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Feb
16
We had some friends over for dinner last night, a married couple expecting their first child this summer. I was a little nervous about the get-together, mostly because I didn’t want to horrify them with a bleak glimpse into their parental future. As it turned out, though, the children were fairly decently behaved and hopefully didn’t freak them out too much. Sure, there was that awkward moment where five seconds before they knocked on our door Riley burst out sobbing due to some mysterious malady with his ear and could not be consoled for several long, unbelievably loud minutes, and of course during dinner Dylan dramatically gagged on one of those tiny puffed-corn snacks that supposedly melts in babies’ mouths and had to be ferried at top speed to the kitchen sink for a corn-puff-ectomy and subsequent hurling, but other than that . . .
At one point our pregnant guest said something like, so, Linda, let me ask you honestly . . . would you say it’s hard to retain your normal adult life and interests now that you have kids? And I gave it some thought and provided the most accurate and respectful answer I could, which was to bend over and heartily slap my knee while barking with bitter, bitter laughter.
Okay, not really. I may have allowed a tiny HAR! to slip past my lips, but I promise, I regretted it immediately.
Here’s what I think: when you become a parent, life changes in more ways than you ever could have imagined. Yes, in all sorts of profound and meaningful and wonderful ways, but also in all sorts of incredibly annoying and inconvenient ways. Every single tiny little activity that you do on your own time, that you enjoy and take for granted, is going to change. You will not necessarily be able to continue to see movies, read books, eat food, sleep, exercise, or take a shit when you want to do so. Just leaving the house will become a strategic operation involving the sort of prep work that goes into Everest expeditions, and unless your hobbies already happen to revolve around diaper changes, naptimes, feedings, etc, they are probably going on the back burner. For, like, several years.
These are nontrivial issues to deal with. I mean, I can only speak personally and I know everyone’s experience is different, but, you know, I think it’s pretty goddamned hard to make that switch and start living your life based primarily around someone else’s needs. Especially when you feel like you’re trying to do just one little thing for yourself, not like a weeklong trip to Cabo or even a Saturday morning spent in bed with a good book, but something tiny — I JUST WANT TO FINISH THIS CUP OF COFFEE OH MY GOD — and you can’t.
So everything changes. And for a while it seems like everything narrows, too — everything draws in for those early weeks of newbornhood, where it’s all magical and sort of awful at the same time and time become elastic and weird. But then I suppose what happens is that it all expands again, and becomes bigger than it ever was before. Life spreads out to encompass everything you want it to . . . you just have to work a lot harder at it. You have to give up doing things when you want, and start doing things when you have time to do them, and if you’re very lucky there isn’t too big of a gap between points A and B.
My adult life has changed in every way possible, but I’m still here. It’s still me. My normal adult life doesn’t necessarily encompass everything it used to, but all the important elements are still thriving, and if certain areas have receded for the time being, others have exploded like Roman candles.
I still don’t know what my actual answer is. Especially without resorting to the cliches about how it’s all worth it, because of course is it, but that wasn’t the question, was it?
Comments
87 Responses to “Adult life and interests”
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Yes. Yes yes yes to everything you said.
Just. . .yes.
And the ‘corn-puff-ectomy and subsequent hurling’ made me pee a little.
But seriously – and feel free to laugh little ol’ childless me off the page – do you think it makes a difference if, as a parent, you try not to live your life AROUND the children? I ask this, not naively like I don’t understand that children, especially babies, require an extraordinary amount of daily care; but I ask it because my parents, and some other older parents I know, scoff at the way so many modern parents are expected to bend their whole existences around their children’s needs and wants…is this the dumbest question you’ve ever heard and am I damned to a shrieking relentless needball of a child for even asking it?
I freaking hate it when people remind me that it’s worth it, because of just what you said – of effing COURSE it’s worth it, but that doesn’t have anything to do with your day to day life. The drudgery involved with the day to day lives with young children is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced before and I have had some *shit eating* jobs! But I just try and tell myself that everyone has done it and I try and be as honest as possible with friends of mine who are about to do it, without being a scare monger. It’s a difficult balance, I admit!
I would say finding a balance between who I’ve always been and the mom I *also* am now was the hardest part of having kids for me.
I think this is where women get depressed and feel like they’ve lost their identity. Once you find some sort of happy medium, it’s like having oxygen back in your lungs.
It’s all about finding a new “normal.”
Sorry, Sadie, that does make me laugh a lot, if only because I used to think it too, back when I had theoretical children and not actual children. Your parents are full of shit, too, imo, same as mine. :)
Sadie: well, I think I sort of know what you’re getting at, but there’s a certain base reality about parenting, regardless of your circumstances — with little kids anyway. I mean, I work outside the home and I still go to a gym and I use inappropriate language in their presence and everything (what?), but my life still revolves around theirs. Not that I cater to their every whim or take my 12-month-old to daily Kindermusik classes or whatever, but, you know, you can’t tell a baby NOT to need a nap. For instance. Or to sleep when YOU feel like taking one.
For Sadie, I’m not laughing at you, I think it’s a reasonable question (for a childless person). I think that it does matter when the children are older and you can chose whether to let them get involved in 14 activities or just 1 or 2. And if they are involved in just one, field hockey say, you can decide if you want to go to every stinking game and cheer from the sidelines or just some of them. See what I mean? There are choices at that stage. But no, I don’t think it matters when the kids are little like Linda’s kids. Just the shear amount of tending to the physical needs of little ones is all of what she is saying and more. But yes, SO effing worth it, AND MORE.
I do think some people do become a little too invested in their kids and I think that is why some older parents scoff at all of us. But I don’t actually know anyone who is that invested in their kids. I just think that if you plop a baby in the middle of two already busy lives well something has to give.
What I hate is how I am told I should be grateful for it. I adore my daughter and am so glad to have her but no, I am not thankful each day that I have to deal with the drudgery. I would much prefer to read a book and a cook a meal that doesn’t involve nuggets of some kind.
In other words, grateful for the kid, not grateful for the slop that comes with.
I always thought people who had children not only expected but looked forward to their life changing; they were just rather clueless on how it would change. While I “Love” and “Cherish” the four I have raised I would rather have a Colonoscopy done with a Seeing Eye dog than go through having infants again. That’s why I loving reading your blog, I can relive that time with a smile and then walk away.
Sadie: I think that’s an important question, because it gets a lot of play in the media right now (this idea that being a parent now is especially hard and time-consuming, and that at some point in the past parents weren’t expected to center their lives on their kids quite so much). And like a lot of things that get media attention, I think it’s both true and not-true–yes, there are a lot of extreme examples of parents (especially moms) who have completely given their lives over to their kids, and you want to just SHAKE them. But I think our parents gave themselves over to us when we were kids more than is currently admitted. My mom has complained many times about how hard it was to adjust, in the early seventies, to being a mom–to having her time not her own any more. This happens to ALL parents, and probably always has, except for parents with bevies of nannies and wet-nurses and governesses, etc. And even they must experience some kind of adjustment, though in my bitterness I can’t imagine what it is.
Really, since many more moms work now, probably on average parents give themselves over LESS to their kids than a few decades ago. Over the whole society, not over individual lives.
Oh, and great post, Linda! You totally said it.
I think, in response to Sadie’s question, that some parents do get uber-involved with their children to the point where there is only child-existence to the exclusion of adult existence. I believe that a nicer, saner balance is appropriate for both parties involved as it promotes more independent, happier children and parents. I also think it’s a little harder nowadays to promote independence in children as we basically feel the need to supervise them at all times so no one snatches them, hurts them or lures them into any number of unsavory ventures–drugs, gangs, Calliou-watching. But, basically, yes, your lives drastically change–even if you continue to do the things you used to do because *now* you do it with a kid (er…or two). And, as previously stated, a young child’s needs (um, food, diaper changes, barf-clean-up, medicine, teeth, sickness, and eventually potty-training, discipline, etc) HAVE to kind of trump other, more enjoyable pursuits even if only temporarily. And, as Linda states, sometimes even leaving the house takes on a Goldberg-ish feel.
It’s why people always say that parenting is like the club you never knew you never wanted to join but are always glad you did. Or maybe I just say that.
g~
I have a three-month-old son, and this captures how I feel about being a mother EXACTLY.
My son is 15 and I’ve almost…ALMOST got my life back. All I need now is for him to get his driver’s license. C’mon August.
Which is all just to say that it’s temporary. A rather long temporary but yes, you DO get your life back.
i think this is a beautifully written description of what it’s like to be a parent. i’m going to file it away to show people when they ask me, “so, what’s it really like to be a mom?” thanks, linda! (and i promise i’ll give you all the credit!)
God, I am finding these comments (and original post) so interesting! Kalisa, your comment reminds me of something a friend of mine told me the other night. It was her 44th birthday and I said that I was jealous, in a way, because she was just four years older than I but both her kids are in college and mine are tiny (and still gestating). She said you trade one worry for the other, because that night, she said her 21 year old son had just left the party and she was ‘pretty sure he was high’. My only comfort is by the time my kids are 21 and high I’ll be so damned old I won’t notice/care.
Oh my gosh – you totally said it. The amount of energy required just to to get thru the day with everyone fed and (sometimes) dressed is indescribable.
