Guest Blogger: The Struggle Is Real

Today on the blog I have the opportunity to have a guest blogger. The Mr. has joined the family blog and so the post today is written entirely by him. Enjoy its pretty fabulous if I do say so myself.

The Struggle Is Real

By: Wes Logan 

Let me start of by saying to my wife thank you!  Thank you for loving our children, being supportive of our new adventure, and for granting me an opportunity to make a guest post on this blog (which I would have never discovered if my mother-in-law hadn’t accidently mentioned it).  I may only get one shot at this so here goes…

I’ve titled my post “The Struggle is Real” because as any parent knows raising children is not an easy task.  Children will test your patience’s.  Children will test your marriage.  Children will make crazy demands!  At some point they will even break you, forcing you to cave on all the promises you made before having children (no videogames, television, candy, etc.).  The Mrs. and I agreed to limit our children’s sugar intake and television time.  Sounds easy, right?  Think again!  When your child wakes up at 4:30 a.m. for several consecutive days, demanding for you “to go to the playroom” tell me you wouldn’t turn on the tv to get a few extra hours of sleep.  As for sugar, forget about it.  When it comes time to potty training your children you will do anything to get that done.  So what, I have to eat at Chick-fila four times a week right now because my daughter stands up after a #2 yelling “I did it, I get Chick-fila.”  Some of you are laughing because you can relate.  Some of you may be judging but you will see the struggle is real!  Now that you have some background I’d like to spend my remaining time touching on three valuable lessons I’ve learned since becoming a parent.

It’s okay to waste food.  I’m currently learning this lesson the hard way.  Perhaps reading this will prevent some of you from falling in the same trap as me.  If you’re like me you don’t like to see things go to waste, especially food.  I’m here to tell you, drop the doughnuts!  In the last year or so I’ve found myself eating more half eaten grilled cheese, doughnuts, bags of fruit snacks or whatever else you can imagine a toddler attempting to eat.  All because I didn’t want to just toss the extras in the garbage.  And the result of all this extra consumption to no surprise is gaining weight, too much weight! Lucky for me I’m tall, so to some degree this massive weight gain has been somewhat hidden.  And like all bad habits once you start it’s hard to stop.  It’s time for me to say goodbye to the extras and hello to the treadmill.  Just writing the word treadmill makes me tired.

Don’t be quick to judge.  When you don’t have children it’s easy to be judgmental towards those who do.  However, as the saying goes you don’t know what life is like for someone until you live a day in their shoes.  Prior to life with children I may have found myself questioning why a child was still in their pj's in the afternoon.  Now when I see a child at the grocery store dressed as Disney princess or still in their pj’s it just makes me smile. Some battles just aren't worth fighting. In my opinion, this is one of the greatest lessons I’ve been taught through my children.  I’ve made a conscious effort to apply this principle in my life and have found my relationships with people to be more meaningful.  And the final lesson is…          

The reward is greater than the struggle.  When titling this blog I left off some very important letters.  It should have read: The Struggle Is Really Worth It!  Yes, children will test us but the love you receive from your child will far outweigh any struggle that has quickly passed.  It’s the simple things like an unexpected hug or kiss or the occasional “I love you” that can warm your heart in a way that you have never experienced.  For me personally, I experienced this the other day when the daughter came up to me and said “dad you are my best friend.”  Simple words that had an unbelieve effect.  I must admit, it got even sweeter when the Mrs. asked if she was the also the dictators best friend to which she responded and is still responding to this day “no dad is my best friend.”  Parenting is certainly not a competition amongst spouses but it is fun to be on the winning side every once in a while!