This Parenting Approach Preserves Your Sanity (and Your Marriage)

Parenting is a lot of work.

I get it. You are overwhelmed with the constant attention needed throughout the process. You’re in an 18-year contract that you didn’t even glance over before you “signed on the dotted line”.

There’s more to it than that, of course (don’t come after me for the joke, it’s JUST a joke).

When they’re infants, they require round-the-clock care. The only thing they do is cry, sleep, burp, and poop (usually in that order, but sometimes they switch it up for their amusement).

Toddler stage means they start exploring, and you are terrified at where they could end up. The baby-proofing process begins, and every corner is covered, sanded down, or otherwise obliterated, never to see the light of day again for at least the foreseeable future.

When they reach elementary school, that’s when the chauffeur stage begins. You are at the point where you can communicate to them, but you’re busy shuttling them from place-to-place, desperately trying to keep up with their growing list of activities ranging from schoolwork to homework to extracurriculars so that you can have some breathing room in your head. At this point, your life is all but repurposed exclusively for them.

And this is where I’m at. Yet I’m relatively unscathed.

Why?

Because of the anti-lock brake method.

Let me explain.

Marriage is a two-way street

Anti-lock brakes are designed to alternately apply braking to one wheel, then the other in order to prevent skidding from occurring.

If you’ve ever had a car lock up on you, then you know just how frightening it can be to have no control over it as you try to avoid a collision.

The anti-lock brake method is one that actually works to the advantage of both parents because it means that both can fully step away for extended periods of time without worry or guilt.

At every point of my children’s lives, both my wife and I have managed to give each other days off from the daily grind of school, general house maintenance, cooking, cleaning, and all manner of extra challenges that arise with this method. The key is to know or at least be familiar with how to handle the entire vertical stack on your own.

It’s not just theory.

How I apply it

Single parents do it all the time, and with marriage and birth rates declining in America, it’s something that will certainly give the whole a much better fighting chance than the standard seething resentment that builds up when both people feel taken advantage of, ignored, and neglected.

Know when to offer your partner a break. Even if it’s for an hour or two. Having the confidence to fully take the load from them is an empowering feeling that not only preserves the sanity of both, but it strengthens the marriage because it becomes an equal playing field. Each gets to unplug for longer stretches of rest and recovery.

This is possible at each stage.

The infant stage had me fully committing to completely doing the night shift of periodic feeding, burping, and changing diapers while my wife slept through the night.

During the toddler stage, we’d take turns running around after them and cleaning, cooking, and sleeping. Taking them to daycare and picking them up was also included when needed.

At the elementary school stage, we can both fully commit to taking care of the kids if one of us needs to step away and tend to curve balls such as a death in the family or if we simply want to spend more time with friends or a night out.

Before you judge, consider the benefits

Call me what you want, but I believe that you can’t be an effective parent unless you know every aspect of childcare and can handle the kids on your own for at least a day or two.

If you don’t want your sanity, or your marriage, to crash into life’s unexpected challenges, consider mastering all aspects of daily life rather than assuming that it’s the “man’s job” or the “woman’s role” or that there’s really any sort of social hierarchy that is required behind closed doors.

Relationships are built on trust. What better way to demonstrate you deserve it with competency across every aspect?

Would you consider an “anti-lock brake” parenting strategy?