My stair gate hell

My stair gate hell

Even if I do say so myself, I am practically minded and can handle the majority of DIY tasks. With stair gates, however, I met my match. I don’t have a good track record with stair gates at all. In my opinion they are a necessary evil and an absolute pain to install. 

When Helen learnt to crawl, we installed a Mothercare stair gate across the living room door frame. We used to refer to the room as baby jail as it was the one place we could keep Helen confined and safe. It wasn’t long until the handle broke rendering the stair gate useless.

A couple of months later we moved house. By now Helen was walking and fitting stair gates was at the top of my “to do” list. This is when I made an irritating mistake.

I was in Ikea buying some furniture when I saw they produced their own range of stair gates. They were a colour that matched our banisters and were cheap. “Brilliant,” I thought, “no need to waste time going to Mothercare.”

I bought two sets, took them home and busily started constructing one of them. I began to get very nervous when I realised that, in true Ikea-style, I had to build the entire gate, including the hinges. The components looked very fiddly and might as well have come from the inside of a Kinder Egg.

I eventually got one of the gates fixed to the wall. The hinges, however, kept falling apart making the gates utterly useless. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get this stair gate to open and close properly and after about two hours I had a major sense of humour failure.

At this point in time we had a builder’s skip in the driveway outside our house. Unable to take any more, I pulled the stair gate off the wall, marched out the house and hurled the gate straight into the skip. The second gate, which was still in its wrapper, was returned and exchanged for a refund.

I’ll sum the experience up in three words; cheap Ikea crap.

Having given up on Ikea, I returned to Mothercare. This time I spent considerably more money on the assumption that cheap stair gates are a false economy.

This time I bought two sets of stair gates and fitted them both – one at the top of the stairs and one at the bottom. It took a while and was a pain, but I got them in place. Unfortunately the fixings proving insubstantial and both sets of gates fell out the wall after just a few weeks.

I gave up and admitted defeat. In a humiliating and emasculating move I got Roger, our builder, to install the gates.

Having sought professional help you might imagine this story has a happy ending. Unfortunately it’s not to be. You see there’s a small gap underneath the stair gate at the top of the stairs (not Roger’s fault, there’s an obstruction he had to work around). It had crossed my mind that Helen might, at some point in the future, attempt to squeeze through it, something that, by rights, shouldn’t be easy for her to achieve at all.  

The very next morning after Roger had fitted the gates, Anna was getting Helen ready for nursery. They were both on the landing and the stair gate was firmly closed. Anna turned her back for a couple of seconds to grab some clothes. When she turned back again, Helen was stood on the opposite side of the stair gate at the very top of the stairs, a big smile on her face celebrating the fact she’d managed to slip underneath!

The stair gate had barely been in place for 12 hours and she’d already beaten it. Needless to say, I shall now have to spend some time modifying the thing so that she can’t get underneath it.

In the meantime, I have a simple message for manufactures of stair gates everywhere; make your products easy to install.

It's tense, and C3PO stole the baby monitor

There’s a certain tension in the air at home at the moment and there are a few different reasons for this. Firstly, we’ve removed the bars from the side of Helen’s cot so she’s now sleeping in her own bed.

Whereas Helen’s been very excited about getting a grown-up bed, Anna’s been in a state of high alert over the past few evenings in case Helen rolls out and on to the floor. I’m more relaxed about the situation. I think the bed is so low to the ground that Helen would have to do something spectacular to injure herself.

That said, the inevitable actually happened this morning and I had to scoop Helen up off the floor. There were a few tears but the most serious injury was to Helen’s pride and a quick cuddle seemed to put that right.

It is perhaps just as well that we’ve got both a bed guard and baby monitor on order from Mothercare. While I question whether it will do much for Helen, Anna and I will have peace of mind knowing that:

1)      It’ll be difficult for her to tumble out the bed and

2)      We’ll hear it if she does.

You might think it odd that we don’t already have a baby monitor. Well, we did have one but we lost the receiver end some time ago. It suspiciously went missing at our wedding reception shortly after my brother, who’d had a little bit to drink, was seen using it to do impressions of the Star Wars character C3PO.

Oh, yes, that was quite a night.

Another reason for the tension is that Helen had the MMR jab nine days ago. We’re on tenterhooks because we’ve been led to believe that many kids fall ill and get a temperature at day 10. Helen’s been clingy over the past few days so I’ve been wondering if something is brewing.

There are a couple of other reasons for the tense atmosphere at home but I’m not going to say anything just yet. All I’ll say is they’re positive reasons and I hope to be in a position to reveal something shortly.

Oh, just one further point. More conservative readers may have picked up on the fact that our baby monitor was in use at our wedding reception. In an act of full disclosure I confess that little Helen was born before we got married. Nobody’s perfect…

Until next time…

Some background information. . .

Having introduced this blog to the world, I suppose I had better explain why I am doing it and give a bit more information. I shall answer in a business-like question and answer format:

Q) Why are you writing this blog?

A) I think there are very few men in my position, i.e. prepared (or having) to be the primary carer for their children. I think men in this position might want to share the experience and women might find it interesting. I could, of course, be entirely wrong and this experiment with social media could fall flat on its face!

Q) What inspired you to write this blog?

