Not dead

Just work trip, then avalanche of catching up, then (and now) sinus/headcold/missing neti pot/misery. Can't think well for love or money.

Questions:

1. What one thing, if removed from your life, would make parenting more fun for you?

2. What one thing, if added to your life, would make parenting more fun for you?

Answer in the comments, please, and editorialize at will about any current issues you're experiencing.

My answers:

1. Little League

2. Realistically: a washer and dryer in my building. Unrealistically: a household manager in the style of Tony from "Who's the Boss?".

Comments

[Sheila]

Ha! Now I don't feel so bad about gazing longingly at Carla every time I watch Mad Men.

What would I like to have removed? Cold viruses. Or half my husband's workload.

[Koshercow]

1. Housecleaning
2. A nanny
2.5 LOTS AND LOTS of MONEY!!

[Elizabeth]

1. Night wakings/feedings.

2. An extra hour in the day somewhere between 4 and 6pm, that we could spend hanging out without the pressure of dinner, bath, bedtime.

[mrscamacho]

1. being woken up in the middle of the night - for nursing (2 month old) or potty breaks (3.5 year old) or sex (husband with bedtime several hours later than mine).

2. my best friend living in town. I really want someone to co-mother with.

[Jennifer]

1. Tantrums

2. A Chauffeur

[Kat]

Hey, my 2. is exactly the same as mrscamacho. I was just trying to think of a 1.

[Blythe]

1. All varieties of gastrointestinal viruses.
2. A personal chef.

[Lynn]

1. Homework.

2. Someone to take care of me while I take care of everyone else.

[Becky]

1. Tantrums
2. More help so I wouldn't feel like a single parent

BLERGH!

[mo]

1. Bedtime. Boys will not go to sleep and that is the part of the day I dread the most.

2. My job to miraculously go from full time to part-time/flex time (with same pay of course!) so that I could have more fun with the boys.

Moxie - sorry your head is a stuffy mess.

[snickollet]

1. Whining.
2. A spouse/partner.

[Amanda]

1. homeownership
2. SAH wife (similar to Moxie's "Tony")

[marci]

great to see you, snick! thinking of you the other day...

hmm. 1) right now, the word 'no' (toddler...nuff said.)

2) a part-time job / childcare combo in northern va when we move there this summer. i'm worried about working that all out.

[mom2boy]

1. my ex

2. free on demand babysitter tied with the ability to have a rational conversation with a two and a half year old about using the potty.

[Julie]

1- Whining, tantrums, whining/tantrum combinations
2- A higher salary/more money to treat myself to a babysitter and/or other luxuries I enjoy.

[paola]

1. the kids!
2. Sex

[Kate]

1. The 45 minutes between when my son gets picked up from school and when my daughter does. Only enough time for one (short) errand, if we go home he's often tired and really needs to nap but there isn't enough time before we have to get her. The two block walk to/from her school is a minefield, sometimes mollified with snacks, bribes, or piggyback rides, sometimes...not.

2. Serious, regular housecleaning help. I feel like an asshole saying I want someone to wash my dishes and straighten up, but if I were in a neater environment I think I would be less stressed out all the time. I don't seem to be equipped with the organizational skills to keep my house neat, neither is my husband, and keeping things (un)reasonable is an unending war of attrition.

[Jac]

1. Clutter

2. A bigger place with more space to play in.

[amom]

1. Random 3.5 year old tantrums.

2. A household organizer to get my house organized and set up a weekly schedule for me to follow.

[Lisa]

1. remove messy environment (requires husband to think neatness is exponentially higher on the Quality-of-Life scale)

1a. I hate to think about it, but what if we didn't have a computer? Or, It only worked for an hour at night?

2. Putting my needs first and acting on them (neat household, new glasses--I can't see a damn thing with these contacts, exercise, weight-loss, thyroid function eval., showers, leg shave, lotion, etc.)

[Ginger]

1. My commute. 2 hours everyday down the drain, which makes me a bit of a frantic mommy when I get home.
2. A housecleaner--I'm horrible at it, and the kid is at that baby stage where EVERYTHING goes in his mouth, so I feel like the worst mom in the world most days because I'm sure he's eating more cat hair than should be allowed.

