People who already have children are occasionally guilty of telling massive lies small untruths about the realities of parenthood. I’m pretty sure this isn’t done on purpose, or as some bizarre hazing, or to, you know, trick you into having children. But it happens. Grandchildren-greedy parents can be especially guilty of these.
I personally have heard, and therefore decided to debunk for the sake of humanity, these particular fibs. Please note the heavy dosage of sarcasm here, and this disclaimer: I do actually love being a parent most of the time. But still…
It’s lovely having children, they complete you!
If by complete we mean add hitherto unseen stress, annoyance and complete lack of lie-ins for approximately 15 years then yes, they totally complete you! You don’t need those lazy, loved up brunches! You want to be scraping weetabix off a high chair or sitting in a baby swimming pool that you suspect is actually 87% wee on the weekend! It’s brilliant trying to wrangle a job and the school run! It is entirely possible to have a complete and fulfilling life sans children I’m sure.
Labour doesn’t hurt that much, you’ll soon forget about it!
Yes I’ve TOTALLY forgotten the sensation of squeezing a watermelon out of my private areas! It was so empowering having three different hands up the foof checking proceedings! I now have no dignity OR shame, it’s brilliant!
They usually start sleeping through the night at about 6 weeks
Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
They’ll be out of nappies at 18 months if you train them properly
I was wiping another person’s rear end for nearly THREE years. We nearly went bankrupt with the chocolate button bribery funding.
You don’t know what love is until you have a child
No, you don’t know what the love you have for a child is. Don’t patronise all the non-parents out there that the love in their life isn’t real, it is. But yes, the love for your children is different. It’s a love that endures exasperation, irritation, pain, deprivation, everything life can throw at you. Little buggers!
This blog first appeared on The Huffington Post
6 weeks! 6 years for my son to regularly sleep through. Even then, he still comes into my bed on occasion. I’m weak, I know. Someone once told me kids are the icing on the cake.Hmm, maybe like icing a chocolate cake with hummous ! #stayclassy
Ahahahahaha! Yes exactly that 😀
That photo!! Beyond cute! And HAHAHAHHA 6 weeks! I’m probably guilty of some of these, but only to make pregnant mama’s to be feel better about what’s coming next 🙂 #stayclassy
“I was lucky with X, he slept through from day 10. How many times are you…? Oh…? Well that’s not horrendous, a 4 hour chunk of sleep is pretty good. I mean I was lucky with X. Did I tell you he slept through from day 10?” F*ck off! The weetabix and swimming pool thing made me lol too
Haha, thank you 🙂 xx
6 weeks! It took 12 months for my son to even contemplate it and it’s still hit and miss! #KCACOLS
Haha so funny. I definitely haven’t forgotten what labour felt like. I don’t think I ever will! I would still do it again though but hey. 6 weeks what a JOKE! And I do think it’s quite offensive to people who don’t want children to say they are incomplete or don’t know love – if you’ve always wanted kids then yeah you probably will feel complete in a way but if you don’t want them that doesn’t mean your life is lacking – just different.
Anyway I am waffling away, funny as always! #StayClassy
Thanks lovely xx
I’m laughing but it’s tears of pain! Very well said. Another favourite of mine is ‘you don’t mind the wee and poo when it’s your own baby’ – let me tell you, you mind when you get an eyeful of wee and sometimes you need a gag to get you through the poos (while uttering ‘what the hell is in that milk?!’)
Fab post – loved it!
Thanks lovely. Yes not heard that one – bodily fluids are HORRIBLE.
Brilliant – I miss those lazy Sunday brunches… And I am now at year 4 of wiping said small persons rear end, no one tells you that potty training is actually a marathon and not a sprint! #kcacols
Indeed!! 😀
Who said 6 weeks? They need shooting. they might sleep through at 6 weeks but the next night they don’t!! Love and irritation go hand in hand! #triballove
Yep! A double sided coin.
I never lie.
Could be why my friends are too scared to have children.
Mwahahaha
#kcacols
HAHAHAH! Mine too!
Love this! It’s so true and yet I’m guilty of telling these lies myself haha! #KCACOLS
Bahahahahahahaha – did you know that I used to have a ‘friend’ who told me that she had managed to train her child at 9 months!! 9 months, it was then that she confirmed what I had suspected all along – she was full cr$p! #KCACOLS
Hahah, of course!! Of course!!!
Hahaha I had a friend who always used to tell me about her child who slept through from 5 weeks old, I don’t need to hear things like this 😉 Love this, so funny and so true x
Sorry forgot to say visiting from #stayclassy xx
Thanks lovely
Ahh your last comment is so true…it is so patronising to be told you don’t know what love is. Love comes in so many different guises. And wow, eighteen months, We’ll be three in August. Not there yet! Lies all lies #KCACOLS
Yep, was three years for us!
Aww – just love that picture! Yes they are all true – spot on. Brilliant post – I love the way you write! Thanking you for joining #KCACOLS. Please come back and join us next Sunday. Nicky x
Thanks Nicky 🙂 x
Thank you 🙂
Sleeping through at 6 weeks? Mine is 12 months and has NEVER slept through. I tell all my non-patent friends this – I’m afraid I may put some of them off having kids of their own. Oops. #KCACOLS #triballove
Haha, that’s the way! Warn em good!
I’ve got friends without children and I kinda dribble with wide eyed wonder when they tell me about their weekend mini breaks and afternoons in the pub! They seem pretty darn ‘complete’! Loved your observations as always 🙂 #stayclassy
I know those BITCHES!! ;D Thanks love hope to see ya Tues!
