A few weeks ago I was able to grab brunch at Waffle House with Step-'n-Brake Hudson. It'd been a while since we were able to just sit and catch up, and it was wonderful and refreshing. I don't see most of my old friends anymore, and you can blame parenthood for that. I remember hearing that once you have kids your social life goes down the tubes, but it wasn't until I actually had kids that I came to see how true that is. Couple parenthood with working sixty to seventy hours a week, and life just rushes by. Even on days when I don't work, it's go-go-go, with few breaks in between.
Perhaps it would be enlivening to encapsulate a "Day in the Life." I'll make it a day when I'm not working crazy hours, just to bring to light how crazy busy life is. The wife and I get up around 7:30AM and spend the first hours of the morning getting the girls fed, dressed, and off to school. Morning scripture is hurried and harried, and our three-hour window before Zoey gets home is usually filled with cleaning, work around the house (home ownership is no joke), and running errands (which is always easier without kids). When Zoey gets home we make her lunch, help her with her homework, and work on her reading and writing. Sometimes we're lucky to get a nap before Chloe returns home, and around that time it's time to start getting dinner ready. We've been fixing meals at home a lot more now, to save money, and leftovers are a godsend. On Wednesday evenings we do our bible study, which can last anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour depending on how many questions the girls (mostly Chloe) have. After the bible study we have evening playtime with the girls: snuggles, wrestling, tickle-fests, games, and some nights we watch documentaries (weather and disaster documentaries are big with the girls). By the time we get the girls to bed, the wife and I are exhausted. Some evenings I read, but most evenings we watch Netflix until sleep overtakes us. And that's just an average day-in-the-life that doesn't take into account doctor's appointments, or church events, or get-togethers with extended family. Needless to say, the day-to-day life of parenthood--including all the love and discipline and patience it demands--is tiring.
It's no surprise, then, that I'm desperate for naps.
By 2PM on most days I'm burdened by a tiredness that seeps into my bones.
I never thought I would be like Dad, but here we are.
(he takes afternoon naps in his office by pushing his chairs together)
Perhaps it would be enlivening to encapsulate a "Day in the Life." I'll make it a day when I'm not working crazy hours, just to bring to light how crazy busy life is. The wife and I get up around 7:30AM and spend the first hours of the morning getting the girls fed, dressed, and off to school. Morning scripture is hurried and harried, and our three-hour window before Zoey gets home is usually filled with cleaning, work around the house (home ownership is no joke), and running errands (which is always easier without kids). When Zoey gets home we make her lunch, help her with her homework, and work on her reading and writing. Sometimes we're lucky to get a nap before Chloe returns home, and around that time it's time to start getting dinner ready. We've been fixing meals at home a lot more now, to save money, and leftovers are a godsend. On Wednesday evenings we do our bible study, which can last anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour depending on how many questions the girls (mostly Chloe) have. After the bible study we have evening playtime with the girls: snuggles, wrestling, tickle-fests, games, and some nights we watch documentaries (weather and disaster documentaries are big with the girls). By the time we get the girls to bed, the wife and I are exhausted. Some evenings I read, but most evenings we watch Netflix until sleep overtakes us. And that's just an average day-in-the-life that doesn't take into account doctor's appointments, or church events, or get-togethers with extended family. Needless to say, the day-to-day life of parenthood--including all the love and discipline and patience it demands--is tiring.
It's no surprise, then, that I'm desperate for naps.
By 2PM on most days I'm burdened by a tiredness that seeps into my bones.
I never thought I would be like Dad, but here we are.
(he takes afternoon naps in his office by pushing his chairs together)
I often reflect on my 'Old Life', before Ash and I married, before I adopted the girls as my own, and it feels like I'm looking back on the life of someone wholly different from me. It's true that time changes a lot of things, and I've changed in many ways. I'm wiser, more responsible, definitely more sober; you have to be all those things when you're life revolves around taking care of others. All the ways life has changed--indeed, all the ways I have changed--renders that life alien to me. I'm not sure I could do it again if I tried. I've gone from a bachelor who spent most of his time in diners and dive bars and hanging with friends and partaking in herbal supplements and drinking on a regular basis to a Husband and Father running a household the best I can (and failing in multiple ways, but moving forward by God's grace).
Life has changed in SO many ways.
(hence the title of this post)
And it's about to change some more.
(and it'll be busier than ever before)
Ashley and I met my freshman year of college at C.C.U., and I crushed on her hard. She ended up marrying my dormitory neighbor, but he turned out to be a really shitty person. God used his sin to deliver her, and she prayed for a blond-haired, blue-eyed Christian man. We reconnected just a few weeks later, one thing led to another, and we were married and I adopted the girls and now we have a third little one on the way!
Life has changed in SO many ways.
(hence the title of this post)
And it's about to change some more.
(and it'll be busier than ever before)
Ashley and I met my freshman year of college at C.C.U., and I crushed on her hard. She ended up marrying my dormitory neighbor, but he turned out to be a really shitty person. God used his sin to deliver her, and she prayed for a blond-haired, blue-eyed Christian man. We reconnected just a few weeks later, one thing led to another, and we were married and I adopted the girls and now we have a third little one on the way!
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| introducing Naomi Loren Barnhart, coming January 2019! |
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