I love my kids, I just hate parenting
My son is five years old.
Sounds cute, right? He’s still little! He still snuggles with a blankey thing; he often mispronounces words in adorable ways; he still likes to sleep in our bed!
It all sounds downright Disney… unless you have a five-year-old of your own. Then it’s more like Tim Burton.
Everyone is always talking about how having kids changes your perspective on things.
They say that when you experience life through the eyes of your innocent children, you appreciate the little things so much more. And I suppose it’s true.
But kids change everything in your life, not merely the way you look at it.
Have you ever been curious about what I was like before I had kids? Or what I thought about kids when I was single and carefree? Well today is your lucky day!
Like most of you, I had a bit of a different take on kids and parents and parenting before I became a parent – I was not yet a part of the collective – and perhaps nothing I wrote encapsulates that different take better than this piece.
Referring to the months leading up to the Hammer’s arrival as “stressful” is a massive understatement.
I was out of my mind with anxiety, from worries about future restrictions on money and and sleep and time, to concerns about both the baby’s and Mom and Buried’s health, to wondering how I would possible survive the post-delivery ban on sex, my mind was overwhelmed with fear and uncertainty.
Now, of course – exactly as I kept telling myself it would be all along (to little avail) – everything is fine.
Kids say the darndest things. They also say the ballsiest things. Things only kids can say.
If I went around talking to my wife, my boss, my friends, anyone the way that my son often talks to his mother, to me, to his friends, strangers on the subway? I’d be divorced, fired, and drinking totally alone. Which might not be that bad, now that I think about it…
Children get away with a lot of stuff, especially in the early years.
For example…