Before you had children, what did you imagine parenting would be like? Did you envision insightful, heartwarming conversations with your kids? Did you picture cozy evenings gathered around the dinner table, basking in candlelight, sharing stories, and snuggling before they drifted off to bed in their adorable pajamas? Did you dream of imparting profound words of wisdom that they’d carry for a lifetime? Or perhaps you imagined serene days and calm evenings, free from harsh discipline, where you’d never lose your patience (unlike your own parents) and always remain composed?
Yeah, us too!
Then, BAM! Like a hockey puck flying off the ice and smacking you square in the forehead, reality hits. Some days, parenting is tough, and it certainly doesn’t always match those pre-childrearing dreams.
The truth about parenting dawns on you, and you realize you’re not just a parent—you’re a broken record. The kind that skips and sputters on the turntable, repeating the same phrases over and over. It gets to the point where even *you* grow tired of hearing yourself say the same things repeatedly.
“Pick up your clothes, brush your teeth, put your shoes away, flush the toilet, stop picking your nose, eat your dinner, do your homework, watch your mouth, turn off the TV, clean your room, make your bed, comb your hair, close the fridge, turn off the lights, put your seatbelt on, wake up, go to sleep, stop eating junk, say please, say thank you, say excuse me, close the door, open the door, don’t talk to me like that, wash your hands.” You get the idea. This endless rant is not something most of us anticipated before having kids. We never imagined we’d morph into our own parents or have children who need constant reminders for the simplest tasks.
Seriously, how hard is it to flush the toilet? Why do kids perpetually leave their shoes in the middle of the floor, “forget” to brush their teeth, or think it’s fine to leave every light in the house on—despite your constant complaints? For years, like most parents, you’ve been repeating the same instructions. Are our kids oblivious?
The Frustration of Repetition
The worst part? As your children grow older, *they* get irritated by your constant reminders. Instead of following the rules and learning from experience that you expect things done a certain way, they have the audacity to call you a nag, roll their eyes, and stomp off because you issued yet another familiar directive—not a new one, but the same things you’ve been saying for years.
Today’s kids are supposed to be smarter than us, right? Many can outshine their parents on math or science tests. Yet, they can’t grasp that an unflushed toilet clogs or that eating junk food before dinner will spark another round of parental frustration.
As a result, parents often resort to raising their voices, yelling, slamming doors, or even punching a hole in the drywall. Some might overreact by grounding the kids for a week over an uncleaned room—not because they need anger management, but because they’re disheartened by the broken-record dialogue that dominates their parenting and mourn the loss of their dreams of being the perfect parent, undone by perpetually imperfect children who just won’t listen.
Every parent, at some point, feels like a broken record. Every parent scratches their head, wondering why their kids can’t just do the simple tasks requested to make life easier, less stressful, and more enjoyable. Every parent becomes the constant reminder that some things in life must be done. And every parent will eventually be labeled a nag, a fun-sucker, or perpetually grumpy because their kids just won’t listen—no matter how many times they’ve been told or how upset you get.
This is the part of parenthood no one sees coming. This is the reality no one warns you about. It’s the aspect of parenting that takes over your life from the moment your child learns to walk until the day they move out and have kids of their own. Only then will the record truly break, and only then will your children understand what all the fuss over unbrushed teeth, messy hair, unmade beds, shoes in the middle of the floor, unflushed toilets, backtalking, and leaving lights on (just to name a few) was really about.
