Exhausted Mom of Four Shared Revealing Multi-Tasking Photo with Cheerful Explanation of Her Day

This mom thinks there’s not enough realness on social media. A photo snapped by her husband received extra attention when it showed just that: real life.

The candid photo snapped by her husband shows a multi-tasking momma in full glory: With her four children in the kitchen, Jazmyne Futrell is stirring up in a saucepan what looks like the start of dinner while watching her two kids Karter, 3 and Kinley, 5 playing on the floor—meanwhile, she looks back over her shoulder when her eldest, seven and a half year-old Karson is tugging on the back of her shirt showing her his homework. But here comes the clincher: on top of all the cooking and homework assisting while watching over her two other kids, she was also nursing her youngest, seven-month old Koehn, as she cradled him. Now that's a juggling act!

Jazmyne admits that the mom shame gets pretty rough in her own head and adds, “My husband’s been there firsthand having to deal with it and he wanted me to see why he thought I was so amazing.”

She decided to post the photo on her Facebook account to show other moms they’re not alone in their struggles.

After giving birth to Koehn, Jazmyne became interested in blogging. She says, “I had postpartum depression and all the other moms looked amazing on social media.

Many times I thought, "Can I do this? I hope showing photos like this lets mothers know they’re not fighting their battles alone.”

She also said that there’s so much to say about this photo:

“I shouldn’t be cooking while holding my baby, my son has a ponytail because I didn’t have time to braid his hair, and my kids are on the floor. That’s why I posted it—there’s not enough realness on social media.”

While many were fascinated by the image of this multi-tasking mom, others were quick to judge too, some offering criticism and racist assumptions.

She said, "A lot of people talk about how I need to stop having kids or how my children probably all have different dads. I've seen some comments like I should learn how to keep my legs closed or get the free birth control that is so readily available."

Other comments judged her parenting skills for being in the kitchen with all her kids while she was cooking. While Jazmyne admitted that those comments stung a bit at first, she has learned to ignore them.

She shares, “It's simple. Those with negative comments come from one of two places: Either they are projecting their own insecurities on me or going based off of what society says about a 'black mom' with several children. Neither of these thought processes can be changed by a single reply from me, so no point in going back and forth with them."

Another objective is to reach out to biracial parents and biracial parents with biracial children. She says,“I never really felt like I belonged.” She adds that she wants to offer a safe space for discussion among parents who may have had to deal with the same things growing up or are navigating them now with their own children.

In her blog, Jazmyne writes:

“As a biracial woman, finding my own identity was hard growing up. Was I black? Was I white? Could I really be both without being considered insecure? It took some time and a whole lot of self discovery but I realized that being biracial is not as black and white as everyone else tried to make it. And now that I am raising my four brown babies, I am determined to help them find their own identity, at their own pace.”