1. She’s a good speller.

(Moms, you know what I mean. Another parent of young children understands a conversation full of spelling over the top of playing children much more quickly and efficiently than anyone else.)

2. We can use words like “poop” and “vagina” without having to preface with an apology or explanation.

3. We can stop mid-sentence and holler something at our kid, and no one gets distracted when we continue our original thought.

4. If we forget what we were saying, our mom friend reminds us, but doesn’t reprimand us for that momentary lapse of patience either.

5. Pee on the floor is no big deal. Even if it’s yours (from all the laughing that you do together).

6. No one flinches when you expose your breast to nurse.

7. She understands last-minute plan changes.

8. She says something to make you laugh when you are about to cry in frustration.

9. She lets you cry when you need to, and she knows when to just listen and not speak.

10. We can tell our mom friends things that we feel ashamed of—like that one time we cursed at our baby when she wouldn’t stop screaming, or how we peed our pants a little from laughing too hard—and more than not judging, she “gets it.”

11. Because, ultimately, mom friends “get it.”

We intrinsically know that all women are different, because all people are different. Yet we see and admire the little quirks and traits that make each of our kids special—and that make each of us as individual friends special—and we celebrate them, while also understanding the chaos and love that is motherhood.

The post 10 Reasons Why All Mothers Need “Mom Friends,” plus the Reason That Matters Most. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.