Before And After Children
December 27, 2006 by Michelle Waters
I was just thinking tonight how my attitudes about children and their behavior has changed dramatically from before I had kids to after I had them.
So, I thought I’d share a few of my observations:
Before children:
My child will NEVER do that!
After children:
All kids do that and it is perfectly normal.
Before children:
If you were a good parent, your children would behave themselves, even when you are out of sight.
After children:
Children can write all over their bodies with the permanent marker you lost underneath your office desk — in the time it takes you to pour yourself a glass of water in the kitchen.
Before children:
Children should be seen, not heard.
After children:
Children who cannot be heard are most certainly doing something they shouldn’t, like pulling the tape out of your old cassette collection or shearing their hair with the manicure scissors kept in the cabinet over the bathroom sink. Noisy children can be easily located and you can tell exactly what they are doing from the other end of the house.
What are your Before And Afters?
Ooo! I must add another…
Before: Your children will quietly watch a movie or play with a new game/toy while you spend 15 minutes on the phone with a client.
After: Children have an innate ability to know the very moment you pick up the phone — and at that very precise moment, you become the only person in the world who can listen to their joke, answer a question, kiss a two week old boo-boo. This ability is universal to all children, or at least to all the WAHMs I have talked to on the phone.
Before: How could that mom go out in public looking like that?
After: After realizing that I must brave the grocery store on Friday afternoon with two slightly cranky toddlers in tow or have no dinner, it is a miracle that I am fully dressed and made it out with the list, wallet and coupons, let alone to expect matching clothes, or hair in something other than a ponytail or under a hat. And the shoes, previously thought of as unstylish, are merely comfy for the purpose of chasing said toddlers down after they take off on the next aisle while I am looking for the one and only type of jelly that the children like.
Direct corollary:
Before: How can a mom let her kids go out looking that way?
After: If the 4 year old won’t wear anything but her dress up princess dress, Babylegs and crocs three sizes too big, oh, well, at least she is staying with you at the store! There is a law of momhood that states that any infant can keep an outfit clean for hour upon hour at home, but will instantly spit up something or blow out the diaper when more than 10 minutes from the house. All forms of food, including snacks designed to keep little ones from combusting while shopping will end up smeared across clothing, face and occasionally hair, and attempting to wipe up will result in screams that will make passersby assume mom is beating the child instead of cleaning them up.
*grin*