________  ________  ________
   2024-11-19                                   /        \/        \/    /   \
                                               /       __/         /_       _/
   I wish I had some sage  advice for agk on  /        _/         /         /
the  struggles  of being a parent[1] and the  \_______/_\___/____/\___/____/_
"fun fatigue" that comes with it but sadly I    /        \/        \/    /   \
don't,  so  this  is  more  an  exercise  in   /        _/         /_       _/
solidarity to let her know she's not alone.   /-        /        _/         /
                                              \________/\________/\___/____/
   TDK is  three and a half and sounds a lot
like agk's daughter in that she's  impossibly  needy and high-touch.  she's an
only  child  and she's had a lot of  upheaval  in her life so  she likes daddy
close  and has  trouble  entertaining  herself  and  hates  being  idle,  it's
exhausting in ways I was completely unprepared for.

   play is  constant,  everything  is a game or a goof but I don't play games,
I'm the kind of  person  who likes to create and write, or to study and learn,
and without those things in my life I have no way to recharge my batteries and
life becomes an  dreary routine of  participating  in a second childhood until
exhaustion and then collapsing until the next round.

   I don't resent my  daughter,  not for a second,  and I treasure the time we
spend  together but it is  HARD  and  thankless  and almost entirely out of my
comfort zone and that takes it's toll.

   what keeps me  going  is the  knowledge that I'm doing my best to steer her
away from a sedentary "iPad kid" life,  I'm making a  conscious effort to show
her that you  don't  need  permission  or  prompting  to be  creative  and I'm
demonstrating  that life isn't about  consuming and owning, it's about sharing
and celebrating.

   this age is a  marathon  but there's going to be a  time  soon  where  your
daughter and mine are going to blossom and the  emotional  exhaustion  we feel
now will be barely a memory.


[1] gopher://sdf.org/0/users/agk/2024-11-14-bored.txt



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