It's scary being a parent

Warning: This is a PWP (Post Without Pictures). It won't happen often, but it's a necessary evil. Sorry.

I mean, it's flat out terrifying.

Not only am I now 120% responsible for an actual human life (for those of you who understand my form of fuzzy math, MacGyver is also 120% responsible for the same human life), but there is also no set protocol for how to do it right.

How can that be???

From the minute I peed on that stick in a public bathroom stall, I was in a constant state of "research." From magazines to books to the internet to TV to books again, I was filling myself with as much information as I could absorb, much to MacGyver's dismay. I would wake him up in the middle of the night to ask his opinion on circumcision, on vaccinating, on discipline, on introducing peanut butter. The responses I received varied based on how quickly he thought he could get back to sleep.

Everywhere we turned, we were faced with controversy and contradiction. Every statistic was met with an equal and opposite statistic. Every sound medical study was discredited with an equally sound other medical study. Each personal experience was outweighed by a completely different personal experience.

So as if the hormones and the weight gain and the inability to go twenty minutes without running to the bathroom wasn't enough, we had to figure out this tangled mess of "how to raise a baby" information.

And it didn't get easier.

Once Turtle arrived, early and without much warning, when we were sleepwalking through those first weeks, trying to sift through the postpartum emotions, the pain of not having our baby home with us, the fear of the unknown, well, that's when it hit. This was go-time. We were parents. More importantly, we were parents to our child. And quite frankly, the best people to decide what to do with our child were us.

The books went out the window. (Ok, not literally. But you know what I mean.)

We don't follow a particular "Parenting Method." I hate labels and I prefer to think of us as "Attentive to our Child." We make decisions about his care and well-being based on his needs, his wants and his personality. We can't follow a specific book or a set protocol, because, quite frankly, they just don't apply to us. So we crafted our own way, cobbling together bits and pieces of concepts, stitching them up with common sense and emotion, until we found a path that works. For us.

We're flexible, constantly shifting with the ebbs and flows of a growing child. We don't say "We won't" or "We never" because we don't know what each new day will bring. We have our standards and our ideals, and we strive to achieve those, but we are human and sometimes we stumble. However, we pick ourselves up and try again.

There are some points I'm trying to make here, in my roundabout way.

#1. We love our son. I can't even describe in words the bliss he gives us. Everything we do is for him and with him in mind. We want to be wonderful parents, and we hope Turtle looks back and thinks we are. I hope that every day, the choices and decisions we make regarding his care are the "right" ones, and that when he is an adult, he won't come to us and tell us that we were awful parents who failed him. The very idea is devastating to me.

#2. It's very easy to get wrapped up in judgement. I judge. You judge. We all do it. But know this. I don't care what you use to wipe your child's butt, so long as that butt is kept clean. I don't care what and when you feed your child, so long as your child's hunger is sated. I don't care where your child sleeps, as long as your child is well-rested and secure. I DO care if you are unkind or cruel to your child; if you neglect or abuse your child; if your child is an afterthought in your world; and most importantly, if you give up on your child. Those are the things that destroy a young soul, and those are the things loving parents should want to avoid.

#3. It's very easy to tear down in this world. As parents, we are all in similar boats. Sure, we may behave differently and react differently, but for the most part, our end goal is the same: to love and raise our children. Why can't we support each other on that? Why must we point fingers and criticize? Why can't we offer each other a helping hand and build each other up so that we can collectively succeed?

Just something to think about. It's scary enough to be a mom or a dad these days, without all the added nonsense. We're not all going to make the SAME choices for our children, but most of us are all trying to make the RIGHT choices. How can that be wrong?