5 Ways Bad Moms Shows Us We’re Good Mums
Lessons we can learn from these wild mums
By Alex Harmon
August 11 2016
You might think that the new Hollywood hit, Bad Moms, glorifies mums going wild, neglecting their kids, and drinking vodka on a school night, but to be honest, these women are anything but bad.
The film is a hilarious satire of motherhood that loudly and proudly shows us parents that we’re much happier when we stop striving to be the perfect mum. She doesn’t exist. Even if you think she does. Bad Moms is a film that says, you can have your store bought cake and unashamedly eat it too.
Here are five lessons I learnt from these “bad moms”:
1. It’s okay to leave your kids with the babysitter
Especially to go and have a long lunch with your girlfriends. Like stay-at-home mum of four Kiki (Kristen Bell), sometimes just getting out of the house to socialize with other adults without being vomited on can be good for your overall wellbeing. Spending time with your girlfriends once in a while is good for the soul. Whether that involves pouring chocolate milk all over yourself is entirely up to you.
2. It’s okay to show up to the bake sale with store bought donuts
Do all mums really have the time to create a four foot high croque-en-bouche for the gluten-free, egg-free, nut-free bake sale? At the end of the day, this event is about raising money for the school and you can still do that with your supermarket baked donuts. (Thanks for that lesson, hot dad from the film.)
3. It’s okay to admit your kid isn’t a genius
One of the film’s funniest scenes is when the mums open up and get real about their kids. So your kid still watches Sesame Street (“and doesn’t get it”), so what? The most important thing is that you love him. And these bad moms have nothing but love for their kids.
4. It’s okay to miss a sporting event
You may feel like you need to be there every week in the rain to watch your kid kick a ball around a field but if you miss one or two games it’s not going to mean you don’t support your little Ronaldo. Carla (Kathryn Hahn), the film’s hilarious single mum says she’d rather go to Afghanistan than attend one of her son’s long baseball games. While this is a bit extreme, it can make us mums who bemoan those weekend events feel a little better about praying for a rain every now and then.
5. It’s okay to break the rules
Blow off the afternoon to go to the movies, have a pamper day with your daughter, don’t wear seatbelts in your husband’s muscle car (please don’t do that…) there are some occasions when it’s okay to bend the rules. As long as no one gets hurt and you’re not breaking any laws. Yes, we’re supposed to be good role models but that shouldn’t always come at the cost of our happiness.
The bottom line, as Amy (Mila Kunis) says, "It's okay to be a bad mom!" So go forth and have fun. And see this film – it’s freaking funny.
