I joined this sub because I'm not crunchy enough for the actual crunchy sub, but I'm too crunchy for the normal parenting subs...but I'm also just not crunchy enough for yall either lol.

Everytime I leave a comment encouraging people to listen to specialists or their docs I get down voted, everytime I encourage people to prioritize their kids futures over the present I get down voted, every time I remind people that vaccines are a good thing I get down voted. Like wtf this is supposed to be moderately crunchy. Yet some of yall are still taking it way too far.

Who cares if 1 or 2 toys have plastic in them?! Who cares if your kid needs to have something more calories dense than anything you can make home?!!

I joined this sub looking for a community of parents who get it, but this is just as bad as the regular crunchy mom groups smh.

I went to look at Charlie Bananas website today because I have some old diapers that I needed to change the elastic size on and this is the image that popped up. This is gross. I can’t believe a diaper company would have this language about babies. I know some of us in this group use cloth diapers so I just wanted to share so others could see it and be aware as well. These were my first cloth diaper purchase years ago. Now I like cotton/ more natural ones better anyways but I still use what I have.

I am probably a little more than “moderately” granola, but it seems whenever I find a seemingly like-minded person, whether that’s in real life or on social media, they ALL homeschool. It’s almost as if you can’t care about limiting toxins in your life AND opt to send your children to public school these days.

I will say I know we are privileged because we live in a good school district, and I realize not everyone does. But there seems to be a rising amount of parents who flat out refuse to send their children to any formal schooling at all, regardless of how highly it’s ranked. I know there are systemic issues within the public schools, but I dunno. Personally, my twin kindergartners LOVE school. Their teacher is great. They have so many specials (like PE, art, music, and library). They’ve made lots of friends. I volunteer for their garden club every Thursday. My husband and I are happy to support the public school district and have made large donations this year. Free, accessible education is so important and something that I feel we increasingly need to privilege check ourselves about here in the US.

I guess I just don’t understand this homeschool movement within the “crunchy” crowd. I won’t lie, all the negative rhetoric around formal schooling sometimes makes me feel badly for sending my kids, but I know they are thriving and they need the socialization and structure.

We all know that doing the granola/clean/crunchy thing is usually the more time consuming, more expensive, more labor intensive way of doing motherhood but we choose to make these choices for ourselves and for our families because we believe it is a healthier, cleaner way of living and raising kids.

I don’t know about yall but I don’t get a lot of positive reinforcement in my day to day life, mostly just people denigrating or trying to downplay my choices.

Had an unmedicated 20+ hr hospital birth? “Nobody gets a trophy for going without an epidural”

Make all of my baby’s food from scratch with no dyes and no added sugar? “They all end up eating dirt as toddlers anyway”

So I want to have a post where we get to brag a little about the things we do that we are proud of as parents that maybe other people don’t totally get

I’ll go first:

I have successfully cloth diapered my son for 10 months while solo parenting for months at a time. He has been 100% breastfed even though it was mind bogglingly difficult at the beginning.

What about you?

my in laws are really pushy about sugar since baby was 6 months and starting solids. every single time we see them, they make a comment about giving my LO a bite of the dessert we’re eating, even tho my husband and i have repeatedly made it clear we’re not giving him sugar. at one point my MIL was blatantly feeding him these loaded waffles even though my husband was telling her to stop. she even made a comment directly to baby about how he’ll like grandma better because she gives him sugar and mom and dad are “bad” (baby was 8 months). both FIL and MIL have made comments or “jokes” about giving him sugar while we’re not there, and my husband finally had to lightly say that baby would not be coming around without us if they do that.

