The Power of Selective Memory

Their holiday or mine?

My kids are in the South of France for an extended Easter. A tough life, but someone's got to do it...

I'm convinced they help keep my ex mother-in-law young. And I'm equally convinced that a week or so of her old fashioned disciplinarian regime helps make up for all my failings as a father. And whilst I miss them it does mean I've had a week to my own devices. I've used it to catch up with various married friends with very young children who I rarely see.

Tiredness > pain

I rarely see them because they rarely get out. They rarely get out because they are basically knackered. There's a theory that pain has no memory. If women remembered just how painful childbirth was, there would be no need for China's birth control policy... but women forget.

In England the typical professional woman will approach family with the same efficient determination she approaches everything else. Time for children? Bish, bash, bosh. Three under the age of five is a mark of respect!

"Isn't it amazing how close the little darlings are in age?"

Not really, it sounds absolutely exhausting!

'Tiring' doesn't quite cut it

Young children - and I'm really talking about the baby-toddler gang - are tiring beyond belief. They cry when you want to sleep; they need feeding, dressing and bathing; and once they can crawl you basically have to man-mark them for a year.

So here's my point. It is absolutely inconceivable that having young children should not have a significant impact on your career. Young children limit the amount of time you can spend working; they exhaust you mentally and physically; and they make you question the meaning of life (in a work-life balance kind of way rather than any deep philosophical questions you may once have harboured...).

Sadly it's still women's business

The tragedy of today's world is that children impact mothers far more than fathers. Nirvana isn't just watching friends with young children when yours are grown up. Nirvana is also when having a young family has exactly the same impact on the father's career as the mothers.

I suppose whilst I'm on the topic, I should probably admit that I'd love to start another family. Children are amazing, and somehow I seem to have forgotten how tiring they can be as well...

Ben Black