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It's not the actual sleep. It's that parenting is exhausting. I could do physical labor for hours. Code straight for hours. But when I have to look after the
by adverbly 5mo ago
It's not the actual sleep.
It's that parenting is exhausting.
I could do physical labor for hours. Code straight for hours.
But when I have to look after the 2 kids for 3 hours solo I'm totally exhausted. And I don't mean sit them in front of a TV - but actually try and feed them, change diapers, clean up after their messes, keep them entertained...
Weekends are suddenly way more exhausting than weekdays.
And then that compounds over weeks.
It's totally exhausting. The modern model is totally unsustainable/not scalable, but I'm not sure what the alternative should be.
- lotsofpulp 5mo ago>but I'm not sure what the alternative should be. A village where trusted neighbors and family members and a chain of kids in increasing ages can help look after each other.
- binary132 5mo agoI mean, we COULD just yield our kids to be raised by the state in pens by minimum-wage strangers and/or robots, I guess…
- remexre 5mo agoI can't tell if you're hyperbolizing the idea of community, or describing schooling.
- binary132 5mo agoNo need to apply critical or creative thought when the downvote button is right there. Go on, just give it a click and carry on with your day so we don’t have to think about the bad things.
- 6AA4FD 5mo agoWe been doin that
- mschuster91 5mo agoUnfortunately, can't have that in a society that requires workers be mobile to chase wherever the next gig job appears. Can't form trust bonds with neighbors when you gotta move every few years.
- temp0826 5mo ago"It takes a village"
- pizzafeelsright 5mo agoYou got two 'village' responses which I fully disagree with because a dozen reasons. The village is not going to help you change diapers, feed the children, or do anything except have the children play together. I do not find parenting that difficult because I parent differently. The alternative: Teach them to entertain themselves. They clean up their own messes. I have the kiddos do tasks with me. Babies are easy enough, toddlers need limited stuff to do as it is all about novelty. Kids 5+ can learn to entertain themselves with their talents, siblings, neighbors.
- conception 5mo agoHistorically, the village 100% changed diaper, feed your children, nursed and generally helped out. Aunts, cousins, parents, friends all pitched in in the community to care for children.
- pizzafeelsright 5mo agoI have been to many places, in different cultures, and countries. Outside of blood relationships and church, I have not seen a villager change a diaper for another without compensation.
- dangus 5mo agoYou weren’t alive before industrial society.
- HaZeust 5mo agoGenerally speaking, we're not supposed to devolve.
- bobmcnamara 5mo agoIt's not free labor, it's a community effort, and the compensation goes both ways in a village! Our friends would be at our place a couple days a week and at my parent's friend's place a couple days a week. Sure if you're not pulling your share some other compensation would be expected.
- gchamonlive 5mo ago> The modern model is totally unsustainable/not scalable, but I'm not sure what the alternative should be. It's by design. Kids don't produce capital for the elites. We peasants aren't supposed to have kids, just waste away grinding so that those in power can accumulate more power, because they can pay others and have as many kids as they want, but we from the middle class will struggle with one or two. It's a form of indirect classist populational control enforced by purchase power.
- doix 5mo ago> Kids don't produce capital for the elites. Kids eventually grow up and "start producing capital". It's definitely beneficial for the "elite" in the long term for people to have kids.
- gchamonlive 5mo agoMaternity leave is 4 months where I live, with many women afraid to express their desire to have kids in their jobs fearing they would be fired. Daycare is prohibitively expensive. A good education too. Sure they grow up to join the workforce eventually, but 16-18 years doesn't show up in the quarterly reports, so the elites don't like it. I could be wrong, most likely am, but that's what I see and that's what these hostile practices represent.
- denkmoon 5mo agoHave you ever seen an "elite" think beyond the edge of the quarter? Lords of the Ashes all.
- mschuster91 5mo ago> It's definitely beneficial for the "elite" in the long term for people to have kids. Why? The elites bank on AI and robots doing everything in the future. The plebs have no place in the visions of Musk, Thiel, Altman and the rest of the wankers.
- throwawaypath 5mo ago>Kids eventually grow up and "start producing capital". They can grow up in third-world countries where elites don't have to spend a dime. Then they lobby to import them by the millions to "start producing capital".
