How To Enjoy The Gift of Parenthood
A toddler’s father take on how parenting can change your life
Parenthood is a noble act of selflessness. It’s a daily wrestle against dirty diapers, messy rooms, dangerous drawers, splashy baths, constant worries, and sleep deprivation. Your first days as a father can give you a feeling of exploding happiness never felt before, but your first year and a half can drive you nuts — especially if you and your partner don’t have they joy of relying on extra help.
Good parenting doesn’t exist. You can be a good parent when you are waking up in the middle of the night to change diapers and rock your crying baby back to sleep, and a few hours later you are a bad parent for letting your already awake toddler be entertained by the TV while it’s only four in the morning and you are trying to catch up with sleep. No matter how many parenting books you can read while you witness pregnancy in excitement and trepidation, you will never be ready to be a (good) father.
The life of a toddler’s parent is marked by an interminable series of quite demanding tasks, all directed towards the goal of either feeding, cleaning, watching, or entertaining your child. Being a parent is something fantastic, but it comes with a high degree of self-sacrifice. It also comes with the idea that everything that a parent is doing is nothing but building the foundation for a man or woman of tomorrow. Not an easy job, being a parent.
I consider myself the happiest parent on earth — that I can say. I am the proud daddy of an energetic, intelligent, smart, and beautiful 21-month-old girl. She is born in America from the love of me and my wife, two Italians moved to Arizona. She spends her full days playing, learning, eating delicious authentic Italian food — though we let her try multiple cuisines and we love that she is interested in most of them.
Among all the activities, she also loves to run around wherever and whenever she can. We quit going to restaurants because we don’t enjoy it anymore. Having to stand up every minute to follow this little creature carelessly speeding around tables drains all the energy out of you, and leaves you tired, frustrated, and no more hungry. Thus, we decided to eat more at home, even on weekends. Because of that, our quality of life — and of eating — has considerably improved. We spend time together cooking, we try new recipes, we don’t eat in a rush.
In life, and more so in a family, communications is key. While our daughter doesn’t fully speak yet, she is being exposed to Italian, English, and Spanish. We understand from our pediatrician that she will probably experience speech delay, but that by the age of three she would be multilingual. As young professionals who live abroad and juggle multiple languages on a daily basis, we think that being multilingual is a gift that we must pass on to our daughter. Speaking multiple languages helps being more culturally open and encourages you to go out of your comfort zone. It’s also a challenge. We strive not to accidentally mix languages when we speak. I couldn’t imagine being exposed to three languages at a stage when I could barely speak one. It’s heartwarming to witness what a toddler’s brain is capable of doing.
A few months ago I was forced to spend some time home due to a layoff, and I took advantage of the unplanned to be a full-time dad for a bit. It’s been a short but tough period of my life, during which I lost confidence and did not know how to get back on track again. It was then that I realized that, even though my sleep wasn’t as good as before and I didn’t have any downtime in my life, my daughter and my wife were the force who lift me up and brought me back on track. During those two months, I took care of my daughter from the moment she was waking up until it was time to go to bed, and in the between I fed her, bath her, and played with her the entire day. Day after day. I was feeling awfully exhausted, but unexpectedly happy and fulfilled.
During this time, I reminded myself of what was like to to think like a child, with no prejudice, without rushing things through, only moved by sheer curiosity and thirst for learning. I completely changed my perspective on how I approach life as a whole. Since then, I regained my confidence and began an amazingly creative period of my life. I started my own public relations business and obtained a new full-time job, which I truly enjoy. Parenthood gave me the wisdom and the lightness to only care for what really matters. And when the day is about to end, and I am rocking my toddler to sleep, I now feel light, happy, and peaceful, and I thank that little person for so candidly sharing with me the secret to happiness.
