Worst Bit About Being a Grown Up? Being a Grown Up.

Euna is regressing at night time... For no apparent reason she is up screaming blue murder at all hours and driving me insane. When Bow is finally starting to do half decent night stretches and she's started doing this I am having conversations with myself at 3:00am that start with "why do my children hate me?" Lots of counting the ten. Lots of gritting of teeth when I just want to shout "JUST GOOOOOO TO BLOOOOOODY SLEEEEEEEP!"

And I'm thinking; do you know what's rubbish about being a parent? The fact that you ALWAYS have to be the grown up. Always. You always have to take the moral high ground. You always have to be the first to set a calm tone when everybody's getting stressed out. You always have to call bedtime. You always have to be the one thinking ahead and planning and putting a practical spin on things. You can't ever say "no you are". You're far too often having to be mature, patient, forward-thinking, reasonable, polite... 

The thing is when my parents had to be all those things I was totally convinced they loved being like that, especially my mum, and that it would be about ten lifetimes before I would have to be like that. It wasn't ten lifetimes, I think it was about ten minutes. And actually I'm not that different a person. Nothing magical happened to transform me in to he imagined mythical version of a grown up I had in my head.

So you just have to act like a grown up all the time. Which is a bit like choosing to be the boring person with a cake allergy at a birthday party. And that birthday party is on for about 12-14 hours a day, every day.

Maybe that's why it's so common to feel like you're a bit of a bore sometimes when you're a parent? I'm not though! I promise! Infact to prove it, because I kind of feel like I need to after reading this post back, we're off on our holidays today and I promise to do at least a few thoroughly irresponsible things! :D Bon voyage! Or asfalés taxídi as Google tells me it is in Greek! 

See you in ten days!