anyways, now baby is going on 1 year and i do give him occasional sugar, like yogurt pouches, cheerios, or a bite of something i’m eating if he shows interest in it. but im still telling my in laws he’s not having any sugar until 2 years. i KNOW if i open the floodgates they’re going to load him up and i wont even be able to say no. right now i still have control over how much he consumes

same with screen time. if i need to take a 5 min shower i do sit my LO down with ms. rachel every so often, or if im cooking something like meat where my hands will be dirty for a few mins etc. they don’t know this either because i know they’ll sit him down in front of the TV while we’re not there

unfortunately, because of repeatedly pushing my boundaries with both their comments and actions i have to do this, though i feel a tiny bit guilty about it because my husband doesn’t know. i know he won’t like that im lying to his family but we also come from a culture where babies are very much everyone’s babies, so it’s way harder to get his parents to listen to us lmao

just needed to get that off of my chest 😅

I was reminded of something based off that yelling thread (fantastic idea btw lol) and I know yall will commiserate.

We took our first family vacation to the maritimes in Canada a couple weeks ago with my 18 month old and 11 year old, and while literally everything that could possibly go wrong did go wrong with our flights there and back, we had an awesome time.

Now, I know that vacation is not reality, but the things that were blowing me away were day to day stuff. We went to P.E.I. and I couldn’t find any specifically labeled organic milk. Why? Because it just IS organic, by default. Driving around you see dairy farms with these huge happy cows chomping on grass and rolling around living their best lives, and these aren’t like crunchy granola hippie permaculture farms, these are INDUSTRIAL dairy operations. But the animals are just treated correctly based on their industry standards, and not the absolute hell hole animals have to endure in the states.

All the food we ate was fresh, healthy and incredibly cheap. Strawberries at the grocery store that came from a farm a few miles away and weren’t even refrigerated were like $3 a box CANADIAN, whereas where I’m at currently, unripe bullshit strawberries imported from Mexico are like $4-5 a box, and the little boxes of strawberries at the farmers market that come from the next state over are NINE DOLLARS a box this year.

And on top of it, every single place we went had changing stations that weren’t gross or weird or awkward, even at the tiniest jankiest lobster shacks. People genuinely cared about my daughter and were very sweet when talking to her or chatting with my son, or letting us go in front of them, or chasing me down when she dropped her binky, etc.

Then. We get back to America courtesy of the Chicago O’hare airport, and of course my daughter poops the second we touch down. I’m like, nbd I’ll change her in the bathroom.

I walk into this fucking bathroom you guys, and the designated changing “area” is about a three foot long stone slab with a fucking sink taking up over one of those three feet. And people are naturally using it as a sink, so the entire “area” is soaking wet and absolutely disgusting. I couldn’t believe it. I asked a woman who worked there if there was a baby changing / nursing room, and she says she doesn’t think so, then a mom tells me there’s one near the playground area.

So cool, I lug my enormous child halfway across the airport to this playground area and come to find out it’s not a nursing / changing room, it’s an all genders / baby / disabled / family bathroom. And there’s one. And it’s occupied.

And I wait for like ten minutes until this 20 year old lookin kid walks out looking kind of guilty for using the bathroom, but who cares, I can see the end in sight.

Except I walk in there, and it’s a stone. Fucking. Slab, with a sink on the side, and it’s SOAKING WET.

I lost it. I cleaned the whole thing up as best as I could, put my daughter on it who screamed bloody murder the entire time and fought me tooth and nail, changed her, and got out of there.

When I got back to my husband and stepson I just started rage crying because I couldn’t believe how fucked up everything here is in comparison to what is the norm in Canada.

Like, our food is terrible, and I have to read every single goddamn ingredient on every single label to make sure I’m not accidentally giving my kids toxic chemicals, and if I want farmers market produce I’d have to pay probably $300 just for a few days worth of meals. I worry constantly about my kids being gunned down in our parks or parades or classrooms. I work two jobs and STILL can’t afford day care and had to go back to work for one job after two weeks and another job after four because we have no maternity care. Our education system is shit, kids are stressed out and suicidal and the vast majority can’t read at grade level or do math but there’s nothing the government seems to want to do to fix it, and then on top of it all, I couldn’t even change my baby’s diaper in a safe clean area in one of the busiest international airports in the country.

