EVERYONE likes to hold onto memories with their kids forever by taking a few snaps in the sunshine.
But one mum has come under fire for forcing her young daughter to partake in a fake photo shoot instead of playing in the pool.
In a viral post on Facebook, a woman called Jen, from Florida, revealed how she had been shocked to see a little girl desperate to go for swim while her mum seemed preoccupied with capturing their day for her social media followers.
She wrote: "Yesterday while at the pool I watched a young Mama and her little daughter enter the pool area dressed in very nice coordinating swimming suits.
"The mom, with her perfect loose curls tied up in a coordinating scarf, spent the first few minutes talking loudly on her phone to a friend while her daughter stood waiting to get into the pool.
"Mom ended the phone call and proceeded to spread out pool toys and sunscreen on a matching towel."
Jen continued: "Then after finding just the right angle and the right light, Mama pulled out her tripod and took a few selfies with her daughter.
"Little One asked to get in the pool. Mama said wait and then posed her daughter in front the pool, then going in to the pool and then coming back out of the pool.
"Little one smiled big and said 'cheese' like she’d done it a million times. Then Mama told her she could play."
The girl swam around on her own in the pool for a couple of minutes while her mum began another conversation with a friend.
The woman recalled how she heard the girl ask five times, "Mama, come play with me?", and after ten minutes the mum ended her call and they left.
Of the heartbreaking mother-daughter scene, Jen asked parents who might see the picture-perfect images posted on Instagram not to assume it is reality.
"Somewhere another Mama is going to be at home with her children, the house a mess from their play, her hair unruly from a day of mothering and her clothes dirty with spit up or peanut butter,’ she added. "She’s going to be tired because she’s spent her day cooking, caring, cleaning and playing with her children.
"She’s going to look at that photo and she is going to compare herself to the perfect Mama at the pool."
Jen finished the post – which has been shared more than 130,000 times – noting: "She’s going to feel like a failure.
"She’ll never know that how she spent her time that day was so much better in God’s eyes and in her children’s eyes than that 'perfect Mama' at the pool.’
She added: "What we see on Social Media isn’t always real.
"Sometimes and often it’s a complete set-up. It’s staged and filtered and it’s counterfeit."
Earlier today, we told you how mums are disgusted at Morrisons for selling tiny denim miniskirts for babies.
We also revealed how a girl, two, left her mum in hysterics by giving the Fat Controller from Thomas the Tank Engine a very rude name.
And we also told you a genius £1 tip for getting sand off your kids' toes.
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