Best 405 quotes in «parenthood quotes» category

It’s time to stop dreaming about who you want your son to be and help him become the healthy, happy, and successful man he’s supposed to be.

It's tough being AWESOME all the time, but the kids need someone to look up to!

It's wrong and unhealthy to deny a child the world of make-believe.

It takes a tremendous amount of strength to be a single mother. To hold down the forte of a home, a life and your child's entire happiness.

It used to be that parents didn't have to be home. If a neighbor so I child misbehaving, it was considered appropriate for the neighbor to intervene. The parents would be grateful when they found out, and they would take the word of the neighbor if the child protested his innocence. Unmarried and divorced parents tend not to behave that way. Instead, they tend to try to be the good guy to their children.

It was not because I had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, but because Joe had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, that I worked with tolerable zeal against the grain.

It wasn't right that you could only understand your parents' pain once you'd experienced the things they had, and by then they were gone.

It wasn't until we dropped him at his university dormitory and left him there looking touchingly lost and bewildered amid an assortment of cardboard boxes and suitcases in a spartan room not unlike a prison cell that it really hit home that he was vanishing out of our lives and into his own.

It was too late for he and his father to have an adventure, and NOTHING seemed to have any color anymore.

It would have been helpful if there was a Mayo Clinic chapter about the topic of "leaving." Man, I would have read that chapter over and over -- leaving your wailing baby in the morning without wanting to slit your wrists; leaving your desk even though you are only a half hour away from completing something that would feel so good to wrap up; leaving the building so no one notices that you are actually leaving. I was much more interested in honing that skill than learning how to puree apples and carrots to freeze in ice-cube trays (not that I ever did that either). As long as I was a full-time working mother with a clock to punch or a train to catch -- as I would be for eight more years -- I never figured out how to leave with grace or with so-called conviction.

I wanted you to know that the world in its entirety could never be found in the schools, alone, nor the streets, alone, nor in the trophy case. I wanted you to claim the whole world, as it is.

I wanted to say, 'This is my life: sitting around dying of boredom, the whining, the tantrums, the baby weight, the endlessness of it all. The way the clock drags all day until Birdie’s naptime, at which point it magically speeds up, and I look up from scrolling around on the internet having not gotten to anything that I vowed to complete when I had the time: a real proper blog post, some freezable dinners, an updated resume, reading an actual book without interruption. It is soul-killing, hour by hour, to have nothing on the horizon but trips to Target, picture books that I read again and again and again until I could recite them in my sleep, new shoes to buy and watch my daughter outgrow like those super-sped-up videos of flowers blooming, an endless line of little kid shoes growing bigger and bigger while my own life grows smaller and smaller, too. My schedule used to be full of town halls and correspondence with people whose lives were being impacted by our policies. I used to spent my days figuring out how to connect with people about the things they cared most about, how to solve real problems. And now it’s just ‘oh, we’re out of baking soda so the diaper pail is making Birdie’s room smell like the town dump. Better go to Target.’ And that’ll be a whole day’s accomplishment. Shit.' But I didn’t say all that. I knew by now, after having versions of this conversation a hundred thousand times, that Graham would never understand. Could never understand.

Listen, it is no secret that there are some women who will take advantage of a good man. So, let me ask you a question… Are you raising your son to know HIS self-worth? Our boys are equally important as our girls! Men get used. Men get hurt. Men get mentally, physically, and verbally abused, too. And don’t be in denial… Men become victims to women that don’t mean them any good. Many women date, marry, and have babies with men simply because they’re successful, have lots of money, drive exquisite cars, live in exclusive neighborhoods, etc. They don’t love your son, they love what your son can offer them. Do your son a favor and instill self-love early on!

Love had still seemed like such a paltry thing in the face of all my doubts then, much the way it felt now. David had worries my love couldn’t touch, fears my love couldn’t easily dispel. My love seemed like a well-worn blanket instead of the titanium shield I needed.

Make me the father, O Lord, who will show my sons enough of a sense of humor, so that they will always be serious, but never take themselves too seriously. Give them humility, so they will always remember the simplicity of true greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.

