Things Parents Do That Drive Non-Parents Crazy

Some parents are unhealthily obsessed with their children and make it known, constantly. But for the rest of the population of the world that is not a parent, it can be extremely annoying to hear parents complain, brag, and lecture them about children.

Social Media Oversaturation Of Kid Updates

1) “My friends are all in the baby stages right now, so Facebook is a lot of pictures of kids doing thrilling things like: ‘Wearing clothes!’ ‘Sitting on a bench!’ ‘Standing on a beach!’ ‘Smiling while wearing a hat!’ Yeah, your kids are lovely, I like your kids, but I do not need to see an album of pictures of them standing on a beach and sometimes poking at the sand with a stick. I am just not that amazed by the continuing existence of your child every moment of the day. Sorry guys.”–

2) “When parents post EVERY SINGLE MINUTE of their child’s life. I know someone whose daughter is 18 and she posts every date she goes on with her boyfriend, every single prom dress she tried on (it was like about 20 total), the entire college process even the ones she didn’t get into, every school function, and so on. I mean, some events are nice like the first day of school (kindergarten, high school, college), prom, graduation, and so on, but after that it just gets ridiculous. I don’t know how the daughter puts up with it. I mean, if it were me, I would have had it by now.”–

3) “It gets to the point where most parents just change everything on their Facebook profile to be as if it is their kid’s profile. Apart from their name. So you look someone up that you used to know at school and find their name, but it’s just a load of pictures of a 2-year-old and a load of random stuff they’ve been doing, that literally no one cares about. Make a separate freaking profile for your kid if you’re literally JUST going to post pictures of them. Like, how am I supposed to creepily Facebook stalk you if there’s nothing actually about you on your profile.”–

4) “I hate those ‘trendy’ pregnancy photos all over Instagram. And all the hashtags that accompany it, for example: #babybump, #mommygram, #bunintheoven. It’s infuriating and I don’t even know why.”–

5) “Dads who threaten to bring out the weapons if a boy gets near their daughter. Moms who have ‘stay at home mom’ as their occupation on Facebook and also, parents who ONLY post about their children on social media. Like, we get it. You have a kid.”–

6) “I have a friend who has three kids and is now 24. She switches from posting a billion pictures and stories about how her kids are so precious, but then she’ll vent about how hard it is being a mom, and how she never has time for herself. All of it makes me want to tell her to shut the heck up; she’s the one who not only got pregnant in high school to her edge lord boyfriend, kept it, and within four years after had the other two, entirely unplanned. If you’re going to be so careless, and refuse to learn how to practice safe sex, I absolutely never want to hear you complain about the easily prevented situation you got yourself into.”–

7) “Parents who make DETAILED posts about all their children’s medical problems on social media. First of all, no one wants to hear about it and it’s frequently gross. Second, you are violating your own child’s right to medical privacy. I had one mother on Facebook who has a kid with down syndrome and posted a whiteboard with the child’s medication schedule for everyone to see. FREAKING WHY???”–

8) “STOP POSTING ABOUT YOUR BABY’S BODILY FLUIDS ON FACEBOOK. I do NOT want to see your baby’s ‘first blowout’ or your baby barf on your shirt. I don’t WANT TO SEE IT. Actually, stop freaking posting about every mundane thing about your children.”–

9) “The hordes of Facebook moms who make posts that consist of nothing other than boring play-by-plays and pictures of their kids, lame memes about drinking wine and/or coffee in yoga pants (and NEVER doing yoga!), and casserole recipe videos. Although if you ever sit for 24 hours staring at a play area in a mall (as I did while volunteering as the easter bunny) it became apparent that the reason they post those things on Facebook is that that IS their entire life. How sad.”–

10) “The young mom culture. I lived in a small town for 9 years and very recently moved to a larger, but still, it’s a small town, where a good 50-60% of young women have their first kid before age 21. The main thing I see on social media is girls circle-jerking each other, talking about their kids/pregnancies/baby bodies, etc… That’s the only stuff they post anymore. If you’re not a mom, they aren’t interested in what’s going on in your life. They post the most inane stuff too. I’ll see hourly updates on how potty training’s going, or ‘Aydin/Jeighdan/Zayeden/Tayrien got their 3rd tooth today, I’m so proud, I’m crying #blessed.’ Once in a while I’ll a post like, ‘So thankful I’m a young mommy; when my daughter’s an adult, we can go the clubs together because I’ll still be young and hot.’ It melts my brain.”

