100 Hours

Five days a week I leave our house first thing in the morning and head into San Francisco on the commuter bus to my software job and don’t return until 5 or 6 PM. My wife Amie stays at home to care for our daughters - 4 year old daughter Charlotte and 16 month old Abby. In addition to taking care of the kids, she also somehow manages to run her own personal training and nutrition consulting business without any childcare. Neither of our families lives nearby so it’s just us – but mostly Amie taking care of the kids and running the household.

Last week she had to leave town to attend the funeral for her grandfather (R.I.P. Fredrick Ahlers) so I had to take a couple of days of work off and be a stay at home dad for 4 full days and nights. This was a fairly big deal in our household considering Amie had only spent one night away from the family since the birth of Abby almost a year and a half ago.

Amie took off on a Wednesday night red-eye flight and wouldn’t return until late night on Sunday night so my ‘shift’ would be about 100 hours. I got psyched up by watching the classic 80’s movie Mr. Mom and googling ‘Stay at Home Dad’ which results provided all types of resources and suggestions for surviving staying at home with your kids. I gave myself inspirational pep talks while looking in the mirror and saying things like ‘You da man!’ and ‘You got this!’ in between karate kicks and chops a la Mark Wahlberg in Boogie Nights.

Amie did all of the shopping and prepped all the meals in advance so I wouldn’t have to go to the store except maybe to pick up some milk. No problem! I got this!

I made it through the first night ok only having to get up once to comfort Abby and give her a little milk to get her to fall back asleep. In the AM, I got Charlotte to pre-school on time with limited drama and made it to story time at the library and to the park with Abby. This is easy!

I got Abby down for her nap before Charlotte got home from school and once Charlotte was down for her rest I thought ‘Bob Time!’ when I could finally eat some lunch and get caught up with the dishes and then maybe squeeze in my own power nap. A minute into making my lunch I hear the ‘Wahhhhhhhh!!!!!!’ blare from the baby monitor signaling the end of Abby’s short-lived nap. I tried to get her back to sleep but to no avail. I had no luck finishing my lunch as Abby cried whenever I set her down. So much for eating!

The next few days played out like the movie Groundhog Day: interrupted sleep, breakfast, activity, lunch, naps, activity, dinner, baths, interrupted sleep with dishes, cleaning and laundry mixed in whenever I could keep Abby distracted for a for a few minutes. As the days went on, I was more lenient with Charlotte on my iPad and TV viewing and my standards for what constituted a meal got progressively lower.

By Sunday night you could stick a fork in me because I was done. I looked in the mirror and I was still wearing the same drool covered clothes I’d slept in, I hadn’t showered and my hair looked like I had just woken up. I finally put two and two together and realized that’s probably why my neighbor was looking at me funny earlier in the day when I was chatting with them outside.

Those four days confirmed a few things for me. 1) Going to work is a piece of cake compared to staying home to take care of your kids.  2) It’s easy to take parenting shortcuts and takes real discipline, effort and complete selflessness to raise your kids the right away. 3) Lastly, and most importantly I have no idea how my wife does this every day. Where does she get the boundless energy and endless patience to simultaneously run a business, raise two children and maintain a household? If she could bottle it up and sell it we would be millionaires. I’m a lucky man.

To Amie and all other stay at home parents – I commend you!