Parenthood

Exactly nine years and 363 days ago I was about to be a parent. I wasn't scared at all. I couldn't wait to have a baby! I knew how to take care of babies, how to deal with toddlers and what to do with grade school kids. However, I really wish someone would have told me about the other stuff.
1. When I was pregnant with my babies, no one told me someday some kid will say or do something to hurt their feelings, or they will physically hurt them and I will feel so angry that I will literally see red and want to physically hurt that person back.
2. No one told me that I will live vicariously through my children.
3. When they were babies, I didn't realize that every decision I'd make from that point on would be centered around their well being.
4. Bedtime will come as a relief because you are so tired by 8:30 you could fall on the floor and go to sleep and finally the house is quiet, but it will also be a little disappointing because your time with them that day is over.
5. No one told me how children have no tact. Especially when they ask for the tenth time, "Are you having a baby because your tummy is sticking out", then they come over to "measure" in the air how much it sticks out.
6. You no longer sleep soundly, and you understand how when you hear about animals that can find their offspring's voice among thousands of others.
7. It breaks your heart to realize everything you do for them, yet they say something mean to you, or they can't wait to go to college or move out.
8. That you will feel regret for telling your own mom when you were 18, 19 and 21 "Good God! I can't WAIT to move out!!!"
9. I was very worried when I was pregnant that there would be something wrong, that I'd lose the baby, that something would go wrong when they are born, that I wasn't eating/sleeping/exercising enough. No one told me one day I'd remember the feeling of being pregnant and think, "At least then I knew who they were with, the choices they were making and no one was treating them badly".
10. I didn't know how amazing it would be. How one day there is this basketball that moves around under your shirt, then the next you have a whole new human being. That the baby will grow to a child who has your good and bad traits.
11. The majority of my paycheck will go to sports related things; sports gear, shoes, clothes, camps, new clothes, different shoes, etc...
12. That I should have bought stock in a sock company, and it's really hard to find quality socks and pants that don't get holes in them.
13. If you get the vibe that a kid is a punk or bully, you are right. Don't give them the benefit of the doubt.
14. You are excited to wake up in the morning if you know they are already awake.
I wasn't worried about childhood, but the teen years terrify me....