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18 Signs You’re a Millennial Working Family
You remember your device passcodes, not your relatives' phone numbers.
We all know Millennials have gotten a bad wrap, particularly in their teen and young adult years. Selfish, entitled, social media–addicted and unemployable, this large, plugged-in-and-tuned-out generation has endured just about every kind of insult you can imagine since Jeff Daniels’ epic Newsroom speech labeled them “the worst, period, generation, period, ever, period.” With that kind of reputation, it might come as a surprise, perhaps even to the ferocious navel gazers themselves, that they are now being touted as some of the best parents in modern history.
Yep, that’s right.
As it turns out, even the most self-absorbed, narcissistic teenagers can turn out to be selfless, involved, loving parents. Well, of course they can! Having access to the internet for most of their lives, they are more informed than any generation preceding them. In addition, they’ve learned from the sometimes too loose, unstructured parenting methods of the 60’s and 70’s, as well as the invasive, helicopter parenting of the 80’s and 90’s, and are striking their own balance of protecting their children, while encouraging their independence.
In terms of technology and entertainment, they share a deep appreciation for the past, as well as a wariness of social media and excessive screen time that they take with them into the future. Their experience with devices and the internet, however, makes them skilled tutors for their children, generation Alpha, which is predicted to be the single most technologically savvy generation in the history of the planet.
And perhaps the most glaring reason Millennials are rocking parenting so hard? They have the largest percentage of family units with two working parents of any generation to date, a great, scientifically proven benefit to their offspring.
So for the first time in the past decade, it’s pretty darn cool to be a Millennial! Think this sounds like you and your clan? Here are 18 signs you’re a Millennial working family to help you find out!
1. You insist your child learn how to play Super Mario World with you before you’ll even think about getting her a PlayStation.
2. You guys are so busy, even the dog has a side hustle.
3. The first numbers your child learned were the ones to unlock the iPad.
4. Your most trusted family physician is Dr. Google.
5. If another kid in your child’s class has the same first name, you feel like a failure.
6. Your family photo album is your Facebook feed.
7. Your child’s first word was an emoji.
8. You spend more money on preschool than you do on rent, and groceries for that matter.
9. Your kid now helps your parents figure out how to use the computer, and thank goodness!
10. You don’t know even your closest colleagues' phone numbers by heart, but you can still remember your best friend’s from middle school.
11. You totally considered a water birth.
12. Who needs to own a home when you’re all out and about 12 hours a day?
13. You don’t accept parenting advice that didn’t come from the Internet.
14. Bedtime stories consist of Dr. Seuss, Shel Silverstein and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
15. You take great pains to ensure your child’s wardrobe is as gender neutral as possible.
16. Family movie night is an all-out brawl between Zootopia and What the Health.
17. Your child assumes every digital device has a touchscreen.
18. You schedule Facetime/Skype/Google Hangout video chats with as much care as you devote to setting work meetings.
Written by Olivia Briggs for Working Mother and legally licensed through the Matcha publisher network. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@getmatcha.com.
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