Sunday, November 7, 2010

Retrospective

So I could talk about today, what happened, how great Catherine has been and how Christina lights up every room she walks into. Rather, I want to do a retrospective of my leave and ask for feedback to people who actually read my blog.
First thing I want to say is that I am so happy I did this leave. To be honest, I was very hesitant. My first one with Catherine was quite challenging and I always felt I was not the greatest at staying home. I am not the mos patient man and I admit to that freely. However, this leave proved to me a few things:
a) I could be quite patient when needed. I am proud of that. Christina was quite challenging regarding feedings. She was also a little harder to read when things were wrong. Was it teething? Was it feeding? Was it a bad TV show I was watching? Was it needing to get out of the house? This was hard but most of the time, I went through the sequence and found out eventually what she needed. That can be daunting.
b) I also know how I got to bond with Christina, which was very important to me. When a child breastfeed, they are more bonded with their mother and the father becomes an after thought. I felt that way a lot in the beginning. This leave made me realize that every child needs a clown and that is who I am. Christina also needs to be stimulated by another person than mom.
c) I can actually not do work for 4 weeks and it's OK. I always take pride in my work but this leave, more than the first, I realize that work is second to family. Christina just loved just spending time and laughing with me, and just hanging. I also got to see friends and work was not in the forefront of my thoughts.
d) I really need to grow breast and get milk to come out of it. Seriously, that would a lot easier than preparing breast milk 4 times a day. And Christina knows the difference. Let's not kid ourselves.
e) I should be proud of what I did. I sometimes think that people believe I just do this for the time off. I was also shamed when people said: "But your wife gave birth 3 months ago?". Now I know that I did something that most guys have no testicular fortitude to do, which is stay at home alone with a young child. I also know that I should keep my head high and say that I did it. I can't really explain it, but I was always feeling like I did not have the right to do this. If you understand, let me know.
f) When you take care of kids, structure some adult time. I think sometimes I got really involved and lost my mind because I did not have one-on-one with adults.  We all need some time to not talk goo goo ga ga, you know?
g) I admire all parents who stay at home. I wish I could say I could do it full-time. But I couldn't. I joke with my wife that I believe in empowering women so they could make even more than man so I could stay at home full-time. I really believe in equality but there is no way I would stay home full-time. Love my girls, they are my life, but we both need some time away from each other in order to really enjoy each other!

OK so I want to ask where I go from here. I want to continue this blog but I really won't have daily material. Should I go weekly? Every other week? Should I continue to talk about my trials and tribulations as a father or more about other stuff or both? Let me know what you think. I have had over 900 views in the past month, which is really cool and I am hoping that feedback will help me to continue or not. Thanks for reading.

3 comments:

  1. Weekly sounds good. Keep it coming! I had to link this to my stay-at-home-mom friends....all dads should give it a spin!

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  2. Dis ce que tu as à dire quand tu as quelque chose à dire... c'est ça le principe des blogues :) Je ne crois pas que tu doives te mettre de la pression pour maintenir un échéancier précis.

    Essaye d'écrire régulièrement et ça prendra forme tout seul...ou non! Bon retour au travail.

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  3. Weekly is a good idea, and if something really special happens you can add it at the time so
    that your mother can read it and smile
    I enjoyed reading your blog. Have a great return to work.
    Edna

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