Bringing The Kid To ‘Non-Kid Friendly’ Places

11) “I saw a family take a five-year-old into the ‘Evil Dead’ reboot when it premiered a few years back and I was working as a movie theater usher. Well, the kid ended up crying in the men’s bathroom alone, because he was too scared to go back into the movie with his family. I have never wanted to throat punch someone so badly in my life as I did those ‘parents’ who were too freakin’ selfish/cheap to get a babysitter so their kindergartner didn’t have to watch people get possessed, taken advantage of, and brutally murdered for two hours.”–

12) “Maybe it’s because of the child-centered community I live in, but I am tired of seeing children at typically adult locations. I’m not trying to ban kids from public or anything, but, like…I did not buy these 8 PM Symphony tickets so I could listen to your toddler scream during a sonata. The symphony actually does child-friendly matinee and holiday concerts – why do parents bring their children to evening shows? And then let them scream? It also bothers me when I see parents bringing their infants to rock concerts. Really loud ones. Like, I get that it makes them feel like the ‘cool dad’ or whatever, but not only do I have to listen to the newborn crying right next to me, but I also start panicking about the fact that I am wearing earplugs but said baby is not. Why do they want to destroy their kid’s hearing? Why? It makes me both annoyed and anxious. And then there are the people who bring their kids to adult-only weddings and parties, despite what was actually on the invitation. And then they get irritated about how there was nothing for the kids to do except stand around a bunch of drunk people. Come on now…”–

13) “The worst, though, is when they bring their kids to obviously adult places (nice restaurants, R-rated movies, Broadway shows) and allow them to act like little savages the entire time. A few years ago, my family went to this nice Italian restaurant and was seated across from a family with about 5 kids between 2 and 10 years old. Surprisingly, the youngest was really well behaved and didn’t make much noise at all. The older kids, though, decided it was a good place for a rousing game of Duck, Duck, Goose. It wasn’t until a waiter nearly dropped a hot pizza on one of the kids was told to sit down (this was said while giving the waiter the evil eye as if he was supposed to know that the demon spawn was going to make the place an obstacle course). If my brother and I acted like that as kids, we would never have been allowed out of the house. I just don’t get these ‘Generation X parents’.”–

14) “One time, I had a friend who brought their kid to my apartment and tried to tell me what I can and can’t say or do in the presence of the child. Uh…It’s my place, don’t bring your kid around if they’re not allowed to hear a grown-up conversation. Seriously, it might just be me, but I’d rather you get a sitter in the first place so the kid isn’t even in my vicinity.”

The Forever Ongoing Conversation Topic

15) “I have a friend that makes every conversation about their kids even when it doesn’t relate at all. Your dog died? ‘My little one loves dogs!’ You went out with friends? ‘I don’t go out anymore because I stay in with my baby, it’s more rewarding.’ ‘Oh, it’s your birthday? ‘I can’t wait to celebrate my baby’s birthday in 6 months!’ ‘Tough day at work? ‘You don’t know what tough is until you’re a mommy!’ Every time someone posts a sad story about a child, she’s overly dramatic about it too. Not the normal ‘Oh that’s awful’ type of reaction that most people have, but the whole “Oh my god, I can’t even imagine! It made me think about my baby and now I’m just crying in public! I’m going to hug my baby so hard tonight!'”–

16) “I am a parent and it annoys the heck out of me how apparently when a friend of mine has a kid, they’re incapable of holding a conversation about anything else for the rest of time. I miss being able to talk to my friends about work and traveling and stuff. No, now every last conversation is about who pooped where.”–

