I remember having a t-shirt as a kid that said, “Pobody’s Nerfect”, and these days I find I’m repeating that mantra to myself a lot. Here’s the thing: as parents we all have a heck of a lot going on in our lives and there are bound to be times when we just have to take a step back, throw our hands in the air and say a mental, “okay…you got me. I give up…”
So if you’re like me and you find yourself occasionally overwhelmed by exhaustion, busy-ness or even just a bad day and a larger-than-normal pile of dirty laundry, then this post is for you. Perhaps some of my admissions of mothering failure will help you feel just a wee bit less terrible about yourself the next time you have an imperfect parenting moment.
(But if you are perfect and never have any parenting fails, kindly move on before reading because I don’t want to you to judge me. Or if you do read this and judge me, at least be kind enough not to comment about it.)
So here they are, in no particular order. Some of my motherhood fails:
- The time(s) I let my kids go to bed without brushing their teeth because I just couldn’t cope with the whining and arguing.
- The time I let my kid watch YouTube and then heard the phrase “blow job” come blaring out of the computer.
- The time I told my kid to sleep on her bare mattress because I was tired and wanted to go to sleep myself and I was just too damn lazy to put a clean sheet on her bed.
- The time I gave my kids gravol before a long drive even though they don’t get carsick.
- The time I let my kids stay home from school even though I knew darn well they weren’t sick.
- Alternatively: the time I sent my kids to school even though I knew darn well they were sick.
- The time I let my kids watch Bridesmaids because I really wanted to watch it and they weren’t in bed yet.
- The time I lied to a telemarketer (“this is a really bad time – we’re just heading out the door!”) in front of my kid while lazing on the couch reading a book and in no way heading out the door to anywhere.
- The time I slept in and ignored the calls of “Mom, can you make me something to eat?” and then came downstairs to find my kids had eaten a bag of chips for breakfast.
- The time I made my youngest stay up past midnight because I didn’t want to leave the wedding yet…
“Please Mommy, I’m sooooo tiiiired!”
So my secret’s out now…but what about you? Any dirty parenting laundry you’d like to air?
ding ding ding! we have a winnahhhhhh!!!! 🙂
Sorry ladies, but I have something that may beat you all. Based on a series of events I won’t get into right now, I sent my 10-year-old daughter to school with the Sports Illustrated swimsuit model calendar to give to her male secret santa gift recipient. Yes, that’s right; I encouraged my daughter to distribute soft porn at school…she got caught and in major trouble. And then I had a GIANT hole I had to dig myself out of. Which I did. Shamefully.
This is your “worst” list? Oh man… I’m going to hell FOR SURE!!
i thought i’d better write this down now…just said the girls can play for 10 minutes instead of me reading them stories so i can have a glass of wine. (didn’t tell them about the wine, tho’)
oh wow….ummm
I feel like my list would be easier if I listed the good stuff….
I say the eff word all the time, and he only gives me crap for saying stupid.
We eat ‘breakfast for dinner’ all the time because cereal is super easy to make.
I ditch him for a weekend a month.
He is four and watches shows for teens.
I’ve lied to him and told him the car cd player is broken when i don’t want to listen to his music anymore.
i’ll need more space than what you give…but seriously, who can be a perfect parent? who wants to be? i can’t imagine the boring, dull kids that come out of a family who doesn’t make one mistake. how can those kids grow up to roll with the punches, to improvise, to look back and find the humour in things? like being left in paris? 🙂
REALLY???Thats the worst ?That sounds like normal average stuff to me,not bad at all.I let my 4 year old play 18+ x-box games with me,and he is better than me.We also watch Dexter and Walking dead,and horror movies.He knows its fake and he is a super smart ,awesome,well behaved kid:)I think its all the way you look at things and explain them to them so they understand why you do the things you do.
The time we left our seven year old home alone while we all went on a trip to Paris.
Wait….what?
These are your parenting fails?! No wonder you guys are such awesome moms. These are just real life. How ’bout this one: The time I arranged via email for a parent on the team to drive my daughter to baseball because I was at an event, and I didn’t know the person and his neutral name meant I also didn’t know if he was male or female. So I said “This person is coming at 12:30 to pick you up for baseball. I don’t know if it’s a mom or a dad. Just go with them.”
The time(s) I sent them out to Timmy’s/Subway/McD’s for dinner because I was too frazzled to cook!
Wait, back up. We’re supposed to get them to brush their teeth EVERY night? Oh man!
Here’s mine:
The time I gave my kid McDonald’s so he would go to his sports class