So, for the past month or so I've been playing Mr. Mom. As the result of a
simple Cost/Benefit analysis, it just made more sense for me to stay at home. I
wasn't making what it would cost to have the girls at daycare, and then having
them at daycare means both of us miss out on spending time with them and my
travel time on top of that made it easy to see that Mr. Mom was the preferable
option. And it's been a lot of fun.
However, at times it's been a bit of a struggle - for the both of us. For
Julia, she hates being away from the girls. And at times the stresses of her
job get to her. For me, trying to do all the things Daddy needs to do - whether
it's cook and clean, getting kids dressed, trying to teach the kids correct
principles... as well as be a husband - it's a lot of work. Then, too, there's
a sense of fulfillment in providing for my family that I'm missing out on. I
felt that way once - I had been working and Julia was off work for some reason
or another. When I got home, she had cleaned a bit, and the girls were playing,
and Julia was cooking dinner. I just had this deep feeling of "rightness". That
this was how it should be. It's a difficult concept to communicate clearly, so
you'll just have to pretend you know what I mean ^_^
Lately, though, I've felt like I've been slacking - I'm not able to get
everything done around the house that I would like to/need to. And then when
Julia gets home, she'll just randomly do something that would have taken me a
while to get done, while she's doing something else. It makes me feel a little
down on myself. For instance, the other day I cleaned the kitchen. Then I made
some banana bread and it looked like I hadn't cleaned the kitchen in the first
place. The very next day I took the girls out shopping and to give Grandpa his
Father's Day gift, and got home, where Julia had cleaned the kitchen and had
two loafs of banana bread in the oven - and the kitchen looked GOOD. Then last
night when I was reading the girls some bedtime stories, she washed all the
dishes in the time it would have taken me to wash some of them.
So I get this combination feeling of intense gratitude and worthlessness,
because it feels like I'm not really contributing all that much.