Negative Nelly

Today was MOPS. In general, I enjoy MOPS. It's nice to try and broaden my horizons as far as friends go and I know the kiddo loves his time playing with the other kids, so it's a good thing. But there is something that just bugs me and it happens every. single. meeting.

The steering team and the mentor moms and even the discussion group leaders all make comments like "Thank you God for our creative children, even if some days we just want to squeeze the creative out of them." or "I love my kids because they make me appreciate the time I have to myself." or "You need to remember that your husband is more important than your kids, even if some days they all act the same." And I just want to say Really? We can't find positive ways to talk about our kids and our husbands?

I love every minute with my child. Even the hard ones. And yes, there are hard ones. There are days that Tim gets home and it's all I can do to say "Hi, love you!" before running upstairs to hide in the bathroom for five blessed minutes of peace. But even with those days, I still cherish the time I have with him and I'm grateful that he's active and independent and stubborn and probably smarter than I am. And I just am tired of the overall mindset of our MOPS group coming across as the place where you get away from being a mom for two hours as if children are some sort of penance or plague that we deal with because we must and not because they bring way more joy than frustration if we take the time to look for it.

And seriously - do little nasty comments about your husband, even if you're trying to say them in a cutesy way, help your relationship? Or shouldn't you simply focus on the positives of him, too? And yeah, there are times I get frustrated with Tim and times he's frustrated with me. We argue, then we work it out. And I never feel the need to bash him to a group of women in some kind of misguided effort to show solidarity.

It's just all so...negative. That sometimes I wonder if we aren't ending up doing more harm than good by telling women, "Hey, it's ok to feel that way, we all feel that way too" instead of saying, "Hey, ok, you feel that way, how can we help you turn your mindset around?"