How did no one tell us about this?
This was the mantra for the first year of life as a parent.
There’s the hard stuff they don’t tell you—the sleepless nights, the visits to urgent care, the devious and various behavioral “regressions.”
And there’s the good stuff, too—the toothless smiles, the first words, the innocent (and hilarious) misunderstandings.
How did no one tell us?
Eventually, I realized:
They had told us. We just weren’t listening.
I have to think back—to the long stretch of my adult life when I was not a parent.
I remember that moment when you realize the conversation is about to turn to children—that there are parents in your midst.
I remember the boredom of these conversations for me.
I remember having to really try to listen.
I remember thinking that children and dreams were one and the same—of intense interest to the speaker, but boring the audience to tears.
I’m on the other side now, and I understand. Talking about your kids—especially with other parents—is one of the best parts of parenthood.
Parents are always down to talk about parenting.
And this is wonderful, because there are so many parents out there.
This fact still surprises me.
There are so many parents out there.
I feel silly pointing this out, but I never thought about it before I became a parent.
It turns out that parenthood is a weird social superpower, because you can talk about parenthood with any parent. And parents are everywhere.
But it’s not just that you now have something to talk about with strangers, or that it’s fun to talk about your kids (which it is).
It’s that these conversations allow us to be honest in ways that we rarely are, offering up our anxieties and small triumphs, and having others (sometimes strangers!) validate what we have shared. After a short conversation about parenthood with a colleague, I’ll feel closer to them than if I’d had a year of weekly meetings.
Taylor Coe 