamilton refused to lose herself once she became a mother.
In retrospect, Hamilton realizes maybe she shouldn’t have been so shocked. “There’s still a gender imbalance around the role that mothers are expected to play and how women are perceived once we become mothers, with all other aspects of our identity subsumed by motherhood,” she explained.
Even though many women find themselves lost in the role and taking on a majority of the labor at home, Hamilton said from the beginning, she refused to let that happen to her.
'Mothers having hobbies and interests is a positive thing for their children,' Hamilton wrote.
“Having fun in all manner of ways is part of how we find joy in life and live as well-rounded people, regardless of whether or not we are parents,” she wrote in her essay.
“There's also evidence that mothers having hobbies and interests is a positive thing for their children. The children of working mothers do just as well as the children of stay-at-home parents, and research shows that ‘maternal life satisfaction leads to decreases in behavioral problems and increases in cognitive performance of young children.’”
A woman who goes out and enjoys life shows her children that women are more than just caretakers to the people they love.
Ultimately, Hamilton said a mother who goes out and has fun every once in a while benefits the whole household. The children see a mom who is more likely to be happy and fulfilled when she comes home because she spent time pouring into herself. Furthermore, it sets a good example that women are more than just wives and mothers. They are people with their own identities, separate from the people they love.
Hamilton ended the essay with this note: “Mom-shaming women for doing things without their children misses half of the picture: It's not just good for mothers to go out dancing occasionally, it's good for their children, too.”
We couldn’t agree more.
