Learner Dad: do I actually love parenting? No, I don’t. Do I hate it? Sometimes
"When you’re tired and run off your feet, something small going your way can change your day."
“I love my kids but I hate parenting”, my wife said the other night when we were pottering around after dinner. I thought she’d finally cracked because the last few months have been hard on all of us, but it turns out she was just reading out a headline that Google pushed out on her phone. But Google knows us better than we knew ourselves, so they were probably trying to tell her something.
It made me wonder – do I actually love parenting? No, I don’t. Do I hate it? Sometimes. Before the kids came along, I’d often unwind after dinner with a nap on the couch. I love falling asleep during the day, a bit of drool dropping out the corner of my mouth. Now the after-dinner half hour is all go, dealing with the dishwasher, saying no when the kids ask for treats, resisting the temptation to put on the TV so they’ll leave us alone to have a quasi-nap standing up because if we put on the TV too early they’ll be like demons going to bed.
There are times when I absolutely love it. Like when we’re walking in Gougane Barra. Or the kids hop into bed with us in the morning and give me a little back rub as we drift back for some more half-sleep. The chats on the way up to school with the sun rising behind us over Douglas, that’s great too.
But mainly, it’s in between, a bit like a job. It’s a little bit annoying or a little bit enjoyable, but nothing that I’ll remember next week. And that’s fine too. We’re not supposed to be deliriously happy with our kids all the time.
Everyone blames social media for this, the way Instagram and Facebook bombards us with images of our friends and relations living their best life with their kids. But we all know that isn’t real. Just as our parents knew that the holiday photos produced when we visited our cousins’ house didn’t capture the ir three days playing Fish in the Pond in the caravan, the rain hopping off the roof. We like to show and look at these images for the same reasons we like Maltesers. They’re a lovely little sugar hit, but you can’t enjoy them all the time.
The Book of Ecclesiastes is good here, you know the reading you hear at a funeral about there being a time for everything, including a time to die. ( The Byrds sang it out in their song ). There is a time for everything when it comes to parenting. Ideally, you want it to be a bit boring.
In our house, we go after small wins. My wife came into the kitchen last night shouting: “Yes!”. I presumed we’d won the lottery or something. It turns out she found a dirty cup in the living room and now the dishwasher would be full enough to justify turning it on. A small win, but I know how she felt. When you’re tired and run off your feet, something small going your way can change your day.
And then every now and again, the whole parenting thing delivers big time. We had a little sleep-in last Thursday, April Fools' Day because we were on Easter holidays. Our son got up first and decided to ‘prank’ his sister by going into her bedroom while putting on his uniform, pretending to be in a rush to go to school. She fell for it and came out to breakfast giggling at herself because she’s a lovely person. Then she tried to prank us, but was hopeless at it because she’s a lovely person and we all ended up giggling around the table for a few minutes. It was a great bit of foolishness, a classic small win. But that’s all you need.
So, to answer the question – no, I don’t hate parenting. It’s a drag now and again, but there’s a time for everything.