17) “I’m a woman of childbearing age working in an office full of other women of childbearing age. All of them have kids except me. And literally every single potluck event or casual meeting or whatever turns into child discussion time. I really don’t mind talking about your kids, but I like to talk about other subjects, too. Does every conversation have to be about potty habits or the hilarious/cute/disgusting thing your kid did this morning? I don’t understand why normal conversations are impossible.”–

18) “If I’m working, young mother customers will always turn the conversation around to their kiddos. A lot of customers assume I’m a mom, asking me if my hubby and kids are alright with me working, I always say, ‘If you mean my (imaginary) girlfriend and (not imaginary) cats, then yes.'”–

19) “When parents make it seem that their entire existence is their children. They just seem to stop caring about their own health, appearance, social presentation, hobbies, interests. Just wear sweatshirts, graphic tees and Walmart jeans, talk in a G-rated ‘mom voice’ all the time, and only ever speak about their kids or how little time they have. Never have genuinely interesting conversations with anyone or project any sort of personality aside from ‘I am a parent.’ Like, it’s good that you’re dedicated to parenting, but you make it seem so awful. Like you’ve just abandoned your entire identity at age 30.”

Spoiling The Child And Lack Of Discipline

20) “I hate it when parents don’t instill in their children that actions have consequences. I do not think it is child abuse to take away a favorite toy or ground a child when they misbehave. I see too many of my friends spoil their kids, or do their kids’ school projects for them because they don’t want them to fail, or argue with teachers who report their kids are causing trouble at school. They are raising complete brats. But you can’t tell them that because ‘You’re not a parent.'”–

21) “When parents give their children tablets/phones for recreational purposes. Many times, I’ve seen parents just hand over a tablet to their child so that they could go on their own phones and play games. I’m not saying that technology is horrible for kids, I have a little brother with severe autism and he has tons of apps on the iPad to help him learn. I just don’t think parents should be letting their children mindlessly use technology all the time. Plus, after working with children, it’s crazy to see how much they’re exposed to through technology without parental supervision (especially through social media). I’ve seen 5 or 6-year-olds taking questionably provocative pictures and I don’t think it’s right.”–

22) “I went to this restaurant for my father’s birthday, it’s more of a pub, to be honest, but they have fantastic food. It’s not a place for children that’s for sure. The tables are relatively close together. This kid kept on backing up his chair against my dad and caused my dad to get hurt. We asked the parents politely to please tell their kid to be careful when getting up. They just stared at us like we were some sort of freak show. Happened again, so we moved our table more away from their table, what does the kid do? Backs up right into my dad again. My dad suffers from back problems. So a chair constantly being rammed into the back of him can’t be fun. My dad gets upset and tells the father of the kid, that he’s asked him nicely and please could he stop. I don’t get it though, why didn’t they just tell the kid to sit on the other side of the table, there was space. Intentionally being petty I think. The mom complains, on the side, saying her kid isn’t at fault here we chose to sit next to them and it’s our fault. I just looked at the mom, told her to shut the heck up because she’s an idiot that shouldn’t have been allowed to procreate. Then her hubby starts calling me horrible names. My fiancee got extremely angry and called the manager. Literally, five minutes later, the manager kicked them out for being unable to control their kid. The mom death stares me all the way, so I waved at her and blew her a kiss. She got so mad lol. A good manager will kick out customers who disrupt other customers. This happened last year, hopefully, we will have better luck this year. My father’s birthday is on the 31st. We’re going to the same place and we are going to ask for a corner table this time.”–

23) “Some parents get offended at me being offended by their horrid little children. I almost ran over three boys playing tag in between cars in a pizzeria’s parking lot and their parents threatened to call the cops on me. They took my license plate number and pictures of my car. I was driving less than ten miles an hour and these little savages were darting in between parked cars like it was their personal freakin’ playground.”–

