You know you’re a parent when...

I have found more and more lately that I am becoming what I previously thought of as a typical parent. This particular edition of my random musings begins with an injury that may make you wince in a similar way that I did. Dylan decided that it would be fun to poke me in the eye the other night. When I say 'poke', what I actually mean is 'jab really hard, fingernail first'. The pain was immense, but fortunately everything seems back to normal as I write this a couple of days later. I couldn't open my eye properly at first and when I did I had the same aversion to light as a vampire - not the pathetic wimpy type that shimmers in sunshine, you understand, but a proper angry one that bites people.
 

A similar attack caught on camera

Kate looked up my symptoms online and concluded that I had what clever types call a corneal abrasion and was amused to observe that, under the named causes, inquisitive small children were top of the list. Ha bloody ha! Anyway, I should be thankful that it's taken laddo over a year to inflict the first really painful injury I have suffered at his hands. Of course, there have been numerous scratches and kicks in the unmentionables along the way and these are just some of the tell-tale signs to those who don't know you that you are the parent of a young child.

I've also found that the majority of my points of reference in life now come from children's television. The other morning, for example, a colleague caught me pulling up my trousers – I've not lost weight, they've just got too stretched. My immediate response was "I'm just like the Tombliboos when they're on the Ninky Nonk." Sad eh? And speaking of television, I literally just found myself telling Dylan not to get so close to it with the immortal line "It's bad for your eyes." Oh dear. I've also caught myself using the phrases "It's not a toy" and "Come on, you've had your fun" quite often.

This was taken in May; he gets even closer now...

I think that most mums and dads would agree that the biggest indicator of being a parent, however, is tiredness. I often used to stay up until gone midnight playing Xbox games, but these days, even on the occasions in which I haven't nodded off in front of the television, I shun the console for some lovely sleep – and disturbed dreams of being beaten up by a cute one year old.