Parenting

a step change in relationships

One of the things that my husband and I have argued lots in the recent years has been about our careers. Turns out, we’re both fairly ambitious, although that’s not a term we associate with ourselves.

I don’t know if it’s just us, our life stage, the times we live in or our generation, but it feels like we are in a perpetual state of transition in our professional lives just about to make it but never quite.

We’ve both been employed and unemployed simultaneously and alternately, pursuing one whim after another. As a consequence, we are constantly negotiating for more support and resources in life with each other.

While constantly evolving career choices has been a big theme in our marriage, we haven’t realised its impact or negotiated as much as we do these days.

So, what’s changed?

We've been together for too long, the love must have just run out and what’s left is merely transactional? Is that it?

Well, I hope not.

Upon deeper investigation, what I’ve realised is that as we grow in our respective careers, our professional lives have become more demanding. Also, every little decision we make today involves a lot more stakeholders than it did in the past.

To be precise - one more stakeholder - our child.

Being parents comes with a new set of responsibilities that you’re never quite trained to handle as an individual or as a couple. Having been at this for almost 7 years now, I’ve realised that being mum and dad is a big step change from being mere professionals or lovers or flatmates or a married couple.

Some people learn to navigate it quite gracefully (or it seems), but most people have to really work their ass off to raise a child, especially without that village everyone seems to keep talking about.

Even simple things like who gets off work early to receive the child from school or who takes the day off when the child is sick. How you navigate summer vacations, who takes the slack at work to attend school meetings - simple everyday stuff becomes a massive discussion, especially in an environment that isn’t parent-friendly.

While India is becoming more individualist as a society, the infrastructure for childcare just hasn’t kept up, or at least not yet.

While there were daycares, dime a dozen, in the UK where I could deposit my child and go to work, my child wasn’t confused about who her primary carers were, despite the fewer hours we spent together. If she was sick, taking the day off or working from home was a no-brainer. Leaving office early for daycare pick up wasn’t frowned upon.

In India, childcare is complicated, especially for two career households.

On the work front, you need to be lucky as hell to have mature leaders in your workplace. I’ve worked for organisations that dictated that you don’t block your calendars even after office hours for personal life, or been issued “notices” for leaving early, with permission, for personal emergencies.

Then again, given that a large number of organisations in India are run by single / divorced fellows or people whose children are raised by stay-at-home partners or nannies, I don’t know what hope there is from workplaces.

On the home front, typical choices would involve living with grandparents (if they’re alive, living in the same city and willing) or hiring a live in nanny (if you can afford one), who anyway needs to be trained/ supervised by you (while on mat/ pat leave) or these above said grandparents, at least until you’ve built sufficient trust.

This may allow you to not only have your careers, but also have a social life that doesn’t revolve around your child’s routine.

Even if you can afford this, it may not be a choice that everyone makes, especially if they want to be actively involved in raising their children.

What happens to relationships with two ambitious individuals who want to build thriving careers while being involved in raising their children?

You negotiate, you barter and strive with the only other person who gets exactly what you are dealing with, to make it work every single day for at least two whole decades, until you eventually become empty nesters and merely lovers.

While at it, you may have different parenting styles, disagree on big and small choices you make on behalf of your child but you might still strive to put up a united front for your child so as to not confuse/ scare the child.

But it’s all a choice you make as an individual and as a couple.

Some people acknowledge the choices and own the choices they make (at least eventually), but some people just give up and end the relationship altogether only to continue as just co-parents.

Now, this is not to say that it is better or worse than raising a child as a couple who is barely able to make it work under the same roof, it’s merely an observation.

Interestingly, some couples realise that this is a big inflection point in a relationship even before experiencing it first hand and make the choice to not even be parents.

A lot of single people I speak to tell me that they’re skeptical about having kids, and prefer not to date people who have a strong stance on the matter, especially if they’re leaning the other way.

I don’t blame them.

Parenting is a step change in a relationship, and brings out a different flavour in you as an individual and as a couple, which you may or may not ever want or learn to embrace.

As for us, I think being co-parents has brought us much closer in our relationship. We’ve argued about such banal things that I think we’ve gotten better at arguing (communicating with each other and learnt to agree to disagree), when necessary.

We’ve learnt to work better as a team and have new found appreciation for each others’ unique traits that may really have never been evident if not for our additional roles as mum and dad.

Again, it is not to say that there aren’t days when we want to run away from everyone in the house and live alone on top of a hill. But there are far fewer such days than you’d imagine.

In fact, we’ve all got our own personal spaces within the house that we’ve learnt to create for ourselves and each other, and respect it. So, net net, we’ve somewhat learnt to navigate the step change (I think?).

But who is to say, only time will tell.

Then again, whether you choose to be parents or not, there are going to be several more step changes in a relationship - when you don the role of your spouse’s carer when they’re old and 64 or when you become a keeper of their memories when they’re long gone.

So, if any of you thought that you are choosing a partner for some three predictable traits that will certainly sail you through the rest of your lives, think again.

---

What I’m reading/ watching/ listening to:

None of this was taboo: Beautiful piece of writing, finding the courage to be oneself.

Workplace bureaucracy: If anyone’s wondering why work has gotten more complicated over the years, and far less enjoyable.

Modern Love Tokyo: Just started watching this, and incidentally, the first episode is on parenting. While this one may be about breastfeeding, it applies to any stage of being a parent I think. Can’t wait to watch the rest of the show.

First they killed my father by Loung Ung: Found this book after reading how to feed a dictator, somehow communist regimes seem to offer lives stuck in a low optimum.

Shapely Gal song: Skyline by Kesh and Nevermind