This is a guest post written by Felicity Frankish from The Baby Vine.
Parenting is full of hard (and hilarious) conversations. The first one that springs to mind is usually The Talk- the good old “how are babies made” chat. But another important talk might come up sooner than you think. The conversation about the end of life. It could be the loss of a beloved pet or the death of a special family member. Or it could be as seemingly innocuous as a dead mouse on the road…
I’m not even kidding. Parenting groups on Facebook are one of the wildest rides you can take while staring at your phone on your daily commute. Or, you know, whenever it is you do your scrolling. The bigger the group, the wilder the ride. Which makes sense; the more members, the more diverse the crowd. I’ve been in dozens of these groups over the years and I think there’s a handful of characters that are common to each and every one.
We all get tired, stressed, sick and sore. Being a parent doesn’t mean you have a monopoly on these things. If people who don’t have kids feel these things, it’s totally valid! Let them speak without making it about you! This is guest post written by Bryony Sumner.
I was making a cup of tea at work the other morning when I overheard a young lad yawning and telling his mate that he thought his problem was that he was just getting “too much sleep”. Making him groggy, you see. Poor lamb.
It was all I could do not to stuff my used teabag up his nose in a fit of jealousy.
Too much sleep. Ha!
Image via STFU Parents on Facebook.
I heard myself guffaw and just as I was about to make a smart comment about not sleeping since 2014, when I got a tap on the shoulder from my younger self and a memory from about 5 years ago.
If you have a both a child and internet access, you’ll know that feeding your child is one of the most fraught and contentious subject that you can discuss. Forget politics, religion or working out which book sucked more- Twilight or 50 Shades? Those debates have NOTHING on the way you feed your kids for the first 10-15 years (yes, YEARS) of their lives. From birth until it’s time to make school lunches, what we put in their mouths is bound to be controversial to someone. It’s like we can’t help ourselves; we have to be outraged by the slightest difference in method, needs or philosophy.
via GIPHY