Yesterday, I was having a conversation with my colleagues. Sadly, one of them has a very ill dog, that is going to cost thousands of dollars in vet bills, or maybe has to be put down.
The lady in question was commenting how she’d called her adult son to tell him, who loved the dog most of all, and how the adult son was close to tears on the phone.
She then went on to say how much it hurt a mom to hear her kids cry. And how she worried about her kids all the time. And then she looked directly in my eyes and said, “You wouldn’t get it because you’re not a mom.”
I blinked in surprise, and then responded, gently, “Of course I understand that a mom’s heart breaks every time their kids cry. I don’t need to have kids to understand that.”
To her credit, she apologized, genuinely. But really, what was the point of interspersing that comment? This isn’t the first time parents have abruptly up and told me I wouldn’t get something because I’m not a mom. Ok, I don’t feel the pain of my children crying like you do…but I am certainly not heartless or evil because I don’t have children, and I know you have pain, and I can empathize with it. Must you be rude to boot?
With this lady, I just attributed it to her distress over the doggie and I let it go…I’m not really offended, it’s just weird and a little annoying.
Maybe I’m being too generous, but I don’t think the intention is to imply that you’re evil or heartless – merely that you might not be able to understand because you haven’t shared the experience. Of course this ignores the fact that any halfway-decent human being can empathise with someone else even if they haven’t been in that exact situation, plus it’s a rather cack-handed and clumsy sort of comment to begin with…but I think most parents like that are being a trifle thoughtless rather than malicious.
It grates on me when there’s a news story about the death of a child and people feel the need to say ‘as a parent’ they find it upsetting. You mean if you you weren’t a parent you’d think it was just dandy?. Many parents (not all by any means) like to imply that they have special insight or are uniquely empathetic as a result of their parenthood. In my experience, these are typically among the least insightful and most self-absorbed individuals you are likely to meet.
I actually think that those kind of statements are a sign of insecurity on the parent’s part. Some part of them might wonder how their life would have turned out without kids and so they reinforce the “righteousness” of their decision.
Nah. Insecurity - yes, but more of an insecurity that they look soft and an easy cry. They catch themselves and try to explain that they are a softie because they are a parent.
It’s nothing personal Anaamika - just something said in a moment of insecurity or weakness.
I’m gonna disagree a bit. Before I became a parent, I understood a lot of stuff about being a parent intellectually. What changed when I became a parent was the direct experience of those emotions. It’s not that they were more powerful, more genuine, more important, better than other emotions I’ve had; but the parental love of my children felt like a new of emotion, qualitatively different from any I’d felt before.
I’ve never been in combat. When soldiers discuss that experience, they probably share a visceral understanding of it that will forever exclude me. I’ve never had a parent die. Until I do, folks discussing the death of a parent will share a bond with each other but not with me. My friends who have had a child die know in their hearts that I know only in my brain.
It’s a bit rude to tell someone that to their face; it comes across like saying they’ve got a personality defect. But it’s a legitimate difference to discuss.
As with anything in life, we don’t really know what it’s like to experience things unless we go through them ourselves. I just had to put down a pet in June, I didn’t know how extremely gut wrenching is is to watch a pet’s life slip away until I saw it happen to my pet. I don’t know what it’s like to lose a parent, I can only try to imagine. When a friend talks about a parent’s death, I can sympathize but not empathize.
I didn’t know before I had kids, the feeling of the powerful maternal instinct I would feel that would enable myself to, as they say, step in front of a speeding train to save my child if necessary. I could no longer watch news items about young children being injured or dying without feeling so sad for the parents. Honestly, I didn’t feel that way before I had children. It’s so scary to think of something bad happening to your child. The unconditional love I feel for my children is not what I feel for my husband, parents or siblings.
Now, my peers are becoming grandparents and they tell me how they love their grandchildren as much as their own children, and how they worry more about the grand-kids than their own children, because they have no control over their lives after the visits end and the car pulls out of the driveway. It’s amazing and hard to imagine that I will love a grandchild as much as my own child!
Yeah. I can’t feel it like you do. I don’t expect you think I should. But don’t tell me I don’t get it, either. I can empathize with you enough to understand it’s a tear in your heart.
I work in a not for profit and every single day I deal with moms and dads who have lost their babies. I will never, ever know that gut-wrenching pain. Do not presume to tell me that I don’t get that it is gut-wrenching pain.
People who are parents existed, before the kids, as people who were not parents. They know the extreme change that happened to themselves, and are here telling you that it is a real, genuine and extreme change. A change that they couldn’t have anticipated before having those kids. A change that I thought I understood before I had kids, but didn’t.
I would never say it to another person like that though.
But her comment wasn’t “You don’t feel it, because you are not a mom.” Of course I don’t feel it. I have no children. Her comment was “You don’t get it.” There was NO reason on earth to make that comment or even think it, frankly. I do get it. How could I not get it? I am not a heartless bitch.
I don’t think I’m going to convince you, because it’s probably impossible (not specifically to you!) to understand. The best I can do is to say that every single person with kids once didn’t have kids. So, we know what we felt then, and we know what we feel now. I really could not have remotely anticipated the difference in feelings.
I have cried maybe three times in my life for emotional reasons before kids. Dad’s death when I was at teenager, first breakup, can’t even think of a third off hand. After kids, I have a hard time even thinking about the scenes in Toy Story where the mom realizes that her kid is growing up without tearing up. I would never have anticipated that change, though I thought that I knew what it would be like.
On edit: Maybe I’m different, and maybe I just couldn’t anticipate. Maybe you can. I accept that.
I could kinda understand her saying that if you were dismissing her trouble or worry, or giving her advice she didn’t think was relevant. But from what you said in your OP it sounds like her saying that came out of nowhere.
Regardless of your own personal experience of parenthood, you have no idea what another person thinks or feels. Perhaps if, on becoming a parent, a person suddenly experiences greater concern for the wellbeing of children it is because they were previously deficient in this regard. Presuming to tell another person that you feel a particular set of emotions more keenly than they do isn’t just rude, it’s baseless and egotistical.
I was deeply sympathizing with the doggy issue. The dog is a young one, and the cost of the surgery is exorbitant. And my heart wrenched to think of this poor family losing their beloved doggy. I wasn’t saying anything or giving any advice, just nodding and listening. And in the middle - wham! I can’t possibly understand her because I am not a parent.
It would have made my sympathies dry up…but like I said, I just put it down to her distress over the doggy. It’s not the first time she’s made insensitive comments but some people just have less filter.
You intellectually understand and empathize with it, and it’s that ability that let’s us all relate to each other, but for many things you need the experience to understand the visceral reaction it can bring on.
Her words were obviously not meant to wound and your reply graceful, I’d just let it go.
Only thing I could guess was she felt like she was being over the top in her grief, so then she thought that you were probably judging her for being too much in her grief (even though you weren’t, you were completely sympathetic and not judging), and so she said you couldn’t understand. Some people can feel weird about grieving or being too emotional in public, and can try to cover for it in weird ways. Probably good to put it down to her distress over the poor dog.
