What you WON”T do for your kid…

[UCGal]

Congrats, CE. You and your lovely bride will make awesome parents.

You’ll give up sleep for the first bit. Especially if you have more than one within a few years… the term “sleep like a baby” is a cruel ironic joke. Sleep deprivation is a big deal – and I read that if a marriage survives till the youngest is 5 – it will survive anything – because it survived the sleep deprivation years, the terrible 2’s (that run from age 1 to 4), and you finally get the kid launched to kindergarten.

I totally agree with scaredy- give up soda. I can’t control my kids diet 100% – but not keeping soda in the house- and encouraging them to drink water is one of the things I am giving them. (Even fruit juice is mostly sugar and junk.)

You’ll be giving up going to theater to see movies for a while. But that’s what streaming and redbox are for. You’ll want the ability to pause what your watching. Even when the kid gets a little older – the cost of babysitting on top of the high ticket prices makes it much more attractive to wait for the movie on video. This was a big deal for me. I had a hobby side job working a movie club, and it wasn’t unusual for me to see 3-4 movies on a weekend – until I had my son. Now it’s 3-4 a year in the theater – if I’m lucky.

You’ll give up some of your freedom to spend odd hours at work – I found myself turning down bosses asking me to work extreme hours after I had my eldest. So did my husband. We found ourselves organizing our lives around our son(s).

Obviously – if you smoke, you’ll want to give that up.

I sincerely wish you and MA all the best in this new adventure!!!

[scaredyclassic]

it sounds kind of scary but it’s actually kind of hugely entertaining. as long as you hold it together.

[FlyerInHi]

Stop being lazy and make up your bed.
I know so many who don’t make up their beds in the morning. Does having kids produce better lifestyle habits?

[Coronita]

I don’t know CDMA ENG… I think you have A LOT to look forward to….

I mean, remember all those times that some parent took their screaming toddler(s) on the red eye flights across the country? You know… Those flights that you thought you would hop on to sleep for 5-6 hours in the middle of the night before your meeting the next morning with a client….flights that you thought only other working people would take… But oh no…. someone thought it would be a great idea to take their toddler that never sleeps at night onto a red eye flight so that not only those parents would suffer from insomnia, but just about every other person who was catching a red-eye for work would too…

Well, you can now exercise your constitutional right now to return the favor…

And if you have miles to earn you a free business class seat for you and your family…even better.

🙂

[Coronita]

Oh… And one thing I had to give up (at least in front of my kid)…swearing…

[zk]

[quote=FlyerInHi]Stop being lazy and make up your bed.
I know so many who don’t make up their beds in the morning. Does having kids produce better lifestyle habits?[/quote]

Oh, my god, they don’t make their beds in the morning? Heathens! Their kids will be scarred forever. They shouldn’t’ve had kids if they were going to be like that. That’s too important.

[zk]

Heartiest conratulations, CDMA.

Life’s full of tradeoffs. We make them all day, every day. The biggest one we ever make is having kids. You give up a whole world of things. And, in return, you get a different whole world of things. I guess for some people, it’s not worth it. For me, it’s the best tradeoff I ever made.

In retrospect, I feel like previously my entire life, as fun as it was, was like a little tea party at a little toy tea set with tiny chairs and a tiny table. When I had my daughter, I looked up, and right there in front of me was a redwood tree. I was a bit stunned and maybe bewildered and I had to crane my neck to see the top of it. That tree was part of me and part of my wife and part of our daughter. But mostly it was my love for my daughter and an appreciation of how important I would be to her. It was hard to believe something so big was part of me. But it is. And it makes me very happy.

[CA renter]

Awwww, how sweet, zk. 🙂

What a nice way to put it. Could not agree more.

Having a kid makes you see the world in a very different light.

[CDMA ENG]

Thanks for the comments.

Swearing wasn’t in the list and probably the toughest one for me. I had forgotten about it. I’m Italian and for the me the F word isn’t a word… Its a comma.

One time my sister asked me what I was going to do when the kid was out of control and not listening. I told her that I was going to tell him to “Dummy up and clean the shit of your ears!” She spit coke half way across the room laughing. She knew I wouldn’t say that but it was something my dad would say when we were teenagers.

We don’t actually every really hit the town these days. I am in my 40s (yes and I have a video game habit) and rarely watch TV. I would rather play video games. There is some really good TV out there but I need to limit myself and what the kids are watching.

