5 Hidden Land Mines of Parenthood That Can Blow Up Your Life

Cracked

#1. All Your Plans and Strategies Get Amended or Flat-Out Vetoed

I can't tell you how many times I've seen this happen. You have your first child and plan on taking a few months off before heading back to work. You just need enough time for bonding, as well as finding a good, trustworthy baby sitter. So after a few months, you nail one down and head on back to your job.

A month later, you start getting weekly calls from the sitter. She's constantly getting sick, and you know from experience that she's using her fake "sick voice" -- in reality, she's tired of not being able to hang out with her friends, instead having to listen to your asshole kid scream for hours at a time while she wipes shit off of his back. But every time she calls in, you have to do the same at your own job. Your work history is now hinged on the work ethics of a teenage girl. So you look for another month until you find another sitter. One who's old enough to have a menstrual cycle. A month after that, same problem. What the fuck?

That's when you realize that baby sitters make jack shit, so it's easy for them to say "Fuck this" and just take the day off. So you up the ante and look for a good child care service -- and then promptly shit your pants when you see how much they're charging, on top of the lengthy background checks and paperwork involved.
. . .
In my case, my ex-wife had to resort to working weekends so that one of us would always be there with the kids. What that meant was that on her days off, I'd be working, and vice versa. We rarely saw each other, because as one of us was walking in the door, the other would be walking out. And that was us being lucky that our respective workplaces were flexible enough to allow modified schedules to accommodate it.

Don't let any of this scare you off from having kids -- being a parent is seriously the best thing that ever happened to me, and I wouldn't take a second of it back for anything in the world. But don't let the parenting books and bubbly family sitcoms paint an unrealistic picture for you. If you go into it educated, you'll be in a far better position to make it work out in your favor. They should be required by law to teach this kind of shit in high school. Dick jokes and all.

Or, I'll just keep my marriage the way it is (and avoid the horrifying results of #2-5) and NOT assume that the best thing that ever happened to John Cheese will be the best thing that ever happened to me. Yes, I like that option very much.

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