Cheaper by the Half-Dozen...

We were driving home from some friend's homes after a long day of playing and stopped at a Wendy's on the way.  It was late-ish in the evening, so the place was pretty empty, except for a boisterous young family that consisted of parents and six children who were between (I would guess) 3 months and 8 years of age. 

Loo was absolutely mesmorized by this family, especially the fact that they were all wearing matching grey sweatshirts with "Team [last name]" on the front and each of their first names (except for the father, who had "Coach [first name]" on his) on the back.

Loo was so fascinated that between bites of her frosty (the reason we stopped) she would hop off her chair to run over and sneak a peek at the family.  At one point, she cozied up to J and whispered, "daddy, I want to be in that family."

Um... not with my uterus?

Loo's been lots of trouble lately.  And it's so deliberate now.  We'll tell her not to do something, and you can see her standing there, processing our words, and then doing precisely what we forbade her to do.  Time-outs barely make a dent in her consciousness, she doesn't really dislike doing a time out because she sits in her "naughty" chair and sings songs, kicks her feet up on the back, does an awkward downward dog, and her 3 minutes are done.

Her favorite phrase right now is "not right now". 

Loo, it's time for dinner.
Not right now.
Loo, let's get ready for bed.
Not right now.
Ok, time to turn off the TV.
Not right now.

Anyways, you get the point. 

Couple of things.  Obama won big this weekend in Washington, Nebraska and Louisiana.  I won a bet with J, since I said Obama would take Washington, and he was sure that it would go Hillary.  J now thinks that Obama has a real shot to take it all the way, though, for fear of jinxing the whole enterprise, I'm keeping a lid on my hopes.  I donated the money to Obama's campaign, which seemed like the right thing to do.

I need to update my net worth chart, just haven't gotten around to it, hopefully I can do it tonight.  I have a big addition to put in (yea!): an etrade account that I just haven't really looked at for a while which had more value in it than I remembered.

J and I are so up and down right now.  We went through several tense moments this weekend where we were barely speaking to each other.  There is such a perpetual sense of frustration and disgust that lingers over all of our interactions that it must be affecting our daughters.  But at the same time, I still recognize that J's a good guy, he's trying, and when we're friendly to each other, it's still the best relationship in the world.  But I get a giant black pit in my stomach whenever I think about our fights.

The truth is, we're not really the most effective parents in the world.  This applies to both of us.  Combine two completely useless parents who still have strong senses of parental responsibility, and we have a disaster in the making.  For example, neither of us seem to be able to take care of the two girls alone for very long periods of time.  So weekends without the nanny (like this weekend) are utterly disasterous.  J will sneak off to take a nap, which pisses me off to no end, and I will do things like make lunch or dinner, which pisses J to no end (because that effectively leaves J in charge of Loo and Kali, and J thinks that we should just order out instead of wasting my time on cooking).  All those mothers on the blogosphere whose husbands that take their children off for a morning or afternoon so that the moms can get a nap or read a magazine.  It has NEVER happened to me in the almost four years since we had Loo.

But I'm just as much to blame.  My work hours start early and end late, and when I'm on, I'm really really on -  I end up dumping all the childcare stuff onto J.  This morning, I had an assignment that had to be done by 10, so I got up extra early to start working on it.  Since our nanny doesn't get in until 8:30ish, J had to get the girls up, change them out of their pajamas and get them started with their breakfast.  His work is much more flexible than mine (for example, the only fixed claim on his time are his classes) so then he ends up staying for an extra hour after the nanny arrives to help her get them through breakfast, and to play with them.   And he resents the hell out of the time that he spends with them on the weekdays when I'm absent because of my work.  He constantly reminds me that he would be far more successful at his work if he wasn't playing househusband to my law job.

We're also coming to a real bitter battle in terms of where we want to be.  I don't really see myself working in a big law firm for the long term and I would like to get to a point where we have a more "normal" family life.  Unfortunately, I think that for me, that means moving out of the big cities in the Northeast.  J, on the other hand, seems to have decided that there are only three cities in which he could live: Boston (but only if he could stay in academia, which, right this moment, is questionable), New York and Tokyo.  I'm really really really not keen on any of these.  I'm leaning towards Portland (OR), Austin (TX), Kansas City (MO) or any similarly mid-sized, liberal city.  Basically, I want to get out of the big mega cities.  We're at an impasse in this argument, and anytime we even try to discuss this, we end up in an enormous shouting match, with accusations flying around.

I know there are others who have it much worse that us and that I should be grateful for the good things in our relationship.  I hate how petty our arguments have gotten, and how vicious.  And every day I hope that we're just on a big enormous hump, that we'll get over it someday, somehow.  But right now, I'm sad and confused and lonely, and my once best friend in the world isn't there to hold my hands through this.

