“My roommate actually inspired me to make the thread. It has been a running joke in my suite all semester long to take mom style selfies and send them to each other,” Abigail told Bored Panda. “When my roommates mom came across one of those selfies in her camera roll, she saw it and immediately said ‘wow this is such a cute picture of you!’ despite the fact that my roommate was trying to look silly.”
“That interaction gave me a theory that no matter how dumb you look in a picture, your mom will still hype you up. I think moms are so supportive because they have that innate desire to unconditionally love them. I’m not a mom, but if I’ve learned anything from my mom it’s that she loves me no matter what and wants to see me succeed.”
Abigail admitted that she didn’t expect her Twitter thread to go viral: “I woke up the next morning and still only a handful of people had responded, but then over the next few days it really took off.”
“Everyone on the internet has reacted in a very positive way, which has been so encouraging. I’ve had tweets go viral before, but nothing that was so personal and interactive. That’s what I’ve loved about this thread. Seeing thousands of strangers online bond over something so positive has been really cool,” she said.
Abigail also shared her thoughts about what we can all do to show our moms how much we love them.
“Understanding the sacrifices our moms go through I believe is a huge part of showing them the same love they show us. Another thing I learned from this thread is that most moms are just happy to receive a text from their kids no matter what it is.”
“I can’t imagine what it’s like to see a thread like this and not be able to participate. I was blessed with an amazing mom, but I know not everyone has the ability to send a selfie to their mom and receive support. Whether someone does not have a good relationship with their mom or maybe doesn’t have a mom, I am thinking of you. You are just as valid and important!”
Abigail’s Twitter thread got over 139,700 likes and 14,600 retweets in just over a week’s time. While the vast majority of moms reacted very positively to getting a random selfie from their kids, some mothers’ responses were unexpected and hilarious.
For example, one mom blamed her son for trying to use the selfie to get out of answering her question about what he bought with her credit card. While another mom asked her daughter what was wrong because she looked happy in the pic.
While our moms might look full of energy and have a smile on their face the vast majority of the time, the truth is, motherhood is hard. Sometimes, moms need to hear some words of encouragement that will pick them up when things get hard and will immediately improve their mood.
Motherly writes that there are some things that we can all say that will help our moms out. Phrases such as "You are doing a great job," "all your kids need is for you to love them," and "you are doing better than you think you are."
While these phrases might seem like common sense, everyone needs reminding from time to time that every single person in existence makes mistakes. Perfection is impossible: we should learn from our mistakes and move towards perfection, but we shouldn’t believe that it’s an attainable goal. After all, even the mothers who seem perfect because of their pristine social media accounts are human, just like we all are.
