One day you’ll be out with a friend, or hanging with your Hubby, or visiting Gramma and Grampa and it’ll hit you.  You’ll be playing with your little one, or trying to feed them, or trying to comfort them.  You’ll try everything to get them to smile, to laugh, to play, to sleep.  Everything you do is to no avail.  Or maybe they are responding, but they almost seem bored with you.  Then it’ll hit you.  All of a sudden someone else (friend, Gramma, Daddy) strolls in and suddenly Mama no longer exists.  Mama is not the funny one anymore.  Mama can’t find the right trick to get you to eat, or sleep, or laugh.  But  this Not-Mama person can.  It hits you. Mama Envy.

I don’t know what it is that makes us Mama’s think that we should be the only ones that know how to comfort our babies, or play just the way they like, or act silly enough to make them laugh at you every time.  It’s almost comical how I think that I should be the only one sometimes.  And true, sometimes I am the right ingredient for making J happy…usually it has something to do with boobies.  And as much as you love how close your baby is to all the other important people in your life, it’ll still hit you right between the eyes.  Mama’s want to be the best for their little ones.

Each time Mama Envy hits me I have to force myself to not run up to J and tear him away from whomever is holding him so that I can be the one making him smile.  Hold me back! Mama Envy is coming through!  *breath* OK, let’s just relax now huh?

I do love that J has so many people that love him and care for him and that he is so open to the comforts and play from other people as well.  I have tried really hard as a new Mama to make sure that J isn’t afraid of new people, that he interacts with as many people as possible.  So it’s ironic that letting someone else comfort him hits a bit of a nerve.

Now there are a few different types of Mama Envy, but in my experience most of it has to do with your (temporary) lack of ability to comfort or provide for your own child.  This can be the simplest thing like your kid throwing a tantrum in the store while little miss Perfect Mama walks by you with her two perfectly well behaved children.  Or it can be the Mama in the grocery store who’s cart is full of FRESH fruit and veggies…while you look into your own cart and see canned goods and ice cream and potato chips galore…Or  maybe you’re just having one of those moments where you don’t have enough time that day to just sit and snuggle your little one, and so they graciously accept some snuggles from someone else.

Mama Envy.  I have to hope that these pangs of envy only push us to be better Mama’s to our little ones ❤