Image credit: blakeemrys

An anonymous reader recently informed me, via email, that I’m a bad mom.

She said: “You say you are a mommy blogger, but you never write about your kids. Other mommy bloggers write about their kids and show them off. You write as if you’re single. It’s hard to believe you have kids at all. Do you ever think about them or is your pretty head so filled with fashion and other stupid thoughts that you don’t even notice your children?”

Um. OK let me see. Where do I start?

Hate mail is interesting. It is bursting with negativity and raw emotion. It always takes me by surprise to see that people can have such a strong emotional reaction to someone they’ve never met. When I received my first hate mail, I was crushed. I had a very hard time accepting that someone could feel so much HATE towards me without even knowing me.

This email? It wasn’t exactly a pleasant read, but this is just ridiculous.

Of course I love my children.

But MomGrind is MY little corner of the internet. It is my escape. Being a mom is the hardest, most rewarding work I have ever done. I am doing it very well and am having lots of fun with it (when I’m not pulling my hair out in frustration), but being a mom does tend to be draining and all-consuming. Children have a way of making themselves your first priority, and you can’t help but put yourself second. This is a very good thing, because children’s survival depends on them being our first priority.

But sometimes you want to be reminded that you are a person too. That even though you are now responsible for the well being and survival of these little human beings, even though they are the most important thing in your life, you can still have a conversation that is NOT centered on kids. You can still have thoughts and ideas and opinions that touch on issues other than parenting.

MomGrind fulfills that need for me.

Even if I wanted to write about my children here, I wouldn’t be very good at it. Being a parent and loving your children does not necessarily translate into writing well about your love. I completely related when Denise Tanton of Flamingo House Happenings wrote, a few months ago, ” I don’t do mommy blogging very well because I’m not the sentimental sort.”

Take Her Bad Mother, for example. I could never write like Catherine does. Other parents that blog really well about family issues are Dooce (duh), Shannon of Rocks In My Dryer, and Sean of Writer Dad.

These bloggers write about family life in a way that makes it interesting to read. Their posts make you laugh, and cry, and completely identify with what they are saying. If I were to write about my family life, I would bore you all to death.

I happen to know and admire many other parents who choose to focus their blog on their business or on other issues, writing about their kids only occasionally, if at all. This does not make them lesser parents. It just means that their blog is a business, or an outlet for something other than parenting.

A few who come to mind are Leo Babauta of Zen Habits, Darren Rowse of ProBlogger, Cath Lawson, Kelly of She-Power, MizFit, Kim Woodbridge, and if I forgot to include you please forgive me, it is almost midnight and I am tired after a full day of parenting and working.

Have you ever received hate mail? How did you handle it?