Imagine your happiness as a graph of sin(x). You have ups and downs, 1 and -1, but they're relatively stable, and on the average your baseline happiness is abou

Imagine your happiness as a graph of sin(x). You have ups and downs, 1 and -1, but they're relatively stable, and on the average your baseline happiness is about the same. Then you have kids. Now the graph becomes 1+3*sin(x). The highs are stupendously higher, but the lows are deeper, and the difference can be stark. On the average your life is improved, but when somebody asks you how things are going your answer can be very different depending on the day and time. It is not an easy thing to ride the parenting roller coaster, but it is personally enriching in a way I cannot properly describe. Also, about not having control and not having any time after becoming a parent. I struggled a lot with this myself until I read a passage in a book which shifted my perspective: "In the past I used to look at my time as if it were divided into several parts. One part I reserved for Joey, another part was for Sue, another part to help with Ana, another part for household work. The time left over I considered my own. I could read, write, do research, go for walks. But now I try not to divide time into parts anymore. I consider my time with Joey and Sue as my own time. When I help Joey with his homework, I try to find ways of seeing his time as my own time. I go through his lesson with him, sharing his presence and finding ways to be interested in what we do during that time. The time for him becomes my own time. The remarkable thing is that now I have unlimited time for myself."