I’m a Way Bigger Worrier Now That I Have Kids

I can’t remember the last time I slept through the night. A night where I didn’t wake up to check that the baby was breathing, or stay up late trying to solve all the parenting problems we have had lately. I spend the day exhausted, ready for the moment I’ll be able to hop in my bed and doze off for the night. But, it doesn’t happen like that.

I hop in bed, ready for my body to fall to sleep, but my mind wakes up. I think about all the parenting decisions I made that day. What did I do right, what did I do wrong? I think about how on earth we are going to survive another week like the last. The calls from the school — endless. The emails never stop. Me constantly refreshing my boys’ school reward system — hoping for a glimpse they’ve had a good day.

I never thought I’d be here. I never grew up having any problems in school, or out of the normal behavior problems. I always assumed my kids would be just like me. That they would be half me, and raised similar to how I was so we would be similar people.

But life threw me a curveball and that didn’t happen.

I’m raising kids that I did not make. Ones that don’t share my DNA. Ones that are growing up so differently than I did. And it’s hard. I don’t know what it’s like to struggle in school. I don’t know how to correct behaviors that I have never had. I don’t know what discipline works, and what doesn’t.

Honestly, I am just guessing. We try things, they don’t work. We try something else, that doesn’t work. And so here I sit, at midnight, wondering what on earth else I can try. And how do I get anything to work when my kids have two different households, each with their own beliefs and parenting.

All I know is that parenting is hard. Parenting when you have a blended family, even harder.

I just hope we find answers soon.