Life isn’t always full of adventures and fun. And life with a baby isn’t always full of joy and sweetness. Sometimes it sucks. And nothing sucks more than being semi-naked in a Sports Direct changing room with Godzilla-baby and a devastatingly helpful shop assistant.

Having a baby can make you vulnerable. Vulnerable to feeling overwhelmed, physically and mentally. Vulnerable to striving to be a perfect parent. Vulnerable to the guilt when you can’t achieve it.

And most especially, vulnerable to judgement from everyone else. After all, the parents are always to blame. And with some judgemental older women, the mother bears the brunt of their bile. I’m not suggesting that all older women are judgemental – far from it. I’ve received a lot of love, support and wisdom from many older ladies. But, sadly, when I’ve been on the receiving end of upsetting, judgy comments, they have almost always been made by people in this demographic. I will call these people Judgementals. Because it sounds more scientific than calling them Arseholes.

Judgementals stab you with unsolicited advice and non-constructive criticism like a hornet’s sting. And I experience it as a violation. Someone trying to intrude into the sacred mother/baby relationship where they don’t belong. But I internalise them so they lurk at the back of my mind like a demented operatic choir, singing out put-downs when I’m having a bad day.

I wasn’t having a bad day today. I was having a very good day. I was wearing clothes that had been ironed, I’d had breakfast with my friend and was heading to My Mall in Limassol to buy a swimsuit. I drove through the blues and golds of the beautiful Cyprus countryside, a bubble of happiness in my chest. How lucky I am to live here.

I parked at My Mall and put Herc in the buggy, bracing myself for his fury. He’s not keen on the buggy (Judgemental Operatic Choir in A Sharp: BECAUSE YOU CARRY HIM TOO MUCH!!!). But today I needed to try things on, so the buggy it was (JOC: SELFISH!) My bubble of happiness swelled as I saw Herc sitting happily in the buggy, playing with a toy. With my shit fully together, we flowed through My Mall, had a relaxed nappy-change and headed to Sports Direct on the top floor.

Where everything went spectacularly wrong.

It seems that Sports Direct in My Mall has been designed with one thing in mind – to torture parents.

Its chaotic, labyrinthine aisles, almost too narrow to take a buggy down without dragging half the aisle with you. Rails of garish clothes soaring so high overhead that even an Olympic pole vaulter would struggle to reach them. It is claustrophobic, maddening and utterly impossible NOT to lose your children in.

I wandered around, trying to find the swimwear section. Herc was starting to ‘register his disapproval’ as we call it. In other words, I didn’t have long.

Swimsuits located, I looked for my size. Except it was all in European sizes and I had to figure out what a size 12 was. They only had size 10 – my prenatal size. I looked up at the row of swimsuits five miles above my head, tantalising me with the possibility that there might be a size 12 hidden in their lofty heights.

Herc started to grumble. Bugger it. Swimsuits stretch, don’t they?

I grabbed the size 10 and headed off in search of the changing room. Five hours later, I found it and dived into the end cubicle, leaving the curtain open so Herc could see me. He was now complaining more loudly. I hastily tried the swimsuit on. It just about fitted if I folded the two loose rolls of skin on my back (one per child) into the suit after pulling the straps on. But the straps felt tight enough to cut off the blood circulation to my arms. Perhaps I’d find an Olympic pole vaulter to search the top row of swimsuits for a size 12.

It was as I struggled to push myself out of the swimsuit that Herc totally lost his shit.

I offered him toys, the crinkly wipes packet, my sanity. Anything to buy me the two minutes I needed to get dressed so that I could put him in the sling where he’d be happy (Judgemental Operatic Choir in C: HE HAS TO LEARN! OTHERWISE YOU’LL BE CARRYING HIM UNTIL HE’S 20!!!!) I’d learned from past experience that picking him up for a couple of minutes and returning him to the buggy would make him apoplectic with rage and prolong the nightmare. So, as I wrestled with the swimsuit, I talked to him, stroked him, even sang his silly Wally-Dolly song. And I didn’t care who was listening.

As it turned out, somebody had been listening.

Suddenly a shop assistant burst onto the scene. ‘Poor baby! Shall I pick him up?’

I was wearing just a saggy pair of Big Pants. Boobs everywhere.

‘Sure,’ I said, stunned.

She lifted Herc out of the buggy, cooing over him as I hastily stuffed my bosoms back into their bra.

‘I hate hearing babies cry,’ she was saying as Herc’s wail became more of a WTF? cry.

She went on.

‘It’s awful hearing babies cry. You just have to pick them up.’

As someone whose parenting philosophy sits more at the Attachment Parenting end of the spectrum, I would usually agree. Just not when I’m semi-naked and trying to GET OUT OF THERE ASAP to comfort my baby.

Herc stopped crying just as I pulled my shorts up over my pants.

‘See? He just wanted to be held.’

Thank you for telling me. I had no idea.

(Judgemental Operatic Choir in F Flat: YOU FAILED)

And then she delivered her final blow.

‘He just wants love.’

BOOM!!!! went my happiness bubble. In its place a heavy brick that was sinking and sinking. I tried to explain that the best way to help him was to get dressed asap so that I could cuddle him in the sling. That picking him up briefly would have upset him more. But I wasn’t thinking straight. I was spiraling downwards.

(Judgemental Operatic Choir in Z Flat: BAD MOTHER! YOU DON’T HOLD HIM ENOUGH)

I put Herc in the sling where he snuggled into me, instantly comforted (JOC: YOU HOLD HIM TOO MUCH!!). In a daze I hastily paid for the too-tight swimsuit, all thoughts of finding a size 12 gone. I took my unloved son out of the shop feeling utterly, utterly wretched.

A tangle of thoughts were whirling in my head. Why are people so quick to judge mothers? If that woman was finding Herc’s cries upsetting why didn’t she consider how much worse I was finding it?? (JOC: IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU, ISN’T IT?). If she’d resisted the urge to preach, her help would have been an absolute godsend. Why didn’t she consider that I didn’t pick him up in that moment because I knew my baby better than she did? Why didn’t she consider that perhaps I was only there in the first place because my moods had been a bit erratic and I needed some exercise to help regulate them. (JOC: IN OUR DAY WE JUST GOT ON WITH IT!).

And the biggest mystery of all: why, Why, WHY do I always passively and politely take it? Knowing that in the past I’ve still felt the sting of Judgemental comments days, weeks, months and – on a couple of occasions – even years later.

Because, like all the mothers I know, I’m trying my best.

But how often do people acknowledge that?

I retreated to Ocean Basket with a pad and pen to vent. And stop my mood continuing down that negative spiral.

And then I stuffed my face with sushi.

Followed by a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream.

Which isn’t going to help me fit into that swimsuit.

(Judgemental Operatic Choir: Silence. Because I’ve punched them all in the face)