Eight things only motherhood teaches you - another not-a-Mommy-blogger post
Every now and then I look back 350 years to when I was a young mummy/mommy delete as appropriate and bring you the benefit of my frequent and disastrous failures wisdom and experience.
Some things I learned ...
1. Sweetcorn looks the same when it comes out of a baby as when it went in. However, it doesn't taste the same, so however tempting it is, however poor you are, however short you are on kitchen cupboard ingredients, don't even think about it.
2. The English phrase 'No, don't you dare', in Babyese, means, 'Go ahead. Do it.' The opposite is also true.
3. The likelihood that your baby will have explosive broccoli-induced diarrhoea correlates exactly with the likelihood that a) you are at a cocktail party held by your mother-in-law, b) the baby is wearing a cream romper suit given to you by your mother-in-law, c) your mother-in-law is wearing a cream outfit herself AND holding the baby.
4. You can't see the trail of second-hand baked beans which has been sicked down the back of your shirt. Only other people can see this. Not all other people feel comfortable about sharing the information with you. Just be sure of this, if they are laughing, it is not at your jokes.
5. Doing a Powerpoint presentation to work colleagues is always livened up when your milk comes in and your nipples leak onto your silk shirt just as you show the pie chart on Slide 14.
6. Babies never scream at the supermarket checkout. This always happens in Aisle 1, just as you've entered the supermarket with a list as big as a banker's bonus. By the time you reach the checkout, they've stopped and gone to sleep. Meanwhile, you've got so wired up you have a trolley full of chocolate, cakes, wine and Paracetamol, with not a carton of milk in sight.
7. Lack of sleep sucks, but there are some advantages it is worth hanging onto. You can wear the same mascara for weeks, because the dark shadows around your eyes will hide the smudges. The pallid look is currently fashionable among Hollywood stars, so even though the rest of you looks like a discarded sack, at least you're on your way to looking good. And being up for 23 hours out of 24 is a good way to lose weight (although eating two packets of dry Sugar Puffs while you breastfeed all night won't help this process).
8. Travelling on trains to important meetings with colleagues is fun and a nice break from being at home with the baby. However, pointing and yelling 'There's a MOO-MOO doing a POO-POO!' when going past a field may take the edge off your professional demeanour just a tad.
Some things I learned ...
1. Sweetcorn looks the same when it comes out of a baby as when it went in. However, it doesn't taste the same, so however tempting it is, however poor you are, however short you are on kitchen cupboard ingredients, don't even think about it.
2. The English phrase 'No, don't you dare', in Babyese, means, 'Go ahead. Do it.' The opposite is also true.
3. The likelihood that your baby will have explosive broccoli-induced diarrhoea correlates exactly with the likelihood that a) you are at a cocktail party held by your mother-in-law, b) the baby is wearing a cream romper suit given to you by your mother-in-law, c) your mother-in-law is wearing a cream outfit herself AND holding the baby.
4. You can't see the trail of second-hand baked beans which has been sicked down the back of your shirt. Only other people can see this. Not all other people feel comfortable about sharing the information with you. Just be sure of this, if they are laughing, it is not at your jokes.
5. Doing a Powerpoint presentation to work colleagues is always livened up when your milk comes in and your nipples leak onto your silk shirt just as you show the pie chart on Slide 14.
6. Babies never scream at the supermarket checkout. This always happens in Aisle 1, just as you've entered the supermarket with a list as big as a banker's bonus. By the time you reach the checkout, they've stopped and gone to sleep. Meanwhile, you've got so wired up you have a trolley full of chocolate, cakes, wine and Paracetamol, with not a carton of milk in sight.
7. Lack of sleep sucks, but there are some advantages it is worth hanging onto. You can wear the same mascara for weeks, because the dark shadows around your eyes will hide the smudges. The pallid look is currently fashionable among Hollywood stars, so even though the rest of you looks like a discarded sack, at least you're on your way to looking good. And being up for 23 hours out of 24 is a good way to lose weight (although eating two packets of dry Sugar Puffs while you breastfeed all night won't help this process).
