Chris Sullivan Quotes

I'm terrified for what is in store for me as a parent!

It is always fragile, being a parent.

As a mom, you have all these situations you go through, and you're like, 'What is going on? Is this normal? Is this a phase? Or what is this?' and then you feel silly for asking questions because you think, 'I'm a mom - I'm supposed to know these things,' but you don't.

You want a child who never makes you anything but proud? Please. Don't bother taking on parenthood if you can't handle the fact that sometimes your child's identity won't be what you would have chosen. And if you want to prevent a child from ever suffering? Well, then don't have a child. No one is born into the world never to suffer.

I do feel a lot of times like I'm out of my league with my kids in terms of what my responsibility is.

Being a parent is not for the faint of heart. I may joke about knowing fear, but the fact is, the first time I ever knew real fear was the day Charlotte, my first child, was born. Suddenly there is someone in the world you care about more than anything.

I'm not sure what it means fully to be a parent.

Parenting is the most important thing to many of us, and so it's also the place we're most vulnerable. We're all a little afraid we're doing it wrong.

My greatest fear is that I'll fail my kids.

At that moment, she cannot think of a more reckless, irrational thing than choosing to become a parent.

It's terrifying, that unconditional love you have for a child. I still wonder if she really came from me, from my womb. It's a miracle. I don't understand it. I live it very intensely.

When you have a child, as anyone knows who has them, that's basically all you want to talk about.

My worst moments as a parent have been much like my greatest moments as a parent: the product of complete and perfect accident.

For all that being a parent is normal statistically, it's not normal psychologically. It produces some of the most extreme emotions you'll ever have.

It's like you have a child and you think, 'Everything that I've done up until this point is insignificant in comparison to being a father.' It's a beautiful, beautiful thing.

We all parent the best we can. Being human, we're ambivalent. We want perfection for our babies, but we also need sleep.

But, in fact, there is nothing that can bring you closer to fearlessness about everything else in the world than being a parent - because everyday fears - like not being approved of - pale by comparison to the fears you have about your children.

Kids are a great analogy. You want your kids to grow up, and you don't want your kids to grow up. You want your kids to become independent of you, but it's also a parent's worst nightmare: That they won't need you. It's like the real tragedy of parenting.

I was 20 when my daughter was born, and making all these plans during my wife's pregnancy. I was going to be the perfect father. Once she was born, it was suddenly, 'Oh, my God! I'm a parent!'

I don't think anybody feels like they're a good parent. Or if people think they're good parents, they ought to think again.

Our need for certainty in an endeavor as uncertain as raising children makes explicit 'how-to-parent' strategies both seductive and dangerous.

All parents gush about what it's like to be a parent. I love it.

There is never a right or wrong time to have kids; it happens for whatever reason, but you can have this paranoia: 'will I be able to do this, I'm not sure if I'm ready to have kids?'

Sometimes it's a bizarre, fairly cold, and horrifying thing to be a parent.

Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves.