A few months ago I hit the blogging jackpot when I wrote a post that went viral. If you are like every other person in the world who I’ve discussed this with, your eyes went a little glassy just now. The conversation usually goes something like, “Hey! How’s it going with the old blog?”
“Great! I had a post go viral a while back!”
Then… the curtains come down. At that point most people change the subject because they have no idea what I’m talking about. A few will have the courage to ask what that means, praying I can sum it up in fifteen seconds or less because really no one cares.
I could give them the short answer: I had lots and lots of people visit my blog.
Or I could give them the long answer: It fundamentally changed who I am as a person.
So I tell them to get comfortable because this is gonna take a while. They glance around for an escape. There is none. I put their head in my lap and stroke their hair as I begin the story.
Prior to my blog post going viral the only people who read or bothered to leave a comment were my sister and a man named Shirley.
I’ve always thought of writing a blog as trying to start a fire with two sticks. For five years I spent countless hours whittling and whittling and whittling. Every few months I might see some smoke. Once or twice I’ve seen a spark.
Then, out of nowhere, last January I got a flame. As I stepped back to warm my hands somebody ran in and threw a gas can on it. I looked up and the tree above me was on fire, quickly spreading to adjoining branches until the whole forest was in an out of control blaze. I got scared and threw a half of a glass of water on it. Fully illuminated, I suddenly realized everyone was looking at me. And I was naked. And in desperate need of a bikini wax.
In less than 24 hours my viral post had been ‘liked’ on Facebook over 30,000 times, I had 250,000 page views and counting. A few days later, just as things started to die down, it was syndicated by a website that has over 750K Facebook fans. Somehow, the scorched Earth and foliage re-ignited and became an even bigger out-of-control blaze than before.
I had finally achieved what every blogger prays for. Attention. And total devastation.
For the most part, people enjoyed the post and left positive feedback.
This was perfection. I can completely relate to the mom stuff, so funny and so TRUE. I’ve decided that I love you and you are now my best friend. That’s not weird at all. Pretty-please send me some of your beard hairs and maybe some finger nail clippings. (< okay, so that part was a little weird)
-Jenn R.
This is OUT OF THIS FREAKING WORLD. I was laughing my ass off at certain points of this. It’s so spot on. I love everything about it. You’re amazing and hilarious. I think having a great sense of humor about mothering and being a stay-at-home mom is such a gift. Your girls wills be better for it and you will be such a source for them to tap into if they choose the same career path. This is the best thing I have read in a long time. I can’t imagine how hard I would laughed if I actually heard these words coming out of your mouth.
-Amanda Q.
Some people did not enjoy the post, and did not hesitate to voice their opinions, both on my blog and on a slew of message boards where it had been shared.
“I want to knock her in her medicated nose!”
-Jessica H.
“… I understand it’s meant to sound funny, but it sounds like you have no idea how to discipline your children or communicate with your husband. Maybe staying at home, you’ll have time to work on these areas before your kids grow up to be selfish ungrateful entitled adults and your husband leaves you for your bad attitude and alcohol addiction.”
-Lazar
Trust her. With 8,448 posts on Pandace Pro Boards and a bottle of Stoli Vanil as her profile pic, she is the undisputed expert.
And, finally, just one of the many, many, MANY stay-at-home moms who swore they had no idea what I was talking about…
“… I love every second of being home with (my daughter) and neither (my husband) or I experience anything near the frustration and resentment the author is joking about.”
-Pigtailsandpenafores, thebump.com message board
I was actually sort of curious about what my little friend Pigtailsandpenafores was up to these days, and decided to look her back up on The Bump message boards to email her for some advice on how one might go about loving every second of anything. I mean, burritos are my most favorite thing in the whole world, but even as I’m eating one there’s at least one second I don’t love it. Like, I might start to feel full or maybe there’s not the proper mix of sour cream and beans in my mouth. I found her and saw her most recent post from August 1:
“I totally used the TV to entertain (my daughter) today. She has been sick for two days and won’t let me put her down. Any time I try to set her down, she starts wailing ‘mama’ over and over in her sad little sick voice, with tears and snot running everywhere. Needless to say, after two days and nights of having her permanently attached to me, I really needed to do some dishes and make some food. Cartoons miraculously kept her happy, so I set her in front of the TV so that I could get a few things done.”