8. Travelling on trains to important meetings with colleagues is fun and a nice break from being at home with the baby. However, pointing and yelling 'There's a MOO-MOO doing a POO-POO!' when going past a field may take the edge off your professional demeanour just a tad.
You also dumb down every single word and phrase that comes out of your mouth. Hello becomes "hebo", bed becomeds "beddy-byes" and you basically think the female presenters of CBeebies are well tasty. Some of the guys too.
ReplyDelete...but then you get older and start to forget so the universe sends you grandchildren and you get to learn new lessons all over again.
ReplyDeleteThis is all very true. I sometimes wonder if sweetcorn behaves the same in my own digestive system but have never wondered sufficiently urgently to check. I think I may continue to view it as one of life's unanswered questions.
ReplyDeleteI once had quite a long conversation with my supermarket trolley before I remembered that I'd left the baby with her granny on that occasion.
Carry on like that with your mommy blogs and I might find life worth living again.
ReplyDeleteI have neither babies nor small grandchildren and am unlikely to have any before dementia hits. And when that hits, I'll be the one spewing sweetcorn, thank you very much.
Very true... a definite 'baby voice' can emerge in some parents. It is where they talk in a higher pitched, simplistic, slower voice. I can't bloody stand it I can't.
ReplyDeleteSpot on and so, so funny. I am lolling. (that's the text speak lolling, not the lazing on furry cushions lolling).
ReplyDeleteWonderful stuff, had me laughing out loud.
ReplyDeleteGross on the sweetcorn thing! Oh, the image that came into my mind...
ReplyDeleteSteve - I think you'll find the 'hebo thing is just you, old chap. Keep taking the pills.
ReplyDeleteNana - what joys I have to come. I hope they ban sweetcorn before I become a granny.
Isabelle - ah, yes, talking to trolleys. No wonder - the level of conversation of the average toddler leads one to all kinds of desperate measures.
Friko - when you start spewing sweetcorn, please post pictures on your blog.
Annie - Yes, and I think sometimes even the kids themselves are thinking, 'Will you stop talking to me in that stupid voice, Mother? You're embarrassing me.'
Lane - you mean you never lol while lolling? SUCH a good combination.
Alan - thanks. Glad to cheer up your day.
Talli - I thought I'd leave that image at 'the mind'. I did consider googling 'nappy' and 'sweetcorn' and see what came up, but I thought better of it.
Fab blog, as always.
ReplyDeleteI am SOOOO pleased I am past all that now.
And to think I wanted a 3rd/4th child. Urgghh! xx
Hilarious - and every word true.
ReplyDeleteXX
Stumbled over here after you left a comment on my blog.
ReplyDeleteI bloody hooked you bugger!
Actually you had me at your 'about me' bit goddam it!
Oh, err, hello by the way x
You are so so right, as always. I just about remember this, particularly the "Look, a helicopter" cry.
ReplyDeleteBluestocking Mum - love the way you say 3rd/4th so casually like that, as though 4 would have been no different to 3!
ReplyDeleteSuzanne - Every single word on this blog is ALWAYS true. How could you doubt?
Tara - err, hello back! Cheers for coming on over.
Elizabethm - I know, and it's only when the whole street is looking up to see the helicopter that you realise you don't have the child with you ... Our family had this thing about spotting 'black-faced sheepies' in the countryside, and years later I still point them out in fields to adult friends who try to indulge me at the time but who tend not to get in touch again.
Speaking as a non-mommy (and non-mummy, as well), let me tell you: The first line of #6 is untrue.
ReplyDeleteAs a non-mum I love reading posts like this and knowing that I made the right decision not to have kids (grin).
ReplyDeleteJune - okay, I'll give you that one.
ReplyDeleteFrench Fancy - keep reading.
My babies never screamed in supermarkets because the first stop was the biscuit aisle where they were allowed to open and eat a packet of Foxes jammie dodgers - the ones with jam AND cream. It was the checkout girls who screamed when the got the slobbered over remains deposited on their conveyor belts and they had to find the barcode to scan.
ReplyDeleteLady, didya HAVE to go there with the sweetcorn? I'm going to have nightmares. xx
ReplyDelete