"My So-Called Life"

Let's start out with a basic truth: taking care of a child is hard work.

It's a full time job. There's no vacation time, no sick leave, no hazard pay. If you're like me and have a regular full time job, having a kid takes over that job's vacation time, sick leave, and pay. In some sense, then, it's both a full time job and the antithesis of one. It requires your attention 24 hours a day, meaning it's the truest embodiment of the phrase "full time." Yet, it consumes the very things regular full time jobs provide.

The preceding paragraph is undoubtedly true for every responsible parent. For those with children facing extra challenges, the pressures of the job are magnified. I'm sure every responsible parent - I use this phrase purposefully; unquestionably, there are (too many) parents who shirk their parental duties - feels a sense of loss of control over one's life. At the very least, a responsible parent's life is irreparably changed. And, again, for those with more challenging children - another purposeful phrase; no child is "easy," except in relative terms - this reality of change and loss of control is heightened. Of course, most of us enter into parenthood knowingly and willingly. Surely, we have some sense going in that things are going to change. If we don't, we have no one to blame but ourselves. Even if we are realistic about the decision, sometimes we get more than we bargained for.

I know I did.

I was not blind to what having a child would mean. Could I completely fathom how being responsible for another human life would change the manner in which I lived mine? No, but I knew it would be different. As it turned out, Ayden had his additional stuff going on, making me more clueless than I could've realized at the time. Seventeen months later, if I'm completely honest, I miss my life.

Don't misinterpret me. I'd do the whole thing all over again. Ayden is worth it. He's worth the hospital visits, the lost sleep, the feeding frustrations, the artificial limitations placed on us right now due to his defect. He's worth all of it. I'll trade him for all of that any day of the week. Even so, a lot of it really kind of sucks. Wait, I committed to honesty. A lot of it really sucks.

It was just Allison and me for almost eight years. We didn't always have very much in the way of disposable income, but we were able to find ways to spend time with (both in and out of town) friends, go to Clemson games, play golf (okay, that one's mostly me), etc. Now? Not so much. We are in midst of the second consecutive football season of seeing the games only on TV. We haven't been able to go visit any of our out of town friends. If we go see in town friends, we're basically confined to be outside, which means no more going over to someone's house to play cards. I've seen two movies in the theater over the last year and a half (tortuous for a movie geek life me). I've played golf once in the last eleven months. (I'm sure if you asked Allison, she, too, could rattle off a list of things she hasn't been able to do, despite them being a part of who she is.) Basically, we are stuck at home most of the time. I knew it would be an adjustment after those eight years, just not to this extent.

This is my so-called "life."

No one should have to live like that. It's not natural. We, like everyone else, need (adult) human interaction. Of late, we are trying to be more purposeful about returning some bit of normalcy to our lives. As I type this, Allison is on her way back from spending a weekend in Birmingham with her mom. She spends the vast majority of her time at home with Ayden, much more so than I do. She was long overdue for a break. I'm going to visit a close high school friend in a few weeks. I've got some theater gift certificates that expire at the end of the year, meaning I'll probably see more movies in the next three months than I have in the previous seventeen. So, we're trying to do better in this area. We need to, as our mental health in no small part depends on us finding ways to have some semblance of a life separate from being Ayden's parents.

Lots of things tend to fall by the wayside when you're focused on taking care of a little person. You'll ask yourself things like: "When's the last time we cleaned this bathroom/floor/kitchen counter/etc.?" "When's the last time I took a shower?" "What day is it?" So, finding the time to go out and do something can be quite a challenge. That's only half of the equation, though. Having a kid can have just as much of an impact on your finances as it does on your life. We've gone from a two income, two person household to one with one income and three people. And that third person brings some additional, unexpected costs with him.

Even if you can find the time to get out and do something, you have to decide if it's in the budget. You find yourself measuring the cost of things in something other than dollars. Thus, a round of golf isn't X dollars, it's X weeks worth of formula. Getting out of the office a couple of times to grab some lunch is worth how much in diapers? A few movie tickets would be how many prescription co-pays? (Maybe that last one is mostly unique to me.) I find it hard to think about things in this way without some or all of joy getting sucked out of them. I know I'm no different than most parents (except that I have a blog upon which to post my rantings). Having a child is a sacrifice. You just have to give some things up. That doesn't mean you have to like it. And I don't.

I miss my friends. I miss going to Clemson games (which are as much about spending time with friends as seeing the game). I miss playing golf. I miss going to the movies. I hate having to say no to things because I'm thinking that's money I could use to pay for diapers, formula, prescriptions, whatever. I hate that Allison is stuck in the house much of the time. I hate that she doesn't get to do things she likes to do either. (An added layer to all of this: I feel guilty getting out of the house to do something. Why? Because that means Allison has to stay home with Ayden. I know she feels the same way.)

I hate it for Ayden, too. He needs the human interaction just as much, if not more, than we do. I know he would benefit from it. I know it would help his development.

If all of this sounds negative, well, it is. This is certainly not what I envisioned when Allison got pregnant. But what are you going do? We are doing (or not doing) what we have to in order to keep Ayden safe. That's more important than all that other stuff. I don't like it being this way, but I can't change it. Fortunately, there's another basic truth: it won't always be like this. I'll eventually get my life back. Not all of it, but most. At any rate, and without question, he's worth it.

There's some positivity for you.