My life is perfect...oooorrr not

Confession: I have a love/hate relationship with Facebook status’.

“My husband is so wonderful! He just surprised me with this huge bouquet of flowers! Just ‘cause! I am soooo blessed”

Because what I read was “SUCK IT! My husband is better than yours! NA Na Na boo boo!”

“Baby girl just took a 3 hour nap, while I deep cleaned the house and baked! So blessed!”

What I read was “MY KID IS SUPERIOR!! And oh yeah! I baked bread from scratch and combed the carpet with a hairbrush so that all the weft was lying in the same direction, while I wore my family heirloom pearls. God is soooo good…SUCK IT”

And when I read many of those all too familiar status updates, I have to try really hard (like really really hard) to not compare my husband to that when he comes home, empty handed, wondering what is for dinner or when Colton is the cranky spawn of Satan for no reason or when after a frazzled day at work I pull out a frozen pizza, make a call for some take out, or just drive through McDonalds. I have to remind myself that no, I didn’t get the “short end of the stick” not all Facebook status’ are in fact what they claim to be. And believe me, I am sure we are ALL offenders. I know I have posted many a status or instagram pic or something that unintentionally hurts someone else. Most likely any post about being pregnant or how tough I find my pregnancy, is like salt in a wound to a friend who may struggle to conceive, who may wish they were pregnant and who may think “would she quit her complaining?” Or a post about a night out with friends might be difficult to someone without family around to ease the load and give them a night out and chance to relax. And my personal “ouchie” a stay at home momma saying what a blessing it is to stay home, might be particularly disheartening to a working momma, like myself. I know I am not alone in this. I know many others have to bite their tongue, grin and bear it, turn the other cheek, or even block people that seem to be more popular offenders. So when does it go from a simple and innocent “blessing post” to a “brag post”? How do you know if you are a repeat offender or not? Good question! I have no idea!! But I will say it is helpful to ask. Ask close friends, or family, take notice of the comments or “likes” on the status. Be sensitive about events in your friends lives. Get a blog ;) do all your bragging and bitchin’ on that platform (like muah). And please please please don’t end your status with “So thankful” or “So blessed” (and if you do, do it in a crazy hashtag, cause everything is funnier as a hashtag!). Because we know! Believe me, we know that you are thankful and blessed! It’s just that sadly 9 times out of 10 it comes off as “Christian Bragging” under the guise of being “thankful” or “blessed”. And all people think when they read it, instead of cheering along, is “here they go again…must be nice…my life blows”. And really, who wants that??!! And what about those “friends” you have that are clearly repeat offenders and you walk the fine line between loving them and hating their posts? Well my passive aggressive nature keeps me from confrontation, so a suggestion passed along to me by my sister, is to remove them from my feed. That way they can keep on truckin’ and doing their thang on Facebook and I can keep my annoyance, irritation or general snarkiness in check.

And I will leave you with a personal example: My pregnancy instagram pictures. One could think just by looking at my weekly photos that I always dress up, or look nice or have had a glowing pregnancy. One could think that by my photos my pregnancy is A-mah-zing. When in reality, that is oh so false! What you didnt see were the early on bump pics because I had my face in the toilet hurling most of my food into it, which made me look pale and awful. Or the 10 pictures prior to the one i posted because I looked weird, or silly or giant. What you dont see are that I make sure and post on a day when I am forced to dress up and have time to do my makeup (like Sunday mornings before church). What I purposefully don’t post are pictures of me in my typical pregnancy uniform : makeup off, no bra, sweatpants, bags under my eyes, hair all busted, and a giant tshirt. If you happen to catch me on a Saturday, that’s usually how I look! What I don’t post are the pictures after I have had a melt down with swollen eyes and red nose from being too tired, overwhelmed, or just “so over this”. Why not, you ask? Probably because nothing is more raw and intimate than putting yourself out there…the good, but especially the bad and the ugly. But really it is because, I want to be able to look back in a year and see myself looking nice rather than hotmess-ish. And as a result I’m sure it comes off differently than intended. And so today I attempted to rectify some of that by posting a very real, very pregnant, very ugly picture of myself on Facebook and Instagram with a 60lb weight gain in labor with Colton. The last thing I want is people to think I “always look good in pregnancy” when if it wasn’t for Alfie forcing me into “real pants” (often) I’d probably always leave the house in sweats! You think im kidding?!

So lets make an effort to be real, folks! To post the bad with the good, the frazzled with the calm, cool and collected and the crazy moments with the normal ones. Because I for one will breathe a sigh of relief knowing that I am not the only one who doesn’t have “the perfect life” J