Life before kids: Weekly Challenge
Life before kids, oh my what is that? I am only 5.5 years into being a dad and I still find it an unreal experience and as much as I miss my old life I wouldn't replace my current one. It is amazing how things change once you become a parent.
I feel more complete these days though and my life has changed for the better now that I am a parent with it now having more of a purpose and a hell of a lot more fun!
I can't say I was much of a partying type and I had a god awful start to life having experienced sexual assault as a minor, neglect, abuse and resided in poverty. Wasn't the best way to enter the world and these are topics I have often spoken about as I now work in the sector supporting people with similar experiences.
Much of my early life was in shambles and I felt like I didn't have much to live for other than wanting to escape it in anyway possible. It is something that people often ask me What was it like? and the only real response I can give is that is was Normal. Not in the event that it was a normal upbringing but in the way that I do not know anything else, or more so did not know of anything else until 5.5 years ago.
But my life isn't and hasn't always been all doom and gloom with the majority of bad times long gone and I am one of the lucky ones in all this as there are many that do not make it out of their dark hole. I owe much of today to my partner who I have been with since 11 & 12 and we are now 35 and 36.
So while my challenging upbringing was Normal to me so was having a partner at a young age and growing up together experiencing the world. Although we both come from a working class background and did not have plentiful amounts of money at our disposal for all the latest things, at times struggled to put food on the table we have continued to work hard on a single goal that once we had children they wouldn't experience what we did.
It took a bit to get out of that hole and it wasn't until later in life where I completed my first qualification which got me hooked into how far I could push not just my physical limits but also mental limits.
My partner did the same and while I went into the legal world surrounding contract management and policy development my partner went into health.
And yes we had plenty of friends and good times along the way but the majority of our early years surrounded getting out of the position we were in and advancing our family that we planned on having. As much as we wanted to have children earlier it just wasn't possible to do because we would have been raising kids in a cycle that would have just continued.
We did however, get a dog! Bella has been with us for 8 - 9 years and had our unlimited love even if she has taken a bit of a back seat in recent years once the kids have come along, but she is still very much a valued and loved member of our family. We are also owned by a cat who is around the 15 year mark and only engages at dinner time.
Although he is getting old and frail these days and losing a lot of weight so I am not too sure how much longer he has with us over the coming years but he to is loved.
When you're studying and knee deep in assignments and projects there isn't often a lot of time for much other things but there is often a strong community at Uni. We dove right into the gym at Uni becoming a part of our Uni team running in fund raisers and community events which were great ways to keep our minds both healthy and strong and filled the time between classes and the void of not being in the Singles area.
That's probably been one of the hardest things being in a long term relationship is that your friends circle is small and remains quite often a little boring. As other friends move in and out of relationships or being younger in friendship circles singles go out to have fun and being the couple means you're not really a great wingman or woman.
At times others would enter in relationships and then call us to go out and do couples things but most times we just went out on our own and did our own thing.
Focusing on winning races and improving our own health was a great way to keep active and life interesting even if at times we were alone. But people jumped in and out on our journey all the time so we weren't always left to ourselves.
Then our plan all came to fruition which was to be stable by 30 so we could start a family and purchase a home and like clockwork while buying a house wasn't easy starting a family for us was.
We fell pregnant and despite some battles managed to purchase a 2 bedroom unit all within the first week of my 30th birthday as if we were presented an award for our triumph and sticking to the plan.
I sometimes look back to try and find things I would have done differently and the majority of things that are negative have quite often been out of my control. Despite my hardship I know that you can't always control everything but the things you can control are worth getting a hold of.
Would I change anything? No, my past has delivered what I own today and my life is no longer about me but our children.
Is there a life before Kids? I don't think so