‘You are a disgusting mother. You shouldn’t have had children. Egoist’
My last column reached 2 million people on social media. Nearly 3,000 people responded. I received kind words, but also an unprecedented amount of negative reactions.
In my column I tell you that I work full-time and sometimes also ask for a babysitter at the weekend, to be able to do something with friends, family or with my husband. It turns out a lot of tongues, it turns out.
In my inbox I read hundreds of messages: ‘You are a disgusting mother. You shouldn’t have had children. Egoist’
It goes on. ‘Then why do you have children? Your children don’t know you. You don’t know your own children. How sad for your kids to grow up like this. What a strange mother. Terrible human being. Better leave them with the nanny. What do you say to yourself. Better if you don’t have a third child. To puke you are’.
It is very easy to say: stand above this. These people, who react like this, don’t know me personally, they don’t know my children, and they don’t know my life. Yet it hurts. Precisely because I am honest in my columns and share important things from my private life, this criticism hits hard. This is criticism of me personally, of how I am doing as a mother. And is there anything more vulnerable than motherhood?
Everyone can have their own opinion. Everyone can do it in their own way, being a mother. I hope every mother stands behind her own choices when it comes to working and scheduling time for yourself. The fact that I work full-time and also sometimes have a full social agenda on weekends is my biggest insecurity. Finding that balance. Especially since Bodi and Daaf turned 3 years old, I’m excited. They are only a few months ‘small’. Then they go to school. It wakes me up.
I shared this uncertainty with others – millions of people. When you read such comments in your private inbox, you automatically start to doubt yourself. Am I making the right choices? Are Bodi and Daaf happy enough? Are they happy enough with mom? Girlfriends say: don’t care about these kinds of comments. Let those people in that online world who know everything better from behind their anonymous screens, but bullshit. But that’s not how criticism works. That’s going to be in your head. It makes me cry. I’ve had a stomachache for days. And worst of all, I’m going to believe their words. That I am indeed selfish. And that I am especially not a good mother because I don’t have my children with me enough.
I have been writing columns for major magazines about my life as a twin mother for four years. But for the first time I don’t feel like writing anymore. For the first time I don’t want to share anything about my children, my vulnerability, my insecurity. I hope we will support each other more as mothers, even though we all make our own choices.
Tessa Heinhuis (32) is mother of Bodi and Daaf, 3 year old twins. She is editor-in-chief of mamamagazine.nl and online manager of Kek Mama.
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