This advice is hard for me to say outloud because I am one of the worst people with this topic. This one idea is applicable in almost every situation that one comes across, and you will almost never be in the wrong for remembering to do this. Ready? Mind your own business. That's it. It sounds so simple, right? Trust me, as a self-proclaimed busy body - it's not.
I am a gossip. I don't like celebrities at all (partially because I don't understand why most of them are famous), but I am quick to gossip about a lot of other people/subjects. It's not 100% bad but it definitely is almost always 100% destructive. Even if you start out with the best of intentions to not beat someone down with gossip, it's like your brain gets total control and you end up going crazy.
I was reminded of this again tonight while watching the most recent video of one of my favorite YouTube mommy vloggers (dreamflight6000). She is the mother of two cute little boys and the eldest has been diagnosed within the last year with Type 1 diabetes. She shares a lot of details about their struggle as a family with his diagnosis, and some of his day to day operations with it, which I appreciate even though I don't have it and I don't know anyone else who does. She is very informative and she is an awesome teacher. They had a scare this week with her child's medicine, and had to end up calling 911 for an ambulance to come to their house for her little boy. It was very scary for everyone and traumatizing for both Amy and her family. In her video she mentioned that she did not want to explain what happened because she gets a lot of hate comments on her diabetes videos normally and doesn't want to make that any worse, which I totally respect. When she said that, it just broke my heart, because she is dealing with this diagnosis as well as can be expected and works hard everyday to ensure life is good for both of her boys. Who are these people to post hate on her videos? Who are these other people to presume to know anything about his medical condition and give potentially deadly advice re: different medicines that they should try or different alternative diets that they should put him on to "cure" diabetes? Can't we just give support and butt out? Why is it that, as a society, we have to project our thoughts and opinions on other people who are just wanting to tell us their story? Can't we just mind our own business? It makes me embarassed as a person who watches her videos on behalf of these people who can not just watch and leave positive comments...
Thinking futher about this though made me remember and realize that, while I am not guilty of projecting any negativity and hate towards Amy and her son that I do "hate" on whole groups of people for random reasons. Never racial or anything like that, but I will detail one of those below:
Parents who don't ERF (extended rear face) their children in car seats. Let me start by saying that I don't say anything to anyone's face re: this subject unless approached by the person to talk about our situation. I don't chase parents around in the parking lot of stores with brochures showing decapitated children or anything like that, but I do say things outloud in my car anytime I see a small child foward-facing in a car. I don't care how many times I hear that someone's kid screams bloody murder in the backseat, or how their child was too tall to sit rear facing, it is still PROVEN safer for children to sit rear facing as long as their sit still fits them for weight and height than to be turned around. It's not uncomfortable for your children to sit like that past one year no matter how tall they are. Now, I understand that every parent has the right to make decisions for their own child and that there are people out there who turned their child around at (insert inappropriately small number of months) and their child was fine, but seriously, why is this like a badge of honor? Leave them turned rear facing. Your child doesn't know what they are missing. Why would you want to take your child's safety for granted? My children are 28 months and 13 months and they will remain rear facing until they outgrow their seats. We have a Sunshine Kids Radian XTSL in grey and a Diono XTSL in grey camoflauge.
I feel justified by talking about these parents because it's better for their children, but when I start to think about it, I am no better than those people hating on Amy and her family. They probably feel that they have her son's best interest at heart but in reality are just as annoying as I probably am about the ERF topic. I can't vow to alter my way of thinking because I will never change that, but I can resolve to stop being so negative about parents that choose differently than I do. I am making an effort to be better. I can't promise anything but an attempt, but I will definitely work on it.
-Sara
