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Being a parent comes with a lot of responsibilities. You have to be a role model for your kid because they look up to you. Parenthood involves a lot of sacrifices, patience, and dedication. Once you have a child, your life starts to revolve around them, especially when you’re a new parent. Your weekly outings are replaced with weekly visits to the doctor’s office, your late-night movie plans become late-night feedings, and your biggest gift becomes the gift of 5 minutes of alone time. Sleepless nights, dirty diapers, cranky moods, weird cravings, and engorged breasts become a part of your daily life, and you accept it wholeheartedly. You might have been a super cool trendsetter before your baby arrived, but after you become a parent, it’s just all about the little ones and their cries. So here are 13 words that have a different meaning altogether once you embrace parenthood:
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1. Weekend
Before kids: The perfect time to relax and rejuvenate after a long week. You probably get in your car and drive to a romantic weekend getaway spot to spend it with your partner. Or you sleep in till noon only to start drinking at 1:00 p.m ‘coz it’s the weekend!
After kids: Waking up when the cock crows and dragging your kids out of bed so they can get dressed to visit the zoo. Educational trips are suddenly important.
2. Eating Out
Before kids: Lunch/dinner at a fancy restaurant, while casually flirting with your partner over who gets to choose a dessert for later.
After kids: Gulping down your food hastily before your kid gets bored of playing with the squeeze toy at the kiddie’s section.
3. 5 a.m
Before kids: A time of the day you are not familiar with. You are in your dreamland wondering about how to trek to the moon or something else that’s impossible yet magical.
After kids: The time you wake up every day. Every single day. Whether it is the weekends or weekdays, or even the holidays!
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4. Blowout
Before kids: A luxurious hair spa treatment at the salon where you come out looking gorgeous.
After kids: A terrifying mess in your baby’s diaper waiting to be cleaned.
5. Tired
Before kids: When you’ve had a long day and are waiting to hit the sack.
After kids: When you haven’t slept for more than three days and start to see stars in your house during the day.
6. Chilling By The Pool
Before kids: Sunbathing by the pool in your two-piece with the perfect summer bod while sipping on your favorite cocktail.
After kids: Frantically scanning the pool and the areas surrounding it to keep an eye on your kids.
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7. Shaving Your Legs
Before kids: A self-care routine you follow to flaunt your little black dresses, skirts, and shorts.
After kids: A luxury you get to enjoy once in a blue moon because now you are in and out of the shower in 10 minutes.
8. Gross
Before kids: Dirty tissue, wet towel on the bed, or a messy bedroom.
After kids: You’ve dealt with dirty diapers and other bodily fluids that your threshold to deem something as gross has shot up to a level you cannot even measure.
9. All-nighter
Before kids: Staying up all night with your husband while being nasty under the sheets, or raving to an epic party until the break of dawn.
After kids: Staying up all night to your baby crying and fussing, preventing you from getting any shuteye.
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10. Privacy
Before kids: Alone time
After kids: There is no such thing as alone time.
11. Coffee
Before kids: Your morning drink, to wake up and get started for the day.
After kids: Your lifeline without which you cannot function.
12. Bath Time
Before kids: Time to relax and rejuvenate after a long day with some bath salts, scented candles, and music.
After kids: Getting drenched while bathing your kids because of their splashing.
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13. Going For A Stroll
Before kids: Taking a walk with your friends, partner, or your dog.
After kids: Pushing the stroller up and down the road hoping your baby inside will fall asleep.
Kids change your lifestyle. You might be a fitness freak, runner, or a yoga enthusiast, but once you have kids, all that changes to accommodate your baby’s schedule. We hope you could relate to our list of reversed meanings before and after having kids. Share this article with fellow parents and let them know that they are not alone in this journey of parenthood.
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