A Small Note, Dedicated To My Pre-Toddler Self…

You’re a jerk.

You think you know aaaaaaaaaaaaaaall about kids because you spent sooooo much time around them your whoooole life.  You know eeeeeeeverything there is to know because you nannied and camp-councelled or whatever.  Right.  YOU DON’T KNOW SQUAT ABOUT SQUAT.

And YOU.  You with your one child, your 9 month old all sweet and cute.  You’ve gotten the hang of this mother thing, you’re over the newborn newbies.  You think you know eeeeeeverything there is to know about being a mom and life is soooooooo easy.  YOU HAVE NO IDEA.

Because the moment will come– perhaps on a Tuesday afternoon while multiple children are screaming circles around you– when you’ll understand that you don’t know squat about squat; when you’ll understand that these kids are YOUR teachers.  And you will say to yourself what I am saying to you now:  Self, you’ll say, I was a jerk.  Man, what a jerk I have been.  And you’ll look at the people who have gone before you, perhaps people whose parenting your childless self did judge, and in that moment your two year old will slap you on the face, and you will realize that high-horses don’t exist for moms of toddlers.

-mtg

Originally published August 14, 2015