Basically I am developing some “home hobbies” that will keep me around and hopefully these things will rub off on the kid. My dad had really good hand skill and I remember watching him in his studio and doing large stain glass pieces. That I have carried with me and hopefully I can get him interested in something by him watching me wood work. Also I plan on learning the bass guitar in hopes he will want to learn something musical as well.

And when gets older… The gift of surfing…

Honestly though I will probably have to sneak soda the same way my dad did pot for years! 😛

Thanks for the well wishes… and advice…

P.S. Should have mentioned though we are foodies and that is going to be a tough thing to miss out on.
CE

[CA renter]

Sounds like you’re going to be great parents, CE (but stay away from that soda!). I like your ideas here. Don’t worry too much about the food; you can make a hobby out of cooking with the family (that’s what we do, since we also love good food, unfortunately).

This will be such an awesome experience for you guys! 🙂

[Hobie]

A little early for you now and this is a ‘would do’ for your kid.

In our neighborhood everyone kept model home clean homes and yards. And none of the men did any home repairs or had tools around the house.

Our home was the ‘go to’ fun house. I very much encouraged hands on building and playing. I always kept hammers, tons of nails, and wood of all sizes. You can’t imagion how much fun they had just pounding nails. Noisey!! I would help them cutting wood to their dimensions. They had a ball building all sorts of stuff. Towing their creations with their bikes and using skateboards for the wheels. Boys and girls.

Get ready and hang on for the ride!

[scaredyclassic]

I think it’s OK to curse. I curse and my kids dont. They’re probably appalled by the way I sound. Kind of like how utterly revolted I was by my parents smoking. Blech. I remember my brother and I pretending to gag and choke and my folks laughing about it. Ah, the old days

[njtosd]

[quote=CA renter]Sounds like you’re going to be great parents, CE (but stay away from that soda!). I like your ideas here. Don’t worry too much about the food; you can make a hobby out of cooking with the family (that’s what we do, since we also love good food, unfortunately).

This will be such an awesome experience for you guys! :)[/quote]

OK – I have to agree that soda isn’t great. And maybe I am sensitive because I developed a morning Diet Pepsi habit in college before I started on (the more caffeinated) coffee. But why does this thread put so much more emphasis on soda than, say, alcohol and/or smoking? Plus, I feel like the biggest battle we face is not soda but staying fun and cheerful in the face of unfathomably messy rooms, mountains of laundry, homework, bills and (for example) my 12 year old’s incessant drumming. Sometimes I go to bed at night and realize I was a real buzz kill for most of the day. Staying positive in light of all the commotion is a daily challenge . . .

[FlyerInHi]

[quote=zk][quote=FlyerInHi]Stop being lazy and make up your bed.
I know so many who don’t make up their beds in the morning. Does having kids produce better lifestyle habits?[/quote]

Oh, my god, they don’t make their beds in the morning? Heathens! Their kids will be scarred forever. They shouldn’t’ve had kids if they were going to be like that. That’s too important.[/quote]

When I grew up, we always made our beds so I have an aversion to messy rooms.

I have the greatest admiration for parents who can keep everything perfect all the time while raising several kids — clean house, make up beds, fold and put away laundry, cook healthy fresh meals at the dining table, tend a beautiful garden ….

It’s easier if you can afford to hire a maid and a nanny, but most families can’t.

I’ve wondered if messy people become more organized after they have children just to set a good example for their kids.

[UCGal]

[quote=njtosd][quote=CA renter]Sounds like you’re going to be great parents, CE (but stay away from that soda!). I like your ideas here. Don’t worry too much about the food; you can make a hobby out of cooking with the family (that’s what we do, since we also love good food, unfortunately).

This will be such an awesome experience for you guys! :)[/quote]

OK – I have to agree that soda isn’t great. And maybe I am sensitive because I developed a morning Diet Pepsi habit in college before I started on (the more caffeinated) coffee. But why does this thread put so much more emphasis on soda than, say, alcohol and/or smoking? Plus, I feel like the biggest battle we face is not soda but staying fun and cheerful in the face of unfathomably messy rooms, mountains of laundry, homework, bills and (for example) my 12 year old’s incessant drumming. Sometimes I go to bed at night and realize I was a real buzz kill for most of the day. Staying positive in light of all the commotion is a daily challenge . . .[/quote]

Good comments. I’m a buzz kill too.

And I agree that smoking is way worse than soda – but so few people smoke these days, it wasn’t on my radar.

[Author]

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