24) “I work in a fairly subtle mechanic shop, one of the ones that you kind of have to be referred by someone or you’ll never know it exists. Anyway, so a customer recently brought her van in for a check up (Approaching winter months, this kind of thing is common) and her 4-year-old was running around the lounge area like he owned the place. We were all doing our best to ignore the little brat. Well, about 10 minutes later, he runs through the door into the actual shop area. (Note: There are signs posted everywhere that children under 16 are not allowed inside this area unless escorted, and closely monitored, by a parent or guardian.) So as one of the owners came out to try and catch the kid, the little tyrant managed to tip over a barrel that had a tub of nuts and bolts on it. Time moved in slow motion as the kid was battered by an assortment of metal (none of them big enough to do damage, fortunately) and then proceed to bawl at what could be the decibel equivalent to a jet engine. The mother comes out of the lounge screaming at us that we hurt her baby and she was going to sue and find another shop to work on her car. (On another note: There were video cameras in every corner of the lounge, and we caught her kid run into the shop and she just sits there not even paying attention to him until she heard him crying.) We put her name on a blacklist, and haven’t heard from her since.”–

25) “When you let your kids run all over me and expect me to think it’s cute/parent them for you. Recently, I had an experience in a waiting room at my doctor’s office where a two-year-old climbed up into my lap and started playing with my glasses because they were curious. I was super uncomfortable and I’m terrified of people so I didn’t know what to do other than trying to ignore her after my initial, ‘Hey, could you please sit beside me instead?’, since you can’t really blame them or get angry at that age, and the mother got very annoyed that I wasn’t immediately falling over myself trying to find ways to entertain her daughter for her. ‘You could talk to her, you know! Her name is Emma and her favorite color is purple, and she loves butterflies.’ I literally don’t care. Either allow me to continue ignoring her so that she’ll get bored and leave, or ask her to come back to you. I would never be mean to a kid – they’re just learning how to respect people and spaces – but I don’t think ignoring somebody else’s kid is as terrible as this lady thought it was. The worst part is that this happens frequently because apparently not being great with kids immediately makes you a magnet for kids.”

Judgment And Hate Towards People Who Aren’t Parents

26) “My boss judged me all of the time for complaining when he knows I don’t have kids. ‘Oh, Are you tired? Just wait til you have kids! Ha ha ha.’ No, I’m tired because I’m the only one in this office who works a full day, most days without a lunch, then go home to work on a second job because I barely make enough to pay student loans AND try and make time to be a good wife. Just because I haven’t popped tiny humans out, doesn’t mean I can’t be tired.”–

27) “There was a job position I had wanted, so I could further my career because I couldn’t get hired anywhere without experience in specifically that. I had done all other positions at this place and had exceeded my trainers and managers in most of them. I had basically begged two different general managers for 2.5 years to let me at least try or at least let me do the paperwork training that gave me the basics and policies to do the actual job, so I could help out when needed, as I routinely did. Guess what. Nothing. I was pretty much even in school for the position, though that was a year before I’d even thought of it. The reason I was given for not getting the job over one my parent friends, two years older, but with two kids under 5, was that I didn’t have the urgency required. She did because she had kids. ‘Oh you’ll have it one day when you have kids, don’t worry.’ No. My career and my ability to perform doesn’t rely on having ‘small trophies’.”–

28) “Someone told me: ‘I didn’t want kids until I had mine and now I can’t imagine life without them!’ Stop. I have health problems that could potentially interfere with getting pregnant. They’re genetic and I have a 50% chance to pass them down. I am on birth control for medical issues. Kids are not in my cards and please stop joking about sabotaging my pills or condoms. I love your kids. I will babysit them willingly. None will come out of me, though.”–

29) “I love kids. Babysit four boys four days a week (or more, if needed). I’ll probably end up doing foster care. But getting pregnant will make my medical problems worse, and those problems will likely be passed on to the child. ‘But have you heard about this oil/tea/shake/massage/piercing/etc that could cure you?’ I’ve just stopped explaining exactly why/how I can’t have children, because if I don’t replicate their mass of children, it’s personal, apparently. Some rare, beautiful people are so kind about it and realize that me fostering kids is just as much of an option as me having them.”–