Memory loss is the key to human reproduction. If you remembered what new parenthood was actually like you wouldn’t go around lying to people about how wonderful it is, and you certainly wouldn’t ever do it twice.

More than Captain America your kids need Amelia Earhart – more than Ant Man, they need Abraham Lincoln - more than Green Arrow they need Gandhi – more than Iron Man they need Isaac Newton.

Most parents think that the commands they give their children are merely suggestions wrapped with lovingness.

Most parents would not worry too much about their children if they knew that children belong not to their parents but to life.

Most people who are would each not be in love with their partner, if they did not have the kind of genitals they have.

Mothering you is the first thing of consequence I have ever done.

Mothers burning inside the risen suns of their children.

Mothers and fathers must be gentle at least some of the time. Mothers and fathers must also be strict at least some of the time. Most of the time, though, most mothers and fathers must be mostly strict and gentle together.

My dear Watson, you as a medical man are continually gaining light as to the tendencies of a child by the study of the parents. Don't you see that the converse is equally valid. I have frequently gained my first real insight into the character of parents by studying their children.” —Sherlock Holmes, “The Adventure of the Copper Beeches

...my father, [was] a mid-level phonecompany manager who treated my mother at best like an incompetent employee. At worst? He never beat her, but his pure, inarticulate fury would fill the house for days, weeks, at a time, making the air humid, hard to breathe, my father stalking around with his lower jaw jutting out, giving him the look of a wounded, vengeful boxer, grinding his teeth so loud you could hear it across the room ... I'm sure he told himself: 'I never hit her'. I'm sure because of this technicality he never saw himself as an abuser. But he turned our family life into an endless road trip with bad directions and a rage-clenched driver, a vacation that never got a chance to be fun.

My little Pierre is now nearly five years old. He is quite a big boy. I used to wait with impatience for the time when I could take him with me and talk with him, opening his young mind, instilling into him the love of beauty and truth, and helping fashion for him so lofty a soul that the ugliness of life could not degrade it.

My mother taught me that reading is a kind of work, and that every paragraph merits exertion, and in this way, I learned how to absorb difficult books.

I watched 60 Minutes...and they showed this woman, she's in every kind of..thing like that. 'This woman', they say, 'she lost her first four children--died from malnutrition--and, now, she's afraid that her new six-month-old newborn twins will suffer the same fate'. ... Who's going to step in and say...'kick her in the cunt 'til it doesn't work', 'that woman is a sociopath! that is a sick human being!'. ... How much of a sociopath do you need to be? That is the slow ritual torture-murder of children, one after another! At what point does cause-and-effect not kick in? How many bulb-headed skeletons have to go stiff in your arms?! ... 'what? this one's not working... oh, well let's try again', one after another. At what point do you not go 'I think this is bad'? ... How many kids are you going to fuckin' kill, lady? ... If you impregnate someone under those conditions, they should abort the parents! that's sick!

I wished that I had some other guardian of minor abilities.

Luxury is the enemy of growth. This is the one thing that I learnt from my father, and I approve of it fully. Abundance is neither good nor healthy for the growth of a child’s mind.

Mangarap ka at abutin mo ito. Wag mo sisihin ang sira mong pamilya, palpak mong syota, pilay mong tuta, o mga lumilipad na ipis...Kung may pagkukulang sayo ang mga magulang mo, pwede kang manisi at magrebelde... tumigil sa pag-aaral, mag drugs ka, magpakulay ng buhok sa kilikili... Sa bandang huli, ikaw din ang biktima... Rebeldeng walang napatunayan at bait sa sarili.

Many of us are failed secret attempts to keep our parents together.

Millions of deaths would not have happened if it weren’t for the consumption of alcohol. The same can be said about millions of births.

Miseries of a birth.

My handsome husband and I didn’t make love for almost six months. I was enraptured, lost to my old life, and, in this obsession, disregarded author Ayelet Waldman – who famously wrote of her 'smug well-being' and 'always vital, even torrid' sex life in the wake of childbirth: I ignored my husband as a man. Instead, I revelled in him as a different thing altogether, far more seductive and important, and infinitely more resonant. My husband was no longer just a man: he was the father of my child.

