Parenting or something like it.

I remember vividly the moment my daughter was pressed, pink and tiny, into my arms. The nurses walked away and I remember watching them leave, feeling both love and terror at the same time. Parents always joke with new soon-to-be moms about there not being a manual, but I'm not sure how seriously those pregnant woman really take those words of advice.

Parenting does not come with a manual.

There is no test required to become a parent, no list of things you have to check off before being allowed to conceive. You can be young, old, stupid, a genius... anyone with a sperm and an egg to rub together can procreate.

If you ask me, that's a goddamn shame. But nobody really asked me.

I sit here, 10 years after that shining life change, still wondering what the fuck I'm doing. I'm working two jobs, roller derby, my girlfriend... and I worry that my daughter is the one suffering. How much time is one supposed to spend with their child? In what ways?

On an average day, I see my daughter from the time I get off work at 4:45p to the time she goes to bed at 9p - 9:30p. Then there are derby days, Mondays and Wednesdays, when I'm gone for another 2 hours. And the weekends she's with her dad. All in all, I see my flesh and blood 10 hours a week.

It makes me feel like a failure. It makes me worry that we're going to turn out the same way that my mother and I turned out, barely talking and going weeks and sometimes months between seeing each other.

The thought makes me nauseated. But I'm not sure what else to do. I'm trying to pay off a student loan that is suffocating me. I do roller derby for my sanity, to keep myself active, but even that fills me with guilt sometimes. I often feel so alone with this parenting thing, with this fear and confusion, that I don't know what to do with myself. My partner works nights (that's a whole other blog entry) and she is amazing with my (our?) daughter but I feel like I'm thrusting too much on her as well.

I'm not sure this blog entry has any sort of point other than to vent, but tonight I feel like venting. I just wish I knew how to forgive myself.