Leave Gen Y mums alone. Yes, they’re exhausting. But they’re rewriting the mundane rules of parenting.
Move over Generation X, there’s a hip new breed of young mummies prowling the playground and they’re killing it in the parenting stakes. Like Microsoft computers, Geoffrey Edelstein’s ex-wives and Nokia mobile phones, we’ve now been superseded by a younger and more sophisticated model: the Millennial Mums.
A recent article summarised Millennials as they make their first eager strides into parenthood: they live online, their babies already have social media accounts and their toddlers wear cooler couture than most adults. Taking selfies, teaching bubs to swipe their first smartphone and sipping babycinos with their mini-BFFs is just another typical day. Matching tutus are optional.
It made me smile as I reminisced about the early years with my own babies, and I was rocking a wicked case of the warm-fuzzies until I read the comments. Rule #1 of the internet: NEVER READ THE COMMENTS.
My blissful bubble was burst by a vitriolic stream of internet bile.
Apparently, Millennial mums are vapid, shallow and narcissistic. They have the mental age of two year olds. They use their kids as accessories. They are stupid and immature. They are appearance-obsessed oversharers. And – like all good intergenerational spats – there was plenty of anguished moaning about the future of humankind, whose fate is now in the hands of selfie stick-wielding brats.