This isn’t a poor me blog – far from it.  I have made choices that were right for my children and for us, and given my time again, I would make the same decisions (more or less, anyway). It’s a blog to explain how it is for us, and how it might be for you too.

It occurred to me a few weeks ago, that I hadn’t had any time in the house, on my own, since our eldest was born almost 22 years ago. In that time I have been with at least one of the them, but never on my own until the beginning of March; 21.5 years with someone in the house with me.  In addition, we have been married for 23 years this year and our last night away, just the two of us, without the kids was 15 years ago, the year before our youngest was born.  I’ve been away without any of them once to a conference for work.  My OH has been away lots & lots but most of that (over 99%) has been for work too.  That’s because we can’t both be away – or at least, I can’t be away.  If I went away when they were younger I would come home to meltdowns and stress (on that one occasion I came back to anger and disappointment from our eldest, who didn’t talk to me for 2 days), so I chose not to go away.

Me being unable to stay away on my own, or being unable to stay somewhere strange with our youngest meant I was unable to go to girls’ nights, and it seems that after you turn something down a few times, people forget to invite you, so you sit at home watching social media posts of people having fun.  I wasn’t jealous at all, I didn’t even feel bothered about not going. I was very bothered, however, about not being invited anymore.  Being a parent of children with additional needs had made me become invisible.

A month ago, our youngest went on a rugby tour, and our oldest and my husband went as coaches.  He managed two nights away from home without a major meltdown, and I managed two nights at home without them (with lots of marking, old episodes of Greys Anatomy and strong coffee). However, my husband was on meltdown watch, and he agrees that it can feel isolating.  They had lots of fun, had the run of the bunk house when everyone was off watching a rugby match, but in the evenings, they spent time just the two of them as being in a crowd was a bit too much, and they weren’t with everyone else, and they were conscious that they weren’t with everyone else.

We don’t go out very much because it’s just easier to have a takeaway and a glass of wine at home.  We don’t book nights away because it’s easier not to have to manage melt downs or spend out time making sure we have phone signal.

It’s not all about our youngest either – we have missed 40th birthday parties, come back early from nights out and cancelled meeting ups because life got in the way of plans. This is what happens when you parent skware pegs – you lead a skware peg life.

The positive, flip side is that this works for us.  We haven’t missed, because we have done other things instead.  We are a happy, close family unit, and our sometimes isolated life works, because we all want it to work.  We don’t need pity, or advice, or suggestions of how to do things differently, because this works.  What we do need is a little bit of understanding, and I am sure there are plenty of parents out there who need the same.  If we keep turning down your offers of nights out, keep asking us.  We need to be invited, even if we can’t say yes.  If you’re planning a really big night out, remember us, and invite us.  It’s not just our children who can feel left out (see here), we can too.   And if you know another family who parent Skware Pegs – invite them too!