For as long as I can remember, I’ve always pictured myself as a dad. As a young scamp growing up in the slums of Scunthorpe, I just kind of took it for granted that one day I’d become an adult, get married and have a kid.

It’s only as you get older though that you realise not everything always happens as you envision it. The world can be a big, dark and scary place in which bad stuff can – and often does – happen to good people. I’ve been lucky – I’m married to the person I fell in love with over 10 years ago, Baby L was conceived within the first month of trying thanks to my super jizz and life is pretty much as I always hoped it’d be as a thirty-year old.

Sometimes though, expectation is different to reality. I used to imagine all of the awesome stuff that came with being a dad, but kind of glossed over the not so glamorous aspects which are also prevalent. That’s fine with me though – you’ve got to take the good with the bad, every cloud has a silver lining, you can’t have a rainbow without rain, yadda yadda yadda.

What this has meant is that I’ve found myself doing some pretty gross stuff which I never imagined that I’d do. Things which make you want to be sick in your own mouth, but you can’t because you’ve already emptied your insides by projectile vomiting down the nearest wall.

The weird thing though is that somehow things aren’t quite as gross when it’s your own kid. The fact that you created this little human using the contents of your own scrotum somehow builds your tolerance levels. As they say, I guess blood really is thicker than your own gag reflex (N.B. I doubt anyone has ever said that until now).

Whilst thinking about this post, I realised that I’ve already written on the blog about two pretty gross things I’ve done since becoming a dad. Therefore, rather than re-hash old content here, I’ll cheat a bit by calling these numbers 1 and 2 of my 5 gross things I didn’t think I’d do before becoming a dad. Here they are:

1) Drinking The Wife’s Breast Milk

As the title suggests, I’ve tasted the missus’ boob juice on more than once occasion. And not by accident. Something which I didn’t think I’d ever say before becoming a dad. Check out my drinking the wife’s breast milk post.

2) Scooping Baby Crap Out Of The Bath

Baby L was enjoying a nice, fun bath when she decided to empty her bowels whilst in the tub. This resulted in manic scooping of shit out of the bath and a horrifying event that I never thought I’d experience. Read about this life-changing incident in splish, splash the baby shat in the bath.

3) Wipe Someone’s Nose With My Hand

Snot is pretty disgusting. Your own isn’t too bad, but other people’s isn’t the greatest thing in the world.

There was a girl at my school who always had a bit of snot dribbling out of her nose – if that wasn’t bad enough, I remember her accidentally blowing snot bubbles when she’d laugh. Bleurgh. With memories such as these from my childhood, it’s hardly surprising that I didn’t picture myself being around someone else’s schnoz.

That changes with a sprog though. If Baby L didn’t have a runny nose through teething, chances are she was all snotty due to a cold. The early days saw me use a tissue or a bit of kitchen roll to wipe away the mucus, but an increased tolerance and a ballooning household shopping bill as a result, saw me just use my hand instead.

Quicker. Easier. More disgusting. But, still not as bad as people who suck bogies and snot out of their babies nose with their own mouth!

4) Eat Pre-Chewed Food

The thought of eating food that has already been in someone’s mouth is pretty disgusting, but since I’ve become a dad, I’ve found myself doing it more and more.

Just to clarify, I’m not talking about going up to random strangers and forcibly stealing food out of their mouth – my treatment helped with that peculiar habit. I’m talking about scraps of food designed for the sprog which she’s either spat out or have accidentally fallen out of her mouth.

Now I’m not in the habit of doing this. I don’t secretly hope that she spits out a half-chewed strawberry so that I can eat it, or find myself giving her food-stained bib a quick suck in order to increase my calorie intake. But, I have found myself eating food I’ve given her from my plate which she’s half chewed, or licking yoghurt off my finger after using it to wipe her mouth.

It might be pretty gross, but it keeps things that bit cleaner plus gets the sprog back for stealing all of my food.

5) Have A Crap In Front Of Someone

Being a bloke, we naturally become accustomed to having a piss in front of other people. Unlike in the Ladies, the Gents usually only have a couple of toilets which are in a pretty shocking condition, so urinals become the norm. As such, taking a leak whilst standing next to a random stranger isn’t too weird.

The same goes for being at home – I think nothing of ‘draining the snake’ when the missus is in the bathroom. Let’s just say I like to share. However, my laissez-faire attitude when it comes to toilet behaviour changes when it comes to taking a dump. For me, this is alone time and is usually used to catch up on social media. Twitter on the shitter.

But, having a baby and being a stay-at-home dad has changed this. When I’m all alone in the house with a baby who isn’t asleep and I need a crap (normally after my morning coffee), there’s not many options I’m left with but to bring her into the bathroom with me.

I resisted doing this for a long time, but I finally gave in and decided it was the best and safest option all around. I just hope she understands, and can forgive me, in the future.

Those are the five gross things I’ve found myself doing since becoming a dad. Have you found yourself doing any disgusting things that you didn’t think you were capable before becoming a parent? Share your horrifying experiences below!

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