When you decided that you were going to be a parent you took on the responsibility that you are going to be there for your child anytime they may need you. There are no breaks.
Here is a prime example:
My son decided that after he woke up at 2:00 am because he was hungry that he didn’t want to go back to sleep. I don’t usually hear him at night and so this didn’t really wake me, but as for my wife, she couldn’t sleep either.
Four in the morning rolled around and I was finally awoken by my son’s cries. I got up, changed his diaper, swaddled him up and tried to go back to sleep myself. He still wasn’t sleeping and now I was awake and could hear him stirring too. Once 5:00 am hit, my fitbit alarm went off to remind me to head to the gym.
As my wife and son lay in bed getting just a little sleep before she had to get up for play practice, I went to the gym. I try to go every day at this time because usually my family is still sleeping and I feel like I’m not missing any moments.
Exhausted from lack of sleep and an hour of cardio, my day was just beginning. I had eight straight hours of work ahead of me.
As I was wrapping up at the office, my wife texted me that we weren’t going to be able to go to the legislative event that night because our son hadn’t slept all day and was screaming at the top of his lungs. If you have ever been with a baby that is so exhausted that they can’t sleep and all they do is scream, it has a way of wearing you out too. You try to do anything and everything to help the screaming child calm down so they can sleep.
When I got home my work day wasn’t over.
I think a lot of the time, dad’s have a tendency to think that since we were working at the office all day that we now can put our feet up and not really need to do anything at home. Not true fellas. We made this decision too. We were there, right? Our wives have been home all day working too. They are worn out and if they had to deal with a screaming child all day they may want a little break.
The modern dad won’t come home after work thinking that his day is done. We come home, take the baby from our stressed out wife, calm them down, help or make dinner, and feed the baby. We will do everything we can to help her out because while we were gone working she was helping us out by taking care of our child (or children). It’s a team effort and we need to do all we can to help out.
