Hey Kid, You’re a Happiness Crusher
Oh joy. Another story about how having kids can make you miserable because parenthood is: a) Hard b) Requires sacrifices c) Is oftentimes maddening and d) Is so tiring that it sucks the life out of you and renders you useless for other things, like happiness, romance and discussions about adult topics, like politics, books and good television programming.
The new issue of Newsweek contains a feature story questioning whether having kids makes you happier or miserable (their answer: miserable).
An excerpt:
“Parents may openly lament their lack of sleep, hectic schedules and difficulty in dealing with their surly teens, but rarely will they cop to feeling depressed due to the everyday rigors of child-rearing. ‘If you admit that kids and parenthood aren’t making you happy, it’s basically blasphemy,’ says Jen Singer, a stay-at-home mother of two from New Jersey who runs the popular parenting blog MommaSaid.net. ‘From baby-lotion commercials that make motherhood look happy and well rested, to commercials for Disney World where you’re supposed to feel like a kid because you’re there with your kids, we’ve made parenthood out to be one blissful moment after another, and it’s disappointing when you find out it’s not.’”
But then, you already knew that parenting is a series of trade-offs. Nothing good comes without sacrifice, at least that’s what I keep telling myself. If you’re married, it’s not all rainbows and sunshine either, but the moments when it’s good make up for the irritations and frustrations. That’s the way parenting is. If it’s not that way for you, there’s always sleep-away camp and boarding school and colleges really far away.
Image credit: Zohar Lazar/Newsweek.
Local mom and author Meredith O'Brien gives you a peek behind the picket fences of modern day parenting. With humor and candor, it's her take on real parenting in the real world.
