Thursday, February 13, 2014

Thursday Thirteen

As a Thursday Thirteen, and as a tribute to my blog-buddy Maria, who confessed to her worst parenting moments, I will list my Favorite 13 Bad Parenting Moments.  In chronological order.

1.  I looked upon the face of my two-week old daughter, as she nursed mindlessly and greedily after a night of screaming her colicky head off; and I thought, "You are a monster.  And a cannibal."

2.  I lay sick in bed, burning with fever, my six week old daughter tucked in the bed next to me, and apologized profusely to her from bringing her into this world.

3.  I let baby Nathan bounce blithely on the kitchen counter in his baby bouncer until he bounced himself off the edge, crashing to the floor on his head.

4.  I have spanked them both.  Once each.

5.  I applied Desitin to Nathans' chapped little hands at night once, not realizing that he would rub his eyes in the night and get a chemical burn.  When we left the Insta-Care the next day, Nathan turned to me and said, "Well, Mom, for parenting, that was got a solid B-minus."

6.  Despite the fact that I am an educator, I refused to join the PTA; would not be a classroom mother.  When the president of the third grade mothers (or whoever she was) called me one night and asked me to make enough royal icing for 25 kids to make gingerbread houses the following morning, I didn't just say, "no."  I cackled and THEN said, "no."

7.  I hate watching their soccer matches.  I used to bring a book and read surreptitiously.  Now I bring a book and read openly.

8.  Once, when my daughter was ten, I forgot to bring the soccer treat for half-time, causing the team mom to shout, "No treat!  No treat!  Quick, does anyone have any carbs?  We need to get carbs into these girls, stat!"  Yeah, she said "Stat."

9.  I left their father.

10.  After I moved out, I lived in a small apartment and they had to share a room.

11.  I let them watch R movies.

12.  I swear, and then scold them for swearing.

13.  I hate shopping with my daughter.  So much that I gave her a shopping afternoon for Christmas, and she was astounded, as if I had handed her a bar of solid gold.  I was great during our afternoon together, for about three hours; after which I started to fade:  fidgeting and checking the time.  "My feet hurt.  I'm thirsty.  Are we done yet?"

But the really sick thing is that me kids are turning out OK, and they like me.  Most of the time.

5 comments:

  1. This non-parent enjoyed reading these honesties. I know for a fact that these would have been the highlights of my parenting, had I become one.

    I rarely regret deciding not to procreate, and lists like this reinforce my decision. I would have sucked.

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  2. Well, that was different! Congratulations on everyone surviving. My TT is up http://collectingmythoughts.blogspot.com/2014/02/thursday-thirteen-black-history-month.html

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  3. There's some pretty great admissions there. I love the PTA comment...especially the royal icing. You mean you didn't have time for that?! ;)

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  4. I love the honesty in your list. Number 5. At least he gave a b-. That was so cute. Once I had two little kids in arm casts at the same time. Talk about the looks I got when we went somewhere.

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  5. I sat here howling. Because, believe it or not, I have done almost everything on this list, except the Desitin. But, I do swear that for one full year, I smelled of it. Liv had diaper rash so bad that I used to just let her walk around without a diaper to help clear it up and then when she made "that" face, I would swoop her up and run for the toilet. I was always ashamed at her checkups because it would be noted in her chart that she had diaper rash and I swear to GOD that I changed her frequently and tried everything on the market. To this day, I smell Desitin on someone's baby and I get hives.

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