On Being a Non-Mom...

Sometimes there are ad campaigns that are so stupid that I wish that I were a fly on the wall when it was pitched just to see how the advertising company managed to sell such a ridiculous idea.

I wish I were the fly on the wall when Teleflora and NBC were pitched the categories for their America's Favorite Mom contest. The photo to the left is of the original categories. Please, click on the image and enlarge it. When you do you will find the following 5 categories:

• The Military Mom
• The Working Mom
• The Single Mom
• The Non-Mom Mom
• The COE (The ChairMAN of Everything) Mom

Please, read the descriptions. Yes, according to Teleflora and NBC I am a non-mom and I wonder if that makes Chloe a non-child?

I try not to get what I call over-sensitive to this stuff but this campaign is ridiculous and highly offensive to so many people. Read on and you will see a mom who parents "her own daughter" and six "meth babies". I wonder if that is how she introduces them? "Have you met my family? Let me introduce you this is my OWN daughter and these are my six meth babies?" Or how about the COE--the mom who is the "Chairman of Everything". Not only is she a MAN but she had to quit her busy job in order to attain that title.

It just scares me that this marketing ploy could make it on a major U.S. network without anyone saying, "Hey, wait a minute....". Is this kind of ignorance of adoption that pervasive and widespread? I am aware that it is obvious that I am not Chloe's birthmother, but I am her mother. I didn't have to give birth to her to love her as my own. I didn't have to give birth to her to be a great mother to her. Heck, I would like to nominate the mom at that Y the other day at swim lessons for the non-mom mom category. She should be a non-mom but she has two "of her own" (according to Teleflora that is the correct verbiage for someone who gave birth to a child). I watched her jerk her 3 year old son out of the pool scream at him and then slap him so hard across his back it made a red welt all because he wasn't listening to his mom when he was in his swim lesson listening to his swim instructor. Can I nominate her Teleflora?

If you go to the current America's Favorite Mom contest site, you will see Teleflora realized the error of its way (thanks to the barrage of letters and calls I am certain they received) and posted an apology and corrected their incorrect verbiage.

So this Mother's Day, thanks to Teleflora, I will remember that it was on Mother's Day 2005 that I became the non-mom of Chloe.