As some of you know I am a new parent, I’m officially a Dad. Heis the most amazing thing to happen to me, my life has completely changed since we brought him into the world last week, I feel completely different now that I am a Dad, life has taken on a new meaning and, as you can see, I am now one giant cliché.
Apparently, I am not a spring chicken - technically my wife and I are “Senior Parents” - according to the American Academy of Pediatrics (and we are still in our thirties…albeit late thirties).
So I find myself not only doting on our new big boy [8-lbs 10-oz], but reflecting on how my life was different before he got here and how it is different now. There are some obvious things: there is another person in the house, our family is now three people, there is another human being completely dependent on me…etc…
The not-so-obvious: I am responsible for the growth and development of another human being. [When I say I, I mean my wife and I]
I am responsible for pointing this human being in the right direction for life and then expected to not have any expectations as to who he becomes. That’s a tough one for me that I’ll happily revisit later. But what I am finding the most interesting right now is how true many of the clichés actually are.
So how about you parents out there? Does the same ring true for you? Do you feel like the clichés that are out there came true for you too?
Yes. And absolutely no one can tell you that before that baby arrives - because you and your baby will escape all the cliches. Plus, explaining what being a parent feels like is like explaining to a blind person what blue is. Welcome to the world where you get to chuckle at the naive concepts non-parents have about raising kids - and laugh at your pre-parent self.
Yup. You’ve got tons of stereotypical situations ahead of you: Playdates, kids injuring themselves, bad influences, dating - all stuff that’s been covered in cheesy comedies. You’ve also got all the horror movie visions in your head when they go off to camp or tell you that there’s a monster in the closet.
Most screenwriters are also parents, I figure, and they draw from their lives to provide us with stereotypes.
Totally. While I kind of understood the whole “Having a child changes your life” thing on an intellectual level it was a bit of a surprise just how much it has changed me as a person. Sharing responsibility for a helpless little infant (now a not so helpless 9-month old) is an enormous thing.
This is so true. It’s beyond true. It’s super, super, super, super REALLY true. Well, I guess the only way to find out how true it is, is to become a parent.
To the OP - Congrats! And I wouldn’t say that my life became a cliche after having a baby, but definitely some of my emotional reactions did. (It’s awesome, isn’t it?)
I had my first kid when I was 39. Second in my 40s. And I gotta tell you, from talking to my friends who had kids in 20s - we all agree, when you have kids in your 20s, yes, it’s great to be a parent but the kids cramp your style. They interfere with your life.
At 40 - what “life”? It’s great to have a kid, he gives your life meaning, and there is nothing to interfere with :). The only problem is you don’t have as much energy as you used to have in your 20s. But that’s workable.
IANAParent, but be warned: from now on and maybe for the rest of your life, you’ll be introduced as “Plosbaby’s Dad”. You will even address other parents as “[theirkid]'s Dad”, with no ill feeling on either side.
I’ve seen Middlebro ask “bytheyway, Alexdad, may I ask your name? I’m Edu when I’m not being The Kid’s Dad”. “I’m Alex too” “Oh, nice, you’re Alex too!.. :smack: You know, before we started being introduced as our kid’s dads, we would have said he [pointing at Alex Jr] was Alex too!” “I know! But now I am Alex too and proud of it!”
The Bros and I often get a few laughs out of the many ways in which Middlebro’s life has become a cliche; they’re the kind of things which become cliches simply because they’re so common.
When my two were younger we were not so cliche, unless it’s the really sad end of cliche - single mom with two young children, living on our own in a tiny apartment watching PBS and eating spam, then living with my parents.
Now I have finished my degree and live in the suburbs in a house with a yard and it took me approximately 3.4 seconds to become the classroom volunteer, Volvo-driving soccer mom. I’m even thinking of getting the frosted, high-waisted mom jeans just to be done with it. OK, no, I can’t do that, but you see what I mean. Sooo… wanna buy some Boy Scout popcorn and go to a lacrosse game with me next Sunday? But I need an answer fast, I have to go make treats for the den meeting tonight.
I will recommend to you something I wish I had before I started raising my kids, by a long way the best parenting book I have ever read. I give a copy to everyone at work that has a child.
Politically Incorrect Parenting by Nigel Latta. If you can’t find it let me know and I’ll send you a copy. Not only is it laugh out loud funny (for antipodeans) it is dead right.
When our daughter was small (she’s now 24), we went to visit my wife’s college roommate, who had a house in the suburbs, and a couple of small children. They had a few friends over that day, and at one point I noticed that all of the wives were sitting around a kiddie pool that the kids were splashing in, and all the husbands were sitting around the grill, drinking beer. I thought to myself, “When did we suddenly slip back to the '50s?”