What I was totally unprepared for is the amount of luggage I have to haul everywhere. I mean, sure, I had visions of cute little diaper bags, but I had no idea. And when my second one came along, it was unbelievable – I couldn’t take all the stuff I needed in the car AND have room for groceries. Diaper bag stuffed full for a baby and non-potty trained two year old, stroller (single or double), breastpump, cooler for the milk, snacks, sippees, booster seat, sometimes a potty seat….and I know I am not remembering everything. If I went to my mom’s house for the day, I had to make 3 or 4 trips to the car for all the gear.
Plus, yeah, haven’t been in the bathroom by myself for over four years. My friend has an 11 and a 13 year old and she says she still has that problem. Boo.
Yeah, see, this is one of those things that I kind of dread, but also look forward to in a sadomasochistic way. It’s also one of those things that I really admire you for, because you’re living proof that you don’t have to be a total jack off just because you procreate. I worry about that sometimes, but you do pretty damn good, so I know it’s possible. I mean what the hell, I practically have no personal life now, so why not go ahead and toss the rest down the drain too. Right? I liked Shrek. Why not guarantee that I will see it again four hundred thousand times?
Hell, I’ll be happy if I can just reach the end of my life without raising psychopathic serial killers. Or at least not the weird ones who do the penis tuck thing like from Silence of the Lambs, cause I could probably deal with the killing, but gender benders freak me out.
So, so well written. I wish I had something to add, but I think you pretty much covered it.
As a person who is two weeks away from parenthood and will probably be mocked, let me say that, after observing an entire starting basketball team AND bench be born and half-raised in my family that I kind of know what Sadie means.
While yes, it’s true, you have to give yourself over to your kid completely, and can’t just carry on with life as normal before children, I don’t think that’s what our parents necessarily mean when they make that statement. I know my parents definitely didn’t mean that they were gallivanting all over creation and having all this free time to take up French and jet to Europe without a care in the world compared to today’s parents.
I’ve seen A LOT of family members take an extreme view of parenting, and that’s just in my extended family (and in-laws, too), so I have to believe it’s more visible than not to other generations. I’m talking about everything from sleep habits (as in, refusing to put their kids on any kind of nap schedule/letting the kids sleep in their bed until they’re an age that people older than us would find HILARIOUS, etc. etc.)to on-demand … everything.
I’ve seen both sides, all up-close and personal-like, and can tell you that some people give themselves over to their kids in insane, totally bizarre ways that even the harried, busy, capable OTHER parents in the same family will acknowledge. Some of this is unique-snowflakey stuff, and some is flat-out insanity, especially to older generations who raised kids in an era where different parenting theories were in vogue.
I think, too, the attachment parenting theories that are popular among certain sets are mystifying to older generations. I was born in the ’70s, while a few of my siblings were born in the ’60s, and breastfeeding theories alone were STARKLY different between our childhoods, much less the ideas that are out there now.
And yes, we haven’t even touched the overscheduled insanity that is kids who are preschoolers and up, which again, is mystifying to older generations who raised us in an era where a lot of what’s offered today just wasn’t available.
So while I’m expecting my life to explode in an eye-poking manner and to never poop alone again — and have been warned as such by my parents — I think I also see what they mean.
I think it’s those tiny things that you take for granted before kids that end up being the biggest hurdles. Like, you really can’t grasp that crapping in peace might one day feel like a LUXURY.
Also, a colonoscopy done with a Seeing Eye Dog….BWAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Holy smokes it’s so weird that this is your entry for today because NOT 5 minutes ago I was at the gym mulling over the idea of procreation because my ovaries are on over-drive or something, and man this uterus ain’t getting any younger…thanks for your insight. I love reading here.
g~,
I have a theory that Calliou is actually an Al Qaeda plot to make our children weak and whiney. And Boohbah was inserted to make our children prone to drug use in later life.
Linda, this is spot on.
Re: Sadie’s question: Absolutely you can have kids and not have them rule your life. You can swear and enjoy reading and want to discuss politics and not the latest poopy diaper, but the fact of the matter is, when your children are small, you will have less time for everything that is not the last poopy diaper. My husband and I both work. Our friends with kids all have jobs. We were busy before we had kids, and now we’ve got to coordinate daycare drop-offs and, for some of us, breastfeeding schedules. So when we have parties, all of us drinking a few beers and enjoying good food like we used to, we end up discussing poo instead of the books we last read. Just the way it is.
Thank you, Linda, and everyone else, for replying. I asked that question genuinely and all your comments make sense. I think, as some people touched on, the constant and repetitive needs of infants/toddlers cannot be avoided, and you DO have to live around those…but like Jonniker elaborated on and my parents would point out, some of those “needs” are subjective (like Kindermusik classes, snorfle). That said, I think my parents are probably just forgetting a lot of things when they recount my childhood. They did smoke a LOT of weed in the late seventies; in a related story, I raised myself, so maybe they are right, parenting is EASY PEASY!
