Daddy DayCare

For the last 10 days, my wife has been working long hours, quite literally long (8:00 am - 10 pm) and I have become a 'single parent' for these 10 days. Never imagined it would be so tough.

I am up by 6:30 am, get ready after having a cup of tea and also, get my son ready (which is a challenge in itself). My wifehas already left for work by then (7:30 am or so) for work. After that, I prepare my son's bag (milk, snacks, breakfast), dress him and put on his shoes. Then, I put on my shoes and prepare my laptop bag. While I getting ready, my son takes off his shoes (or poops) or does something else - which means an additional 20 mins. Somehow, I manage to put him the car seat and manage to leave by 7:50 am. The ride to his daycare involves 20 odd mins of traffic and by the time I get on to I-66 is its peak rush hour (8:15 am). I takes me an hour to get to work. I work until 5:00 pm and leave work (again on I66) to get to my son's daycare before 6:00 pm. As I have to leave early, I have been taking shorter lunch breaks.

I pick up son up and then take him to a grocery store or a similar place - an outing for him. We get home around 6:30ish and I let him loose for 15 mins or so while I prepare his food. Then, it's dinner time which can take anywhere between 15 mins to an hour (depending his mood). Then, it's bath time (45 mins - massage, bath, toweling, hair drying). Finally, the challenge is to feed him milk before making him sleep. If I am lucky, he sleeps immediately but usually he takes roughly 15 mins to sleep. Finally, when my son goes to sleep, it's 8:30 and I am exhausted.

I always appreciated how much effort my wife has to put in and will have to put in but this has given me even more respect for what mother's have to go through.

What i have learnt in these 10 days - PATIENCE. Oh, I can't wait for this Friday when my wife's long shift gets over...