Our Adequacies

I know this has been brought up a million times but I wonder why us moms can be unkind to each other sometimes. Someone recently made a comment to me about my child that served only to remind me of one of their inadequacies which I was already well aware of. It bothered me because I already know it is an issue and I don't need a friend of mine to make me feel bad by being reminded of it. The problem was that I was feeling a bit sensitive at the time and the comment struck me the wrong way. It isn't as if the advice of this mother is coming from a mother whose children are perfectly adequate in all ways. Why must mother's compare their children with each others' and inadvertently, or purposefully put each other down? It seems to start when the children become toddlers and start gaining usable skills like drinking out of a cup, walking and talking, and then of course potty training. But yet, when the child is an infant, and sits like a lump, you'd think that my lump is equal to your lump and there is no comparison and discussion. But even so, we take our stands on breastfeeding, working or staying home and mess with eachother's heads with these factors in raising our lumps.
I realized when Gabriella was a colicky infant and I was catapulted into motherhood with no training and no clue, that it is hard. And no matter what each mother deals with - a difficult baby, a sick baby, a difficult family life, poor support system, unfavorable financial situation, working or isolated- whatever the situation is, when you have a child, it is hard. And since I learned this, and many others should have too, shouldn't we all support each other and give each other the benefit of the doubt? I guess because it is so hard that we need to constantly boost ourselves so we feel good about what we are doing. And we shouldn't do this at another's expense. We should give the mother the benefit of the doubt because we don't know what they are going through. And God bless the mother's whose children have special needs, deformities or disabilities. That just adds so much onto the already hard job we have.
My son developed a hemangioma on his forehead days after he was born. This was a small window into the thought process that could result from a deformity like this. A hemangioma can develop into something rather large and defacing as well as impairing. Fortunately, Marco's did not, it stayed long enough for me to realize how fortunate every inch of unscathed flesh is on my children. And it stayed long enough for me to field questions from strangers and friends about it, and maybe spread the awareness  and realization of all of their blessings. People tried to make this scar a positive by telling me it was a kiss from God, or they called it a raspberry. I don't go for that kind of stuff. It's a collection of blood vessels in the skin. God kissed mine and yours and all of theirs, and I don't think He wears lipstick or gives them a hickey. It is what it is and because it arose on the magical forehead on my remarkable child, I loved it. I read about it and I left it alone. And as it was described, it grew until it peaked in size, and before my eyes began to vanish. I guess no mom wants a child who is impaired. Life is easier when you function properly and life is easy when you are beautiful. But there is so much inside that means much more than that. And I am not trying to sound cheesy but after you get up there in age you see a lot of unfortunate things and sad people and if you are strong inside, and content with a life where suffering is inevitable, you are pretty darn adequate. If you can smile through strife, you may as well be the equivalent of a 18 month old walking with their open drinking cup, rockin' big girl panties and talking about your feelings with your big girl words.