How much of your daily life revolves around your kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SAHM, but pretty much all. Cooking, cleaning, laundry, shopping during the day, and homework in the afternoons then we are often at games or practices until 9:30 at night.

BS. You are not spending SIX HOURS every day cooking cleaning and laundry while kids are in school.

You certainly have leisure time in there, maybe yoga class or gym time?

[Anonymous]

14 & 15 year olds, and definitely more now than when they were in day care/elementary. Maybe it will be more back to normal in a few years when they go to college. Or at least when they start driving.

[Anonymous]

And then in an instant, they're gone.

Empty nester here still trying to figure out how it all happened so fast. What's the saying....the days are long but the years are fast. Not that anyone wants to hear this but, find a way to enjoy the chaos. It's fleeting.

[Anonymous]

2 kids (6 and 9)... this time of year both play soccer and baseball, in addition to music or art lessons, etc. M-F it feels like every day from pickup (330p) to dinner (630p) is kid logistics (pickup/snack/homework/activities/playdates/etc.)

Once dinner hits we often switch off nights, one parent might have a work/civic/personal meeting, or just need some downtime for themselves, etc. The other parent can handle the post-dinner hangout and bedtime routines.

Weekends are a blend of kid activities (sports games mostly) and family activities. Sometimes we need to do 1-parent/1-child splits, but most of it we do altogether, and again if one parent has something personal they want to do (brunch with a friend, etc.) we're usually able to work that out as well... the other parent can take the kids out for a meal, shopping/run errands, play at the park, etc.

When the kids were younger (sub-5) it was tougher to single-parent for an afternoon, so we didn't have as much ability/desire to take individual personal time... or if we did, it was in the format of the other parent doing a group playdate at a family friend's house.

3 kids certainly seems like it would be more of a challenge, but my guess it is has a bit more to do with the 3-year-old probably needing a lot of attention/monitoring and not yet being as independent (especially for bathroom breaks, etc.) than it does the total number of kids. Every family is different, but IMO 10/8/5 seems a much more promising prospect for being able to tag-team some single-parenting duties (and thus have some personal time in the schedule) than 8/6/3 does... hang in there!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Scheduling revolves around the daycare schedule quite a bit. And daycare pickup -- bedtime revolves around kid almost daily. But otherwise not much. Only child life is bliss

Only child in daycare…. Wait until elementary and middle school

Yup. Parent of an only here. School demands WAY more of parents than daycare does. Also offers less. It doesn't seem that bad before you're in it, but dealing with all the random and extra childcare you need once your kid is in school is annoying. Even for just one kid. Random days off, holidays, breaks, summer break... you are pretty much constantly having to figure it out. Plus once your child is old enough to form actual friendships and have opinions that are more significant than "yay dinosaurs" or "broccoli yuck", the emotional labor involved in parenting is much harder. Plus you have to navigate them wanting/needing more independence with the fact that they are also encountering much more complex situations than before.

Don't get me wrong, having an only is still easier than having multiple, I think. But those early years where you just drop them off at daycare and then pick them up are cake compared to the elementary and middle school grind. It's so different.

[Anonymous]

My whole day.

Signed,
Wohm of 13 year olds

[Anonymous]

Wait until age 18. Then you’re good.

[Anonymous]

OP here - hahaha well this doesn't give me much hope for the next 10-15 years of my life! I love my kids dearly but good lord I am exhausted. It doesn't help that DH works a very very demanding job and is often unavailable to help during the week. On the weekends he does prioritize being there to help shuttle kids between sporting events and other activities but during the week days its all on me. Thankfully my job is very flexible (and still pays pretty well) so I can do most of the drop offs and pick ups and answer emails from my phone sort of thing.

[Anonymous]

I take a different tack. I don't sacrifice who I am and take the time I need to achieve my balance. I set the example for my kids and work full time, outsourcing what we need for balance. When my kids were that age I had a nanny and housekeeper, so I could have time to exercise in lieu or laundry, cleaning, or driving to some activity where I just sit and wait.

