Mom Asks 80-Year-Old Neighbor To Babysit Her Bed-Ridden Kids So She Could Get Her Nails Done — 'Self Care Above All'
She says she hates the feeling of puke on her nails.
sammie_head / TikTok We all know that no one deserves self-care more than parents of young children, who often forget about themselves while raising their families.
This, however, begs the question — is there a time and place for self-care?
Some parents believe so, and it is definitely not when your little ones are sick and need to be taken care of.
One mother on TikTok seems to be poking fun at videos of moms putting themselves before their kids by showing herself going out to get a manicure while her two children were hit with the stomach flu.
The mother claims she asked her 80-year-old neighbor to babysit her sick children while she got her nails done.
Sammie is a stay-at-home mother of four kids who she calls Pampas, Porty, Harold, and Incisor on her social media accounts (yes, you read those names correctly).
Most of her content seems to be a tongue-in-cheek depiction of life as a mom on the internet, though she often elicits some not-so-funny reactions from those who take her videos seriously.
In a recent video, the mom jokes that both girls came down with a nasty stomach virus, which meant that Sammie had to care for them throughout the day as they got sick repeatedly.
While the mom says her heart ached for her sick babies, she had other priorities to tend to that day.
“I have a nail appointment,” she confessed in a text overlay of the TikTok video. “So I asked my 80-year-old neighbor to come over and watch them. I told her it was an emergency.”
Sammie adds that she “hates puke” and could not deal with the feeling of it being trapped under her fingernails.
Before heading to her appointment, she promised that she would bring back her neighbor a drink from Starbucks as a thank-you gift for looking after the sick girls.
“Self-care above all, moms!” Sammie captioned her video. However, not all TikTok users were in agreement with her — mainly because they were missing the joke.
Some people were horrified that the mother would leave her children with a babysitter while they were sick.
“You guys, I can’t believe she would leave her babies like this, right? Especially when they’re so sick,” one user commented.
Others were concerned about the 80-year-old neighbor’s health.
“Aren’t you afraid she would have caught the stomach bug?” another user pressed.
Others joined in on the joke, praising her for taking time to herself.
“Once your nails are done you’ll feel so much better!” one user commented.
“Don’t forget to show us the nails after.. you are an inspiration,” another user wrote.
“Good job taking care of yourself mama!!” another user praised Sammie.
“If momma ain't happy, no one's happy,” another added.
Some users recognized that the mother was simply joking and that her children either were not sick, or their father was looking after them as opposed to their 80-year-old neighbor.
Some of Sammie's other videos include bloopers and outtakes from her skits, proving that we shouldn't always take her content seriously.
“Nails are very important. You did the right thing,” one user sarcastically commented.
“Getting paid to babysit sick kids with a Starbucks drink is very fair. Cash is dirty and has germs that could make her sick. You're the sweetest,” another added.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.