5 Ways Kids Obliterate Our Best-Laid Parenting Plans (and Why That’s Totally Okay!)

This is a sponsored post for which I’ve received free product and/or compensation, but the opinions are 100% my own.

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Let’s get real for a moment, shall we? Kids have this amazing way of completely obliterating even our best-laid parenting plans. I want you to play a game with me. Think back to your pregnancy. The moment where you still believed you were in complete control, that you could plan for every contingency and chart the perfect course for your kids. Trust me, I’ve been there.

Then I gave birth and “the plan” went out the window. See, kids don’t really care about your life itinerary for them. They just want to be kids! They want to soak up every last moment of joy, even if it pushes your buttons at times. These are just a few of the many ways my son has completely obliterated my best laid parenting plans…and why that’s totally okay! Plus, see how I get help getting at least some of my plans back on track thanks to L’il Critters™ gummy vitamins!

 

5 Ways Kids Will Obliterate Your Parenting Plans

Throwing a wrinkle into your birth plan

From the moment my son was born, he threw a wrinkle into my perfect parenting plans. I planned for him to arrive on time- give or take two weeks. I’d have my epic baby shower, the nursery would be done. I’d rush to the hospital and delivery a perfect 7lb baby boy. Basically, I planned a TV show delivery. Instead, my son arrived 8 weeks early, 3lbs, and 5oz, with a broken arm. The nursery wasn’t done. The baby shower was epic mostly because he was there asleep in the next room!

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It took me a long time to be okay with my perfect birth plan going out the window. I spent six years trying to get pregnant and felt like the universe robbed me of my Hollywood moment. As my mom reminded me over and over again, it doesn’t matter how your baby gets here, only that he does.

Making mealtime as challenging as humanly possible

When I was planning my son’s future, I envisioned him eating all sorts of amazingly healthy foods. Choosing broccoli over chocolate, salad over candy. Since my son was a preemie, feeding time was a challenge right from the get-go. Just when we got that figured out, we’d hit another snag. When he was two, I realized that he was going to be a picky eater. Not just any picky eater, though, but the pickiest eater on the planet.

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As tough as it is to plan meals, I’ve learned to be okay with it. It’s an adventure, trying to find new foods that he actually likes. Since there are still gaps in his nutrition, I rely on L’il Critters™ Fruit n’ Honey Bee Active Complete Multivitamin. L’il Critters™ have been his favorite vitamins since we first tried them a few years ago. He loves the new line even more because it’s made with real clover honey (he absolutely adores honey). I love that it’s made with real fruit juice* and contains no artificial flavors or HFCS. The multivitamin is an excellent source of 12 vitamins and minerals, so your kids can get nutrition even when they obliterate your mealtime plans!

Questioning you so often that you question yourself

If there’s one thing kids are great at, it’s asking tough questions. Sometimes they’re easy enough to look up. Thank goodness for the internet, right? My son has asked some really strange questions over the years. I’ve spent hours looking up information on bone marrow (he went through a phase where every cut was the end of the world when he was three, so I taught him how blood cells are formed), black holes (kindergarten), and most recently, string theory.

The toughest questions, though, are the ones that make you question yourself. Just when you think you have the “right” answer to your child’s greatest conundrum, they throw back a “what if” that blows your mind. These are the moments that challenge us in the best way possible. They also let us know that our kids are going to be okay. That they have the ability to think for themselves and question things they don’t understand, which in turn leads to standing up for themselves and against things they feel are wrong.

Testing the boundaries of mom’s “yuck” tolerance

I never, in all of my planning to be a mom, imagined just how gross kids can be. Never. I’m not even talking about the “yuck” that comes out of them during the first few years. You get oddly used to that. I’m talking about the stuff that comes later. Earthworms dangled in front of your face. Weird stinky science experiments discovered under the bathroom sink. The “but I don’t want to shower!” phase that repeats itself every few years. All the while, you’re thinking to yourself “how on earth do you not have the plague yet???”

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Turns out, my son has an incredible immune system. I make sure to keep supporting that healthy immune system while allowing him to explore all the world has to offer with L’il Critters™ Bee Immune Super C Plus Booster. It’s a great source of Vitamin C plus a boost of Vitamin D and Zinc for immune support**. Like the L’il Critters™ Fruit n’ Honey Bee Active Complete Multivitamin, it’s made with real fruit juice* and real honey.

Completely stealing your heart the way you never thought possible

If there’s one thing you can never, ever plan for, it’s just how much your child will steal your heart. Oh, you know you’ll love them. You even know that you’ll love them more than you can imagine. Until the moment you hold them in your arms, though, you have no idea just how deep that love will run and how you won’t be able to imagine your life before them.

See, while our kids are keeping it real by obliterating our best-laid parenting plans, they’re doing something else along the way. They’re teaching us what it really means to be a mom. It’s not about planning. It’s not about perfection. It’s about love, pure and simple. There’s nothing more real than that!

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I say forget the plans! Keep it real and go with the flow. You’ll find ways to balance everything out, don’t worry. For me, my biggest balancing act comes with mealtime, which is why I rely so much on L’il Critters™! L’il Critters Fruit n’ Honey is now available nationwide at select mass, drug and grocery stores as well as online retailers. Visit their website to find retailers near you!

