We're not always at our best as parents. We repeat ourselves often, knowing the result will be the same. I'm but a parent to young kids, but I've done research and I know of 11 ridiculous things all parents of kids under 6 have said. I know because I've said them all and I'm a parent and therefore [science explanation that's probably wrong]...
1. "Kids, I'm going to the bathroom. I'll be right back."
It's a bathroom, you're a parent, they're kids. They know.
2. "It doesn't need a Band-Aid."
Is it bleeding? Can you see it? Are they pointing to it? Can they see it? It's there. It needs a Band-Aid.
3. "Should we set an alarm just in case the kids don't wake us up?"
For real? In case the kids suddenly sleep in past 6:00 a.m. for the first time in five years? OK, you tell yourself it's needed.
4. "I can't believe this is something I'm actually telling you."
Did you just tell your child not to use the hair dryer to vacuum the house with? Or did you just ask them to take their hair out of the peanut butter jar? Whatever it was, it wasn't in the "things you need to know about raising a child" book that you bought to prepare yourself for raising kids. You know what though? You do believe it, because just yesterday you said "there's nothing you could do to shock me any more," when you found them filling your closet with water.
5. "Whoever called them the terrible twos has never had a 3-year-old. Whoever called 3 the worst age has never had a 4-year-old. Whoever said 4-year-olds are the worst has never had a 5-year-old. I quit."
But wait until they're 6. Then it all gets better.
6. "There, the laundry is all folded."
Oh, is it? Then what do you call the pile of clothes at your child's feet?
7. "I'm sorry these pancakes don't look like the Incredible Hulk, or Captain America, or a circle."
Yes, you watched the tutorial and yes, you told your kids that you'd be able to do it. But then you started ACTUALLY doing it. And then you got mad that it wasn't working so you stabbed the Incredible Hulk pancake with a spatula. And then you couldn't even make that mess look like a normal pancake.
8. "That clock is broken, right? It's not 5:00 p.m., is it? Did we just have a time change? How is it not bedtime?"
You're right, the clock is wrong. You forgot to set it back last time change and it's only 4:00 p.m. and you're still at work hallucinating about how much havoc your children are going to wreak when you get home.
9. "I'm going to give you both the exact same thing so you don't fight over it."
Because kids can't notice imperceptible differences in the size of the fishy crackers you gave them, or the slightly different shades of green of the bowl the crackers are in. And because children don't love to fight about nothing anyway.
10. "If you don't stop right now, we're not going to go get ice cream."
That ice cream is for you and you know it. You never, ever intended to not go get ice cream. You think they don't know this?
11. "It's time to go to sleep."
Just stop. It's never time for sleep.
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