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I have a kid with my partner and I'm still not sure it was the right decision for me. They do become a full-time job in their own right and there is a whole set

I have a kid with my partner and I'm still not sure it was the right decision for me. They do become a full-time job in their own right and there is a whole set of skills that you can kind of learn through books but is going to be unique to your little one. The first couple of months were especially hard as they don't have much of a personality, don't really react much to the world around them, they're just feeding, sleeping, and growing. Starting at the beginning of the third month for me it started changing and every baby is kind of unique. I now _detest_ most of the books/articles/child-rearing advice I've encountered. Most of all of their content is fluff to pad pages, a blog roll, and are frequently superseded by more modern research backed evidence. There is a lot of toxic advice in those books and systems as well, usually for parents that are prioritizing restoring their prior social lives over the well-being of their children. It's time-consuming and exhausting, but I haven't found it to be _hard_ yet. Waking up in the middle of the night and giving your kid a hug and maybe reading to them a bit when they have a nightmare isn't a challenging task. The challenging tasks are exceptions (surprise medical issues, your daycare closing down with two days notice, etc). The baby and child industry put a cost premium on the clothes targeting them and they don't last very long due to the child's growth. I _saw_ this coming but not to the extreme it has actually manifested and you'll find it replicated in every child/baby sized item. There are a lot of surprising upsides and my motivations have definitely changed since we had a kid. I will flip a mountain to see my kid smile and laugh, it hits deep. I enjoy spending time with her and I'm terrified of missing her achievements and milestones. When she comes to me and asks me to show her how something works, wants a book read to her, or just wants a hive five I get a double whammy of that serotonin once for being a Dad that she wants to engage with and once for getting to spend time with her. I still, and unfortunately kind of frequently, miss what I have effectively sacrificed to have her. I am slower at staying on top of emerging trends, hobbies have been left by the wayside that I did for decades, I gave up running conferences and with it I drifted away from whole treasured social groups. None of this was really a surprise, but I didn't realize how much what I gave up was really part of who I was.

tonyedgecombe 1mo ago
The social thing is interesting, you will inevitably drift away from friends who don't have kids. Even for the ones who do you will be so busy with your own life that you won't get to see them much. You will probably end up with more contact with parents from their schools although that will stop suddenly when they finish. Not sure what the solution is other than putting in some deliberate effort to maintain those relationships (which I didn't do).
the_af 1mo ago
Good comment. I have two remarks: > It's time-consuming and exhausting, but I haven't found it to be _hard_ yet. I think this is exactly what people mean when they say "hard": time-consuming and exhausting, not hard as in "I cannot figure this out". Usually you figure it out as you go. This is excluding children with serious health problems, etc. I'm thankful I won the lottery in this regard, I know some situations can destroy families. > I still, and unfortunately kind of frequently, miss what I have effectively sacrificed to have her. I am slower at staying on top of emerging trends, hobbies have been left by the wayside Also rings true for me. Especially my hobbies, I barely have time for them now; and when she grows up who knows whether I'll be able to resume them. But in my case, this is balanced by this thought: would I be happier if I had more time for my hobbies, but she wasn't in my life. And the answer is very clearly that I prefer her to be in my life 1000000%, and if I cannot do my hobbies all that often that's an acceptable loss.

tonyedgecombe 1mo ago

The social thing is interesting, you will inevitably drift away from friends who don't have kids. Even for the ones who do you will be so busy with your own life that you won't get to see them much. You will probably end up with more contact with parents from their schools although that will stop suddenly when they finish. Not sure what the solution is other than putting in some deliberate effort to maintain those relationships (which I didn't do).

the_af 1mo ago

Good comment. I have two remarks: > It's time-consuming and exhausting, but I haven't found it to be _hard_ yet. I think this is exactly what people mean when they say "hard": time-consuming and exhausting, not hard as in "I cannot figure this out". Usually you figure it out as you go. This is excluding children with serious health problems, etc. I'm thankful I won the lottery in this regard, I know some situations can destroy families. > I still, and unfortunately kind of frequently, miss what I have effectively sacrificed to have her. I am slower at staying on top of emerging trends, hobbies have been left by the wayside Also rings true for me. Especially my hobbies, I barely have time for them now; and when she grows up who knows whether I'll be able to resume them. But in my case, this is balanced by this thought: would I be happier if I had more time for my hobbies, but she wasn't in my life. And the answer is very clearly that I prefer her to be in my life 1000000%, and if I cannot do my hobbies all that often that's an acceptable loss.