I have a 6 year old and was actually beginning to experience the joy of sleeping in and relative independence so of course I went and had another baby. I am stuck in this sort of weird reality where I *know* things will get easier but I am still dealing with a 6 month old and holy crap I don’t remember it being this hard?! Also, when looking around at my small home and lamenting that Toys R Crap apparently exploded in my family room, I remind myself that there will come a day when that will be all gone, and I will wonder where the time went. A fine line of wishing time would slow down and wishing they were in college somewhere already. Crazy thing, parenting.
As if having a two-year old and infant wasn’t punishment enough, I went and got a puppy. In our minds, we’re “getting it all over with.” Not in the brushing-off, meaningless sense, but in the sense that when we’re done, we want to be D-O-N-E. No more babies, no more puppies, no more poop or pee on my coffee table (don’t ask).
My mother still calls me every day and I’m almost 30. I don’t think our lives are ever fully our own. And I’m okay with that. As long as this baby eventually sleeps through the night FOR MORE THAN ONE GODDAMNED NIGHT IN A ROW. Ahem.
you know when you’re a mother when you have a dental appt + pelvic exam tomorrow + are excited about being baby-free for the duration.
and yup, I was talking about me.
omfg YAYYYYYYYYYY for tomorrow!
So great – I’m so glad there are folks like you who can write so eloquently what I’m feeling and then when I get asked the same question, I can just send them to your blog!
BTW, I’m on the eastside and wondering where the park is in your most recent pics? It looks KEWL and we’re needing some variety!
Interesting. I was maybe last person keyed in to these points apparently. I naively thought that being a step-mom made me exempt from some of this stuff – but I was WRONG! I think it probably applies to any full-time parent, no matter the sort. With the one exception that I’ve noticed that I seem to have an easier time setting limits and boundaries than some of my friends with biological kids – there’s no way my toilet time is interrupted and his bedtime is one of my favorite times of day and is adhered to religiously, (unless there’s a Charlie Brown Special on…)
Wha? You work, you hike, you geocache and pop off for spa weekends. I sit around all day in dirty pajamas and my ONE kid is 2.5. If you don’t have it all figured out what the hell does that mean about ME? I thought you were the high bar…
You always explain everything so well – that’s how it all is in my head, and yet I could never have said it so perfectly. Every non-parent should read this post!
This is the best thing I’ve ever read about what it’s like to be a parent. You’ve captured it perfectly. And now I feel a lot better about the fact that I never ever ever ever get to do anything for myself anymore. At least we’re all in the same damn boat together.
The next time my childless girlfriends say something like “Oh, I know all about raising kids! I have [insert number] neices/nephews/kids I babysit for all the time!”, instead of snorting and guffawing, I will just show them your post. Thank you for putting into words what I’ve been trying to, but failing miserably.
This is just so lovely and perfect. Right on.
I totally relate to the ‘trying not to horrify the pregnant lady’ scenario. When I was expecting my second I dragged my reluctant 3-year-old into Motherhood Maternity because, for the love of all that’s holy, I needed a new shirt. Two maternity shirts were not cutting it. Of course she totally melted down in the middle of the store, and all the expecting moms just stared in horror. As I would have in their situation.
I don’t really think that there’s anything you can say to prepare someone for parenthood. You may think you know what you’re in for, but until you’ve gone through those early weeks yourself there’s no imagining. So I try to say little, be reassuring, and not laugh too much.
Ah yes, grateful. If I had a dollar for every person who suggested that was the answer to every new struggle I’ve encountered in these first 6 months of being a mom (and thw whole AWFUL 10 month of pregnancy for that matter).
What gets me is that when you read between the lines of a just-be-grateful bully, what they are really saying is that I am UNgrateful. Oy that gets me worked into a tizzy every time.
That’s why I think it’s impossible to have these conversations in a meaningful way with anyone who a)hasn’t experienced a baby or b)who experienced it too long ago. They either just don’t have a clue yet, or they’ve forgotten how intense it is.
But, Linda, you certainly do have a clue, and you have a knack for laying it all out there in exactly the way it needs to be. Get on gettin’ on with that book already. :)
And thanks for this great blog. I read you before I had the little one, but I literally used it as a resource in those early days. I would look up the corresponding week after Dylan’s birth and see what you had to say. On more than one occasion this blog has made me feel less crazy. And that is a very good thing.
I hear you on the cup of coffee…I’d just be happy to go to the bathroom without my child bursting into tears because mommy has SHUT THE DOOR which clearly means the toilet monster has gobbled mommy down into an alternate dimension where everything is made of ice cream and chocolate candy and it’s so goddamned unfair that he can’t open up that door!
Amen. Double Amen. TRIPLE Amen. You said it perfectly.
