August 5, 2007

Unfit parents

So, I feel a little unfit to be a parent today. Here's why:

We went to bed around 10:30 last night. That's way early for us in the summer so we were really excited. When I woke up this morning, I looked at the clock and it said 6:48 (which was actually 6:28). "Wow, he slept a REALLY long time," I thought with pride. But I was a little suspicious, so I asked Kyle to check on him. Kyle got up, opened the bedroom door and we heard him crying. We both thought we had turned the monitor on, but it seems that one of us turned it on and the other actually turned it off. I sprinted down the hall and picked him up and he didn't seem like he had been crying that long. But chances are that he woke up in the middle of the night and cried himself back to sleep . . . hungry and alone.

He's been sleeping all day, so I'm pretty sure he was awake a lot last night. I felt (and still feel) horrible. I know he has no memory of it, but I will.

I guess if it's the worst thing we do, we'll be lucky. But you know we will both triple check the monitor tonight.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sometimes it happens, in our efforts to be good parents sometimes we just miss the mark....Luckily it gives you stories to share with new parents so they realize they are not alone, we all have our moments. Once when Ally was probably 1 1/2 we went to a Superbowl party with friends and their kids. As the party went on Ally was just cranky. Of course Trent and I were frustrated we didn't understand why she was cranky, we were at a party for pete's sake. Well on our way home we got to talking about how she usually wasn't like that and over the course of our conversation we realized we didn't feed the kid!!! AARGH, we felt horrible. Here we were stuffing our faces with Superbowl crap and our poor child was starving. We know she doesn't remember this but of course it made us feel horrible. I think it even makes Trent feel worse than the time she fell off the changing table, I'll save that story for another unfit moment....

Kristyw905 said...

Wow, stop being so hard on yourself! Even abused children have grown up to be normal! If that is the worse thing that you forget to do, you can still be considered the most caring, attentive parents ever. It's the parents who don't care that are a problem. And, what you don't know, is what Jack was really doing or not doing! He may have never awakened. Or, he may have even learned new ways to self-sooth that he would not have learned otherwise!

Also ...
Let us not forget who got locked out of the house by their two year old ... mom felt guilty, but Sara watched TV and sucked her thumb!

Let us not forget who left your brother in a car seat alone in the driveway for ... ummmmm ... well, at least a few minutes! Again, mom felt guilty, but Jeff sat contentedly observing the scenery and as you can tell, he has been psychologically messed up ever since! (NOT!) I think it was actually character building!

However, one parental mistake I vehemently caution you about is to NEVER touch your childs hair (i.e. perms, haircuts, etc.) Leave it to the professionals. A bad outcome can leave them scarred for life!