I don't much like being a Parent

I feel like venting about this for a while, and being as my children are still too young to read, I feel safe putting it up here.  Perhaps some day they'll be trolling through my electronic history and stumble across this.  If so, good job, detectives!  The treasure is buried under Old Man McGillicutty's mansion.

I've given it some thought, and you know what I think I hate the most about parenting?  It's that in far too many circumstances, it's easy to identify the right choice, because it's the one that makes your children less happy.  We speak of childhood, collectively, as this great time of wonder and exploration.  It's not.  I'd be properly chuffed if Tyler exhibited a little more wonder and explored a little more.  Mostly it seems like childhood is screaming when things get difficult or confusing, and always trying to eat foods that are bad for you.  I think that line might not fit in a sonnet as well, though.

I've been waiting for a moment, or even a gradual transition, where I start to really *feel* good about parenting.  Where he does something that melts my heart or makes me proud to be a parent.  I certainly didn't feel it right away, but I was prepared for that.  Dad's sometimes don't feel that connection right away.  But Tyler is coming up on three and a half years old and I still view him as largely a series of chores.  Even playing with him isn't that much fun.  The games we are allowed to play together are pretty restrictive, mostly involving him ordering me around until I get tired of it.  This doesn't surprise me, really.  He's three.  We can't really break out Dominion or Scrabble to pass the time and bond.  But, I dunno, playing with him now just feels like work.  I'll keep doing it because the books have told me it's really good for him, but let's not kid ourselves, I'd rather be doing almost anything else on my own.

I'm afraid, actually afraid, of being generous with him, of letting him have too much of what he wants; I can't keep it up.  Any reward must be transitory, of course, and he's capable of becoming a real monster when you have to turn off the TV or take away the IPad.  So I'm reduced to just being 'proud' of him.  It feels so empty.  I hope that he likes me and that such gestures give him some sort of positive reinforcement, because it feels like the only tool of positive reinforcement I'm allowed to use.  And, of course, I don't want to give him too much dessert because I'm trying to lose weight, and on top of everything else there is to do in a day, saying no to ice cream too often strains my self-control.

Of course, we are only a few years into the whole experiment, and raising a 6 or 10 or 15 year old has to be a completely different animal, but *man*.  People say all the time that they love their kids.  I'd certainly start breaking fingers if anyone tried to take them away, But I look at him now and I mostly just feel...tired.

-N