My son will wear the title well, the Duke thought, and realized with a sudden chill that this was another death thought.

My whole life, you have made decisions for me." "Your whole life," Georgiana pointed out, "totals nine years.

No one said parenting was easy,but NO good parent has any right to give up.It is one labyrinth you can never quit because it seems too hard.

Not a few millions of parents strongly hope that their own children will step in by instantly becoming their own parents’ foster parents, if and when the parents reach their second childhood.

Not everyone knows how to be a good parent. Not everyone knows the right things to do or the right things to say. We are all just doing the best we can with the tools we were given. What matters is that we educate ourselves and keep doing our best.

No true...father would be unconcerned about discord in his family that may cause it to disintegrate in his absence...

On first hearing that little voice – as fine and friable, I felt, as cotton thread, the impact on my soul was that of the highest magnitude of earthquake, those that occur every hundred years, say, or every thousand. The old shell I called myself cracked and was swallowed by a sudden crevasse, and just as suddenly was lost in the commotion.

My mother delayed my enrollment in the Fascist scouts, the Balilla, as long as possible, firstly because she did not want me to learn how to handle weapons, but also because the meetings that were then held on Sunday mornings (before the Fascist Saturday was instituted) consisted mostly of a Mass in the scouts' chapel. When I had to be enrolled as part of my school duties, she asked that I be excused from the Mass; this was impossible for disciplinary reasons, but my mother saw to it that the chaplain and the commander were aware that I was not a Catholic and that I should not be asked to perform any external acts of devotion in church. In short, I often found myself in situations different from others, looked on as if I were some strange animal. I do not think this harmed me: one gets used to persisting in one's habits, to finding oneself isolated for good reasons, to putting up with the discomfort that this causes, to finding the right way to hold on to positions which are not shared by the majority. But above all I grew up tolerant of others' opinions, particularly in the field of religion, remembering how irksome it was to hear myself mocked because I did not follow the majority's beliefs. And at the same time I have remained totally devoid of that taste for anticlericalism which is so common in those who are educated surrounded by religion. I have insisted on setting down these memories because I see that many non-believing friends let their children have a religious education 'so as not to give them complexes', 'so that they don't feel different from the others.' I believe that this behavior displays a lack of courage which is totally damaging pedagogically. Why should a young child not begin to understand that you can face a small amount of discomfort in order to stay faithful to an idea? And in any case, who said that young people should not have complexes? Complexes arise through a natural attrition with the reality that surrounds us, and when you have complexes you try to overcome them. Life is in fact nothing but this triumphing over one's own complexes, without which the formation of a character and personality does not happen.

On her way toward the shore, she kept coming across weekend tourists. Every cluster of them presented the same pattern: the man was pushing a stroller with a baby in it, the woman was walking beside him; the man's expression was meek, solicitous, smiling, a bit embarrassed, and endlessly willing to bend over the child, wipe its nose, soothe its cries; the woman’s expression was blasé, distant, smug, sometimes even (inexplicably) spiteful. This pattern Chantal saw repeated in several variants: the man alongside a woman was pushing the stroller and also carrying another baby on his hack, in a specially made sack: the man alongside a woman was pushing the stroller, carrying one baby on his shoulders and another in a belly carrier: the man alongside a woman had no stroller but was holding one child by the hand and carrying three others, on his back, his belly, and his shoulders. Then, finally, with no man. a woman was pushing the stroller: she was doing it with a force unseen in the men, such that Chantal, walking on the same sidewalk, had to leap out of her way at the last moment. Chantal thinks: men have daddified themselves. They aren't fathers, they're just daddies, which means: fathers without a father's authority.

On my fifteenth birthday, I came to realize that the expression spoiled rotten meant exactly that. We kids were the apples of our parents' eyes, and I, for one, was rotting from inside out.

PARENTHOOD is journey of being driven to the BRINK of INSANITY and BACK...Like a YO YO!!

Parenting is not about the parents, it's about the children.

Nations, as well as men, almost always betray the most prominent features of their future destiny in their earliest years.

Originality must compound with inheritance.

Parenthood is the only job that gets progressively harder every single year, and you never, ever, ever get a raise.