Sleep

If you know much about me, you know that I have always had a problem with sleep. Not that I don’t like sleep. I love sleep. I just have never been able to get enough. In fact if you look at the times that I’ve been posting blogs lately, you might think that I’ve timed them to go out in the middle of the night. Unfortunately that is no the case. Every one of these blogs has been posted right after writing it.

I truly think that something is wrong with my inner clock. It seems like it’s on a different cycle then everyone else’s. I’ll be fine for a while. Than all of a sudden I won’t be able to sleep for a night. Which leads to some interesting times while taking care of the kids. But then I have to go to bed early that night. And it leads to my days and nights being switched.

Before we had kids I actually thought some of this would help me. Most of my life, I’ve been able to function on very little sleep. In college most of my papers were written in the middle of the night. It’s always been when I do my best thinking. For some reason, my mind thinks a whole lot clearer with little sleep. Maybe that’s another reason these blogs are written in the middle of the night.

But, as it turns out, kids take so much more energy to raise then sitting through a class, or stumbling through another day at work. Max is up and ready to take on the world most days at 6 AM. Before kids, the only time I saw 6 AM was on the end of an all-nighter.

Part of the problem might be that I’m a night person, and in order to be up and moving at 6, I have to go to bed way before my body would normally want to. Plus, after the kids go to bed is the only time I actually get to hang out with just Jennifer. So, it’s not like I just want to rush to sleep as soon as the kids are down. But most nights I’m not too far behind them.

Then it seems like a night will come along, and my body will rebel against this trend and keep me up. Even if I’m in bed. Than the whole cycle gets screwed up, and I’m just trying to tread water to keep up with my kids all day.

Another part of the problem is that I’m getting older and cannot go as long without sleep as I used to. My body knows this and will eventually give out. But my mind hasn’t fully wrapped itself around this idea yet. So, I go into a night like I’ve had the last few nights, where I’ve slept for a good portion of the day, and think I’ll just stay up and then all day tomorrow and I’ll be fine. I might have to go to bed a little early, but nothing major. Then morning rolls around and Jennifer and the kids are wanting to do something, and I’m a zombie sitting in the chair. So, I will eventually head to bed and then I’m up all night again.

Yeah, not a very good way to live. But until my body and my mind both realize that I’m not in my twenties anymore and need to sleep when normal people sleep, I guess this is how it will have to be.

Forming a new habit

I think I’ve mentioned before how when I became a stay at home dad, I thought I’d have a ton of time to write and explore this part of my life more. But that really didn’t work out so well. I’m really not sure where all the time goes. But there is never very much left for me, let alone the energy to really think things trough enough to write about them.

So, I would myself leaving this dream behind for a while. Every once in a while I would try to start something up. But I would always run out of steam after a little bit. Partially because I would run out of ideas and just let it go for a day or two. Then I’d get out of the habit and stop all together.

That’s one of the things I’m going to try to do differently this time. I’m trying to carve a little time out at the end of my day to just write a few words and get this ball rolling. As I’m sure you will find out, it doesn’t take much to get the ball rolling for me. I can start in one place with one thought in mind and end up in a totally different place.

So, that’s what I’m really trying to do with this blog. I’m trying to just sit down to write something up everyday. Get myself into the rhythm of writing everyday. I’m still not sure exactly what I should be writing about. So, I’ll just go along with whatever comes into my head at the end of the day. Some posts may not make a ton of sense. But that’s to be expected when they are written very late at night and with little sleep.

I will try to keep putting things up every night. I’ll do my best to make them interesting. I mainly want to let people into my world. Let others see what goes on in my chaotic mind. Maybe if I have a place to put my thoughts down, I’ll be able to sort through them myself.

Oh, and if you have any topics that you’d like to hear my thoughts on, or things that you’d like to know about me, let me know in the comments and I’ll do my best to write about them.

Thanks for reading this. It means a lot. I would love your feedback on what you think of my writing. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Reckless and accident prone

Tonight, my wife, mom and I, were talking about memories of being a kid. Everything I remembered about my child were these big reckless abandon moments. I was a carefree kid who would run head first into almost any situation with a smile on my face. The problem was, that I was also somewhat accident prone. So these memories also centered around injuries that I had sustained. Like the time I slide my bike under a parked dump truck on my knee. Fun times. My mom even said there were many times that she wasn’t sure I’d make it through childhood alive. Let alone with no broken bones at all. But I did.

This brings up several thoughts for me. First off, I’m scared for Max. He’s already showing a reckless side. Plus he’s inherited a double dose of the accident prone part. This will make his childhood very interesting and eventful, I’m sure.

But, it also brings up feelings of the things I’ve lost. Somewhere along the way I lost that reckless part. Worse than that, I replaced it with an extreme fear of doing almost anything remotely dangerous. I’m not even sure when along the way I lost this part. But at some point I stopped putting myself out there. I stopped making friends. I stopped trying new things. I moved into my little box and stayed there. I almost didn’t go out on the first date with my wife, because I was so scared.

It makes me wonder how many things I’ve missed in my life because I’ve been too scared to step out and try. I’m not saying that I want to go back to that total reckless abandon. But I really do wish I hadn’t lost that crazy streak. I think life would be a lot more fun if I were willing to try new things and step outside my little comfortable box once in a while. I might fall down sometimes. But I would at least be moving and hopefully in a forward direction.

Dreams, and what's become of them

So I think I’ve decided to try to write a little on here every night. Can’t promise it will happen. But I’m going to try. It may not always be coherent either, but that’s because I might be doing it in the middle of the night while everyone else is asleep. I’m also going to be trying to keep these fairly short. I read a lot of blogs and there are a few that just seem to get too long sometimes and I just don’t feel like reading all of that. So, I’m going to try not to put you through that either.