Well, crappers, girl! I really had some hope there but now I just feel silly about burdening you with my silly little question.
You would think by this time in my life I would be used to judgment. I drive a mini van, for crying out loud.
At first, I told myself that anyone who didn’t get my humor didn’t matter; I shouldn’t care what they think. But strangers were breathing life into thoughts I had been trying to suffocate for 38 years. I’m a bad writer. Not smart. Not funny. Not a good Mom. Don’t appreciate my blessings. Alcoholic. Blah blah blah.
I was actually impressed by the lengths people went to make sure I felt like crap. One woman posted over 10 comments about how much I suck using different names and email addresses. I was about to jump off my roof until I noticed the IP addresses were all the same.
Between us girls, the truth is that none of the negative comments really surprised me. I do a really really good job of tearing myself to pieces in my own head. Not one thing that was written was something that I haven’t already thought to myself. Except the one that wanted to punch me in the face. I’ve never really wanted to punch myself in the face. But everything else.
“Why would anyone put themselves out there?” I asked myself. Why did I ever make myself a willing target of criticism? Not just normal criticism, but criticizing what I hold most precious. My parenting ability, my kids, my husband, my chardonnay. The ding on my phone alerting me that I had another comment was synonymous with my stomach digesting a Chinese throwing star.
So as a well-seasoned professional, and responsible 37-year-old Mother of three, my knee jerk reaction was completely strategic and rational – burn everything and head for the hills. It would have been easy since I have spent my life running away and hiding from things I’m scared of. Snakes, mostly, but lots of other things.
Then I thought about what the world would look like if everyone cut and run at the first sign of criticism. Abraham Lincoln was one of the greatest people to ever live, and he had tons of people who hated him. Did that stop him? Well, technically yes. But not before he did many things that took a lot of courage.
I grounded myself from the internet for 24 hours and conjured up the same pep talk my Mom had with me when I was 17 and she totally botched my Ogilvy home perm. Hold your head high and pretend like it doesn’t bother you. They only make fun of you because they’re jealous of your natural beauty. Here – rub this burn salve through your hair – the top layer of your scalp is starting to blister.
I read countless motivational passages:
Nothing ventured nothing gained!
Oh yes, the past can hurt. But you can either run from it or learn from it.
Thou shall not kill
Life is littered with opportunities to be brave. Some we choose and some choose us. Locker rooms. Walking up to a podium in a room filled with people. Nurses wheeling you back for a DNC. Hitting the publish button.
Putting yourself out there, signing your name and slapping on a head shot took balls before, but now I knew it would take extra large scary swollen hairy balls knowing how quickly and easily it was to find yourself in the middle of a shit storm.
But after the bravery comes strength.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that there are two kinds of people in the world: the safe and boring, and the selfish ungrateful entitled adults whose husband leaves them for their bad attitude and alcohol addiction.
Taste the rainbow.
Hannah,
Thanks again for the laughs. I think there are so many people out there who are not happy with anything in their lives except for making other people unhappy. I’m glad you didn’t “burn everything and run for the hills.” By the way, I’ve had so many botched perms. The latest was my first year teaching when I was 27. Why the hell I got a perm when I was 27, I don’t know. (I think I wanted to look like Meg Ryan) My 7th graders were equally confused and let me know how horrible it was.
Holly 🙂
Girl,
You know how much I love you. You are up there in Blogger Royalty for me. Can I landscape your yard or something??
Taste the rainbow, indeed. You ARE the rainbow. Keep that permed head up high.
It is sad to say that we thought we left behind the bullies and back stabbers when we left high school. Looks like the world is full of cattiness.
Don’t let the ones who criticize you in a loud voice stop you from hearing from the hundreds who LOVE YOU. You make us laugh and feel like as moms, we are all in this together.
