Four Months In
Soaking in the paradox of parenting
We’ve made it to four months. A third of a year. I’ve been underwater the past several weeks, so taxed, physically and emotionally, that I have been unable to muster the energy needed to write. My wife reminded me this week that writing is a vital part of who I am, and that I made a commitment to share my thoughts with the world. So I’m back at it.
Parenting evolves with your child. Everything is the same, but everything is new. The day to day patterns continue but with slight alterations that accrue over time. Harper’s manual dexterity, for instance. For a couple of weeks now she has been using her hands to feel things: the texture of her Teddy bear (whom we have named Reginald), the TV controller, Sara’s necklace. She can confidently grab both of my hands while I’m trying to bottle-feed her, or even remove my glasses from my nose. At times she will hold out her hands in front of her as if taking stock of the fact that her appendages are, in fact, tools under her command. She has learned that an entire fist can be lodged in her mouth as a form of self-soothing. Her strength has multiplied by leaps and bounds, too. Now, during tummy time sessions, she raises her neck high to take in the world, usually with a smile. Her cooing has become more complex, almost like a kind of proto-language, and we expect her to start giggling any day now. In so many ways, our Miss Bean is on the path of self-development to toddlerhood.
And she’s doing this all in a new place. After spending the first three months of Harper’s life in Washington DC, we have returned to Central America. Harper is now a seasoned international traveler, having completed three plane rides (we recently did a round-trip to Seattle for my brother’s wedding), and is hard at work accumulating stamps in her passport. I am back working full-time and Sara has converted to stay-at-home mom status, a switch that has upended our status quo. I now only see Harper for a few hours a day, while Sara has the much harder job (by far) of caring for our child at home. I will note that we are very fortunate to live in a country where hiring full-time help is cheap. We have a nanny, Maria, who is excellent and handles anything we ask of her with aplomb, from cooking to cleaning to holding Harper while she naps. And all for the equivalent of four dollars an hour, which is considered a good wage for a working class person in this country. We would never be able to afford childcare like this in the US, so we are taking advantage of this while we still can. Maria’s presence substantially relieves the burden on Sara, though with Harper’s feeding schedule Sara never gets a true break for more than a few hours.
I have acknowledged this reality since Harper was born, but I’m still just beginning to understand the implications: having a child immediately and drastically lowers the quality of life for you and your spouse. Sometimes the demands are so extreme that you barely have time to connect with your partner, and any plans you had of a semi-relaxing evening (dinner and an episode of Modern Family) are tossed out the window. A few nights ago, for example, we had one of the most trying experiences ever with Harper. For three hours, from seven to ten, we struggled through Harper’s fits of crying as she adamantly refused to go to sleep. It seemed like a Sisyphean task: every time I lowered Harper into the crib, she would startle awake and return to screaming inconsolably. We were on the verge of throwing in the towel and dividing the night into shifts (reminiscent of Harper’s first six weeks) when she finally exhausted herself into a deep sleep. The whole ordeal was, to date, the worst example of Harper’s general sleep regression, something we have noticed over the past week or so. It’s much harder to put her to sleep, and the same routine that worked for her before is no longer as reliable. The four-month regression that people warned us of is very real. Desperate to avoid a repeat of this kind of thing, we are in the process of reaching out to a consultant to help us get Harper on a semi-reliable sleep schedule.
Hard nights such as this have forced me to meditate on one question in particular: am I happier now that I have a child? The immediate answer is no. In fact, in some ways I am less happy. For example, the hobbies and interests that I have become accustomed to doing are now extremely curtailed. I haven’t touched my guitar in months; it sits idle in the case, and though in theory I would love to take it out, I have to weigh the opportunity cost of doing just that against all of the other things that I want or need to do, knowing that I have to compress my wants and needs into a tight schedule that is dictated by what my child needs. When there are clashing interest, the child always wins. Practically speaking, this means that I have only a narrow window of opportunity to get in a thirty-minute workout: between five and six in the morning when Harper is still sleeping. If that window passes, I can forget about even trying to squeeze something in. I am surviving with a little less than six hours of sleep a night, which is sustainable but only barely.
David Brooks, in The Second Mountain, writes that a truly fulfilled life comes from the commitments that we make to others. The “first mountain” is the hill that we climb in pursuit of self-gratification: money, power, success. I would add leisure to that list, since millenials like me highly prize the free time to do whatever we want (like travel the world). The first mountain can offer some degree of happiness, but it cannot satisfy our deepest yearning to be connected to others. Ultimately, Brooks posits that we exist to give ourselves away, and only through this can we fully discover our humanity. Brooks’ book is one of those rare works that forces you to reflect continuously on your own life. Harper is my second mountain, one that will take a lifetime to climb. Every morning I wake up not knowing which version of my child I will be dealing with that day: the pleasant, easygoing Miss Bean or the shrieking banshee. Most likely it will be both. The only thing predictable about children is that they are unpredictable.
I have recently been reading 12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson, and he similarly observes how self-sacrifice — the denial of ego — is the only proper response to the chaos and suffering that we see in the world. Peterson recounts how humanity discovered the virtue of delayed gratification through the idea of ritual sacrifice; i.e. giving up something in the short-term to gain something more valuable in the long-term. Parenting, I think, epitomizes this idea of delay, as you pour your heart and soul into building up your child in the hopes of raising a healthy, strong, and ultimately happy adult. A key aspect of Peterson’s philosophy is that the point of life is not happiness but rather fulfillment. In this sense, his ideas overlap with those of Brooks, and together these two thinkers have helped me to make sense of my identity as a parent. Leisure and freedom are great but only have temporary appeal. There is something that resides within me on a spiritual level telling me that I was made for fatherhood. Harper is not the sole purpose of my existence, but she is now the primary one, and in light of this the physical, mental, and emotional ordeal of parenting is all worth it. There is much hardship and self-sacrifice to come, and that will all be worth it, too. Giving of oneself so that another person can live brings with it a degree of fulfillment that I didn’t know existed.
The last four months have affirmed my decision to become a parent, for the reasons stated above. At the same time, parenting has given me a renewed sense of empathy for people who have considered the self-sacrifices inherent in childrearing and chosen to opt out. Not everyone is emotionally or psychologically prepared for this. Indeed, there have been points with Harper where I have consciously thought, “This is so hard, if I was a less stable emotionally, I can see myself requiring psychiatric treatment.” Parenting can and will break you, and if you feel that you don’t have the reserves to take this sort of beating, there is wisdom in not having a child. I am less convinced by the other reasons for not having children, such as a desire to save the climate (global fertility is plunging fast and therefore population decline, not overpopulation, is inevitable) or a desire to save money (yes parenting is expensive, but from a purely self-interested point of view it’s invaluable to have a child that can care for you in old age). But I think it’s worth acknowledging that some people are self-aware enough to know that they are not cut out for parenting, and this self-awareness is ultimately beneficial to society as a whole.
The past year has been one of transitions, and as we barrel towards the six-month mark there are even more on the horizon. We will return to the US soon and will therefore be stripped of the safety net that comes with having full-time help. Our stress level will no doubt increase as we navigate these demands, but we also look forward to the milestones that will arrive in the next year: Harper eating solid foods, crawling, and — that pinnacle of pinnacle — walking. There is unprecedented pain in parenting, but also unprecedented reward. That is the central paradox not just of parenting but, I think, human existence as a whole. The more we are pushed and challenged, and the more we are forced to give ourselves up for the good of another, the more complete we become.