The New Parents’ Guide to Realistic Resolutions
Suzanne Fleet, the writer behind one of our favorite blogs Toulouse & Tonic, helps new parents set realistic resolutions for 2014.
Hey you there — gazing at that beautiful infant and contemplating the new levels you’ll rise to as a person and a parent in 2014. I see you with that pen and paper in your hand, resolving to “Go back to school for your doctorate,” and “Run the NYC marathon” this year — the strains of “Auld Lang Syne” playing in the background.
I’d like you to think of me as the Ghost of Parenting Present, here to help you avoid the catastrophic dejection you’ll feel by month’s end when you inevitably fail miserably at those lofty goals. Your life just changed dramatically. And you know that in a meta kind of way. But you may not yet realize it in a relentless-24-hour-a-day-job-covered-in-spit-up kind of way.
And that’s where I come in.
I’m here to help you set realistic New Year’s resolutions so you can still feel okay about yourself when 2014 is over and the full scope of your marathon training consists of putting the baby’s pacifier back in 149 times in a single night.
The key is to keep your standards low. Nope, lower. Just a little bit lower. Now drop it down about another foot. Now limbo under that. Yep, that’s the spot.
Please feel free to print my resolutions and use them as your own. You don’t have time to write things down anymore anyway.
1. I vow to have sex with my partner at least two times in 2014. I will make several more attempts than this, realizing that I’ll fall asleep before kissing has turned into petting 9/10ths of the time.
2. I resolve to change my shirt on or around the time it accumulates 10 stains including but not limited to breast milk, formula, spit-up, baby food, mashed banana, drool (my own or others), ice cream, coffee and urine. If my clothes have poop on them, I’ll change them almost immediately.
3. I will fold the clothes in the laundry basket at some point before baseball season starts and put them into actual drawers before it ends.
4. I resolve to remember 50% of these “essential” diaper bag items when I leave the house with the baby: pacifier, bottles, back-up pacifier, diapers, back-up back-up pacifier, wipes, changing pad, change of clothes, hand sanitizer, blanket, thermometer, infant Tylenol, teether, rattle, lovey and back-up pacifiers for my back-up pacifiers. Oh and coffee. I will never forget the coffee.
5. I vow to go out with my partner without the baby one time before 2015, remaining awake until at least 10:00pm and talking about a minimum of one other subject than the baby.
I could go on but why? The point here is realism and five is already waaay more than you can handle, even with standards this low.
Just know that it’ll get easier after the first year and then you can start setting loftier goals — like showering more than two times in one week. Unless, of course, you decide to have another one. Then all bets are off.
Many happy returns to all the new parents out there. You’re in for a year of indescribable joy. If you’re still up at midnight, enjoy the fireworks. You won’t be seeing them again for at least a decade. Cheers.
Suzanne Fleet is the writer behind the award-winning blog, Toulouse & Tonic, and SAHM mom to 2 stinky boys, who together with her good-natured husband, give her loads of funny writing material. Suzanne is one of Circle of Moms Top 25 Funny Moms of 2013, a contributor to Huffington Post and a proud co-author of the best-selling books, “I Just Want To Pee Alone,” and “You Have Lipstick on Your Teeth.” If you want to find her, she probably just sat down to check one little thing on facebook and is still there 3 hours later.
