I'm not a big blog fan, but lately I need to vent, and I guess I need to feel like someone is listening. I'm 30 years old, married, one kid (boy, age 7). I'm a veterinarian, just out of school. I have 2 cats, a dog, and a bearded dragon. And I feel like I'm drowning.
Today my husband and I had a fight. It was stupid; I'd asked him to get up (at 9 am) to take care of the pets and the child so that I could sleep a little. I'd been up until 3 working on the boy's Halloween costume (he wants to be Nightcrawler; you can't find one of those online); the Husband had been up until 3 playing Minecraft. When I got up at 11, one cat (the loud one) had been fed. The dog had neither been fed nor walked, the outside cat had not been fed, and the child had gotten his own poptarts. Husband was asleep on the couch. I was annoyed, but not surprised. I walked and fed the dog, got the child to feed the outside cat, and started lunch for the boys. The husband came into the kitchen, pulled a pack of brats out of the fridge and said I should use them. I sighed and said, sure I guess I can do that. The husband stormed out of the room, claiming I was always mad at him for no reason. I told him he knew perfectly well why I was a bit upset (I had not raised my voice at any point) and that if he wanted to pretend that I was being irrational, that was fine but I wasn't going to start a flame war over something this dumb. I told him that I understood that I did most of the chores on the weekend, because he has to take care of the child for the most part during the week due to my job. He said that if I wanted more things to get done I needed to be home more.
I work 42-60 hours a week, depending on how much emergency calls I have. I hate emergency; I hate that I am away from home as much as I am. No one likes living most of their life at work, certainly not me. I hate that I miss so much of my son's life. But it's the only (and I do mean ONLY) veterinary job within an hour's drive of my house, and when I graduated, my husband insisted he didn't want to relocate. I'm horribly underpaid and overworked at work. I'm still trying to figure out the "being a doctor" thing, and I'm often frustrated by how little I feel like school helped with that. I don't leave any later than anyone else I work with.
After our fight, I came downstairs, put my hands on the sink, and thought about divorce. For the most part, we get along really well. We like a lot of the same music, we share similar views on politics and religion, and can discuss our differences intelligently. We both love our son. But if he could live in a one-bedroom apartment with a bed and a desk and a TV, he would, and he doesn't want anything to do with my four-footed life. I don't know how to reconcile this. I literally cannot "be home more" without getting another job, and there isn't one here. I could spend ALL my time at home being a Mom and a Wife, but then what happens to me? I already have no topics of conversation that do not involve Mom/Wife/Vet, and all of my hobbies that I used to love are dying. I used to read a book a week at least; now I read one a month maybe. I used to sew and cross-stitch, now I feel like I can't pick up a project in the hour or two each day I have because I'll either barely get into it before I have to go to bed or be called in, or it will keep me up so late I'll be exhausted the next day and mess up at work. About the only thing I do any more is play half an hour of Civilization at night; I never finish a game.
It's been two hours since we fought. I'm going to take my son and the dog to the park for a while now. I wish this post wasn't so depressing; my life isn't always like this and I'll write something more positive soon. I just needed to vent, and pretend someone gives a damn.
PS- Told husband not to pull that card. Husband agreed it was a cheap shot. Still ended up doing chores all day while he did work-work, and played more Minecraft. Yup yup.
