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A permanent, full-time job
It might be too early to say, “It looks as if summer is around the corner.” I’ve been wrong about the weather many times, because I’m a mom. In Junes past, I remember sending the kids off to school dressed as if they were on a trek to Baffin Island. On those days I wouldn’t have won the “Best Mom” award as the mercury rose to the high 20s. But I’ve never claimed to be a meteorologist. I’m simply a mom. Our youngest is past 30 now, and if she’s nearby, I still ask if she’s got a sweater and a scarf, just in case. And all of our children know I’m checking for signs of frostbite, chilled skin, and a fever whenever I hug and kiss them hello or goodbye.
My point is, aside from wanting to swaddle your babies, being a parent is a tough, emotional business. Nobody warns you about that when you get all dreamy-eyed thinking how wonderful it would be to have a little bundle of joy in your life. I know I fell for the media hype making parenthood look like a snap and a flurry of Laura Ashley comforters and pillows. You know the stories in magazines, on television and in the newspapers where a mom smiles on a downy head as she rocks her media baby to sleep. I fell hard. I thought the hardest part of having a baby would be the labour and delivery. And not one person I spoke with about labour and delivery told me the truth about labour and delivery. Geez, what a surprise I got when I got home and found out the fun part was the labour and delivery. For some reason, the messiness and painfulness of the next few weeks (actually, years) postpartum was never mentioned. No one spoke of sleepless nights and explosive poops and projectile vomiting and colic and tears. Of course, LOML and I assumed there would never be a feeding problem—but the stories we could tell about our kids and food. For me, I think I shed more tears than our babies ever did. Sometimes LOML would stand by helplessly while I, silently, mouthed the bad words I was thinking. Sometimes I didn’t just mouth the words. Why do people talk about how soon you’ll forget the pain of labour and delivery and then skip over the rest of it? If you’ve had children, you know what I’m talking about. I’m not angry about having children, far from it. Heck, my youngest is now 30 years old and I don’t regret being a mom to our kids and our bonus kids. It’s just no one ever told me, or LOML for that matter, about the length of time you commit to parenthood. Parenthood is a permanent, full-time job. Monetarily, there isn’t a dollar amount you can take to the bank and parenting is without paid vacation or paid sick leave.
So, with Mother’s Day in the recent past and Father’s Day fast approaching, I say it’s time to be honest about parenthood. It’s not for the weak. It’s not for the squeamish. No one will ever tell a father that parenthood will change your life forever, and give the real details. No one really tells you to kiss your social life goodbye or to enjoy sleeping late while you can. Certainly, no one mentions that you might have to physically restrain your partner when the screeching APB goes out from the baby’s room at three in the morning. Believe it or not, no one tells you how your taste in music might change with a youngster in the house. Here’s to all the dads, and father figures who’ll be celebrating on Sunday. And here’s to all the parents who never really saw it coming.
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