Which of your best-laid parenting plans have your kids completely obliterated? Tell us in the comments!

 

*Contains 16% pear juice from concentrate

**These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

 

 

34 thoughts on “5 Ways Kids Obliterate Our Best-Laid Parenting Plans (and Why That’s Totally Okay!)”

  1. Oyinkan Ogunleye

    Babies do w/e they want to do LOL! I feel like it’s when people plan for their first stages of the baby (including the delivery), things tend to not go as planned.

  2. Everything you say is so true and I love your outlook! As a child I would make mealtime incredibly difficult refusing to eat anything that wasn’t a chicken nugget or a hot dog. My parents slowly expanded my tastes, and I thank them for being patient but firm with me.

  3. Yep! Totally 100% truth here. How about a road trip where your child throws up all over the carseat, you have to completely remove the car seat cover and you only had a million wet wipes to clean him up with but that wasn’t enough because you soon smell puke baking in the hot Arizona sun. Good times I tell ya!

  4. I am always surprised how easily the way I think things are going to go, actually go a completely different way. I am learning to be alright with it as my daughter is now going on 12 years old.

  5. Children are more likely to grow into well-adjusted adults if their parents are firm disciplinarians, academics claimed yesterday.

  6. Going back to your first point, my son, in a way, threw my birth plan for a loop. He was born a whole month early. We were not expecting his arrival and we were not completely ready for his arrival. I was actually happy he was out early as he was a big boy at birth and it was hard to waddle around with him while caring for his older sister that arrived a year earlier.

  7. I actually had two sons that were healthy eaters from the beginning. They always ate any fruits and veggies for snacks. There favorite snacks was ants on a log. These Fruit n’ Honey Bee Active Complete Multivitamin and Immune Super C Plus Booster are something I will have to share with my nieces who have picky eaters. Thanks for sharing the information.

  8. LOL this is all so true and so touching. My kids are young adults now and what I would give for them to be babies again! My plans were maybe not the best to begin with either lol. There are honestly too many derailed plans to mention but that is okay they keep us on our toes and keep us young at heart.

  9. We try to teach our kids to eat healthy, but having a good vitamin to make sure they are getting what they need is nice. I agree that kids always have a way of making everything different than what you expected. The birth plan is just the start.

  10. I am not a parent so I can only imagine how challenging it is to get kids to cooperate! I think the fact that vitamins come in gummy form makes it less of a hassle as they just think it’s candy haha

  11. Eight years back, I thought I’ll have a normal delivery but turns out I had a low placenta which blocked the exist and that C-section was imminent. There’s no other way but I was thankful that he came out healthy.

  12. Yes! It is so true! My son was born early too, and breastfeeding was a huge challenge which was so disappointing to me. He also became a picky eater, and it has been really hard to get him to eat anything remotely healthy. But when he looks up at me and smiles, it just melts me inside.

  13. Stacie @ Divine Lifestyle

    My kids have always been excellent plan sinkers. Whether it was throwing their breakfasts or trying to sneak in extra cuddles in the morning. It’s always been great!

  14. Oh yes, my best laid out parenting plans were thrown out the window after the doctor told me three different times, “it’s a boy!” Not much goes as expected despite my planner addicted ways, but they are happy, healthy, sweet little humans and I wouldn’t change a thing. Great post!

  15. This sounds like a great brand for kids. I need to show this to my daughter for the grandkids, she loves healthy!

  16. Annemarie LeBlanc

    This article is so spot-on! I also had big plans for my children. Although nothing turned out the way I wanted it to be, it turned out to be better! Just let the kids be kids. We are here to guide and nurture them, not to mold them into something they are not.

  17. We try to plan everything especially when it comes to our kids. But we have to realize that they’re individuals who decide for their own as well. I think these vitamins can really help cover the nutrition that they need.

  18. I haven’t heard this brand before, but I really need to check it out. Anything to make parenting go a little easier, I am for!

  19. My first to hear of the vitamin brand. We’re about out of ours though, so I’m going to look for it tomorrow, and see if the boy likes it (he does NOT like the store brand I bought this last time).

  20. Kelly Hutchinson

    Leave it to our kids to put a wrinkle in our plans! I must say, many of my plans that they blew away were better for it.

  21. Jeanine @ sixtimemommy.com

    My kids all have ways of pushing boundaries.. Vitamins are essential and the Gummy vitamins are huge in our house!

  22. Kristi Nelson Renner

    Vitamins are so important. Glad they have improved the options from when I was a kid. Now they actually taste good and I don’t have to fight my kids to take them.

  23. These are all so true! My girls have always pushed the boundaries, and now that I’m sending my firstborn off to college in a few months, I am really going to miss those moments. The gummy vitamins sound really wonderful, too.

  24. Kids definitely destroy your plans. And what worked for one of your kids may be totally wrong for your next one.

  25. Yeah, this parenting thing is throwing me for a loop! I now have a teenager and I never know what is going to happen next. I just try to keep him healthy and keep the lines of communication open.

  26. I was hoping to not rely on iPhones and iPads so early, but she kept wanting to play with our “toys” so I’ve recently uploaded some kids games to keep her still while I do chores. I have to deal with “screen time” rules sooner than I’d hoped.

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