Friday 5: Top Parenting Quotes

I’m not normally a huge fan of quotes, especially when people tweet inspirational quotes on my timeline.  However, over the years I’ve come across a few parenting quotes that either resonated with me or made me laugh and thought I’d share them with you.

 ‘Toddlers are like airports without control towers’. ~ Dr Christopher Green

‘You don’t have to be perfect to be a good parent’. ~ unknown

‘If you have never been hated by your child you have never been a parent’. 
~ Bette Davis

‘Parents who are afraid to put their foot down usually have children who tread on their toes’.
~ Chinese Proverb

‘Mothers are all slightly insane’. ~ J.D. Salinger

 Do you have any that have made you laugh or made you nod in agreement?

 

Things you shouldn’t say to your kids

I was walking to Sainsbury’s the other day, it’s just around the corner, and came across a mum, possibly a 2-3 year old in the stroller and their dog, suitably on a lead.  The dog was whimpering a bit, nothing really.  But then I heard the child from the pram say ‘shut up’ to the dog, then the mum turns and said, ‘yes, tell him to shut up!’.

When we were growing up there were 3 things we were not allowed to say as kids:

  1. Shut Up!
  2. I hate you!
  3. I’m going to kill you!

Now that my sister and I are safely in our forties, we do tease our mum and taunt her with ‘Shut Up, I hate you, and I’m going to kill you’ in unison.  Luckily for us we’re too big to put over her knee but wouldn’t put it passed her to get the Lady Maker out (Wooden Spoon).

In my opinion, I find ‘shut up’ rude, offensive and insulting.  I know at times I’m screaming it in my head but would never say it to another person.  Well maybe I’ve been guilty of it on one or two occasions.

I really felt for the dog, but also dread to think how she speaks to her child when she’s not in public.

What words or expressions (remember this is a family blog) that you find offensive?  What can we say instead?

 

 

 

 

Smothering not Mothering!

I’m convinced some mums secretly enjoy their children being clingy. *runs for cover*

On the weekend I took my daughter to a children’s production.  It was a lovely story of a dad, with a wild imagination who got up to all kinds of mischief.

At the beginning of the play, the father is asleep on the floor, all the children were sitting on cushions up front and the actress who was playing the daughter, tried to get some of the children to come up and help wake him up.  He was snoring the house down.

I was stunned, not one single child, except my own, would go up and join in.  What the hell were they scared of and why were they so timid, their parents were within a metre of them and it was a safe, fun environment.  Sadly, this isn’t the first time I’ve seen this!

This is not an opportunity for me to boast about how confident my daughter is, as this has many challenges in itself and according to research ‘kids who are so “independent” are far more likely to use drugs or alcohol, be sexually active, and have other problems’.  So I’m screwed either way really.

I’ve never been good at articulating this (maybe I shouldn’t blog) and I’ve tried to have this conversation with friends before but it didn’t go down very well, one of those lead balloon moments, maybe it was a bit too close to home.  I often see mums peeling their children off them at the school gate.  The mum’s do seem stressed, but I also get the sneaking suspicion that they like it and have a need to be needed.

Is this another result of overprotective parenting?  If so, how and why does this happen: Do mums now base their own self worth on their children’s deeds, so if the child fails they feel they have, were they insecure as a child/adult themselves, were their own parents overprotective or do they worry that if they don’t others will judge them as bad parents?  Seriously tell me why!!!

Obviously, like any parent we want to protect our children from harm but I really don’t think we’re doing our children any favours by passing on our own insecurities.  This isn’t mothering it’s smothering!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.  Am I way off the mark? If you have a clingy child can you see anything that you did early on that may have caused it?  If you could do it again would you do it differently?  Do you prefer your child to be more cautious?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe being a perfect parent isn’t such a good idea….

Do I take my daughter to see her daddy in hospital?

This was a question I struggled with recently.  As many of you are aware my husband was involved in a road traffic accident and sustained substantial head injuries; not a phone call any loved one ever wants to receive late on a Friday night.  However, he is expected to make a full recovery after giving us all quite a fright.

Perfect childhood to blame?

Coincidentally, as I was whiling away time in the hospital, reading yet another trashy newspaper, I came across an article, but for the life of me I can’t remember the woman’s name.  However, she grew up in the 70s in the perfect house on a perfect street with perfect parents.  Growing up she didn’t know a single person with divorced parents!

She was never exposed to any of life’s challenges and now as an adult she’s unable to cope with further education, relationships, work and now being a parent.     Ironically, in a time when people wear a bad upbringing as a badge of honour, she blames her ‘perfect upbringing’.

Life’s lessons

As an adult, I feel I’m quite good at dealing with difficult situations as I was given the opportunity as a child/young adult.  My life hasn’t been anymore difficult than anyone else’s, I’ve experienced death, divorce, disappointment and disease, but my mother never sheltered us from these situations when they happened.  However, she was always careful with the amount she did share, telling us just enough to put us at ease.

The Conundrum

From the beginning, I was honest with my 4 year old and told her that ‘daddy had fallen off his bike and bumped his head and would need to stay in the hospital for awhile’.  After a couple of days they both started asking to see each other and I was really torn.  Do I take her or don’t I take her?  On the outside she seemed okay, but I could tell that she was worrying as she was a bit quieter than usual, which may be because the last two people she visited in hospital died.

In the end, I decided to take her.  A friend suggested that the best thing to do was to prepare her first.  My friend kindly sent me a photo of her own son; one with a black eye and another a few weeks later with it healed.  I showed these to her on the train,  explaining that Daddy looked different but in time he would be heal.

When we arrived she was very quiet and I slightly panicked that I made the wrong decision, but within minutes she climbed into bed with him, they shared a much needed cuddle and quickly began arsing around with the bed controls laughing and carrying on as usual.  Phew!

When we got home she did say that she ‘was scared when she first saw him’ but I could tell that a giant weight had been lifted off her little shoulders.

What would you have done?

 

 

 

 

 

Lies we tell our kids!

As parents we’re not always perfect and at times are pushed to be creative with the truth; eg. Telling them the park’s closed, sheep are wooly pigs and that wine is ‘Mummy’s Brain Juice’.  What’s the worst/best thing you have ever told your kids?  Feel free to add them to the comments section.

Here are a few gems from my lovely twitter friends.