Parenting is no joke. Let me be more clear…parenting is hard, so hard, quite possibly one of the hardest jobs any of us will ever have.
Some weeks are just hard, some days are just hard, some moments are just hard.
I remember the day before our oldest was born. I stood there in our tiny one bedroom apartment looking at the crib set up right next to our bed in that tiny bedroom. We had a crib, diapers, blankets, onesies, outfits, socks, a nose-sucker thing, tiny clippers, tiny towels, a baby bath, pacifiers, and on and on. We had all these things, yet I knew without a shadow of a doubt, I would have no clue what I was doing once we brought that baby home.
Turns out, that’s exactly what happened and I was right, I had no clue what I was doing. Not then, not now, not ever. That is one thing that makes this parenting gig so hard. You can read all the books, you can talk to all the other parents, you can even attend classes, and somehow, one day, you will be sitting there wondering what in the heck am I doing?
Besides not having a clue, there are all those sleepless nights. This seems to begin right away and and just seems to continue. You find you can get that little baby to go to sleep, but then you spend the rest of your evening catching up on things you need to do. You finally go to bed, but you can’t sleep thinking about everything you need to do the next day. You finally go to sleep, but then that little one is up crying, up with a fever, up sick, up knocking on your bedroom door, up because they need to go to the bathroom, up because they had a bad dream, up just because they are up. So now you’re up. You take care of whatever they need for however long that takes. You finally get that little one back down, they’re finally back to bed, and now there are only a few hours or a few minutes left before your next shift begins.
You finally get out of that stage, they sleep through the night, but now they are going to school, involved in activities, navigating the waters of friendships, and discovering their own interests and sense of self. Your minutes and hours are filled with questions…first questions like why is the sky blue then on to other questions like why won’t those kids play with me? They begin to figure out how to do things on their own, even if that means hiding or keeping things from you. You are trying to figure out how to teach those lifelong lessons like how to be a good friend, to always try your best, and to always tell the truth. You still have sleepless nights, only now you are up trying to figure out how to protect them, teach them, support them.
Before you know it, those little kids are big kids, and you don’t have any more figured out when they are fourteen years old than when they were fourteen days old. All of the time you used to spend playing with them, you now spend watching them play. All of the time you used to spend teaching them things, you now spend watching them learn. All of the time you used to spend driving them around, you now spend waiting for them to come home. And those sleepless nights remain. The same little one that used to knock on your door because of a bad dream, you now wait for him to knock on your door that he made it back home. That same little one that used to keep you up when he was sick, now keeps you up sick with worry.
I am currently in the midst of this…all of this…with a house filled with both teens and toddlers. Just last night, I waited up for our teenage son to return from a haunted house while I watched movies with our teenage daughter. I kept in touch with our other daughter via text while she was out of town with a friend at a football game. Late, late last night, I finally made it to bed after I had the little ones tucked in and our son made it home safely. Inevitably, I was awakened hours later by the three year-old that was scared of the lightning and thunder.
I am in it…all of it…and I still have no idea what I am doing.
Through the years I have learned this parenting gig just does not get any easier. I don’t think it matters if you have one kid or ten kids, I don’t think it matters if your child is an infant or fully grown, none of us are sleeping and none of us really have it figured out. As soon as I thought I knew what to do with one kid, the next one was totally different. As soon as I knew what that one kid needed at a particular time, suddenly that phase was over. It’s like this constant uphill sleep-deprived climb.
As hard as it is, parenting is still the best thing that I have ever done. As hard as it is, and as much as I do not know what I am doing, it is worth it. I have learned the sleepless nights are met with a rising sun, and each rising sun leaves behind a trail of days that I wouldn’t trade for anything. As hard as it is, I am learning I need to treasure each and every waking hour.
Beautiful!!!!
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