Finally Friday #6
June 3, 2016
Theme: Adult time, me time
We’ve got a lovely neighbor who is genuinely happy to take JuggerBaby for 10-20 minutes if we need, probably longer if we asked, in the evenings. We’ve exchanged kids a few times now, her family is great with JuggerBaby and ze is totally into hanging out with them. Ze isn’t in the least bit shy of running up and demanding a snack. (The well trained kid in me groans at this imposition. But we are happy to feed their little guy when he asks for a snack so fair’s fair?) Their little guy is much older but he loves the company of anyone at any age, so he’s hung out with us a few times too, sans parents, and he’s hugely entertaining when he’s not running around in circles.
It’d be the perfect arrangement but alas, they’re only here for a little while. It’s hard to find people we consider a good fit: trustworthy, patient and firm, very reasonable, willing to tell a child “no”, and just easy to get along with. We’ll stay in touch, I’m sure, but they won’t be just on the same block anymore and sometimes, we just need a hand from someone who can be there without a long commute or scheduling two weeks in advance.
I mentioned earlier that we found babysitters – yaaayy! But they are only available the occasional Saturday and run at least $25/hour – OUCH.
We’d originally imagined babysitting to be the solution of buying ourselves some free time, some guilt free time, where we happily paid someone to help out with JuggerBaby for an hour or two to do something for ourselves or just get some work done. It’s tough when we’re both timing almost everything on the weekend for hir naps. It’s even tougher staring down the barrel of hir phasing out the second nap. (Say it ain’t so!)
We work at making sure PiC gets his gym time, that’s as important to his mental health as my quiet no-people time is to mine. Thus far, I’ve gotten by with thinking of daycare days as double duty days: It’s when I get my quiet me-time, and I get all my work done.
Once in a while I think wistfully of a time when I wasn’t on the dog or the baby’s schedule. Mostly, I think I’m as rested as I can be given health issues, and as fulfilled on a personal level as I need to be, right now, but eventually I’d like a little bit more. Nothing scheduled, I hate the commitment of taking weekly classes. Just the odd hour once or twice a month where I am solely committed to just doing whatever I want.
I don’t want to say that it’s entirely down to JuggerBaby that we don’t get our time, in that blamey kind of way, because I don’t resent it. The reality is we chose to have a human puppy. That’s fine, it brings a whole load of work and compensates with fun and laughter and snot and drool. It’s relatively even. But ze just happens to be the reason this period carries extra scheduling challenges.
I know this is a problem everyone has to some extent with their families, friends, work, and all their other obligations.
:: Do you get enough time to yourself? How do you carve out time for yourself? Do you prioritize alone time and social time?
