“Everyone is a perfect parent, until they have children.”
Anyone else concur with the above statement? Haha.
Before I was a parent I really thought I was pretty parenting-savvy. After all, I had a pretty good preparation.
I’m the second oldest of thirteen (yes, 13) kids. I changed my first diaper at seven years old. From fourteen years old and on I babysat for other people’s kids consistently, even nannying for several years after college.
I felt pretty prepared to be a parent and let’s be honest, sometimes I had thoughts about how I would do things differently if I was the parent of so and so’s kid.
Enter parenthood three years ago.
I truly felt like life changed for the better when I became a parent, but I also quickly realized that all my preparation hadn’t prepared me for the hardest part of parenting – making the decisions.
After Caleb was born I was so glad to have my mom around for a few days to help me know what to do. I’d taken care of plenty of newborns before, but now for the first time it was my newborn. When I nannied, I just fed the babies when their mom told me to. Now all the sudden I was the one in charge of baby’s schedule and I didn’t feel entirely confident that I knew what I was doing.
I remember leaving the ped’s office with Caleb when he was three or four weeks old, in tears because I wasn’t sure if I’d made the right decision about something. The responsibility for the well-being of this itty-bitty baby was on me and it scared me.
I’ve been a parent now for three years and although I’m a little more confident with the baby stage, having a three year old is new territory. I have a feeling that the longer I’m a parent, the more I’ll realize how little I know. But maybe that’s a good thing in a way, because it will drive me to Christ, as well as to more experienced parents who can give me good advice.
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Anyway, in honor of my three years of parenting, I thought I’d share a few things that I thought before I was a parent, in no particular order. Feel free to laugh along with me. 😉
Before I was a parent . . .
I thought I’d get my kids to sleep through the night quickly
Yeah . . . they both didn’t sleep through regularly until after their first birthdays. Actually, Sofia still doesn’t always. Choosing to laugh about this instead of bursting into tears ha!
I thought I’d let my kids cry it out
Nope. I can’t do it. I let my babies fuss for a bit before they go to sleep if they need to, but crying and crying and crying? Nope. They need their mama.
I thought I’d have no problem leaving them in the nursery when they were crying
My pre-kid self secretly thought parents were wimps when they felt too bad to leave their crying kids in the nursery. Well, maybe I’m a wimp now but I can’t do it either. Thankfully right now both my kids are in a pretty good stage where they don’t care so much. Phew!
I was sure I would be consistent in my parenting
Umm, why is this SO hard you guys?? It looked easy when I sat back and critiqued other parents haha!
I definitely wouldn’t let my kids watch TV everyday
Yeah . . . well, turns out we’re big fans of Daniel Tiger, Baby Einstein, and Super Why over here. Pablo and I have set limits, but a half hour show happens pretty much every day, occasionally even twice a day (gasp!) Maybe we’ll cut back at some point but in the mean time Pablo and I have learned to be okay with Super Simple Songs stuck in our heads all.day.long.
I said “my kids will adapt to my schedule, not the other way around”
I remember sitting in a coffee shop with a friend and confidently saying this to her. Let’s take a moment to laugh at this together, shall we? Admittedly, it’s still my goal to not always cater to my kids. I want to teach them to be flexible and well-behaved, but let’s be honest – things go the most smoothly when I stick to their basic schedule. That’s just life with kids.
I thought I knew a lot about parenting
I guess I did know a lot about parts of it. But no one can fully grasp both the weight of the responsibility and the depth of the love you will feel as a parent until it’s actually experienced. Parenting is wonderful, scary, exhausting, and full of joy all at the same time.
So, those were some of my thoughts before I was a parent. Now I’d love to hear from you – what were some things that you thought before you became a parent?? Let me know in the comments! And if you enjoyed this post, please share. 🙂