So that’s it, that’s my novel of a rant. I hate it here 🙃

(Also I know Canada has a lot of its own problems especially with its treatment toward First Nation people and immigrants and their healthcare system, but in comparison with us? It’s a fucking utopia)

I’m just so overwhelmed and want to vent but I also want to hear from other women and femmes in relationships with men where they’re rearing children…is it normal to feel this way? Do you have good partners who piss you the fuck off because of the patriarchy or is my partner just really falling short?

I feel that with all that my body went through that there should be some care and consideration given to birthing people for how tough carrying pregnancy and giving birth is. And instead of like a Nobel prize all we get is fucking treated like shit. I’m enraged. The lack of proper medical care, the being judged, criticized, seen as a second class citizen and then having to take on all the extra load (even in good relationships with well meaning male partners), deal with being objectified or discarded, not having maternity leave—it’s no wonder people have ppd/ppa and all these other issues.

My partner is a good dad but he’s not the most caring or generous. He’s ADHD and the baby of his family—I’m parentified only daughter but feel like I relate to oldest siblings most. I’m adhd too but I’ve had to overfunction for the both of us on this journey. He’s been hard to get on board with baby tasks, research, planning and carrying his fair share of the weight in many ways. He never doted on me or dawned over me in pregnancy or postpartum, I feel sad about that. He was both interested and a little overwhelmed and hesitant to have a baby. Now that we have a baby, he loves her madly. Let me be clear…he’s not a ‘deadbeat’, he’s emotionally intelligent and does ‘think like a feminist’ in theory. He acknowledges me and thanks me. He does show up in some ways. He changed all the diapers when our baby was first born (at my request, but he did it). But I still have to ask him 15 times to do things and most things related to our home or baby are planned and conceptualized by me. Its not helping that his professional situation has been a mess and that he hasn’t been very focused on or dedicated to work when I’m very busy with work. Honestly I feel so fucking bitter and like I’m not sure I can come out of it. Yes, we are in couples counseling.

With pregnancy and breastfeeding combined I feel like I am literally being sucked dry of every bit of matter left in my body after having been hit by a car. To have to argue with my partner about who should sleep in so that it’s “equal” makes me want to set things on fire. Like bro I literally got norovirus, have postpartum arthritis on top of my chronic pain, worked a full ass week in the process of weaning, got my period AND am carrying the mental loads of MOST THINGS in our home. And you’re arguing about who’s more tired? You could never. Are all men just fucking babies? Is my man a fucking baby? Is the patriarchy just getting me down or are men a bunch of losers? Should I move to a commune of women only?

Can anyone relate? I read through the comments on the recent post about homeschooling on this sub, and all the pro-homeschool points make a ton of sense. I agree with most of them (besides the alt-right, religious reasons). Mostly, I value less exposure to kids who aren’t being parented properly (ie allowed access to the internet, allowed to cuss, etc), less exposure to screens in early grades, and more one-on-one attention and catering to their interests so that they like to learn.

However, and this may get me judged here, I have a hard time with the commitment to being home with my kids all day every day. I am a mom who needs her morning coffee shop stop after school drop off, being able to clean the house in peace with a podcast or music on, and even reading a book maybe before I go and pick them up. That is something that fills my cup and refreshes me to parent for the rest of the day. I so WISH I was the homesteading mom that I see online who genuinely thrives on mothering 24/7, but I’ll admit I’m not like that!

I guess I just want to make this post as reassurance for anyone who is feeling the same way. If you homeschool I think you are a super mom! If your kids are in a traditional school environment, you are also a good mom who knows what is best for your family, but I see you if you’re like me and think you could be doing better but can’t commit to it, whether that’s because of work or reasons like mine.

