You grew up together, were in each other’s weddings, and dreamed about the day that you would raise your children in unison. Then, BOOM. Kids arrive, and it doesn’t take long to realize that, whoa, you and your best friend have very different approaches to this parenting gig.
The odds of her letting her babies “cry it out” are about as high as me co-sleeping with mine, and by that I mean not a chance. That’s not the only thing that makes us very different in terms of parenting. I enforce strict bedtimes, while her kids are catching a 7 p.m. movie at the theater. My little ones eat most meals from a box or the freezer, and hers have palates more developed than most adults.
We're both teachers. She cries when August rolls around at the thought of leaving her kids to go back to work. Me? I’m itching for “me time” and aching for conversation with someone above the age of five.
Sure, we’re both trying our best to raise happy, respectful, and kind children, but when I’m faced with a grumpy four-year-old whose mood rivals a teenager, I choose to send her to her room for quiet time. My best friend tickles the grouchies away.
She has endless patience while I’m nearing the end of my fraying rope by noon.
I’ll never forget one day when my daughter was having an epic tantrum, and I said to my friend, exasperated, “Ugh, sometimes I just want to scream ‘Shut the f*ck up!’”
Her response was one of shock, her eyes wide with horror. “Jennifer!” she said, appalled.
“Of course I would never actually say that,” I quickly clarified. “But c’mon, you mean to tell me you’ve never thought that before?”
“Never!” she replied.
Then we chuckled about how different our mindsets are.
That’s the thing – it’s not a secret that we're raising our kids using opposing methodologies. We know that about each other and we respect that about each other. Here’s the key: there’s no judging.
My friend’s children are being raised with religion in the household – praying at meals and before bed, talking about God, and falling on faith to help explain many of the mysteries of the human experience. My husband and I rest pretty low on the spirituality ladder and while we have no problem explaining religious beliefs to our kids, we have no plan to incorporate religion into our family.
“Johnny included you in his bedtime prayer last night,” she recently told me.
“Aww, tell him thanks,” I said, “and I love him.”
We don’t hide things from each other or pretend to be similar in ways that we’re clearly not. With such different approaches to most aspects of parenting, you’d think that it would be difficult to be friends, but the opposite is true. Honesty, empathy, and support go far in maintaining a lasting friendship.
In a culture that likes to pit moms against each other simply because of differing choices, our story proves that it doesn’t have to be that way.
Many of our conversations start with: “I know you think I’m crazy, but…” Sometimes when one of us (usually me) needs to vent about an issue with our child, the other one just listens and does her best to offer advice even if it’s not something that we would do personally.
In the end, it comes down to this: there's no right way to be a mom. No one hands out gold star stickers to the moms who are doing things “this” way, rather than “that” way.
So, is it possible to be best friends with a mom who has polar opposite parenting styles as me? The answer is yes. She may be the June Cleaver to my Rosanne Barr, but what can I say? It just works.
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