Finding Time For…

Time is something that you may have plenty of as a stay at home dad, but most of the time, you can never use the time.

I have a list of things in order of priority that need to get done in the day. The first one is take care of my son. Second, find work so my wife can do this (she’s way better at the mommy thing than my). And third, somehow manage to do something to keep the house clean. Contrary to what my wife thinks, and says, I do manage to get to all three of those during the course of the day. For some reason, there is never any time to do anything that “I” want to do.

Does that sound selfish?

Anyway… it’s a funny thing, as soon as you become the stay at home dad, you no longer have much time to do anything fun, without you family. I remember working 80ish hours a week and still managing to find some time for something fun and it wasn’t a big deal with my family. Maybe this was a product of our situation, but I really think there is some inequality when it comes to being a stay at home dad.

For those of us that are stay at home dads, we need to remember way back to when we weren’t. Was there a set of duties that you did as part of a family? The honey dos? Yeah, that written, nagged and unspoken list of things around the house you were supposed to get done. Do you still have that list? I do. I’m going to get smacked in the head for saying this, but I’ll take my chances.

Why did you have a list of honey dos? Maybe it was because it was stuff you wife didn’t know about (I’m looking at the table that is about to collapse because a certain little person took off all the bolt). Could it be some sexist attitude about gender roles and responsibilities (thank you diversity class). Or, what I think it is, they just didn’t have time as a stay at home parent to get to those things. I’m not going to pull out the power drill when a little boy is going to play with it every moment I put it down.

Well, do you still have that honey do list? I know I do (awaits smack to back of head… waiting for it… waiting) Okay, I think I’m safe, at least till she reads it. So now I have to take care of my son and do a bunch of honey dos. This doesn’t seem right.

In all fairness, I’m not going to ask my wife to change the breaks on the car. I’m not even sure she knows how to use my floor jack, but we need a rest!

I think back to the times when my wife would say I need a break with my friends, here are the kids, dinner is over in the over, and I’ll be back sometime. She did that to me once and went to Vegas. I’m not sure, but I’m pretty certain if I pulled something like that, I would be in trouble. My wife still goes out without the kids with here friends. I haven’t done that in a very long time. Actually, I’ve only done it once.

So, what’s the solution? Fight for some me time. When the wife gets home, tell her the dinner is in the oven and you are headed to the gun range to waist some ammo, or going to a Jean Claude Van Dam movie. Get out and find some me time. Your basically a social outcast anyway as a stay at home dad, might as well have some fun.