30) “Sweet Jesus, I hate parents. It’s like anytime someone gives birth to a tiny person they lose their FREAKING minds. All common sense evaporates, but at the same time, they somehow gain deity level insight into my life and all things. Like what the actual heck is going through the sloppy stupid brains all the time? ‘Man I’m super tired today!’ ‘You don’t know tired till you’ve had kids!”Really? I guess you don’t know tired till you’ve been to Afghanistan.’ Well, I think having kids is way harder…ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME? Can you hold my baby for a minute? ‘No, I’d rather not…’ ‘Oh, it’s fine here…”No.’ ‘What’s wrong with you? It’s just a baby!’ DUDE, I DONT WANT TO HOLD THAT SCREAMING POTATO SHAPED POOP MACHINE! SCREW OFF!”–

31) “Parents being utterly confused because I don’t want children. Being a married woman just makes it IMPOSSIBLE for them to get through their heads. My Aunt told me one time that ‘I hadn’t met the right one yet, and when I do, I’ll know it because I’ll definitely want kids.’ She was basically telling me that my wonderful husband isn’t right for me cause my ‘biological clock’ hasn’t started ticking yet??? CRAZY!! Hmm…maybe we just enjoy time to ourselves and SLEEP. I like kids, but I like giving them back to their parents more.”–

32) “The passive-aggressive attitude toward my wife and I. We get so much flack because we buy things when we want and typically don’t hesitate to splurge on things. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard ‘You wouldn’t be buying that if you had kids!’ Wow! No way?! My wife and I don’t have kids yet because we are focusing on what makes us happy. Seriously, call us DINKs (dual income no kids) all you want, but don’t for a second think we are going to take pity on you if are popping out your 5th child in six years and you can’t afford to get nice things.”

Self-Entitlement Some Parents Think They Have

33) “When parents think their travel day is harder than everyone else’s because they are traveling with a kid. I once witnessed a mother cut in front of the entire ticket counter line for no reason other than she felt entitled. The worst part was the fact that the guy she cut in front of was blind!”–

34) “The special treatment they receive in the workplace. Oh, 30 minutes late today? ‘Had to get my kids to school.’ Need time off? ‘I need to take my kids to the dentist.’ I get it you have kids and you need to look after them but SCREW you for making it my problem now. I work closely with this woman who has 4 kids and ALWAYS has something going on each week that excuses her nonsense at work. Then there’s me: I have no kids and it is known by management. Last time I asked for a few hours off leading into the weekend boss asks, ‘You just want to get out of here to go with your friends?’ The answer is YES, YES I want to leave early ONCE in a blue moon.”–

35) “I have an employee that thinks she shouldn’t have to work outside of Monday-Friday 8-4 because she’s a single mother. She’s a barista. YOU’RE NOT THE ONLY SINGLE MOTHER IN THE WORLD. Others have also made it work… DECIDING TO HAVE A BABY DOESN’T ENTITLE YOU TO ANYTHING.”–

36) “Parents who think having kids entitles them to all kinds of extra privileges at work. You think smokers are bad for taking a few extra breaks, they’re nothing compared to parents. My former boss had to come in late every day because he had to drop his kids off at school and had to leave early every Tuesday to pick his daughter up. Oh and he gives himself the privileged to work from home whenever his kids are a little bit sniffly. But do I get to leave early when I get a migraine? Not unless it’s in the back of an ambulance. Kinda unfair considering I never got an opportunity to get rid of my migraines…”–

37) “When they feel entitled to tell complete strangers how to act and talk because their kids are present. I don’t have a very PG-rated vocabulary, but I’m also not obnoxious about it yelling profanities left and right, just when I’m having casual conversation I don’t filter very much unless I’m putting myself in an environment more likely to have kids (niece’s birthday party, going to a friend’s place that has a kid, etc.) I’ve been interrupted mid-conversation because the person behind me and my group in a line had their child there. A friend of mine was told off because he had a shirt that had an inappropriate word on it because the kid could see it (ironically being called that word, by that parent when he just laughed it off). I get you don’t want your kids to pick up that kind of language and all. But, how about instead of relying on the world to cater to your every need to make your child the person you aspire them to be, learn how to freaking parent for yourselves and explain that stuff to your kids. A simple, ‘Those kind of words you hear are not appropriate for you to use and might be seen as rude,’ to your kids and they’ll get it and it goes from there, but screw you if I’m watching my language around your kid who will never cross paths with me again.”