I was thinking the same thing – AMEN.
And when you’re not tending to their true needs – food, sleep, clean diapers, etc., they want you to PAY ATTENTION to them, too. Help build pirate ships out of the dining room chairs, WATCH THIS, mommy!, and sit on your lap while you eat dinner together as a family.
I think the hardest part for me was remembering that I am still my own person, that I do exist separate from them. It’s getting easier as they get a little older.
Thank you for this.
This was just perfect. My bestest friend has just had her teeny, perfect baby and she is feeling a little bit erm, overwhelmed by the whole thing. It’s like the baby is born, you love it more than you could ever think possible and then it has the cheek to need other things than love. Like milk! And rocking around the room at 3am!
Linda, your post sums it up perfectly. I’ve always said that becoming a mother is the easiest and hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Easy because how could you not love that little bundle that you created. Hard because that little bundle needs constant care and attention.
I think it’s a good thing that the kid thing is a TEMPORARY stage, or no one would be willing to reproduce the species. I find the work satisfying, and worth it as you say—-but wouldn’t want to do it until the day I died or anything. I think that would be Too Hard.
Oh, and I totally know what Sadie means. I parent with a “fond neglect” philosophy that works for me, and I think I’m less TRODDEN DOWN than my friends who instead do a philosophy that involves a lot more time spent actively interacting with the kids. I often fret that they’re making the Better Choice, though.
This is a lovely entry.
I think parenting forces us to be *choiceful* about the parts of our “normal adult life and interests” we retain. Before we had kids, we traveled, we ate out with friends several times a week, we saw movies, we read, we went to live music. With two small kids, we have time for less than half of that. So we’ve needed to choose–which is more important to us, reading or eating out a lot? Seeing live music/movies out, or saving our money and watching dvds at home?
It’s a lot like exercise, or eating well, or anything else. If it’s important enough to you, you’ll find a way to fit it in, even post-kids. If not, you won’t. Because as you said to Sadie, there really *isn’t* a choice about whether or not you meet their basic needs.
I still mourn the Saturdays and Sundays of yesteryear. What I miss the most is simply lying on the couch watching TV for as long or as briefly as I deemed necessary.
With an 8 month old who crawls, there is no lying on the couch. Ever. There is only pulling the cords out of his maw.
Still, I wouldn’t trade him in as he’s pretty cute. It’s just a strange place to be in: to sometimes want what you can’t have and to not want to give up what you currently have.
We’re in the process of having in vitro (no, I don’t already have six kids and Crazy Eye) and with any luck, I’ll become a first-timer at 40. I’ve of course been reading anything and everything re: parenthood and at first I was hoping that because we’re so old and don’t do much anyway (half-joking)it would be much easier for us to adjust. But I realized, no – I do enjoy sleeping in some Saturdays and reading the paper on Sundays, pooping in peace and reading a whole book in a day sometimes. Yeah, I’m scared shitless. Excited, but scared. And you know of course if this does happen, I’ll NEVER be able to complain about anything, because look how long it took and how much effort and money we put into it!
@ Kim–I’m an IVF veteran with a 7-month-old son, and I think we get it a little harder than most. Like we’re not supposed to complain about the suck, you know? When I would reach that 2am meltdown stage, I would feel so guilty because we wanted him so badly.
That said, parenthood has been so fun. We take our son out to eat at family-friendly restaurants (and not always fast food places, either!) and he’s just starting to like to go to the park for the swings. And, you know, I never thought I would be so interested in watching someone eat a cracker, but there you go.
Sometimes I try to think back to Before (before moving in with my husband and his two young daughters, then having a son of my own), when I was single and living in a studio apartment in the city, and I try to remember what I did with all that glorious TIME.
And you know what? I have absolutely no idea. It feels like all I’ve ever done is cut up other people’s food.
(Does your pregnant friend read your site? Maybe today’s post will help explain things for her.)
In Vitro Kim,
I think any parent has a right to complain, bitch, whine and moan about parenting regardless of how easily their children were conceived. In fact, I entitle you (because I can do that, ya know) to it even more because of the time, energy, heartache, money, etc you’ve invested into this.
Good Luck!
g~
Thank you Linda–this is one of your best. I reiterate what I have said in other comments, you have SUCH a friend in me in South Florida (and in my sister in Va. Beach). I just want to thank all of the other commenters, too. It is so gratifying to read the thoughtful, intelligent, and honest comments of the women and men who read this blog. You ALL just made my day!