This right here…I laid awake at night the first night scared shitless that our CO2 monitor\detector worked properly. And others… Now I have gotten better, 11 days out and we now have 4 CO2 detectors!
All those cliches are cliches for a reason; they’re true. Well, most of them are; you’ll find your kid and your situation skips over about one in five cliches. (We never had a “terrible twos,” for instance.) And kids ARE different - how to get them to sleep varies from kid to kid, and don’t let anyone tell you their sleeping method is the correct one.
But the cliches are true. There’s nothing as fundamental, as primeval, in us as being a parent. It’s an essential part of us. If you step back and look at it from as much of a distance as you can from time to time, it’s very intellectually stimulating. You’re getting a chance to see instinct and sapience work together in fascinating ways, both within your family and in relation to other families. It’s neat to observe stuff like what BrotherCadfael describes.
A few years ago I took the Small One to a berry farm along with a few friends and their kids; altogether we had five adults and four children. As we were picking raspberries, the smallest kid was briefly lost amongst the rows. What happened was really quite fascinating; the two mothers immediately pulled the remaining kids in to them, and the fathers fanned out in different directions searching for the little girl (who was just seconds away.) None of this was planned or directed; it just happened, behaviour that came right out of our brain’s monkeys-out-of-the-trees center. It was neat, in retrospect.
I guess everyone is different. I became a new parent about 8 weeks ago, and it was pretty much as I expected (no sleep, always changing diapers, poop and vomit everywhere). As the OP said, this stuff is cliche.
Very Cool - I can say that there is definitely something in my reptilian brain that is making me hyper-aware of what’s going on in the house. The smallest thing, the furnace going on, wakes me right up.
Another really cool thing is that we have two dogs, a Beagle Mix and a Border Collie\Siberian Husky mix. The Border mix is the youngest at about 1.3 yrs old. The other day he was laying on his bed next to the door, when the Beagle came over t my wife who was nursing on the couch. He jumped half on the couch, with two front paws on the cushion and the back ones on the ground. Our Border immediately cam running over, and with no sounds at all, no growling or anything stuck his head between the Beagle and the Baby and nudged him off the couch…then trotted back to the bed and laid down. My wife and I looked at each other [this pup was a stray…] and were shocked!
Maybe it won’t. But it isn’t the “no sleep, always changing diapers” I’m really talking about. Its the irrationality of “four CO2 detectors” or deciding you MUST get the baby gates up in week three. Or staying up all night because the hamster died and it was TRAGIC and you would do anything to protect your precious from the disappoint of a dead hamster. Its the “I am NOT going to be that parent that runs into the room the first night baby sleeps through the night wondering if they died” and then - you are. The sudden sympathy you feel every time you hear of a tragedy involving a child. Its the “total being” of “parent” becoming central to who you are that no one can explain. How you can love something so completely - and so differently than you love your spouse or your parents. But maybe you don’t feel the same.
Its the naive innocence of “my kids will never play with guns” - or the alternative of “of course my kids will enjoy hunting as much as I do.” Or “my daughter will NOT wear pink” or “I won’t stress about potty training.” Some cliches are the ones that may or may not happen to you - as RickJay said, you’ll skip a bunch of them.
Naw, just wait until you have a problem with a two year-old, post about it online, and then some asswipe tells you that you are doing everything wrong based upon their vast amounts of baby-sitting their nephews from 3-6pm for a 4-month period. “No, I’m not a parent, but my experience with my sister’s kids is exactly equivalent!” Er, no it’s not.
Or you read a comment somewhere about a couple who is debating on kids, but then decide to get a dog “for practice”. Uh, people, until it becomes acceptable to put your 4-day old in a pen with a bowl of water and newspapers on the floor all day while you go to work, it’s not the same.
Or you remember how you promised yourself back in the day that you’re going to read your kids Shakespeare every night, a promise that now seems laughable because you’re aware that Shakespeare is irrelevant to a person who has to be taught not to smear their shit on the walls.
That’s what is meant by “naive concepts” and “laughing at your pre-parent self”.
Our experience was a little different (okay A LOT different) since our little ones came to us at 5 and 6 years old.
I spent the first three months trying to be perfect. They had to have everything that everyone else had and eat perfectly and I had to handle every situation perfectly. After nearly dying of exhaustion, I decided that wasn’t to be.
Now, we are at ‘it’ll do.’ Kid has a hole in their backpack? Here’s some duct tape. It’ll do. They had ice cream for supper? It won’t kill them.
and, as you can see, I am now one giant cliché.
But now I am Alex too and proud of it!”