[Shannon]

1. Teething

2. Childcare. Ideally it would be grandparents living closer to provide childcare. Then I could stop stressing about trying to do the internship I need to finish my MEd.

[maria]

1. Court battle with abusive ex

2a. real financial security, tied with
2b. nearby good friends/emotional support

[LittlePumpkin]

1. power struggles with my 4.5 y.o. over bedtime and pretty much anything else

2a. dinner magically cooking itself while I pick up the kids, so I can give them the attention they need when we all walk in the door

2b. time for me to exercise/do yoga/meditate/take a walk, etc. even 2x/week, and the $ to hire a babysitter to enable this (DH is terribly overworked and even more stressed than I am.)

As I'm writing this, I realize that what I want most is to feel like I'm actively and intentionally living this life, rather than just moving zombie-like from one day to the next, one item on the master work/family To-Do list to the next.

[Jen]

1--My dogs. I know, I love them, but gah! They add so much work!
2--A better childcare situation. Maybe a nanny share in the neighborhood or a retired grandma to help out.

[Creatingbalance]

1. Teething/night wakings in my babe they are intertwined.
2. Due to no sleep I don't do much with my down time but try and nap or just lay on the couch, I'd love some real me time where I feel more in possession of my brain. I crave the time/enegry/creative process time I had before life with child. After a year of numerous night wakings I'm void of a personality. At least I feel that way.
I believe if our well is full we have more to give, not too much giving around here.....

[WaltzInExile]

1. Lack of sleep
2. Sleep.

Srsly.

[llmcfaul]

1. germs! with a 3 y/o in preschool germs are everywhere and a i hate for her, me or the baby to be sick.
2. a salary and/or personal chef

[Kate]

@creatingbalance, I had that feeling too. It crept away very slowly, starting when I joined a book club when my daughter was about a year old. Those people saved my intellectual life. Really.
Eventually I started blogging, joined another book club, started jogging, read the damn newspaper from time to time, etc.
Hugs into the dark void from the other side.

[donna]

1. Long winters--are rough with a little one, though I really appreciate this gorgeous weather because of it. mmm!

2. Child sleeping well (and me). going on 4 years, it's getting old. My body is so screwed up, even if when I have a chance to sleep, it physically can't now.

[Carmen]

1. Tie between potty training a resistant 3 year old and night-feedings with the baby. Can't decide.

2. Whenever my husband wistfully wishes for something, I always say, "If you're wishing, just wish for a million dollars... then we can get X AND still have $950,000 to buy everything else we want/need."

PS: I would by a Tony as well.

[B]

1. Remove feeling judged by other parents for my decisions that don't match theirs.

2. Add SLEEP.

[Carmen]

PPS: Been up since butt-crack of dawn, locked my keys in the car at the babysitter's (luckily kids were not in said car... and yes, I've done that before), and have been uncharacteristically mainlining caffeine all morning. I am now pumping and wondering if I should just toss this milk so the baby and babysitter don't have a weird day 3 weeks from now when they use this milk.

My house is beyond a distaster, we are busy for the next 3 weekends and then I'm having a thyroidectomy and will be in the hospital 1 or 2 days depending on if they find cancer (gasp!) and I'm already worrying about how the hubby will handle both boys who both wake up at night by himself....

I love my life so much and am soooo blessed and I KNOW this but man today is kicking my ass peeps.

Sorry, I just did a "primal scream" post. My bad:)

[the milliner]

1. Night wakings/feedings

2. My Mother living in the same city as we do (aka the 'free on demand babysitter' that @mom2boy talks about), tied with a cleaning person to do a complete spring cleaning + regular cleaning 1x per week.

2.5 Ditto @Koshercow...Lots and lots of $$, so that as so well put by @Carmen, "we can get X AND still have $950,000 to buy everything else we want/need." Brilliant!

@CreatingBalance, Here Here!
@Kate, thanks for the words of encouragement.

[BadMamaAnonymous]

1. Oh, it is so wrong to say this, but... my 17-month-old. Or maybe I should say, this particular half-year disequilibrium, which so far is the one I have the hardest time handling. (I've only experienced through age three so far...)

2. A job. Preferably full-time and in my chosen field, but you know, whatever.

[mia]

1. REMOVE transition tantrums i.e. every morning when i ask my older son to get out of bed in the morning and dress himself. also REMOVE constant food preparation.

