We're Gonna Make It After All!

With Padraic's first day of kindergarten looming a week in the distance (come on and get here already!), I feel the need for some reminiscences and to put my thoughts out there about this new experience we're all facing. Yes, our whole family is transitioning as Padraic starts public school. Life will never be quite the same. I happen to think it's gonna be better than ever.

When Padraic was born, my first thought was, "I'm a mom, and this kid is gorgeous!" Then we took him home from the hospital a couple days later, and between long periods of staring at his cuteness I kept thinking, "Why the hell didn't anyone tell me how hard parenting would be?" I got no sleep and had no time to do anything other than tend to his needs. I still clearly remember that when he was about 8 weeks old he finally slept for longer than 2hrs at a time (which he'd never done, day or night), which meant so did I. I cried with relief, and all I'd gotten was a paltry 3hrs of uninterrupted sleep for the first time since his birth. It took him--and his little brother--a solid year to start sleeping through the night on a regular basis, so you can imagine how rough it was getting out of bed each morning. Maybe it was because they were breastfed since breast milk digests more quickly than formula, or that they wanted the comfort of Mommy holding and rocking them more than they wanted sleep. But that first year had just as many hellish moments as joyful ones because of juggling work and home life on next to no sleep; I will admit to that.

Back then I swear I thought Ken and I would never survive to see the day that Padraic would start public school. The day-care bills were crushing, toddlerhood was maddening, and we were just holding out for the first day of kindergarten to come as if it would be proof that we could actually do this parenting thing. And now, here it comes!

Only one week from today I will put my firstborn son on the school bus that stops at the end of our driveway, and I will go inside our house and cry. First I will cry out of nostalgia and the overwhelming emotions that come with watching our little boy go out into the big world, and then I will cry from sheer relief that we made it through over five-and-a-half years of being full-time employees and a full-time Mom and Dad. Five-and-a-half years of getting up at 5am to get Padraic (and later, him and his little brother) to day care early enough that we could beat rush-hour traffic into Philly and then leave work early enough to beat it back out of the city again. Five-and-a-half years of paying out the wazoo for day-care at some great facilities where teachers and staff have become like second families to us and our kids. Five-and-a-half years of Ken surviving as a single parent while I travel for work.

While we'll continue being full-time parents and employees, and there'll still be a day-care bill, and I'll still have to travel for work, we'll have reached the milestone that seemed to impossible back in January 2005 when a 7lb 8oz baby boy first arrived in our world and turned it topsy-turvy. Of course, now we'll have more homework than pre-K and more parent-teacher conferences and more in-school activities (some of which we are bound to miss because of our work schedules, and we'll feel all the guilt appropriate to those instances), but we're entering a new world of opportunities, too. New friends--both for Padraic and hopefully parent friends for us as well--new activities and interests, new places explored during field trips. It's exhilarating and a little nerve-wracking all at the same time. But so far, for me at least, exhilaration is winning. I hope the same is true for my favorite 5-year-old. :)