10 Mommy Words I Hate

Contemporary parenthood, if you’re a lady, is rife with all kinds of cutesy terminology that I personally cannot stand. Maybe it’s because I grew up in a house where my grandmother visibly cringed at words like “panties” but it’s getting to the point where I can’t even do my proper Mommyish reporting without drowning in the following ridiculous — and honestly infantalizing — terminology. Are we mommies or 4-year-olds ourselves?

1. “Push Present”

push present

Normally, I’m a big fan of alliteration but I just can’t with this one. I’m not quite sure whether it’s just the fact that this word is becoming synonymous with gold digging money grubbing lady stereotypes or that pushing out a human warrants shiny jewelry. Either way, I downvote this nonsense.

(photo:  younona_1307)

2. “Playdate”

playdate

When I was a kid, which honestly wasn’t THAT long ago, it was just called going over to some friend’s house. Now that the childhood staple has been upgraded to a term that implies your spawn and someone else’s kid playing tennis and bridge — or something. Unless there is a legitimate date happening here, which probably isn’t happening until your kids are at least teenagers, I have little tolerance for the image of toddlers in cashmere sweaters drinking Tom Collins.

(photo: Christian Montone)

3. “Mummy Tummy”

afterbirthtummy

Just no with this bullshit. We have enough derogatory tabloid terms for women’s bodies as it is. We do not need to add yet another cutesy, back-handed way of describing women after they give birth.

(photo:  mattyG1553)

4. “Tummy Tuck”

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If grownass women want to get LIPOSUCTION or cosmetic abdominal surgery, that’s their prerogative but can they please sound like grownass women when they get it done? LIPOSUCTION is a serious elective surgery that adults get for an array of personal reasons. “Tummy tuck” sounds like you’re 15 and throwing in an extra spa service while you’re getting your brows done.

(photo: Piotr Marcinski / Shutterstock)

5. “Hubby”

1950scouple

I’m guilty of using this one from time to time in my Mommyish tenure, usually when I’ve had too much caffeine and Eve Vawter is distracting me with awesome GIFs. Truthfully, I have no concrete reason for disliking this word other than my approximate distaste for pet names for other people’s partners. And “hubby” sounds like you two coo at one another on double dates and probably call one another “bunny” at dinner parties. But come to think of it, I’m guilty of doing that too.

(photo: clappstar)

6.  “Yummy Mummy”

yummymummy

British readers, you and I need to exchange serious words on this crap. First of all, cutesy annoying phrasing aside, the notion that there are “yummy mummys” implies that there are just “mummys,” and furthermore that those “mummys” and not “yummy,” i.e. bangable. The notion that it is flipping shocking, SHOCKING that anyone would still want to bang a woman after she’s had kids is so innately derogatory and offensive that you and I would need to spend an entire graduate thesis properly deconstructing all the layers of jacked up lady hating to do it justice.

(photo:  bambina bambina)

7. “MILF”

jennifer coolidge

I LOVE to make fun of this word. Especially when I pitch a completely tongue in cheek guide on “How To Be A MILF” and Eve is like, “CAN WE INCLUDE CAT SWEATERS?” I primarily can’t stand this word for many of the same reasons I can’t stand “yummy mummy,” but with MILF, we’re suddenly immersed in a trough of goods and services that are marketed to women in an effort to prey on their every mommy body insecurity. While I do think you can be a hot, sexually active, desirable woman who happens to have kids in just about whatever uniform you want — from lacy thongs to yoga pants — you better believe that only one passes the cultural MILF test.

(photo: WENN)

8. “DILF”

Matthew McConaughey

I appreciate the insistence here to obliterate double standards and also hold men up to the same sexualizing lense, but I’m still okay with “that hot dad.” Do we need a shorthand for this? Having said that, I love to make fun of this word too just as I do MILF. If you can say “the DILF-iest DILF around” with a completely straight face, you’re not human.

(photo: WENN)

9. “Post-Baby Body”

Kendra-Wilkinson-Post-Baby-Body

I echo one of our awesome Anonymous Moms awhile back when I say that I don’t believe in “post-baby body” constructions. It’s a game that you can’t win, mostly because the term has been steeping far too long in such BS terms like “muffin tops,” “FUPA,” “jell bell” and all that. We have bodies. They change. Usually when we have babies, but sometimes by other means too. While ladies need a vocabulary ( as well as a platform and space) to address their bodily changes after childbirth, I vote for one that isn’t packed to the brim with so much body-shaming. The sooner we stop comparing our bodies to the the way they were before, you know, WE WERE CARRYING AND GROWING A HUMAN, the better. So fuck post-baby body, pre-baby body, and everything in between.

(photo: momgrind.com)

10. “Cougar”

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You know what they call old dudes who happen to date hot young things? George Clooney, Jack Nicholson, Warren Beatty, Doug Hutchison, James Woods, Alec Baldwin, Michael Douglas, and pretty much every male actor ever. It’s just called being a man. You know what they call women who do the same thing? Demi Moore and Madonna jokes for days and LOLZ isn’t it so funny that some cute “boy toy” would want to bang this old bag? WHO IS SHE KIDDING? Here look at these pictures of lionesses. Seriously, I can’t even.

(photo: outdoorsman / Shutterstock)

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