I really appreciate your honest perspective! I don’t know if I’ll have children, but if I do, I don’t want to go into it with unrealistic expectations. I want the real dirt!
sometimes i like to reminisce about what it was like to, say…
- go shopping after work
- lay on the sofa after work
- sleep until 7 am
- read the newspaper
but i can hardly remember those days. which is okay. :)
I truly miss drinking my coffee before it reaches bone-chilling cold; I miss my old jeans that may never fit again, no matter what the scale says; I miss reading something above the “I Can Read!” level; I miss non-scheduled sex (with husband or alone, either one…) I miss drinking more than 1/2 glass of wine at any given time because I’m going to drive home with the kids and I am a responsible mom!; I miss REM sleep; I miss having all the socks come out of the laundry with a match; I miss watching any movies up for current academy awards…
But in the place of what I miss, I get hugs whenever I want them; hugs to knees, elbows, heads, necks; I get “I wuv you too, mommy” when I tuck her in; I get to play with play-doh!; I get the joy of holding my son and feeling him relax from the sobbing and burrow into my neck; I get to make cookies with my daughter; I get to be Santa Claus; I get her hand in mine when we walk the dog together; I get to make snow people in the front yard; I get to read book after book after book with them on my lap, excited about reading; I get group snuggles on the couch; I get the excitement of sleeping in a tent in the living room…
In essence, I have gained so much, that what I have given up doesn’t seem that important anymore. Except drinking coffee when it’s warm…and that’s what a microwave is for.
Undomestic Diva:
(This is to take nothing away from or invalidate what you say in any way) If there are any dads-to-be reading this, her comment applies to you too; it’s very possible you’ll start to feel like you’ve lost your identity. I felt that _hard_, and we do new parents a disservice with the sweetness-and-light-it’s-all-worth-it stuff.
Yes, it’s worth it. But sometimes it has to _become_ worth it. Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t feel that way immediately.
I now what Sadie is saying, I think. For one thing, when my doctor was young and having her children, HER (male) doctor’s advice to get her baby to sleep through the night was to put them in their crib, close the door and not go back until morning. Period. That was just the mentalitiy back then and it was rare for women to question their doctors.
For another, there were a lot of moms that stayed home even before having children, and even if they didn’t they were expected to resign once they had them. Women weren’t expected to do it all, but they were expected to stay home, run the household and raise the kids. It was normal and expected that babies be put down in cribs and playpens and stay there while the moms cleaned, cooked, etc.
I also suspect that generations past went out to eat a lot less and did fewer things for just themselves in genera.
So I guess what I’m saying in response to Sadie is that older generations may think we’re crazy to cater to our kids the way we do, and yes, they did not center their lives around their kids, but I think their lifestyle was intrinsically more accommodating of having kids around.
Spendy products that might be worth it? I would say fotofacials and Restylane (though these are services not products and I guess you don’t necessarily want to test drive them yourself since you’d be semi-permanently altering your face. . . ).
AMEN. I can’t remember the last time I was able to drink something without sharing, have a poop without company, or walk through my house without stepping on a GD Hot Wheel car! But when he smiles at me, well Shit! of course you can have another slobber covered sip of my apple juice.
How I’d answer the posed question….
Yes, parenting is hard – but what changes after becoming a parent is the definition of “Normal Adult Activities”
Don’t expect that change to be simple to make – it’s complicated by a deep love and devotion to your own personal miracle that has no sense of time, poops constantly, and doesn’t care if you don’t get to shower for a week. It’s like a life earthquake that shifts everything around and makes you feel uncertain on your feet.
Eventually though, the shifting stops, and a new “normal” happens.
I am so glad you wrote this because I am the only one of my close group of friends that has a child. I ALWAYS feel like they do not even begin to FATHOM why I cannot just GO OUT WITH THEM on Friday night. “Just leave him with his dad” they say. As if it is just that easy. It’s just as easy as saying “Honey- I am going out drinking with the girls. Have fun with the evil teething baby this evening even though you have been working 18 hours a day all week long- ok?!”
Yeah, right. HAHAHA.
We just had our third baby in June. People ask all the time which was harder, going from 1 to 2 or 2 to 3. I always say the first was hardest because it was such a complete life change.
I LOVE this post and all the comments…one more thing I just want to add. There is such huge financial shift that happens too. We’ve had to say good-bye to so much… not just because we don’t have the time (that too!), but because diapers, babysitters, formula, pediatrician co-pays, etc. add up. So even if I did (for some strange reason) have a day to myself, I certainly couldn’t afford to do the things I used to do. Kids are expensive, man! But I do keep reminding myself that I wouldn’t trade all the ski trips or manicures or pottery classes in the world for my kids. It’s all about perspective right?
Christy,
I’ve heard that the 3rd is the hardest. You can no longer play “man to man” (or person to person). You have to switch to a zone defense.
HAHAHAH! Corn-puff-ecotmy!! We are so very familiar with that procedure. Melt in mouth-my foot!!
