I don’t have a babysitter right now.  Her mother unexpectedly past so she left for Asia on Friday for a month or two (or three).  I don’t have a geographically-convenient, sexy, Korean wife right now either.  She just departed on a business trip for a week.

So without a sexy, Korean wife/mom and babysitter to help share in the daily, care schedule of my 2 baby girls, I find myself a bit short-handed at this very moment.  Where is Jeremy Lin when you need him?  C’mon #17, I needs yo help!

it's peaceful and serene. until the baby wakes...

Being home, alone with 2 baby girls is not easy (at least not for me).  It’s not a child to parent ratio that I prefer.  It’s exhausting at best and a very lonely space to be in.  This happens to me from time to time – my parental support system going down unexpectedly.  The work/social/daddy world that I so delicately constructed instantly explodes and I have to become 110% Daddy Fan 24/7 until reinforcements arrive.  My personal and professional life must be lived, at best, in between naps.

I don’t officially qualify as a full-time SAHP (Stay At Home Parent).  And honestly, the mere thought of being one scares me silly.  It requires a level of love, patience, and maternal skill exclusive only to the Jedi Knight set.  Compared to them, I am but a Padawan Learner with a short and dimly-lit saber (though it is growing and getting bigger with time).  But hey, at least I can say I try really, really hard.

some day I will master this Parental Force. some day...

I’m not a SAHP but I play one on TV.  So it’s safe to say that on days like today, when I am forced off the bench and straight into full-time SAHP-ville, I’m a bit out of my element.  I’m used to parenting as a team – in coordination with the soft and sensual hands of my sexy Korean wife and the dry and aged meathooks of my babysitter (I will get her a jar of Aquaphor asap).  But today I do not have a team.  Today, I am Daddy Fan Solo and tasked with maintaining the happiness, health, and clean booty regions of my 2 baby girls.

Help me, please.
Help me, help you.
Help me, help you.
Help me, help you, wipe the poo.

this is how i feel on the inside right now. just more yellow

I’ve been up since 5:30 am.  My one year old likes to beat the rooster to the crow.  I probably won’t be baby-free until about 9:30 tonight when they’re both asleep (hopefully).  And by that time, I’ll be blown.  The only thing I’ll be good for is maybe a few games of Angry Birds and an episode of The Walking Dead.  After that, I will attempt to sleep, knowing full well that each child will wake up at least twice throughout the night, requiring me to wake up with them too.  Next thing I know, 5:30 will be back around…again.

This sucks.

But it also rocks.  As much as I find this particular parenting scenario unappealing and a pain in the butt, I also love it too.  It’s a strange lesson in extremes – a parental double edged sword if you will.  On the one hand, not having mommy around makes parenting 2 baby girls challenging and painful.  But on the other hand, not having mommy around makes it ok for my 2 baby girls to grant me their deepest and most potent love-affections usually reserved for their maternal #1 (ie. not me).  I always thought my girls loved me with all their might.  But I was wrong.  The first time I was simultaneously short a mom and babysitter was a HUGE eye-opener for me.  I realized that my 2 baby girls had been holding back.  I realized that I had been raising a pair of love hypocrites.

call me hypocrite again and I'll pop you, pop...

In a nutshell, when mama is around, papa gets second class love.  If mama is around, papa gets fewer kisses, weak-sauce hugs, and a general level of affections one or two standard deviations below what mama regularly gets.  A big surprise indeed.  I didn’t understand the truest depths and potency of baby love until I was forced deep into my parental discomfort zone.  With great pain came a great revelation.

I think I have a general idea of why my kids hug me longer, kiss me more, and just plain love me like their mother when mama is away.  I’m told it’s a scientific mishmash of psychology, sense of abandonment, biology, innate survival, maternal pecking order, womb politics, etc.  But I’m not going to try and dissect it.  I’m just gonna take what I can get, when I can get it.  And perhaps with time and a few more extended, solo parenting moments, I will somehow be able to maneuver myself into the #1, mama-love position (I’d be happy with a tie) and somehow de-hypocrite my lovely little love-hypocrites that I call my own.

Daddy Fan out.  Or, more accurately, passing out…

wake me when my kids are 21 por favor...