This is mostly a rant that I need to get off my chest. I hope this is a safe place for it. My best friend since childhood and I have boys the same age who are, in turn, really close friends. Her son’s 7th birthday party is next weekend and it’s 7/11 themed??? She said they’re going to have Gatorade, slushie machines, candy, “all the red dye and sugar you can think of” (her words to me). I have no idea why she went with this theme. It’s so niche it almost feels like it’s to spite me because she knows how we stay away from that kind of stuff.

The icing on the cake is they’re going to be giving away that Jake Paul brand Gatorade-type drink as the party favor. Prime, I think? Her kid is obsessed with it because he’s allowed to watch YouTubers.

Not to be that parent, but ugh. What a tough age this is in friendship and parenting. I obviously don’t want my kids to miss out on their best friend’s party, and I know a little sugar and red dye won’t kill them, but this whole theme is basically everything I’m against and try to stay away from in my parenting, and she knows it. I also felt the comment she made was a bit pointed. Idk am I being crazy?

heyy sorry don’t know if this is okay to post here…

I am 4 months post partum and i have never seen anyone with my type of body post partum before and megaaa struggling to accept it. But slowly and surely i am:))

i was hoping anyone could help me figure out why my belly dips so much like is it diastatis recti or just my body now or what can i do?

And if there are no answers i hope someone sees this and feels comforted in there post partum body like i do when i see others:)

<3

EDIT-> thank you so much evryone for all the messages, they have been really helpful and lovely i will be going to a PT and making sure they properly assess me and until then will continue to be gentle with myself and soak up all the time with baby:)

I am a FTM, 5 weeks postpartum (C-section) and I can’t do it anymore, but I also don’t want to stop.

Breastfeeding didn’t work out, so I started pumping pretty early on. I became obsessed with output and worked really hard to increase my supply for my baby (though we supplement with formula because I still have a slight undersupply due to only pumping 7 times a day).

Pumping is insanely time consuming. Somehow every time I pump, the baby needs something. My husband gives almost every bottle, tends to him when he cries, etc. I’m just a human cow. I feel like I lose time that I could be spending enjoying my sweet baby. Sometimes I feel like my baby would rather be with my husband when I am holding him. I feel like the worst mom ever for just trying to feed him breast milk and like I don’t do enough or give enough of myself to my family despite pumping over 3 hrs each day.

I’m realizing I need to stop pumping for so many reasons, but I cannot get rid of some feeling of guilt or failure. I am a granola person, and always assumed I’d breastfeed for a long time but never knew how hard it would be.

We’ve been supplementing with ready to feed Similac (since that is what we used in the hospital) but I’m grossed out by the smell and the ingredients (Corn Syrup). I also feel guilty about this because this formula is definitely not granola.

Please tell me it will be ok, and that I will feel so much better when I wean. I just want to enjoy my baby, contribute more to caring for him, get my body back, and feel like myself again.

Please be kind. I find myself tapped out and yelling at my four year old it seems once a week. I’m pretty educated in child development and I *know* this is a me problem not a her problem so I need practical solutions. I feel like when I talk to friends about this they want to give me a diagnosis and a pill. “You need lexapro. Have you thought about an ADHD diagnosis?” There have got to be unmedicated moms out there who don’t yell at their kids.

No shame if you have a diagnosis and need medication, I just don’t think I fall into that category.

ETA:

Thanks to everyone who shared genuine strategies with compassion and without shame! I’m going to prioritize finding a therapist I feel I can work with and I’ve added a couple books to my to be read list. In the meantime, I hope to find some other strategies helpful. I feel such a sense of shame but I’m going to leave this up in case another parent needs help. To those who cannot imagine this struggle and seemed to want to be unkind and judgmental: I’m so glad this isn’t a challenge for you, truly. I hope that wherever you do drop the ball in your parenting, you’re able to show your kids some humility in that humans do fuck up and can repair relationships. I hope that you receive more grace than you give from behind your keyboard.