This is the best description of motherhood. And oh so real. I’ve seen others give good descriptions but you don’t do it in a militant, cliched, us vs. them type way. That’s what I like about you; you’re able to remember what your life was like before children and compare it to now in an effective way instead of an AIIIEEEIIIEEE, screechy way. Thank you.
Tony, for me, my first baby was hardest. Going from non-parent to parent was a huge adjustment. I found it really overwhelming. When my second was born, I found her to be a piece of cake. Number three has definitely put me over the top in terms of getting things done around the house. I’m hoping that improves with age.
Thank you guys to responding to my IVF comment – I feel like someone on the outside looking into the exclusive club that is parenthood sometimes and also sort of like a weirdo because I’m the only one I know who’s having to go through this procedure. It’s parents like you Linda, who make me think that I will still be me even if I become a mom. I’d rather read about real life than fakey perfect-world flowers and unicorn farts any day.
Hilarious!! My dogs have accompanied me to the bathroom for years, but now the toddlers want to *view* the poop. OMG. And if my husband tries to hide in the bathroom for a 20 minute shit, I scream at him to finish already and help me!!! LOL
Kim, we often (semi-jokingly) tell our kids that they cost $75K per child so they better support us in our old age/better live up to our expectations because boy we have alot of them! Of course they are only 2.5 and don’t really understand all of that… We sometimes say, too, I coulda been happy just raising dogs… but then I get home from work and they shriek with delight and throw themselves in my arms. And the language is so much fun too–Chicken Uggets. Awfully fun.
I love the whole post, of course, but especially laughed about not wanting to totally horrify your friends. I’ve had the same fear, but then realized that the friends will probably just smugly think to themselves “oh we/our kids won’t be like that” just as I did as a smug not-yet-parent!!
I think Chief Tyrol summed it up best on BSG a couple of weeks ago: “Welcome to fatherhood. It sucks. *pause* Except for the parts that don’t.”
The place where non-parents (myself included, a few years ago) get it wrong is in assuming that parenting is overwhelming because of the choices that the parents make. That scenario may be true with older kids and busybody parents, but not for babies.
Parenting a baby is overwhelming because of the sheer relentlessness of the job. You are on hyper-alert 24/7, even if you are a “hands off” parent. A baby will command your attention in a way that you didn’t realize was possible. You won’t even sleep the same way–you’ll have one ear open all night long. Babies rob you of all autonomy, even your bodily functions.
But yes, it does get better. You also get more efficient, because you spend so much time thinking about what you wish you could do with your free time that when you finally get a free half an hour, you back a week’s worth of recreation into it.
I’m reading these comments and loving may them, but also half-laughing, because am I the only non-parent (for two weeks, anyway) who is ONLY expecting parenting to be a non-stop parade of death, destruction and misery?
Am I the only one who seems to be surrounded by real-life people who only wish to share their horror, shock and misery, without any of the good stuff?
Where are these unicorn-farters? Who are the people who claim NO ONE TOLD THEM IT WOULD BE HARD? And … really? Really, no one told you, REALLY? I’ve stocked my freezer with food because I am genuinely anticipating that I will never be able to STAND UP again, much less COOK.
I’m not kidding you, I am expecting it to be BAD. I will consider my first week a success if my kid doesn’t ACTUALLY gnaw my face off, spit it into the garbage and follow it up by stuffing sharpened bamboo shoots down my fingernails. Seriously.
And Linda, I’d like to second HB’s notion that you, more than anyone, articulate the balance very well — the person you were before, the challenges of what you face now, and how to reconcile them both in a realistic way that doesn’t come across as condescending or “Oh, you’ll never KNOW what it’s like even though you think you DO, so let me LAUGH IN YOUR FACE and see how stupid I can make you feel now, so that when you have your own, you can tell me that I told you so.”
You never do that. Most people really seem to like to. I appreciate that you don’t, and it’s a large part of why I’ve always liked you.
err, loving many of them*
AWESOME post, Linda.
Yes. So much yes. You got it in a nutshell.
“And if my husband tries to hide in the bathroom for a 20 minute shit, I scream at him to finish already and help me!!! LOL”
LMFAO… am printing this out right now to PROVE to my husband that I am not the only one to do this! “I know it doesn’t take you that long to take a shit!” has been yelled many-a-time in my house!
Just wanted to say that it was lovely meeting you tonight! And that I think I’ll need to seriously revisit this post when considering having children of my own.
I just figured out why I love reading your blog…
Remember the episode of Friends where Phoebe sings songs to children at the library? And the parents hate it, but the kids love her because she sings about the truth?
You rock at singing the truth about life as a working parent.
