Don’t Stop Inviting Moms

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I am back in the bleary blurry days of early babyhood. My second baby is 4 months old. He’s a milk monster. I spend a lot of time scrolling the internet in the middle of the night.

Recently, in my scrolling social media, I read between the lines and deduced one friend was planning a party for another friend. And I knew nothing about it.

Just when I thought breastfeeding at 3 am couldn’t feel more lonely.

This is an old, familiar feeling. I certainly felt excluded from time to time before I became a parent. But since…well, it feels different.

The difference is that now I suspect I am not invited as a result of other people making choices for me. They assume because of my family commitments, I won’t be able to come. And so they don’t extend the invite. 

I have a three-year-old and a baby and a professional career. My husband had surgery recently that laid him up. It put more even strain and family responsibility on me. My life, like all moms’ lives, is totally hectic and often feels like I’m holding it together with chewing gum and fishing line. And it’s totally possible I will not be able to make it happen. But I still want to be invited.

Don’t make the decision for a mom.

Or anyone. Everyone likes to be invited to things. The guiding principle for me in planning our wedding. For example, I was making choices that would allow us to invite everyone we felt like we should invite. They couldn’t and didn’t all come, of course. But I wanted to be sure they were invited. That was my vision for my wedding day, not a certain color scheme or type of flower, but the inclusion of all my people.

So, invite me. Maybe I won’t be able to swing it, but I’ll sure try to. And if I can, I’ll be ecstatic to overpay for some cocktails. I’ll be over the moon to talk and laugh with smart, funny women all night. I’ll probably have to pump at some point, but then I’ll be right back out there so happy to celebrate and to just be me again for an evening.