I know it probably doesn’t help much, but I love you and your writing. I totally get your sense of humor and even though I’m not a stay-at-home mom, I can only imagine that if I were, I would feel like you do – especially with 3 little ones! I only have one and he drives me crazy when we spend an entire day together. But Lord knows the second he goes to bed I miss his annoying, cute little self. 🙂 As hard as it is, don’t let the haters get you down! You are very funny and I guarantee there are more moms who relate to you than who don’t. Without humor, parenting wouldn’t be as survivable. I seriously laugh at you harder than I laugh at almost any blogger! And I secretly hope that since I live and work in the St. Louis area (our home is on the IL side of the Mississippi) I will run into you sometime when I’m out and about and we will become best friends. Because I also share a deep love for Taco Bell (when I was 11 I told my mom I wanted to work there when I got older – high aspirations, I tell ya!) and drinking wine. Please don’t give up doing what you love because you really ARE good at it! I’m not a blogger but I read a lot of them, so that makes me kind of an expert, I think. ~ Hugs!~
Is it okay that my takeaway from this post is that I badly want to meet Lazar? Sounds fun and insightful.
I actually thought that might have been Nick.
Love this post, usually it is the humor I love so much about your posts, but this one is totally about your honesty! I wonder if any of those haters have ever read your posts to your girls on their birthdays….doubtful! I hate reading those negative comments. Ladies, shouldn’t we be supporting other women, not tearing each other down?
A HUGE fan! Keep it up H Bomb Mom!
KSDK posted a fun pic on their facebook page a while back and some Debbie-downer type made a comment that said something along the lines of it not being news and there are starving children in Africa. KSDK’s response was “You must be a lot of fun to hang out with.”
Perfection. I think that every time I see one of those comments now. Don’t let the haters get you down to their level.
Love this. SO very much.
That’s hilarious. And a thought that often went through my head as I read some of these comments. Like, I was so curious about what these people do for fun?
I ❤️your blog! Reminds me of when my 3 girls were small and we were living in St. Louis I’m sure I was living a life very similar to yours. Now mine are 15, 12 and 7 and we live in OKC after a stint in Overland Park. Which blog went viral?
Ahhhhh you used my comment!! I am so glad you saw it and that it helped lift you up instead of push you down. I have been on pretty intense Brené Brown kick and in her lecture from The Power of Vulnerability, she discusses what a true epidemic “mommy-bashing” is. She said “You can’t claim to care about the welfare of children if you’re shaming other parents for the choices they’re making”. I thought that was incredibly profound. It’s hard not to let other peoples opinions and judgements hurt you but you dared to put yourself out there, to be vulnerable and to be seen and that my dear takes guts that a lot of people don’t have. I am proud of you and I hear you and I think your honesty and humor is a gift to your readers and more importantly, a gift to your children.
Brené also has another great quote that applies perfectly to this post.
“Don’t try to win over the haters; you are not a jackass whisperer.”
xoxo
I’ve literally spent entire days reading your archives. You are hilarious, talented and its obvious how much you love your children. Because of you and your blog there are a hellofalotta moms out there who feel normal and not alone. Even mom’s who are on the other side of the small person faze (Like my mom for example) gets a huge kick out of blog posts I send her because they remember being there.
I’m glad you didn’t cut and run.
Hannah, I’m shocked, SHOCKED, that someone who named their blog after poop would give a damn about the opinions of new moms with sticks up their butts. They. Don’t. Know. Yet. Just revel in the knowledge that some day, very soon, they’ll be in your shoes…perhaps with an exploded diaper and an empty pack of wipes.
Keep at it kiddo. I’m on the other side–both kids are in school. They DID, in fact, learn how to wipe their butts. OK, so the issues change. Right now, my biggest parenting issue is trying to convince my teen that showers are a good thing (my god, the stench!) or just letting him be a stinky pizza face in hope that no girl will discover that he’s actually a handsome young man and take him away.
