This Mom Nailed How Ridiculous Parenting Double Standards Are in Just One Blog Post

Australian blogger Constance Hall is kinda my new favorite person, and it's all because she shared a hilarious anecdote about diaper changes that made me laugh out loud, and at the same time, totally nailed how ridiculously different people treat moms and dads for doing the same thing.

In a viral Facebook post that has garnered more than 73,000 reactions, Hall tells the story about how she was eating out with a friend when her baby needed a diaper change. "I went to the bathroom and there was no change table," she writes. "No dramas the restaurant was in a park, I went very far away, put her on the grass and changed her bum. No big deal."

Except to someone, it was. "30 minutes later a [woman] approached me and said, 'I saw you changing your daughters nappy, could you please use the change table next time.' I said "there wasn't one.' She said 'there is, it's in the disabled toilet and that's around the other corner.'"

Hall responded to the rude stranger as only she could. Spoiler alert: It involved sarcasm and swearing.

Then, coincidentally, Hall and her husband Bill were in the park the following weekend when their other child needed a diaper change. "I told Bill that it was his turn, he put Rumi on the grass and changed his bum," she writes.

Like before, random strangers had opinions to share as well. But this time, their words took on a different tone.

"A group of women walked passed, one said, 'Aww good dad!!! That's what we like to see, get in there,'" Hall shares. "Bill felt like a legend."

Now here's where Hall notes the double standard. She says, "I didn't think much of it because I am used to it. I am used to being scrutinised for jobs that my husband is praised for."

"I am used to picking the kids up from school to judgmental looks about being late, while Bill is used to a red f-ing carpet and a 12 piece band praising him for his heroic appearance at school pick up. That's the way we as a society are, we place so much pressure on women to be perfect and selfless while putting low parenting expectations on men," she concludes.

As a mom, I can relate. In fact, as I write this, my husband is at the grocery store right now with our three daughters. And I imagine, like Hall's experience, people are falling all over themselves because a dad is shopping with kids. But meanwhile, when I'm at the store with them, I'm just "doing my job."

But Hall isn't looking to daddy-bash. She ends her post by saying, "I am not saying quit the praise. I love seeing Bill get praised for the things he does for our kids. He is a good dad, why not celebrate him. But let's praise each other too, let's see a [woman] talking on the phone while pushing her pram and think 'wow, she chose not to stay at home bidding on eBay smashing straight vodka. She chose to come to the park and be a magnificent mum.'"

From your lips, Constance, to the ears of each and every living, breathing, judging person on earth!

Melissa Willets is a writer/blogger and a mom. Follow her on Twitter (@Spitupnsuburbs), where she chronicles her love of exercising and drinking coffee, but never simultaneously.