My youngest is 8 now, so we dont have a nanny. We do quite a bit of driving and extracurriculars, but sometimes I tell my MS daughter to catch the bus home to and from her competitions. Very occasionally she tells me Larla's mom "sacrifices everything" for her and attends all the competitions. I simply say DD is a huge part of my world but not everything, life's a balancing act, and I'm doing what I need to achieve that balance. I usually follow it with a question of if she wants to sacrifice herself (including hobbies and fitness) the way Larla's mom does. She fully understands.

No point is playing the martyr ladies! Set the conditions for your own success (however you define that).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“All day, every day….
Therapist, mother, maid…..”

I’ve been listening to that on repeat lately. I guess you could say nearly all of it?

Same. And I have a middle schooler & a high schooler. I’m ok with it. Parenting is a very short window in time. Soon they will be gone, and it will all be a fuzzy memory…

[Anonymous]

My kids are younger, and as others here have pointed out, apparently it gets worse as they age. I also only have two, though we're planning a third, so maybe it's the third that will make this untenable but:

But I don't feel this way, and I think it's because my husband and I carve out frequent, regular, fairly lengthly times when one of us is 100% in charge of both kids and the other can do whatever. For us, it's a half a weekend day almost every weekend, each (either until 2pm if you've got a morning off, or after 2pm if you've got an evening off). That still gives us a full day for family time, or to go off each with one kid if we want. Plus, two weeknights a month off for each of us. (We also do regular date nights together, but that's usually after the kids go to bed, easier/cheaper to find sitters).

So, sometimes I legit sleep until noon and read or watch TV in bed until 2pm. Sometimes, I leave at 2pm, go get a massage, meet up with a friend, get drinks, have a leisurely dinner, then go see a movie. Sometimes I spend a bunch of time crafting (my primary hobby). Happy hours. Time with friends. Parties. Whatever.

Don't get me wrong, it's HARD to be 100% in charge of the kids for such a large stretch of time, and we've been doing this since they were 2.5 and 6 months old, when it was BRUTAL to do the end of the day/dinner/bedtime routine solo or to have to juggle a whole morning. But it's SO worth it to have the downtime, and honestly, as we forced ourselves to do it, we got better and better at it, and it's gotten easier and easier to handle them together as they aged. They're now 2 and 4 and it's NBD at this point.

Now obviously you need a true, solid partnership and both parents on board (there was a post recently from a woman with a similar setup where it sounded like there were a LOT of issues and resentment). But for us, it's such a game changer.

Oh, and the first time you try it, the person in charge of the kids will be like THAT WAS SO HARD I'M EXHAUSTED and the person who had free time will be like "I don't even think I used the time well, I just felt so weird and off, what do I even like to do??" and so it's easy to give up, but push past that! Find yourself again! So worth it.

Oh, and yeah, the rest of the time, basically every minute revolves around the kids.

[Anonymous]

90% of it, at LEAST. I have 3 young kids and I work 20 hours a week

[Anonymous]

I have three kids - elementary, middle and teen. Things are fairly calm during the day when they are in school, and mornings are easier because they can get their own breakfasts and get ready on their own.

Compared with when they are little though, our afternoons/evenings and weekends are much much busier with activities, concerts, school events, tournaments, recitals. The siblings bicker more than when they were little, and often at least one is sick with one thing or another.

Sometimes I see the parents with their younger kids who are able to sit on a lawn chair outside and watch their little ones play in the driveway and with each other all afternoon and I miss those days!

[Anonymous]

Getting a nanny would help you a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have three kids - elementary, middle and teen. Things are fairly calm during the day when they are in school, and mornings are easier because they can get their own breakfasts and get ready on their own.

Compared with when they are little though, our afternoons/evenings and weekends are much much busier with activities, concerts, school events, tournaments, recitals. The siblings bicker more than when they were little, and often at least one is sick with one thing or another.

Sometimes I see the parents with their younger kids who are able to sit on a lawn chair outside and watch their little ones play in the driveway and with each other all afternoon and I miss those days!

I agree with all of this. Afternoons/evenings are very busy. My weekends are often structured around their plans, although my husband and I do make sure to get out and do something for ourselves each weekend and I do sleep in.

Everyone in our family is happy and content so that’s a relief.