Haha brilliant post! Totally true though. #KCACOLS
This is so great! I’m trying to think if anyone has ever told me one of these lies. But I have to say they certainly made me laugh especially the one about how much sleep you will get and being potty trained at 18 months. I mean for goodness sakes. I hope I don’t find myself telling these lies anytime soon. I try to keep most of my answers about parenthood pretty honest without scaring people off too badly. #KCACOLS #TribalLove
Haha, I have definitely scared some people off! There are too many people around anyway!!
Lol, whenever anyone says any of these I either wanna punch them in the face or shout “Lies! All lies!” in their face. No one knows the reality until they have a child themselves. #KCACOLS
Sleeping through at 6 weeks?! Hahahahaha, nope no way. Clems almost 2 and I think it’s happened maybe once or twice that’s it. Whenever anyone says they want kids I just tell them about labour and lack of sleep, they soon change their mind. #KCACOLS
6 weeks?!?! My son obviously missed that memo-we’re at 14 months and I’ve had ONE night he slept straight through. Kids really do make life interesting, and sometimes, so painfully frustrating…
Adorable photo though! The love does make it all worth it <3 #KCACOLS
It really does 🙂
Ah yea girl! Read this on Huff. This needed to be said. It is glorious having children but let’s not lie to the people who don’t have kids! I don’t think this would have prevented me from having them. I maybe would have delayed it a bit longer so I could sleep more. ; ) Thanks for sharing with #StayClassy!
I miss the long lazy brunches. And at a recent GP check up the doctor actually drew the curtain around me while I got ready. I told her, “Since I had a baby I just don’t feel I have any dignity left,” to which she replied primly, “Yes, but we must try and keep some.” #Chucklemums
Oh yes love this post! 6 weeks 6 weeks??? Who said that? Slap them! Even if by some miracle that was true – don’t tell other people- keep it secret, keep it to yourself! Thanks for joining us #stayclassy
All I would say is: yes children’s love is magic, but enjoy your freedom (and your social life!) until it lasts. No rush!!! Funny post, I like the idea of the watermelon 🙂 #chucklemums
YES! Love this. Couldn’t have written it better myself! #chucklemums
I used to laugh at the ‘they just sleep for the first 6 weeks’; well my second child never did. She screamed from the beginning…and is still a feisty little cracker. #chucklemums
Oh my god I know so many of those parents who spout the “wonders truths of parenting” thanks for the read. Gave me a giggle #chucklemoms
haha! yep, I heard all of those lol – all bullshit 😉 funny! #chucklemums
Brilliant post and so (painfully) true!!! No dignity left after giving birth, not sure my husband will ever look at me in the same way again! 😉
I hate it when people say you don’t understand true love until you’ve got kids. My bestest friends are having trouble concieving and I can see the pain comments like thesew cause. You’re spot on as always Mumzilla!!!
Gems.xx
#chucklemums
Oh I love this! Sleeping through the night at 6 weeks?! Someone needs to tell my youngest who, at 16 months today, has decided that 4am is time to get up for the day. When a friend was pregnant with her second, it took every ounce of willpower not to say “good luck”! #chucklemums
Yes, all so true and of course they are worth it. I can feed you some myths about teenagers if you like: they are always pleasant, they never argue, they want to spend time with you, they never fall out with their friends, they never have their phones at the dinner table….You can find out the rest for yourself! Alison x #chucklemums
Hahaha, would you like to write a come-back guest post about teenagers? 😀
Gosh, Mother heard all these pre-me. ‘You lied to me!’ she said to her friend. ‘Labour DOES hurt that much.’ But I think that parents have to be fed this fabrication otherwise babies would stop being born. Hilarious 😉 x #chucklemums
I love this post. Lies all lies as you say. So true about childless people and kids – so Mother Theresa / Florence Nightingale etc couldn’t feel love eh?
I think I might write 10 (obvs) lies we tell ourselves as parents so we have more than one child. I’m at that stage where I find myself ‘mis-remembering’ things about the first time so it all seems like it was a lovely, cosy, special time. Pah – why must you do this to me brain?! #chucklemums
Spot on! I love the way you pop in the pic of the sleeping baby… the angelic sleeping baby!! #kcacols
Haha particularly like the sleeping through at 6 weeks part – 17 months down the line it hasn’t even happened once. Who came up with these myths anyway?! #KCACOLS
Lol @ the 6 weeks for sleep and 18 months for nappies!! I must say though, I can’t really remember the labour pain… Probably a good thing as I’m about to go through it all again… Ignorance is bliss right!? Xx #KCACOLS
Very good and very true!! #kcacols
Ha ha! This made me giggle. I remember people telling me how much their babies slept, and I had a vision of my complete life being the perfect mum and still having an immaculate house and continue my job! Pa ha ha you can imagine how well that turned out! #KCACOLS
Haha! Oh the bloody nappies! & the sleeping through the night! & I haven’t forgotten labour yet! #chucklemums
Yes so true! I think I have been told everyone of these! #KCACOLS
Lol! Sleep…I’m sure I’ve heard of that before but it’s been so long I don’t quite remember…x
I thought labour was a walk in the park compared to pregnancy. I didn’t enjoy it first time and hated it second time. Trouble is babies are so darn cute, they almost make you forget the trouble you have carrying them.
Tbh I found labour a walk in the park compared to pregnancy.
Loved this post!! ITs all so true haha
Lx
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