2. ADD a ground floor with a sliding glass door into the back yard so they can play outside without me, but still be visible.

[sfsaf]

1. Arguing with DH about everything.
2. More money or less work. (But not less money and less work.)
3. More good-family/friends-that-are-family around so I feel that the things in my life are more plentiful than scarce.

PS: For those of you wanting housekeeping to make life easier: I spend $80 for 3 hrs. of work every three weeks and it MAKES ME SO HAPPY. The way champagne makes me happy. See if you can budget for it. It's worth it!

[yasmara]

1. An easy bedtime. By the time Younger Son is asleep, I'm totally exhausted from all the back-and-forth, mental energy, threats, etc. it's taken to get him there & am usually unproductive the rest of the evening.
2. House cleaner.

[BlueBirdMama]

1. a. My own temper and tendency to get seriously annoyed seriously fast
b. other children's birthday parties every. single. weekend! (Can't wait until he's old enough just to drop off at a b-day party!)

2. Realistically: More exercise (helps with temperament problem referenced in 1.a.) Unrealistically: a housekeeper/au pair/personal assistant

[BlueBirdMama]

@sfsaf: Ditto! We have a cleaning lady for $75 every other week-- there is absolutely nothing better than coming home to a clean house that someone else cleaned for you! Worth every single penny (if I had to make a choice I would gladly trade cable tv, eating out for lunch, and other treats for a housecleaner).

[pennifer]

1. My husband's inability to think on his feet and rise above the chaos when it comes to parenting. The ability not to get sucked into negative/chaotic situations is gold, and he ain't got it. We'd all have more fun if he did.

2. A twice-weekly housecleaner. Unrealistically: lots of money to pay other people to deal with issues that are endlessly bogging me down.

I have so many things I want/need to do to run our household (repairs, improvements, problem-solving) and just not enough hours in the day to do them on top of having fun with The Boy, the horse and the hubby (not necessarily in that order).

[Another Kate]

REMOVE tight finances - still living in the newish house, month-to-month grind, haven't rebuilt FU fund up. Tired of worrying.

ADD another day to the weekend. (Money would be good too, of course). I worked 4 day weeks last fall, burning vacation. I miss it.

[emnyc]

1. The commute home from work via day care.
2. Family members who lived close by or almost-like-family friends who lived close by.

[Catherine]

1. Remove one day from my work week. I'd even take the corresponding pay cut.

1a. Also, remove tantrums. DS has just now, after 2.5 years of being completely unflappable, discovered The Tantrum. Please God just make it go away.

2. Add local dear friends. Or even just one.

2a. Give DH the ability to take on a household task that is not optional (e.g., mow the lawn, vacuum) but necessary (e.g., groceries, pay bills, laundry). Having all the "if it doesn't get done, very bad things happen" tasks on my shoulders is getting very old.

[Alice]

1. Remove: Commuting.

2. Add: Food I enjoy cooking and eating to the list of foods my kids will happily eat.

[Charisse]

1. Husband's south beach diet requirement - seriously, it is getting better but finding things that work for all 3 of us has been a chore while Mouse was little.
2. 5 extra hours in week for yoga/writing/reading. I'd be such a better person in general.

[z]

1. Remove: Financial Stress

2. Add: A job to help with 1.

[eep]

@marci, we recently moved to northern Virginia and I was able to find part time care for my almost 3 yo in high quality centers. Every place I looked had immediate availability for part time of various schedules, as well as full time. Where I lived before, 3-6 month waiting lists were the rule, even for questionable centers, and part time care was very difficult to find. I was shocked by how easy it was to find a place for him that worked for us.

I can't help you with a job, as I need one myself, but perhaps knowing that daycare is easy to find will ease your mind.

[ML]

My comment disappeared!

But here it is again:
1. Housework.
2. I third (fourth?) mrscarmacho: I'd love a true friend to talk to. (She doesn't even have to help me with stuff! Just be a sympathetic ear and be persistent with getting together to do stuff! And be unrelated to my employment or my spouse's.)

[Meg]

Remove: NIGHTWAKINGS!!! I don't know how much longer I can go w/o at least a couple good nights in a row...

Add: 2 or 3 more hours in each day, or a pause button, so I can get all the stuff done that I slack on because I'm always so freakin' tired.