Can You Ever Be Prepared To Be A Parent?

I wrote this for BMWK.com, first posted 12/11/08. Gives you something to read over while I’m on “vacation.” See you Monday!

This ain’t the Boy Scouts: There’s no such thing as a prepared parent

 

I know one of the first things I did when I found out I was pregnant with my first child was run out and buy some pregnancy books. I got all the classics: What to Expect When You’re Expecting, The Breastfeeding Book, The Girlfriend’s Guide to Pregnancy. When I gave my husband the dog-eared books for him to read, he looked at me like I had just took a swig of liquor and handed him some to drink, too. “What do I need to read this for?”

 

Of course his question infuriated me, but I had to admit that he was right in some respects. People have been having kids for eons without the help of Dr. Sears and would be doing it for years after he was gone. I felt it was important to learn everything that could happen so that I could be prepared.

 

But can you ever be prepared? Can anything – let alone sitting down with a 200-page book – really help you understand the magnitude of parenthood? I don’t think so.

 

In all those books I read, there was never a chapter on what to do when your child has eczema, which is something I desperately needed to know. There was never a chapter on “What to Do When Your Child Flings Things at You for No Apparent Reason.”

 

Those books also never talk about the strains your marriage will face. “How to Stay in Love with the Person You Just Had a Baby With” should be chapter one in all those books, but it isn’t. Most baby books gloss over the fact that you and your partner will never be the same and (for the first few months at least) you might argue more than you’d like.