This is a cranky whine by Cranky. Please ignore if you’re not into whining.
You’re not reading anymore, right? Ok good.
The Twig and the Bed
Yesterday, husband and I decided to get Twig a real bed. While she’s not crawling out of her crib, she’s been ejecting Mouse… and blanket, pillow, and anything else not nailed down.
And then whining for us to get them.
Aha, we think. We will get her a bed, and then she will be FOILED in her attempt for attention since she will be able to retrieve said items herself.
So we headed out to IKEA to get the Twig a bed. FYI: People who spank their kids in the middle of IKEA set a bad tone for the rest of my day.
The bed plan didn’t really work out as intended. She didn’t want to sleep in the crib anymore. The bed was too cool. But she didn’t want to sleep in the bed either. She wanted to sit there and giggle.
Fine, whatever.
And We Have Raid Responsibilities
Husband and I had signed up for raids as a courtesy (we weren’t on the ID earlier in the week, so we were offering to sub for anyone who couldn’t make it to night #2 of the raid). I told the raid leaders that we were having baby issues, and they could have one, but not both, of us. Husband was picked for his leet DPS, and I was on baby duty, alternating between spending stretches with the baby, trying to settle her down, and then hanging on an alt leaving her alone to get to sleep.
But, of course, this was the night that everything went to hell. One of the raid leaders was having troubles with his ventrillo, and as soon as that got resolved, one of our guildies suddenly dropped group. And we were already short people and barely making 2 groups happen. If I ever wanted to nuke a guildie from orbit, it was last night, because the timing just sucked. I was BUSY dammit. BUSY BUSY BUSY.
I joined the group because they were seriously out of options, and Twig was finally quiet. Just after we pulled, she starts raising holy hell, and at this point she was overtired and unreasonable and just needed to sleep already for her own good… so I put her back in ye olde crib, where she couldn’t get into any trouble. I knew she’d fall asleep there, as she had every night for the last 2 years, even despite the strenuous (thankfully brief) protests.
In Conclusion
Ah the parent’s dilemma. On the one hand, the kid comes first, always. On the other hand, once the kid is asleep (or ostensibly so) you need a little you-time or you’re gonna go crazy… and you can’t let people down once you commit to something, unless it’s urgent.
My husband and I deal with this too, though we don't raid — the "you can only have one of us, not both" thing. And then there's the getting the Sapling to sleep so I can get up and play, thing. And the "will she stay asleep long enough that I can run a heroic with my friends" thing (which has gotten better, lately). Our little one has never slept in a crib, unfortunately (for us). She went from bassinet to our bed, and though she's had a bed of her own for most of the last year, she's only slept in it once. She also considers it more of a thing for playing in than for sleeping in.
Yeah, we don't have kids ourselves… but our tank healer, off-tank/raid leader, raid healer, and three of our core DPS do. Baby/kid aggro is a perennial problem, but it's one we all understand; at this point we groan a little bit when one of the kiddos decides to be obstinate about bedtime, but shrug and take it as an official afk for drink refills, pit stops, smoke breaks, and the like.
You can always tell the non-parents from the parents when Ossifer Bear and Holy Terror's six-year-old decides to come up and say hi through the open miike… silence versus "HI PUMPKIN!"
I gotta tell you Cranky… I love reading your baby vs raider posts.
When I'm a mom, I hope I'm half as awesome as you are.
Aww thanks! Though when I'm writing these posts, I'm always thinking "nobody wants to read this shit"… but I write it anyway because it's MY blog
For the first few months after our baby was born, I didn't raid at all. Then it got to the stage where I could heal successfully with him on my lap either feeding or with a toy, and got pretty good at playing one-handed. We were pretty worried his first words would be *For the Horde*.
When he got a bit older, it sometimes got to the stage where I would have to leave a raid early, because he needed my attention. I am fortunate to be in a guild where real life _always_ comes first, that a replacement can usually be found quickly (yes we have people who don't mind getting themselves locked for 1 boss), and people are generally understanding.
Now our son is 2, and my husband and I both play in the same raid group, and there are times when one or both of us have to disappear with him for a bit. The raid group just takes the opportunity for an extra icecream/cocktail break.
I guess we are very lucky – I am not sure I would commit to raiding in a different environment.
I just got my wife to agree to play wow. She is a level 5 BE hunter. We had baby aggro the first night we tried to play together so I took care of him and let her quest on her own. I think she could be a great wow player she just has to find the fun in it. Low level quest aren't quite fun and that may be why wow doestn hod but 30% of new players.
Any suggestions on how to make wow more fun for her. I have tried to stop being less coachy about helping her and let her kinda wing it. Bossy people dont make games fun.
She needs to stick out hunter until level 10. I just started a hunter myself and whoa… levels 1-9 just suck. Like evilly suck. I promise that it is a LOT more fun at 10 when you get a pet and can just sic your pet on things. And remember, they nerfed the crap out of mounts and stuff (so to speak) and hunters get fast-run at 16. A pet + going faster makes things not suck.