Thanks. :)
Before I had children I thought I knew what I was getting myself into. Of course we wouldn’t be able to drop everything and go to the movies and such, but life wouldn’t change THAT much . . . oh. ha ha HA. I found myself missing the drive to work, just to have 20 minutes of solace with the radio. I missed work just for the reason that I could have privacy when I went to the bathroom. It took me three months to finish one book. I’ve become strange and stingy about food, preferring to take my plate into an empty room just to be able to eat without tiny hands suddenly grabbing my food. Yes, my life had definitely changed, every hour of it. I have definitely had to priortize what I want/need and work diligently to carve out time for those things.
I’m pregnant right now and I only asked that question once. The answer was: infinitely harder, but it gets better. So over the course of the next few YEARS, I suppose we’ll see how much she lied to me…
I love the analogy to Everest expeditions!
I read this yesterday, and I’m still thinking about it today, so I’m compelled to say: thank you for this. I think we all change throughout our lives (jobs, marriage, passionate hobbies, developing interests other than lighting farts and doing kegstands), and kids just do that job of changing us faster and more efficiently than anything else. We have to figure out that we are still ourselves, still us in here, as you put it so beautifully, through all those changes, but especially kids. It’s hard to do, but it’s crucial.
I think I’ll print this up as a Pamphlet of Awesomeness, or possibly as a large tattoo (on my back?). Thanks for it.
For me, I was really scared that I would turn into one of those overly scheduled, must get into FancyPants School, must have FancyPants stroller and all MANDATORY acoutrements-type mom. I don’t know why I thought that, but I did (I also had a similiar experience with fears of being consumed by the Wedding Machine – which btw I wasn’t). I guess my only point of reference was those “perfect” moms on tv, and my own mom (grew up in 70’s suburbia) which just didn’t jive with my very urban lifestyle. Then I visited a old friend who had 2 kids and she was just like she always was, except with 2 kids. It was an eye opening visit, and I came home and told my husband that yes, officially, I think we can have a kid and still be us. I saw it with my OWN EYES! So now we have a 15 month old and are seriously contemplating #2 and we are having fun and still being ourselves.
I read both “Tweak” and “Beautiful Boy.” The thing that really struck me forcefully was that, for the dad, his son’s addiction was this horrifying trauma that blotted out the sun. The dad’s whole existence, at times, was consumed by the desire to save his son, so much so that when he had an aneurysm, he kept struggling to remember his son’s cell phone numbers, and could only get the first three or four digits. By contrast, for the son, his addiction’s impact on his family was a peripheral concern. Addicts are hugely self-absorbed, and even though Nic comes acros as sweet and harmless in “Tweak,” he’s barely aware of how much he’s hurting his family. The contrast is at its starkest when Nic learns of his father’s illness and feels no panicked “Oh, God, must see him NOW” response similar to his dad’s.
my days are numbered in half empty cups of coffee.
There’s a great article clipping over at Suburban Turmoil that put me in mind of this discussion:
http://suburbanturmoil.blogspot.com/2009/02/in-defense-of-sahm-plus-scared-skinny.html
My biggest challenge right now is trying to find the time to work out. I have school work in the evenings so I have to make time in the mornings and my 11-month-old will not let me most mornings. You would think that I could reasonably expect him to be asleep between the hour of 4 and 6, but no so luck.
It’s amazing how much things change when you have children. Even little things are a challenge to accomplish, like a shower, or a hot meal. And it’s hard to maintain the strong connection with your spouse that you used to have. All the little things you used to do together and take for granted are rare now. Like staying up until 2 in the morning talking. With two small children, I’m lucky to make it until 10. And seeing a movie that is not animated? That’s a very rare treat.
And it’s not something that can be explained to people that don’t have children. How very much they change your whole existence. How much they change you. It’s a whole new facet of your personality. You as a parent. It changes the dynamics of your relationship with your spouse and it can change how you view situations.
Long time reader, delurking to say… Wow, lots of great comments and an awesome post to begin with. I will have to muster up some AUDACITY to think I can add to this conversation… There.
The way I describe new parenthood (at least to people who care about the actual experience and who aren’t going to get too spooked) is thus: It’s like you’ve just had a bomb go off in your home, so that everything or nearly everything is pretty unrecognizable. and while you’re staggering around trying to remember what you left on the coffee table that is now a charred remnant of its former self, you discover that a whole wing of your house that you never had access to has been opened up due to this explosion. and so you move in, taking a few still-smoking remains with you.
[...] (This post was inspired by an awesome post I just read on Sundry Mourning, by Linda from our Milk & Cookies blog. It’s titled Adult life and interests and in it she says what I am trying to say below in a much more eloquent way. So yes, go ahead, click over and read her post. You’ll be thankful that you did.) [...]
I loved reading your post. I especially second the whole “oh my god I just want to finish this coffee” thing. I felt like I almost like crying last weekend when I was reading newspaper and having some coffee and kept getting disrupted. Ah, it’s the small things that get impacted that you end up missing the most.