I do not want a tablet for my kids. I just don’t want to open that can of worms. We have a TV or family computer for screen time. Maybe my preferences will change someday but right now I’m really prioritizing avoiding mobile screens.

Whenever this gets brought up, some asshole is like, “Oh, well they use iPads in kindergarten now! They have to learn by then. And my kid only plays educational YouTube Shorts and Candy Crush but they put numbers on the Candy Crush candies which makes it educational! Blah blah blah.”

1. iPads are crazy easy to use. That’s why kids are so good at them. Monkeys can do it. My kiddo will figure it out when she’s exposed to it, guaranteed.

2. Oh no, my child is going to show up to school without knowledge of something? She’ll have to learn a new thing at school? How horrible! Have any children ever suffered such misfortune as having to learn new skills when at school?

I know that there are lots of skills that you need to know to be kindergarten-ready and I’m not saying that I don’t need to teach my kid dressing or potty because teachers should do it. But if my kid needs to learn how to use an educational tool, she can learn it in an educational setting. You wouldn’t buy your child a school bus because they need to learn how to navigate it for school. You’d work on a variety of other skills and let them use that tool when they need to.

That’s it that’s the post :)

Until what age did you contact nap. My daughter turns 6 months tmrw and she still takes most naps on me. If we r in the car and she falls asleep then obviously not lol but otherwise its all on me. Just curious how long others did this. She sleeps in her crib in our room at night and does great.

Our daughter is about to turn 1 in a few weeks and my husband and I decided to intentionally keep her processed sugar free for the first 2 years. This first year has honestly been a breeze and I know things will come up in year 2 but that besides the point.

Everyone in our immediate circle keeps making comments about her birthday cake. These comments range from “no one does sugar free birthday cakes” to “you are really going to give her fake cake?”. Outside of planning her birthday, the comments are never ending. We never lead with the sugar thing but somehow always comes up and there has been soooooo much judgement.

Unsure what I’m looking for other than maybe another mom in a similar boat who can provide some reassurance? I heavily researched about sugar and that’s why we decided to do it, I just feel like it isn’t that insane? Thanks in advance!

ETA: thank you everyone for such kind words 😭😭😭 i love this community of mom’s. i need y’all IRL!!!

My son is 13 months old and has been in daycare for about 2 months. I work from home and managed to keep him home that long with some help from my mom and babysitters here and there. I'm working on running the numbers to see how this would really impact our lives, but I know in my heart it's what I want. I don't really like my job, but it's super flexible, pays well, and provides health insurance for all of us (husband and 4-year-old as well). I'm in the US, so unfortunately that's a huge factor.

The daycare we picked is really good, they seem very nurturing, and he's generally happy there. I do have some concerns about how they're feeding him, as I'm pretty picky about what food comes into our house (though we try not to be too restrictive outside the house). He used to love my from scratch cooking, but he's often not hungry when he gets home because I think they sort of over-feed the kids things like graham crackers in order to keep them happy. If I had my way, he wouldn't eat anything with added sugar until at least age 2.

As far as my feelings about having him home, I do worry that I'm thinking the grass is greener on the other side, and I'll come to regret this choice when it inevitably becomes exhausting, frustrating, or boring at times. I'm also worried about the world and afraid for the future, concerned I won't get another job when I want one, and all of that. With that, none of us knows what the future holds, and my baby is only going to be little for a short time, so this is my only chance. If I could, I would just live in a commune or at least in a co-housing situation where we all take care of our kids together, but that's not my reality.

I'd love to hear if any of you have been through a similar experience and how it went for you.

My kids are 3 and 5. Ive never been away from them for more than 24 hours. I’ve been feeling pretty burnt out and dealing with some hormone stuff. My mother, sister, and 17-year-old niece are taking a week-long girls’ trip at a tropical all-inclusive. I was invited to go.

A week is too long to be away for me but I found a package for 4 days, technically 5 if you count travel.