But what am I going to write about? I’m still not entirely sure. I know that I’d like to talk about my life as a stay at home dad, but I’d also like to talk about some other things.

Tonight I think I’m going to talk about the dreams that I’ve always had for my life and where some of them have gone off track.

I can honestly say that I never thought I would be where I am today. To be honest, I didn’t even think about the future very much until I met my wife in college. I never really wanted to be a dad. I truly didn’t even know if I wanted to make it to my 30th birthday. But that all changed when I met my wife. I could see myself growing old with her. I could see myself getting married and having kids. I now looked forward to the future and what it might hold.

But there is one thing that I think I forgot along the way. Finding a career path. I’ve never really known what I wanted to do with my life. And so as I’ve grown a little older and made it into my thirties, I find myself kind of floundering. Not sure what I want to do, or what I should do.

I was working part-time at Borders when we had our first kid. There was no way that with my ever lower hours there, that I would be able to even come close to paying for day care. So, we decided that it would be best for me to stay home. I can honestly say that this was probably the second best choice that I’ve made in my life. The first being to ask Jennifer to marry me.

But at the same time, I went into it very naive and blind. I’ve always had a passion for writing and playing music. So, I thought I would have all of this free time at home watching my son, that I would just be able to write music and stories. Start a blog or two. I would eventually start making a living doing this and be able to contribute to my family finances in some way.

But, as you’ll know if you’ve ever tried to get something done with a kid around, that was next to impossible.

Well, I think it’s time for me to head to bed. Need to get some sleep. I’m sure I’ll come back to this topic at some point in the future. But that’s all I have for tonight.

Thanks for reading.

New Start To Blog

Well, I guess it’s time to get this thing started. I’m not sure how to really do that, but I’ll try and get through it. If you don’t know who I am, my name is Geoff. I’m married to my amazing wife Jennifer and am the father of two beautiful little kids, Max(3) and Chloe(7 months). I’m a stay at home dad, which means I have the most demanding job I’ve ever had in my life with the most amazing bosses in the world. Plus what other job do you get to wrestle and have tickle fights with your boss at.

I love what I do. But as you’ll likely find out, if you keep reading that is, it’s not always easy for me to do this. I’m an extreme introvert dealing with some severe depression and thrive on having a lot of time to myself to think through things. Which is not so easy with little kids running around. That might be the reason I’m writing this at 11:30 pm.

In this blog I’m going to be trying to tell my story, both past and present. It may not always be easy, and I may not share everything. But I’m going to be trying to tell things how they happen. I’ll try and add some good times in with the bad, but I’m not sure how this will all go. I’m going to try and not make this just the place I come to vent about my life and kids. I wouldn’t want to read that and I’m sure you don’t either.

Plus I love what I do. I’ve never felt better about anything in my life. But that doesn’t mean it’s been easy. It’s been a very hard road so far, and I’m sure there will be even more bumps along the way.

I hope you’ll come back and hear more of my story as it unfolds. It would be great to have other people along for the ride. Plus you might be able to help me figure out what I’m doing.

Head Clearing/Blog Purpose

So, I’m here today cause I think I might have actually figured out what I want to do with this blog. I think I’m just going to start talking about my life. Focusing mainly on being a stay-at-home dad. I’m going to try to be as honest as I can about all the struggles and joys of this life. I don’t know why I feel the need to share any of this online. I think I just need a place to write this stuff down. But I might as well let some others in on this journey. Maybe they can help me along the way. God knows I need all the help I can get.

I guess I should get to my first real blog post then…

First off, let me say that I love being a stay-at-home dad. It’s the greatest joy in my life. I’ve had so many amazing times with my son. He is truly the reason I get up most days. And not just because he’s standing there telling me to wake up. It’s been amazing. I truly think I was put here for this reason. And I look forward to getting to spend these next few years with my son and to adding my daughter to the mix.

But that being said, this is also the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Some might say that I haven’t really done that much with my life. But it still remains the hardest thing I can imagine. M is at once the most amazing and most demanding boss I’ve ever had. And I’ve had some bad ones.

Each new stage that we’ve entered has been a new and scary challenge. And the next stage is even scarier. As we look forward to adding C to our lives, I find myself filled with even more anxiety. I wonder sometimes how this guy who doesn’t even always feel like he can take care of himself can now take care of two kids. And two kids that need everything from him. I have no idea what I’m going to do. I look forward to the changes that are to come. But I don’t think I’ve ever been this scared.

I think that’s one reason I’m writing on here. I don’t really feel like I have anyone to really talk to this stuff about. I don’t have anybody in my life that really understands what I’m going through. I know that is partially my fault. I’ve hidden myself away to the point that I don’t really have many, if any real friends. I have people that I talk to once in a long while, and I have family. But I don’t have anyone who sits down with me and really talks about how things are going. So, I guess that’s what this blog is going to be. For now anyway.

MAXTV2

Ok... I know what you're going to say. It's about time. I'm sorry for the lack of updates. Remind me not to promise things. Especially right as I'm starting a series of really good books that will give me a really fun reason to procrastinate. Once I entered the world of Percy Jackson it was hard to come back out until I was done. Then I'd forgotten about wanting to update more often. Sorry.

Things are going pretty good here. Max is getting so big. It's crazy to think that just a little while ago he was so tiny. Now his birthday is on Sunday. I decided to post a few old videos that were taken when Max was 1 week old. Then there are a couple of us at the park last month. Then one from today. I hope you all enjoy. And no promises this time, but I will try to post something soon.