673 Quotes About Parenthood

Why do men like me want sons?" he wondered. "It must be because they hope in their poor beaten souls that these new men, who are their blood, will do the things they were not strong enough nor wise enough nor brave enough to do. It is rather like another chance at life; like a new bag of coins at a table of luck after your fortune is gone.

The very lack of explicit pressure was itself a compelling force, for it created a world in which the expectation of success was simply there, a fact of life as basic as breakfast.

Goldfish get big enough only for the bowl you put them in. Bonsai trees twist in miniature. I would have given anything to keep her little. They outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them.

He closed the laptop. A sure sign I was about to receive his full attention.

I’ve never needed a sword to protect you—to raise you the way your father wanted. Caring for my family meant putting away the fighter, so I did.

People say that when a baby is crying the paternal grandmother will say, "The baby is crying, you should feed her," and the maternal grandmother will say, "Why is that baby crying so much, making her mom so tired?

....I was a mother, whereas he would have been a father, and whether those two labels SHOULD mean the same thing - to the culture, to the parent in question, to the children themselves - in practice they usually do not.

The first birth is documented. A doctor stands by; physical facts are readily available; literature abounds in accounts of birth. Folk knowledge hammocks the pregnant woman; she sways in the gentle wind of attention. Not so with the second birth into adulthood. That is a solitary business for the parent. The course of events is not documented--cannot be, as each child tears the connective tissue differently.

i believed we could do itbc we’re in this togetherbut together never happened through the stress&the struggle i dealt with on my ownyour sleeping pattern never changedbc of the baby you wanted to have