- glitchc 5mo agoI feel your pain. Parenting is exhausting, especially the first two years or so. Hang in there, it gets a lot better. Lowering standards also helps (Does the house really need to be that clean? Does the toddler need a bath every day?)
- gsinclair 5mo agoOur doctor told us not to give the baby/toddler a bath every day. Didn’t need to tell me twice. (Every second day is fine, and better for their skin.)
- abirch 5mo agoWe’d bath twice a week or with a blowout. Our kids are still alive
- j45 5mo agoThe strange thing is the infant years seem tiring in a different and more tolerable way than when they are interactive and running all over the place. The babies being potatoes phase if visiting my life again would benefit from transferable skills that you simply don't have as the first time parent.
- cullumsmith 5mo agoMaybe counterintuitive, but I've found that having more kids actually makes some things easier. With 4+ children, the kids almost never come to us for entertainment. They form their own little society and find tons of ways to play and interact with each other. The little ones are just as likely to ask one of their older siblings to read them a story as they are to ask a parent, for example. Sure, things like laundry and meals always have toil that increases with family size, but kids can start helping with such things after age 7 or so.
- tayo42 5mo agoGreat, so 5 more years of exhaustion lol
- j45 5mo agoNothing gets easier in life, you just get better.
- rayiner 5mo agoYes. My boys keep each other occupied at home and don’t ask to play with us at all.
- yapyap 5mo agoIsn’t that just parentifying one or more of your children and passing it off as a solution because it’s easier for you?
- j45 5mo agoNot always, Children always wanting an adult to run a circus for them also doesn't let them discover creativity through bordeom. ids who are of a similar age can be guided to have activities they enjoy playing togeter. Parentification is having to be responsible for the feelings and actions of an adult.
- mothballed 5mo agoYes that is how families functions, older take care of the younger to balance the load. The parent isnt a slave, everyone helps out once they're able.
- rayiner 5mo agoI think older people who have more patience are supposed to help. We moved to America when we were young so my mom had raise my brother and I by herself, which was very hard coming from somewhere people live in multi-generational households. She had very little patience for it. But she and my dad have way more patience for my kids. My mom lived with us for a year and then my wife’s mom lived with us for a year while our youngest was 2-3. Then we moved 10 minutes from my parents. My middle child kept getting ear infections so he went to my parents’ house every day for two years. These days my boys (4 and 7) go to my parents’ house every weekend. I don’t think younger people are wired to be taking care of babies full time. I’d imagine in nature they’d be out hunting or gathering and our attention spans are wired for doing that.
- camgunz 5mo agoI super agree; my partner and I talk all the time about how like, kids really benefit from having all kinds of different caregivers. Mostly from a place of "did we make a mistake"--we moved to the Netherlands away from our parents/etc. and, while we can compensate with day care and such, it's really not the same for all kinds of obvious reasons. We did have kids later: I was 39 and 41 when they were born, so that kind of helps. But, it's hard to not also feel it's the worst of both worlds: I have neither the energy of a late-20s father, nor the patience of a mid-50s grandfather. For us (my partner and I) these discussions dovetail into discussions about community. Like, so much about modern, suburban, nuclear family stuff is really isolating for everyone involved. We don't know exactly where to go from here, but looking at the declining fertility rate, it does seem unsustainable.
- rayiner 5mo agoI suspect western societies are cooked unfortunately. It is unsustainable, you’re right.
- piker 5mo agoSounds like they're young. It gets way easier, and much more fun. Hang in there.
- casey2 5mo agoTotally the opposite. Doing even just 3 hours of constant physical labor over a few weeks and my joints are aching, lost mobility in my right foot. Looking after kids is qualitatively easier. Another part is that most modern parents are subject to predatory lending on a scale that would previously be unfathomable.
- pfannkuchen 5mo agoEven the ones who manage to understand and avoid the predatory lending are still subject to competing with everyone else's speculated future earnings. Mortgages in their modern form should absolutely be made illegal as they bid up land prices to the detriment of almost everybody.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- jml78 5mo agoLook, I can’t tell you what will work for you. My wife and I just made the kids adapt to our lives. We keep doing the same shit we always did. Concerts, they go with us. Breweries, they go. Don’t get It twisted, they were expected to behave. Kids pick up fast. Now my 17 year old and I love going to shows together. We are legit besties. We just integrated the kids into our existing lives.