Lies About Parenthood #588

Parenthood Lie: Playdates are fun opportunities for your children to socialise with other children their age while giving you a break from entertaining them.

Parenthood Truth: Playdates suck, other people's kids suck, and playdates are boring and annoying. They're boring because your kids are not available for you to play with, so you have to do grown up shit like laundry and dishes. Playdates also require you to run interference and play referee when things don't go as planned, have enough patience and food to feed yet another mouth (why are other people's children hungry the MINUTE they cross my threshold? And why are said kids so damn picky? Just scrape the mold off, damn you!). All of that, and for those couple of hours you need to pretend like you're June-freakin'-Cleaver so the kid does not go home and tell their Mum that you fed them 2 minute noodles topped with sugar-laden cereal right before you encouraged them to go out and play with cars on a busy road.

Playdates are a miserable way to spend an afternoon. They're awful but nobody tells you that because they're so damn relieved to get rid of their kids for a couple of hours, it's in their best interest to perpetuate the lie. Now aren't you glad I'm here to clear up any confusion? Playdates are parents' way of torturing other parents.