Lost in Planet Parent. I miss the old me.

I had the best weekend recently. I got the luxury of a date night with my main man, we (I, it’s always I) purchased tickets to a club to stomp along to a favourite DJ of ours, dropping some banging tunes – we still say stomp, drop and banging right? Months ago I bought the tickets and dreamed of our date night. Devil child was adopted for the night by her best friend auntie (She’s MY best friend) and ‘best snuggle giver’ uncle, while mum and dad shoveled drink down their throat, just to get over pre-night out jitters – it’s been a while, I tend to get a little antsy before going out these days. I’m out of practice.

Pumped full of Sailor Jerrys off we went into the night. Until, wait for it…..4am! Say what?! Parents out till 4am, what stop outs…what fools. But don’t worry, the babysitters assured me a late child pick up the following day was acceptable. In fact it was pretty much welcomed, best friend auntie and uncle had the ‘whole day planned’ Elf style. Baking, crafts, playing, cooking, the whole lot, in one day, with a toddler – who’s the fool now?

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The Myth of the Nagging Wife — It’s Invisible Burns That Actually End Marriages

One of the best blog posts I think I have ever read. Please, give it a read. So many couples struggle with this day in and day out, I know I have (do).
Married or not, this ‘hurt’ drives couples apart and it’s heartbreaking.

Must Be This Tall To Ride

Sometimes we’ll find it’s the husbands, or men, in relationships whose invisible wounds aren’t properly cared for. Just not most of the time. (Image/RawStory) We sometimes hear husbands complain about their stupid, bitchy, nagging wives.

Some of them probably are married to petty, unkind women who’ve been plotting all along to make their husbands’ lives miserable. Statistical probability and whatnot.

But that’s NOT who most women are.

Most women said yes to a man’s voluntarily offered marriage proposal.

This isn’t arranged marriage in medieval times. This is one adult voluntarily asking another adult to give up being single together to form a partnership and live together faithfully for the rest of their lives, share property and finances, and maybe have children together.

Maybe some people don’t mentally grasp the parameters of a typical marriage agreement, but I feel confident in speculating that most do. Most people know what they’re signing…

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Birth Trauma

Every now and then, when I have one of my depression roller-coasters, that ultimately end up with me breaking down, crying, frustrated at life, Dave and I always come together. We sit and we talk to each other, trying our best to understand this horrible cloud that has been placed over my head. After the tears, snots and cuddles, my witty humour always comes back out the closet. And the line we always, well I always utter is ‘have kids they said’.

Our life was relatively normal, stress free, non-mental before the birth of Jessica. Still, 2 years down the line we are trying to understand when and what happened to allow my depression to take hold. I have joked on more than one occasion that child birth is ‘traumatic’ and I ‘have post traumatic stress or something’, in fact I’m sure in one of my posts I do say I was traumatized by birth, but in a good way – if there is such a thing. The reason I joke, is that my idea of trauma is enduring a significant, upsetting, fearful, horrendous experience that harms a person, either physically or emotionally, such as rape, robbery, war, assault, experiencing a natural disaster or a car accident. Something that really altered your life, left you in a state of confusion and shock, something that you never want to happen to you again.

That doesn’t include child birth, right?

30 Things…..that should be made EXPLICITLY clear when having a child

Continuing with the 4 month long run up to my big 3-0 celebrations (previous 30 things), I have complied a list of 30 things that should be known to expectant parents. Maybe there should be some kind of disclosure agreement or something new expectant parents should sign before the big day, in fact these points should be make known to couples even thinking about conceiving a child! It’s all fun and games till the baby pops out, then the real hardshi(t)p begins!

Parenting class 101: John wick

I was watching John Wick the other day, I had seen it previously, a few years ago I think. I enjoyed it the first time, so when David suggested we watch it while we stuff our face full of take away, well, I was delighted. I was more than happy to watch a ‘man’ film with ‘men’ being men, blowing things up, shooting guns with great ease and awesome accuracy. I love a good macho macho (man) film.

As I was watching it, I had the normal ‘almost an adult’ thoughts, you know, the ‘I wonder how much that house cost?’ or ‘they obviously don’t have children with all that minimalistic white furniture’ or ‘she owns a lot of Jo Malone perfume (or is it cologne?), wonder what she does for a living?’. For a while now, when I’m watching films or TV shows, I’m thinking of the everyday practicalities these people live in – have you seen Fortitude? They guy that lives in a house with massive glass window panes in all directions? Does he not sit around in the buff, scratching his regions, picking his nose and flicking through the naked lady channels? Has he no shame that everyone can see him? But something new happened when I was watching John Wick the second time around. This time I learned a life lesson, and that lesson is ‘don’t raise your children to be arseholes!’.