I have a couple of observations about my life as a new parent that I feel like sharing with you fine folks:
Sleep. It's the holy grail for new parents. It's the thing that every person who doesn't have a baby is sick of hearing about (tough shit). When it's good, you feel like you're floating in a pool of angel tears. When it's bad, you feel like you're floating in a pool of angel turds. Some people are blessed with babies who just naturally snooze and the rest of us have kids who run their fingernails across the sides of their pack n' plays at 3am, like some kind of fucking horror movie.
Well-meaning old ladies at the grocery store make you feel like if you don't "train" your kid to sleep through the night, they are going to end up being a 47-year-old man who sucks his thumb and collects women's hair. And yet, when you think about letting your kid cry it out, it's easy to be flooded with thoughts of them in their adulthood, lacking empathy because you stole their precious attachment and thus resorting to registering as a Republican and exhibiting extreme road rage.
I feel like I might offend someone here, so my apologies in advance, but sleep training makes me want to punch someone in the tit. Sure, I get it. In fact, every other night I tell Josh, "That's it. Tomorrow night we start teaching this kid to go to sleep on his own." I might even do it eventually. Side note: For those of you with no kids, reading this in bed at 11am (I hate you), sleep training is when you 'teach' your kid to go to sleep on their own and sleep through the night without relying on you because they are tiny babies who can't fucking figure it out on their own. But really, I think sleep training is a way to make money off of terrified, sleep-deprived new parents. OF COURSE I will buy and read your book that promises if I do steps one through eighty-seven my kid will sleep through the night. Who wouldn't buy that shit? But here's the thing: If it was that simple, there wouldn't be 900 fucking books on the topic. Babies are different from each other just like you and I are different. While masturbation and a hot cup of tea puts me right to sleep, for you that shit might just make you feel all uptight and give you heartburn.
Maybe I'm just cranky 'cause I'm tired.
Anyway, here are some other, less-ranty parental observations:
I sometimes wonder if my kid is going to speak only in sing-song. I find myself looking at him sometimes, thinking, "I can't have a conversation with you if you don't talk back to me. Fuck." So instead, I sing everything at him. "You got a load in your pants that smells like sweet bread. If we were rednecks then your name would be Jed."
No one checks me out anymore. It might be the extra 30lbs I'm carrying or the fact that I haven't brushed my hair since 2013, but I don't think so. I think it's because once a kid comes out of your vagina, people can tell that the last thing you want to do is fuck a stranger.
That's all I got for now. I tried to write a whole paragraph about baby poop, but it turned out shitty.
Cheers!
