to get completely pissed off by smug 'know all' parents?

[JRmumma]

It might just be me, but I find it really irritating when people who have children when you don't, or have older children than you, talk to you as if they are the authority on being a parent, and know better than you, just because they did it first. It also has a tone of 'im better than you coz i have kids/ had kids before you did'.

My favorite example is when someone says 'you don't know what tired is until you have a child'. Really boils my piss. There are a plethora of reasons why someone might be tired in their life, not just because your baby wakes in the night or is high needs. Its this sort of attitude, that implies that all life experiences except child rearing are invalid, that i find so desperately infuriating.

Anyone else???

Well I never knew what tiredness was till my dc, so tired it affected my whole life and anything I did and it dragged on and on and on and on and on.

I never mention this to others though, as I wouldn't want them to think I'm a bad parent who couldn't 'make' my babies/toddlers sleep

I am grateful though that my dc grew up and out of the bad sleep.

I feel so sorry for parents/carers of dc with special needs who still struggle with sleep issues

The tiredness of having a newborn baby was the hardest physical endurance test of my life. Getting to 8 months without anything like a full night's sleep was pretty horrendous. But I wouldn't say I didn't know what tired was before. It's just a different type of tired. And I would certainly never say it in that smug way some parents do, to a non-parent who is complaining about feeling tired.

What used to get me was a friend of mine who, whenever I did anything remotely fun, liked to pipe up with 'you won't be able to do THAT once you have children.' In fact you can do most things once you have children, it just takes a bit more planning and compromise. It's the insistence that your own experience is the only one that's relevant which irritates me. That and 'you think it's hard now? Wait until they're toddler/at school/teenager/still living with you when they're 40, etc'.

To be honest, people who have older children, or who have children when you don't usually are the authority on stuff you have no clue about. If they sound like they are being smug know-it-alls it's probably as a reaction to having to listen to people who have no experience of something telling them exactly how things should be, or will be when it's their turn.

I see it all the time on here. People with two year olds telling people with very challenging 15 year olds what they should and should not tolerate, and how they should and should not react to things. Because it's all so clear and simple until you have to do it.

I just do a great deal of hollow laughing from this side of my screen.

Ask any mother of hard work toddlers what winds them up most, and it's criticism from people who do not have any children, and having to hear all about how they think you are doing it wrong. It's quite hilarious really.

Sharaluck. .Thank you. .7 year old non sleeper here.

Who won't "grow out" of the toddler stage and become much easier independent and able to be left alone/help out

It's all relative.

However I DON'T generally say that to people with NO kids for the reasons in the OP. I am with the OP

No=NT.

Daft phone.

I don't say it to childless people either of course

Might be against the grain here but for me the following truths apply - not that I shove them down the throat of anyone, but they are still truths:

I had far, far better sleep with newborns than during pregnancy. The first one was a bit weird in that you are not used to that feeling of not knowing when you next wake up, which is disconcerting, but they did sleep quite well, both of them, by sheer fluke, but during pregnancy I could barely sleep from 25 weeks onwards (crap at pregnancy) so for me just not being pregnant anymore and being able to grab 3 hour or 4 hour becoming 6 hour slots was an absolute godsend.

For me it was sort of easier with 2 - not in every way, but number 2 I knew what I was doing, and before long they'd play together, and all was well. Some complications happen, when one is of an age when they need to be picked up from preschool just when the 18 month old decides to nap or whatever, but all in all, having 2 within 2 years was a good decision/luck/whatever.

People who say stuff about their experience may have a point and also may be way off the mark.

People who say the things that are really important to you re certain parts of child rearing (which they usually bring up in the first place) will go out the window are often wrong; not small things like dummies but the really big things like making false threats or smacking/not etc. The things that really matter big style/philosophically to you before children often matter enough after that you stick to it.

And therefore it is patronising to say otherwise.

When I encounter pregnant women who say "ooh crap its all going to be crap everyone says it will be crap" I often say, y'know it might not be that bad - or it might - nowt you can do about it just go with it.

3 under 15 months- sorry tiredness doesn't even begin to describe the exhaustion I felt which I had never experienced prior.

If asked I give the truth- babies are exhausting particularly the newborn crying all night and just toddling stages,c/sections and 2 year olds are actually a piece of piss and breast feeding was the single most difficult and horrible bit of parenting I've experienced to date.

