Sunday, July 1, 2012

I Will Never ...

Three little words were never spoken by another as much as they were spoken by me. Before I had kids, I was absolutely certain that there were specific things that I would simply never, ever do. Like wipe my child's nose with my shirt. Of course, there are some good "never"s, like allowing them to play with knives in traffic. That kind of thing. But then there are the other "never" promises that were spoken out of complete inexperience.

Upon becoming a mother, I completely proved myself wrong. Utterly wrong.

Here are some of my best "I Will Never" statements that are now "I Do Actually"confessions:

I will never drive a minivan.

I will never have brightly colored toys in my house.

I will never tell my child to do something "because I said so".

I will never let my children wear their pajamas all day (although I still won't take them out in public with their jammies on ... except in drive-thrus ...).

I will never let my baby sleep in my bed.

I will never watch Elmo.

Oh, sigh. Me.

And the list goes on.

The biggest lesson motherhood has taught me? To keep my mouth shut until I experience it for myself. :)

How about you? Was there anything you absolutely swore you wouldn't do when you had kids ... and then you actually had kids and things changed?

Have a lovely day!

13 comments:

  1. I would never let a baby change my schedule. I was convinced I could still go out to dinner with friends and just tote the baby along. Ha...maybe some babies are good out in public but not my guy.

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  2. Oh goodness, my list would go on and on. I've also learned to "keep my mouth shut until I experience it for myself," and I kind of wish I could impose that mantra on a few people in my life. He he. ;)

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  3. Definitely said I would never let my baby sleep in bed with me. And I would never be one of those moms that hangs out at home all the time. I was going to take him everywhere and he was going to love it. HA! Not so much. Little dude likes going places, but not for too long. He definitely feels most comfortable at home.

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    1. Oh girls, I totally hear you! I thought for sure my baby would just do whatever I wanted to do whenever I wanted to do it--ha! I guess I was surprised that I didn't birth a programmable robot, but rather a little human being who had his own needs. Who knew?!

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  4. We were NOT going to do a pacifier and definitely not one after 2 years old! (she got rid of it at 2 years and three months old)

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  5. Oh man, we've all been there, huh? Before kids, I SWORE I'd never be a stay at home mom. Yuck. Hahahahaha. How funny how life changes you. Once I saw that little heartbeat on the ultrasound, my story changed and that got thrown in my face. I couldn't leave my babies. ;)

    I also swore I'd never let my kids wear tacky character clothing. I've since learned to choose my battles. If it makes them happy and gets us out the door to our destination without a struggle, I'm all for it!

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    1. I totally forgot to mention the character clothes! YES!!!

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  6. My biggest, "I will never," was, "I will never have children." I thank God everyday that he proved that, "I will never," wrong.

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  7. I swore I would never open a grocery store item before paying for it just to keep my kid quiet! :)

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  8. Oh gosh, I swore that ...

    I would NEVER co-sleep & we have co-slept with both our boys for 15 months and plan to do it with number three here in a few weeks...
    I would NEVER let me kids wear character clothing. Well, Thomas the Train shirts & lighting McQueen shoes now live in my house.
    I would maybe breastfeed for 6 months... I strictly breastfed my first for 15 months and my second for 12 and I can't wait to do it again.
    I would NEVER use any kind of sippy cup. Well, taking little ones out & about without a cup with a lid on it is pretty hard to do... duh.
    And, the list goes on...

    Motherhood is humbling in EVERY way.

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  9. I will never let my child sleep with me. It doesn't happen too often but at one in the morning when a crying four year old comes in your room because he had a bad "dweam" all that flies out the window.

    I will never have a child that throws a fit in public. Ahem . . . I do discipline my child people. Oh how I wish I hadn't judged!

    I will never feed my child mcDonalds . . .

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  10. My perspective on this is a little different. I was a young mom (20, almost 21), so I never really had a chance to say "I will never..." I was the first of my friends to have kids, and it was years before any of them did. Instead of "I will never" I had a lot of "I will always..." statements. I will always be patient with my children, speak kindly to my children, have plenty of clean laundry for them to wear, etc. I was SO idealistic.

    I think most of our "I will never" or "I will always" statements are based on our disapproval of what we've seen other parents do or not do. It's the same principle- we really don't know what we will or won't do until we're in that situation. And sometimes even the situation is unimaginable to us, especially when our kids are young (I never could have imagined what having a child in middle school is really like).

    That's why when moms of little kids tell me they'll never have their kids in competitive sports or they'll never spend hours each day driving their children here and there, I just smile. If I had known moms who did these things 10 years ago, I would have said the same thing. But oh, how perspective changes everything!!

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  11. Oh man! We don't have kids yet but these are all things that we say now...kinda scares the crap outta me!! haha

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