Dear Hannah,
I’ve been reading you for a long time, girlfriend. Those d-bag trolls would bother me, too … but I actually know someone who regularly comments in a high-and-mighty manner and guess what? Turns out she’s a frustrated fiction-writing wannabe and she’s jealous of anyone’s success. Doesn’t matter who they are. She’s constantly rolling her damn eyes about them. Feel sorry for these losers!
Like I’ve said before, you remind me of Allie Brosh without the cartoons. I actually thank the good Lord you don’t have cartoons with all of the burritos and various bodily fluids in your posts.
Keep up the good work!
Kristin
I see a lot of myself in your blog so I guess we are both
doomed!
Wow, well said!!! I have a 3 old boy and a 1 year girl and just want you to know it makes my day when I see you have a new post. So tired of moms acting like they have it all together. You are absolutely hysterical and put a much needed humorous spin on such a hard job! Screw safe and boring!!!!!
Keep that chin up. None of us are perfect, and no one who reads your post can accuse you of thinking you are either. Like I said before, you say what almost everyone thinks. Sure, not everything you joke about or say is what I would, but I love you for who you are and I don’t even know you. Not sure you’d ever want to pal around with me as I fit the boring and safe description, but I sure love your posts and enjoy seeing those happy smiling faces of those sweet angels you are raising. Keep up the good work and God bless!
Des
Hi Hannah,
Obviously I was lucky enough to hear this first hand at The Nest. I could write a small novel about how and why I just deeply and profoundly “GET” this post. The Nest was the journey down the “Putting yourself out there” rabbit hole for me – one I am still recovering from. I was, and am still, in complete and utter shock for how torturous and awful women can be towards one another – it sickens me.
The saddest part was how much I let the haters run the hamster wheel in my head that I too was all of those things (Enter in: NOT ENOUGH) – Here I was trying to build a safe place where women would support one another. It did not end up that way in the end….and its a loss for both me and for what it could have been for other women. I needed it, I still need it, it breaks my heart that women can’t see how desperately we ALL need posts and laughter and to make fun of the world that is at times so painful (Can you say planes falling from the sky, Ebola, Palestine vs. Israel) that the only way through it is to connect to someone that makes you feel for a moment that YOU ARE NOT ALONE. Thats what opening yourself up and sharing is all about. Your talk, and your post makes me feel that. Bravo my brave friend. Bravo.
In the end there is a long list of haters that clinked their wine glasses while singing ding dong the witch is dead the minute the Nest failed – but I choose instead to focus on the hundreds of tears people shed when coming to say goodbye. For what it is worth I say fuck it. And fuck them. I guarantee not a one of them are brave enough to do it themselves. Xo
Holy crap – you guys are amazing. Also, I feel like I need add some sort of disclaimer that I totes wasn’t fishing for praise or compliments when I posted this. No, I was actually looking to form some sort of angry mob complete with torches and pitchforks that travels house to house of everyone who left a negative comment. Everyone rally at my house at 5:30?
Hey, I’ll be there with my handy dandy pitch fork if you promise to serve burritos afterwards.
Ugh…there are some miserable witches out there. I cannot believe someone actually went to the effort of posting multiple times from different email addresses – clearly not someone with kids because we all know how much time you have to spare once you have kids!!
You are completely hysterical and I wish I could meet you in real life. My one complaint is that you don’t post enough because your writing is so funny I would like a new one to read every day. But I’m guessing I need to refer back to my point at the end of the previous paragraph for why you’re not doing that!
Keep doing what you’re doing. Oh and let us all know if you ever decide to do a stand-up comedy tour 🙂
Helen
It has been my experience that absolutely no one who is enjoyable or has anything substantial to contribute in real life leaves shitty internet comments. It is always enormous turds, wallowing in their own shitty shitness, or in complete denial of their shitty shitness with a serious Regina George complex. The most together, responsible, on-top-of-life moms I know would never in their life drink enough of their own koolaid to say they love every second of staying home with their kids. No matter how sparkly their precious snowflakes are.
You’re a shining star. Fuck those motherfuckers.