I would leave Monday and get back Friday. My kids are in preschool and kindergarten on four of those days. My partner usually works long hours but happens to be off work right now so he’s able to care for them without it requiring a bunch of work to figure out logistics. He’s never done it solo that long before. I have and it’s hard! I haven’t asked him about this yet but I know he’ll encourage me to go.

Also my kids are both sensitive and alllll about mama, especially my 3yo and he may have a tough time.

Is it horribly selfish for me to go? Is 5 days too much with young kids?

——

EDIT: I was not expecting this to get so much attention so I wanted to give everyone a little update that I have BOOKED THE DAMN THING AND AM GOING!!!! It sounds silly but I literally don’t think I would have given myself permission to go without all of your validation and encouragement. I don’t have a lot of mom friends and am truly so touched. Thank you all. And the greatest gift of all? I feel ZERO guilt.

My greatest wish is for each and every one of you to get a well-deserved vacation someday, guilt-free 💜

hi my favorite subreddit community - i’m looking for some insight / words of encouragement etc lol. my daughter is 2.5 and up until now i’ve been SURE that i’d be one and done. but my mind and heart have opened up to having another. i had a pretty brutal birth and postpartum - i definitely have a lot more knowledge now and would do things differently the second time around as far as birth etc. was the jump from 1-2 as jarring as 0-1? obviously it comes with its owns hardships taking care of two children - but im especially scared of 1. rocking my daughters world 2. going through horrible pp again 3. childcare for two children lol. i know everything will work out and you just figure it out because you have no other choice. the age gap would be about 3.5 years. i’m not trying to be talked into it or talked out of it as my mind is made - just looking for insight and realness !!! tyia <3

I swear if I hear “what do you need me to do?” one more time…

Like sir ...use your eyeballs. The sh!t is right there. The counters are screaming. The floor is sticky. The kids are at the door every 2 seconds with something new. And I have a whole football team now (5).

And on top of the physical mess, I’ve got a whole invisible load running in my head— dentist appointments, birthday gifts, thank you cards, emotional stability, etc.

Oh, and I just had another baby. Because apparently I like side quests. 😭

Anyway, I’m not looking for advice. Just validation.

If you’re also tired, burnt out, and tired of pretending you’re fine for social media — I see you. You’re my people. 🤝

But here we are at 3:30 am watching Oliver and Company with my 13m old in the snippets of time between her puking :/ Rules go out the window when your baby is sick, man... Just venting I guess

A beginner moderately granola FTM here, trying to buy safe toys for my 7m old and just bought this toy kit from Amazon. My biggest toy concerns are microplastics, chemicals and lead.

I know Amazon isn't super trustworthy but I recently read they make all sellers test the products through third party where the labs submit the documents themselves. I also saw the country of origin was US and the product materials were wood and cotton so I genuinely thought I made a safe purchase.

When the toy arrived I saw the made in China underneath and the fabric was certainly not cotton.. probably polyester with maybe satin pieces? So what else could they have lied about, product safety was my thought. Looking up the company address it brings me to an apartment building instead of a factory which seems so sketch. Not to mention everything goes in her mouth at this point.

Does it sound like I'm overreacting or is returning the toy a safe and reasonable option? I've definitely learnt my lesson and will double check next time if I even bother with Amazon again.

I got referred to this sub, after being eaten alive(kind of lol) on r/babybumps for a post on the same topic, slightly different question though.

If you eliminated nothing, totally fine, let me know how you feel about that! If you did eliminate stuff, let me know what you did and why. For Gen health reason, I’ve so far reduce plastic in my house, I use more natural cleaning products, and I use safer room sprays. I feel like this is genuinely the best I can do for now, but wanted to speak to other people with a similar mentality.

I didn’t consider myself crunchy/granola, but maybe I am? And maybe I’ll get nicer Response here. Lol I don’t know, I’ve been to Europe multiple times in the last four years, and the ingredient comparison, and the health outcome comparisons are just difficult to ignore is all.