Don’t Judge a Mother By Her Meltdown

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Review of The Mother of All Meltdowns

mother of all meltdowns

We’ve all had one.

A meltdown. It’s such a perfect term to describe not only a nuclear disaster, but what can happen to human beings when our core does not remain stable. If our cooling-off mechanisms break down, dangerous radiation, i.e., anger and perhaps profanity, can escape and contaminate the landscape.

And while I write a lot about how we should strive to maintain our composure even in the midst of life’s challenges, I’ll admit that I’ve had my share of meltdowns.

The one that immediately comes to my mind is not a mommy meltdown, but it did occur prior to the rite of passage that would eventually bring me to motherhood: my wedding. Two days before my wedding, I went total Bridezilla on a poor, unsuspecting Goodman Jeweler employee because my engagement ring had not been properly set in my wedding band, and now I would have to have my wedding ceremony conducted with an imperfect ring! Was she aware of the bad mojo this created?! Did she know she was ruining my wedding?!

It was a very un-Buddha-like moment in my life.

I’m sorry, jewelry salesperson. I acted terribly toward you. You may have judged me and concluded, on the basis of my inappropriate unloading of pent-up wedding planning stress, that I was a mean and thoughtless person. But I’m really not.

And how often, fellow humans, have we witnessed a mother’s public meltdown, and judged her? The mother yelling at her daughter at Disney World, for example, or the mom chasing someone down the street and yelling at him for telling her to put a hat on her child…

But she’s just human.

We’ve seen one little glimpse of her life, and there’s a lot more to her. We shouldn’t judge.

That, for me, is the ultimate message of The Mother of All Meltdowns.

When I first saw this book, I admit I did a little judging of my own. I know we’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, but I did. The image of that lady sticking her head in a dryer creeped me out.

Right after the book came out, I spoke with one of the contributors to the book at a blogging conference. I told her I had seen that the book had great reviews. She mentioned that the one negative reviewer complained that the book wasn’t funny enough.

“It’s not necessarily supposed to be funny,” she said.

I was a bit surprised. To me, the cover suggested it would be a humorous book about mothers losing their $h!t and freaking out. You know, “Moms Gone Wild” and then sticking their heads in clothes dryers.

But just like we can’t judge mothers {or, ahem, brides} for their meltdowns, we can’t judge books by their covers.

While I did laugh reading several of the essays, ultimately I was touched by the poignancy and honesty of this book.

Each mother’s story is real and touching. To highlight just a few…

  • Jen from My Skewed View shares her meltdown when her son smashed the glass on the dryer door {is that you, Jen, on the cover?}
  • Deb of Urban Moo Cow writes about the anger every mother has felt when she received unsolicited advice from a stranger.
  • Kristi from Finding Ninee beautifully describes her anguish over her emotional response as she came to realize her son was different from other children.
  • Rachel from The Tao of Poop relates her moment of rage when her seventeen-month-old co-sleeper decides it’s time to break out the sass and kicking at bedtime. {Rachel also provides a great list of ideas for keeping the peace between parents and little ones, based on her time as an elementary teacher!}

This book isn’t about schadenfreude, laughing at “moms on the edge of a nervous breakdown.” It’s about hearing from real moms about the real work of parenting. It’s about contextualizing the meltdowns and creating understanding. Yes, we do lose our $h!t sometimes. It’s normal, and we should talk about it.

When I shared one of my less-than-perfect parenting moments {which I wrote about here} in an online interview, a commenter accused me of being a bad mother. The last thing mothers need is more judgment. What these stories reveal is that the explosion from a mommy meltdown is often fueled by the intensity of our love for our children, our passion for wanting to ‘get it right,’ and the anxiety created by those generators. Where there is passion, there can also be rage.

I especially loved Melissa from Home on Deranged’s advice for coping with a mommy meltdown. In fact, she gave me a new parenting mantra: “embrace the crazy.” 

And that’s what I loved about this book ~ it’s about embracing the craziness of real life. The more we speak and write honestly about motherhood, the more we can share the “me, too” moments with other mothers, the moments that lead to compassion and support. And that’s what every melting-down mama needs.

So judge not. We’re all human ~ the bridezilla, the screaming mother, even the lady with her head in the dryer.

And most of all, let’s not judge ourselves. We’ve all been there.

You can read the stories from thirty amazing and loving mothers who have been there, too, in The Mother of All Meltdowns. You’ll be glad you did.

Sarah Rudell Beach
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