My sister sent me an article you wrote, ehh, about 8 months ago. Sometime before I had my second child. I fell in love with it and remember laughing so hard I cried and peed a little….hey I was 8 months pregnant! Sometimes it’s hard to hold it in! I’ve been reading your stuff ever since because I need to. I need to know I’m not the only one having rough days and that there is humor in the ridiculous things that can actually occur in the same day or the same hour! Sometimes I need to just laugh. And to be honest, sometimes I just need to know things in my house really aren’t quite as bad as I think because your day seemed way worse than mine! Thank you for your blog and screw those other people!
You my dear, are a froot loop in a world of Cheerios. You know what they say, those that can, do. Those that can’t, criticize. Screw them and their opinions of how you should live your life….the world would be a boring place if we were all the same Stepford Wife people they apparently strive to be. Your posts make me laugh every time they come through and couldn’t be more honest and hysterical and the well deserved snorting laugh I needed at that moment.
I know you weren’t finishing for compliments – but one more here anyway!! Me and three friends got the viral, and all became regular followers, “wasting” hours on reading the archives!!!! We all work full time outside the home, but so much of what you write resonates so well anyway! I’ll tell you, with three kids (youngest 6 weeks old) and all vaginal births, I’ve got some serious stress incontinence issues, and your posts certainly “stressed the incontinence”… 🙂 (I know you’ll pardon the TMI!). You’re hilarious, please keep on writing lots!!! Misery loves company, especially during maternity leave 😉
I love the internet for many reasons; however, I find that it allows people to be unusually cruel and hurtful without a second thought. So someone doesn’t like what they read. I don’t see any reason to go on a rampage and then go after the individual personally with words. If they had to say it to your face I think the delivery would be a lot different or many would back down and not say anything. Women can be especially cruel for reasons I don’t understand. Everyone parents differently. You just have the ability to put it in to words and make some people laugh. You have three kids and stay at home with them and yet you still find time to write a coherent piece of work. I think that’s an accomplishment. Keep it up! Haters gonna hate.
I have to confess…..I am also the man named Shirley…….
I read your blog aloud to my husband in bed at night. That’s how much I love it.
I was one of those people who came across your blog in January. I have loved it since then. I went back and read all the stories (I promise I’m not a stoker :-)). Your writing is hilarious! I have never experienced what you are going through, I only have one baby and I work full time, so I don’t really deal with the baby 24/7, but this is very entertaining.
Don’t listen to the haters, you are amazing. And kudos for the courage to put your life out there. And thank you for the hints (i.e. how to remove Vaseline from hair). Please post more! I check your website almost every day to see if there is something new.
Oh, and as a side note, I googled ‘best mom blogs’ and came across a recent top 10. I checked most of them. Nothing compared to yours.
Bam! Nice ending. I also found you through the viral post but I’ve been reading you ever since and have been enjoying. Keep em coming.
Hannah-I truly believe you are a comic-mom-genius! I was one of those people back in January that saw your viral post and went on to send it to every human being that I knew. You were speaking for me! Finally, I had something to show my husband that proved I was not sitting home all day doing nothing. I have been reading you ever since and I recommend you when ever I hear another mom lamenting about how parenthood isn’t easy. So, I will gladly beat up any of your naysayers…
This is great. In fact, I enjoyed every second of it!
Hannah,
I stumbled upon a St. Louis kid attractions site that had a post written by you, loved your freakin’ humor (Are we sisters?? I’ve always wanted to be told I was adopted…and I’m from MO, so….maybe???), and I clicked on the link to skidmarks. Congratulations, now we’re BFFs! I salute you for this post, to put yourself out there time and time again, to feel the need to retreat but instead FIRE back some shit at shitty people, you go girl!! It always takes more effort to NOT support fellow mothers, to NOT admit our own faults, and to have NO empathy for those who are brave enough to share their ups and downs with the world at the click of a button. Screw ’em, and screw ’em good. Good work on the extent to which you checked into some of these “do-good-ers” and their awful posts.
Keep sharing, and I’ll keep reading! AND LAUGHING!!