If you were to scroll through my phone's photo gallery, you will find thousands and thousands of pictures of my children.
Many of these also have other family members in them.
However, rarely am I in the picture. Why? Because I am the one taking the picture.
Like so many other mums in so many other families, I am the designated photo taker of the family, which, of course, results in the fact that more often than not, I am behind the camera, and not in front of it.
The thing is – much as I am nota huge fan of having my picture taken, I also want my children to one day have pictures of me to look back on. Pictures of us together. Pictures that show our life as it was. I wouldn't even care if my hair was messy or my eyes had circles under them from tiredness or if I didn't look skinny. Because I know that someday in the future, when my children look back at these pictures, that is not what they will see. They will see their mum – who they love so, so much, and that will be the only thing that matters.
But in those hasty moments, when I whip out my phone to get a snap of them, I so often forget to get in the picture too. And forget to ask someone else to take the photo for me.
And I am not alone. So many mums are in the same boat. Recently, Chrissy Teigen shared a snap on her Instagram account highlighting just this:
As a former supermodel and one of the most famous women in the world, Chrissy Teigen no doubt has plenty of photographs of herself. But what she doesn't have are family photos with her in them.
Nope. Like so many mums, Chrissy isn't in the family pictures because she is the one taking them.
"I never have pictures of myself because I am selfless and am the designated photo taker and keeper for my family and no one else seems to care to be thoughtful and take good photos of me," Teigen captioned an Instagram that casually signed as "To john."
She also kindly shared some advice for her husband and any other dads snapping photos.
"They merely click them off without paying attention to angles or lighting or general photo ambience. but it's okay. such is the life I chose." Teigen sarcastically noted.
And boy, do we get her.
But I now make a mental note to remember to ask others to take the picture for me. Because I want to be in it.
(Feature image Chrissy Teigen/Instagram)
