How do you guys deal with parenting? My wife had work events all weekend last week so I had to be on point 100% and then continue to all week. Now this weekend we had a girl scout hike and my wife wanted to go to a special event with me in the evening. I haven’t had time for any real solitude for two weeks and am mentally/emotionally drained.
How do you guys deal with this? I feel like a bad parent/partner for not being excited for these things or feelings negative about doing them. Am I expecting too much from myself? I don’t know, thanks for reading anyway.
I’m autistic, and one of my 4 kids is also autistic. Their mother died when they were 9, 11, 13, and 15 and I raised them after that by myself. All I can say is that it was hard. What I found to be most useful was writing down rules that we all had to follow and then sticking to it, including the way punishments worked, which basically ran on a sliding scale depending on issues met. There were also specific rewards for doing good things as well. Basically coming up with a plan, including the kids in that plan (they helped determine the rules) and then sticking to it. Those rules included who was responsible for what chores, etc.
It made things much easier, although of course kids will be kids and will always push the boundaries.
It left a lot more room for us to have fun together.
Sorry for your loss. That sounds like great advise. Challenges always occurs and I’m glad you found a way to make it work.