Pretty much covers it.I don't give unless asked(does anybody) but I'm not in the habit of lying or sugar coating when advice is asked for.

No smugness here just battle weary.

Gertrude mine are 6 and 4 and it is definitely easier. I can take them for a walk through the village knowing they won't bolt into the road. I can take them to the supermarket knowing none of us will have a screaming tantrum my meltdown or a wee in the booze aisle.
And the best bit? In general I'm doing all this on at least six hours unbroken sleep

Mine are 9 and 10, it's even better.You can eat lunch at any time,go to cafes with nothing bar a wallet,wet wipes are a thing of the past,they can hold on for a wee for aaaaaaages.....

Embracing the Tweens whilst eyeing up the teenage years with trepidation.

On a more serious note I prefer brutal honesty as you can then breeze through things knowing hundreds have found it hard before you.If I had had more honesty re bfeeding I honestly think I'd have done it longer.

Mine are 9 and 6. Yes it's easier, but I found that me and my dh had been on autopilot for years and years (my ds has only just come out of the tantrum stroppy stage if honest) and we found last year that our relationship nearly broke as we just both felt emotionally (and physically) exhausted. Things are much better now. I think it's just the drip drip drip of monotony, tiredness, boredom etc.

Anyway, back to the point. I try not to talk to people about newborns unless they ask.

What I really hate, is the 'smug' new parents. You know, the type that have about an 8 month old who's sleeping a bit better, weaned, not moving, not talking - they come out with lots of idealistic stuff like "oh my child will never have crisps for snacks" or "my child will never have the tv on" etc. I'm thinking, hmmmmm let's wait until you've hit the relentless whining, arguing, destruction stage. It's easy to be a perfect parent when your child sits where you put it and doesn't talk back or have an opinion.

Smugness is always irritating.

But the comment about tiredness is possibly the truest statement ever made in the history of humankind.

And yy to harryhausen

Besides (on a roll now) it's not just the broken sleep.
Poor/ no sleep every night for ......well, months/ years...
Not just waking up but waking to attend to / feed/ settle a baby/ child
Then no respite the next day. No lie in, no time in your own head to mentally recover whilst all the time putting the needs of your baby first. Having to get it right on no sleep/ no rest because your child is so valuable and dependent and also because Everything you do is watched and commented on by ppl around you.

And yy to Harry.

That type of parent normally accompanies all their pearls of wisdom with loud parenting so the whole world knows their baby is enjoying an array of organic finger food and how patient their sing song voices sound.

Sad thing is those further down the line know they'll be shovelling in pink sausage rolls,dishing out death stares and hissing manically along with the rest of us in the not too distant a future.

To quote the queen,life will never be the same.

But it is worth every minute of exhaustion and exasperation.

Would just like to add that your body clock never recovers hence the abundance of early MNing on a Saturday morning.

I can never understand the ones who say that their DC slept right through the night from day one. Is that actually possible? Don't newborns need feeding frequently?

What really annoys me are the sort of people who talk about boiling their piss. Really worried me how their children will grow up and I am an authority as I have older teens.

I mean, I saw a thread on here the other week saying how it was 'abusive' to tell your child to shut up.

I face palmed quietly to myself with that one. I frequently tell my children to shut up, especially ds6 who had spent the last half hour literally breathing huge lists of Doctor Who baddies or trash pack toys in my ear while I'm trying to fill out a form/make dinner/talk on the phone to a client etc.

However, I'm slightly going off topic here

I didn't know what tiredness was until I had to recover from a massive blood loss and major op while looking after newborn twins....I was simply not physically capable of keeping my eyes open, I couldn't be trusted to feed my babies without supervision.

However having babies seems to make you public property, a bump or a buggy seems invite unwanted comments, some were lovely and some were horrible, I learned to keep my head down and not make eye contact. "Double the trouble and half the fun" was trotted out while my dts were in their buggy singing Twinkle Twinkle...and they were being perfectly lovely. I was flabbergasted at the rudeness, but they got a massive grin from me....sad bastard.
And I've been told so many times how having single children is so much harder than having two newborns at the same time - the joys of competitive misery - I always agree with them and go further telling them how completely awful it must be for them, how do they cope etc...I get a perverse pleasure in taking the piss but seeming completely genuine.