A) A male work colleague has a son three months younger than Helen. We used to chat a lot about pregnancy, the birth-giving experience, parenting and the like. As Helen was the older child he was always keen to hear what was going on in our household. A couple of weeks ago he suggested that I produce a book on parenting. That struck me as a little ambitious but I liked the idea of writing something and so here we are (...although I wouldn't rule out doing a book if the opportunity arose).

 

Q) Why all the assumed names and, crucially, why have you named yourself after a Boney M song?

A) Good questions. This is possibly going to sound hypocritical but I want to protect my family’s privacy. As for naming myself after a Boney M song, it was the first available user name I could find. I'm not convinced it was a good choice but I'm stuck with it now!

Q) Where are you based?

A) Greater London, United Kingdom.

I think those are the main points to answer. Any questions then just ask. I'll be back with an updated entry soon.

I'm shitting it, but welcome to my blog

I am the married father of an eighteen month old girl. In a few weeks time life for my family, and particularly for me, will change massively.

You see I’m about to give up full time employment to become the main carer for our little girl. To protect her privacy I shall refer to her as Helen. My wife Anna, not her real name, will remain in full-time employment and will be the bread-winner for the family.

I am desperate to spend more time with the little one and look forward to it. It would be dishonest of me, however, not to admit I’m shitting it. It’s not the being at home with Helen that frightens me, it’s the uncertainty of leaving full time employment behind. The longest I've ever been out of work is six weeks, and that was only because I was recovering from surgery.

I’m worried about the loss of income and also the prejudice I might face as a man taking on a role that many would consider women’s work. It is, after all, rare to find a man that is the main carer for his kids. Some of my friends and family know of these plans. A remarkable number have been very supportive but I’ve had to tolerate a few disapproving comments.  

At some point in the future I know I am going to attend a party where I don’t know anyone. I can imagine the conversation:

“And what do you do for a living?”

“Well I used to work in PR and communications but now work part-time and look after our daughter.”

“Oh, you’re a househusband, fascinating…”

At this point I imagine the conversation coming to a swift end as other guests start nudging each other, pointing at me and whispering about this atypical situation. Okay, okay, maybe I am a bit paranoid and focusing on the negatives a bit more than is necessary but as Richard Nixon said; “just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me”.

That said, I’m not sure who they would be; disapproving mothers at the school gate perhaps or maybe disapproving male friends and relatives? Unlike Nixon, I think I can safely say that in my case it won’t be the CIA.

I sense I'm getting a bit carried away! So how have I ended up in this position? Well, it was bit like the stars coming into alignment – a number of things happened that just made this the obvious course of action.

Crucially, however, Anna and I don’t want little Helen to be in full-time nursery care any longer. She has been at nursery five days a week since the age of eight months and we both want her to spend more time with us. Both Anna and I thought it would be straightforward to have our daughter in nursery while the two of us worked. This hasn’t proved to be the case.

We find that we’re always playing catch-up with the housework and weekends are filled with domestic chores that we haven’t done during the week. Added to this, Helen's first words were said at nursery. A few months later her first steps were also taken at nursery. It made us feel uncomfortable that we weren’t present for these significant moments in her life. This, I should add, is no criticism of Helen’s nursery care. She’s always had excellent carers and that's an important point to stress.

It also came as something of a surprise when we recently discovered that little Helen was one of only two children of her age at nursery five days a week. While it always made me feel a little uncomfortable having her in full-time childcare, I refuse to feel guilty about it. As first time parents I think we were a bit naive about how difficult it would be to put Helen in nursery five days a week. We’ve learnt our lesson, and we’re now taking action to put it right.

A major influence on our decision has also been the economic realities of life in the 21^st century, i.e. modern woman's ability to earn more than modern man. Although I have what many would deem a professional job, my wife can command a higher salary because she has a specialised occupation.

In addition to this, I had for some time been thinking about leaving my job and seeking new opportunities elsewhere. There had been a restructure at my employer and the culture changed massively. My role became considerably more demanding and equally less enjoyable. Having childcare commitments didn't make life any easier and becoming a father changed my priorities. It is, after all, difficult to bring work home at the weekends when granny and grandad are visiting. 

I lived for the weekend when I could spend time with the family but dreaded Sundays. I spent much of the day watching the clock, counting down the hours until I had to return to the office. It was desperately depressing and I became very moody. Anna made it clear she found this upsetting and this made me feel awful.

One fateful day a couple of months ago things came to a head. I'd had a dreadful day at work and returned home miserable. I discussed all the options with Anna and we felt the best course of action was to throw caution to the wind and for me to resign. Either something would come up during my notice period or I would do office temp work for a while.

A little time has now passed and a clearer plan has formed. I plan to work part-time, possibly freelance, and have Helen with me two days a week. In addition to this, I’ll take care of more of the domestic drudgery that needs to be done, and this, we hope, will reduce the amount of time spent on household chores in the evenings and weekends and enable us to spend more time together as a family. As a side-effect, this will enable Anna to concentrate on her career.

I’m presently working through my notice period and applying for jobs. I’m pleased to say I am getting interviews but I suspect I may end up working for temp agencies until something turns up. In the short term, I don’t care.

So that’s an introduction to my story. In the weeks and months to come I shall update this blog as plans take shape and I become a stay-at-home father. In the meantime I look forward to reading your comments!