What a true statement that all new parents realize after their first year navigating through new parenthood.
I remember the days before becoming a parent and Brett and I would talk endlessly about what type of parent we will be when we were lucky enough to have children of our own. We had everything mapped out on our do's and don'ts of parenting, or so we thought...
I very quickly learned that we may have been slightly... Ummmn... Unattentionally judgement...
Here's a few...
1. "Oh our kids won't watch TV..."
Lasted 8 months and the world of Yo GABA GABA entered our life and so did 23 glorious minutes to actually accomplish what should be the simplest of tasks, like the dishes..
2. "Our kids will never sleep in bed with us"
Lasted 2 months and a sick little Sawyer entered and it took us weeks upon weeks to get him adjusted back into his own room.. Sometimes Daddy sleep overs are the only way to a restful sleep, and I will take it!
3. "We won't change anything in our house, our kids will adapt within our space...
Haha this was a great one and last about hmm 30 seconds as soon as the kids started to crawl.. By the end of the day everything was shifted out of reach and has continued to gradually rise higher as their reach continues to extend..
4. I will never raise my voice at my children...
This one we are still pretty good at sticking too as I strongly believe in clear communication, however sometimes that can be a challenge with 17 month old twins.. When you turn your back for two seconds and turn back around and see one twin scaling the side of your bookcase and the other is standing on the table "walking the line".. it's pretty hard not to shriek in fear/frustration.
5. Speaking of communication.. I believed...wait for it..."that I had the ability to reason with a tantruming toddler..."
I was clearly oblivious with "how hard can it be"... While our tantrums are not often, I have spent months learning and adapting to dealing with this one. Deep breaths and cool heads thankfully have prevailed.. But reasoning not so much.. When I figure this one out I will let you all know!
6. "Our kids will always eat the healthiest organic food and eat the food we eat..."
We are still strong believers in organic and healthy alternatives for our children but we have been blessed with an extremely picky eater (Sawyer). We could only take so much of his flinging of expensive organic food all over the floor. After sweeping/mopping up hundreds of dollars in food off our floor we realized we needed to make some adjustments and have accepted that our kids will not always eat what we want them to eat. We are pretty good at providing a healthy mix of what our kids need to grow big and strong, but sometime it's a waffles for dinner kind of night for Sawyer..
7. "Our kids will never play with our phones or electronics...
This one we are still pretty firm on, however we have caved a couple times while out for dinner to allow us to have at least two bites of warm food.. Oh look kids somthing shiny *quickly shovels food into mouth*
8. "Our kids will always get along"
As someone who has grown up with siblings I have no idea how I ever thought I could pull this one off lol. While our kids do love each other, they also are very much brother and sister and have displayed this in the occasional hair pulling, block in the face or pushing/pulling.. I have had to learn to to take a step back and allow our kids to try and resolve some of there issues without our constant intervention. When I did this, I noticed a slight shift but definetly not my "our kids will never fight". They are learning boundaries together and we always inforce positive playtime, it does not always happen and we have to accept that.
9. "I will never look like "that" parent"
A day I can walk out of the house not covered in snot or food is a day I will celebrate.. On my days in the house I have my dad sweatpants that start off clean and end with food, puke, snot and whatever else my kids attach on to me. I call them my "coat of armour".. At the end of my day with them I am generally wearing what we ate and did throughout the day, however the kids are as clean as a whistle. Go figure...
10. Lastly "we will never fight over how we will parent our children"
As you all know it was years in the making for Brett and I to have our family. We had endless night talking about what would parent like together.
While thankfully this has mostly been true, however we have had nights of no sleep and exhaustion where our differences on the "proper resolution" have been polar opposites.. Sometimes not our proudest moments as parents and as a couple, but we have come to the realization that we are not perfect but we can always strive to be better together.
What I have learned is that you never know what type of parent you will be until your in it.. Life changes so quickly and so does your perspective on how you live it.. I now live in the moment and allow my experience to unfold in front of me naturally , rather then me trying to control exactly how I think they should happen..
Moral of the story, don't beat yourself up for your "failures" of what you thought was once wrong.. As a parent our jobs are big and we must learn to adapt on a dime, so being stuck in the world of "this is how it should be" will not get any of us anywhere.
Share below some of your realizations in parenting..
As always lots of love and blog again soon!
Justin
