Erma Bombeck Quotes

There comes a moment as a parent when you realize you will no longer be the center of your child's universe.

When a child is small, it is his mother who is mainly responsible for the way he is brought up. So it was with me. I belonged in those days to my mother rather than my father.

Parents are the designated caregivers and are best suited for being able to raise children.

If you've never been hated by your child, you've never been a parent.

Parenthood remains the greatest single preserve of the amateur.

This whole head of the home thing has been blown way out of proportion. Some guys just take it way too far. Some parents take it way too far. Yet children need guidance. They need a parent to help and guide them. They also need a friend. They need a confidant.

When you have children, your perspective on the parent-child relationship alters.

What I continue to learn as a parent is to be mindful of the fact that I am responsible for being the parent that my children need me to be and not necessarily the parent I want to be.

Being a parent is a huge responsibility. Your child becomes the centre of your world.

What does it feel like to be a parent? What does it feel like to be a child? And that's what stories do. They bring you there. They offer a dramatic explanation, which is always different from an expository explanation.

When you hold your baby in your arms the first time, and you think of all the things you can say and do to influence him, it's a tremendous responsibility. What you do with him can influence not only him, but everyone he meets and not for a day or a month or a year but for time and eternity.

I never turned down a mother role.

All the time a person is a child he is both a child and learning to be a parent. After he becomes a parent he becomes predominantly a parent reliving childhood.

While having two biological parents at home is, the statistics tell us, best for children, a single-parent household is almost as good.

You know the only people who are always sure about the proper way to raise children? Those who've never had any.

When you become a parent, you look at your parents differently. You look at being a child differently. It's an awakening, a revelation that you have.

The character and history of each child may be a new and poetic experience to the parent, if he will let it.

Mothers - especially single mothers - are heroic in their efforts to raise our nation's children, but men must also take responsibility for their children and recognize the impact they have on their families' well-being.

I am basically in awe of every family's ability to make decisions for their kids.

Wherever I look, I see signs of the commandment to honor one's parents and nowhere of a commandment that calls for the respect of a child.

There is no job more important than parenting. This I believe.

I had five sisters and one brother, so having a big family is a given for me, but now being a father, and trying to be a good father, I already have my work cut out for me.

And part of that is, what is the point of having children if you don't have the privilege of bringing them up?

If you bungle raising your children, I don't think whatever else you do matters very much.

I don't think I would have been a good mother. Being a parent brings immense responsibility. It's a Herculean task. It would be almost too much for me.