Comments

[PT-LawMom]

I'm so sorry. :( I told my husband yesterday that he should just get the hell out of the house since I'm the one bringing home the bacon, frying it up, serving it, throwing it up after taking all my damn medication, and then cleaning up after me, him and our son afterwards, so what the hell do we need him for? Nice, huh? And all in front of my sweet little one. Of course this is after he slammed my laptop down on my hand and told me I'm addicted to the computer and must either shut it *now* or he wouldn't be spending the day with us. Talk about bad years... But some things I just don't want to blog about, KWIM? Kudos to you for much more honest blogging. :)

As for little ones, I feel your pain on the not right now. My perfect child who was a great sleeper and eater from birth now won't go to bed, is a picky eater and is suddenly juggling knives and trying to use the microwave by himself!!! Ack! I swear, he's going to send me to an early grave if work or my stress level don't do it.

Sending you some happy, perky vibes!

[CT Mom]

Hi Kady - I followed the link to your blog from the comment you left on mine, and just finished reading it from start to finish. I was you 7 years ago, the only difference was my oldest was 11 months when I started my law job and 2 1/2 when I quit (I found out I was pregnant with my 2nd the week I quit). My job was an in-house corporate lawyer, $62K a year, which I told myself was ok because I was trading salary for work/family balance. Wrong, wrong, wrong! Hours were long, I was never home, hubby was working a corporate job plus taking care of our daughter (after she already spent a whole day in daycare). I was angry, I missed my daughter and our marriage was tense. I wanted to quit a month after I started. Before I passed the CT bar (took 2 tries - horrible morning sickness while taking the Feb bar, missed by 12 points, took again in July and passed), I was a systems manager, and loved my job. I took the law job because it looked like a good opportunity to use my 12+ years in financial services plus law - I was hired for my business experience. I was treated like a lower than sh-- on your shoe 1st year associate, and after almost 2 years, enough was enough. I quit and went back to systems. I now work in data security and information protection policy as a project manager and work with attorneys all the time. The degree gives me credibility, I love the guys I work with. I make in the low six figures, and the worse week is when I work 50 hours. AND I"M HAPPY.

So what I'm saying to you is this - the situation you're in is not worth it. You're sacrificing everything - family, marriage, your health. There is more to life than big law. Your daughters will only be this age once - I missed so much of my older daughter's young life, and I will never get that time back. Yes, you have debt, and yes, J's job may not pay a lot, but he finds it fulfilling. You need to do the same.

Btw I did do the SAHM thing for about 9 months (other than maternity leaves) when my daughters were 6 and 3 - left a job that I initially loved but turned so bad to the point I became severely depressed. But as SAHM I was bored out of my mind and they drove me crazy - I like working. Hubby has been supportive but even he got tired of the ups and downs - first I'm a lawyer, hate it, quit, get new job, ok for a few years, freak out, quit, hate being home, work again. And I don't blame him.

Sorry for the long comment - I guess I just want you to see that there is life outside of law, and what you're sacrificing you will come to regret. It's really not worth it. Feel free to email me any time.

[wa]

I can't even imagine working as a lawyer AND being a parent. But keep your chin up--at least you don't have matching sweatshirts, right?

And my town of Austin's the best. So's Portland. Basically, any town that has people selling tie-dye on the streetcorner's gonna be a good place to live.

[chrissy]

I think you need to move to salvage your sanity, or at least find a less intense job. I can't speak about Austin or KC, but I'm in Portland right now and loving it. The legal salaries are not what you'd expect given the rather high cost of living, but the billables are a lot more forgiving to compensate. There are also a lot of colleges here, too, so maybe J can find another teaching gig. Good luck to you.

[anon]

I completely agree with you on wanting to move to a midsized city and think your husband is being very unrealistic. Boston, NY or Tokyo? I mean, for that to work, you would either need to (1) stay at a long hours/high stress job you hate or (2) he would have to get a better/more stable job so you could get an easier job. He seems to be pointing you to the former option because he can't make the second option work for himself (but blames you for it, i.e. playing househusband).

It seems unfair that he should get to value his own geographic preferences over your desire to spend more time with your kids/work less. I would think personal geographic preferences should take the back seat to children/wanting to enjoy one's career. Especially when the options on the table are all urban areas and not total rural, bfv places.

[LawyerMama]

Came over to check out your blog & just let me say that I can totally relate. The single most predominate argument in my marriage is the "whose time is more important" argument. We actually left D.C. because we were both working insane hours & we were going to kill each other if we didn't slow down. Unfortunately, now that I'm at a less demanding firm, my husband tends to take advantage of that a little *too* much, if you know what I mean. It's a careful balancing act and we have to rebalance constantly or we all fall over. Hang in there!