Is a vacation possible, without my son?
Posted by Laurie
This past weekend my husband and I flew to Cancun, Mexico. We spent four nights in Shangri-la, while our son stayed at home with visiting grandparents. It was our longest time away from our son. The weather was nice. It was slightly overcast part of the time, but as long as I could sit in a lounge chair by the pool with my husband beside me, I was euphoric. Blake was thoroughly entertained and happy at home, and the grandparents were thrilled to be with him. What could go wrong? Me.
Apparently, I need to take a vacation from my brain. For the first day of my trip, it just wouldn’t stop the movie reel: what if our plane crashes? What if Blake desperately cries for me for hours? What if they put him in the warmer pajamas but the heat is turned too high and Blake overheats in the middle of the night? What if they forget to read him “Goodnight Moon” at bedtime?
What if I shouldn’t have left my baby?
I met another mother at the hotel bar who was also on her first “couple” vacation with her husband since having their ten-month old. We bonded. She told me that she’s surprised no one called the police when she handed her daughter over to her mother-in-law the day before their vacation. The transfer happened at a McDonalds at a highway rest stop mid-way between the two ladies who lived hours apart. When my new friend passed the baby to her mother-in-law at the fast food joint, she was bawling, as if she would never see her daughter again.
By day 2 of our trip, we had confirmation that Blake hadn’t cried for his mommy or daddy once, that he ate his entire meals (which he never does with us!) and that he was energetic, happy and a pleasure to be around. Now we could really start relaxing. And so the vacation from my brain began.
We ate, we drank, we talked, we slept, we… you know, and we laughed. We laughed at our son’s funny words and habits (like “pooter” for computer and how he copies us and sometimes calls himself “Blakey Blake”). We laughed at ourselves and how we go away so that we can spend half the time talking about Blake. We realized that just like everything else changed when we had Blake, so had vacations. The fact that the hotel provided free phone calls to the United States was better than drinking margaritas and eating chocolate cake. A direct flight home, priceless.
I didn’t know if would be possible to ever have a relaxing, beautiful beach vacation again with my husband. It is. We are not just parents, we are a couple.
Are you a new parent or expecting parent planning a vacation? Have you recently gone on a vacation without your child? Were you more or less anxious than you expected? Do you think vacations are more fun with your kids or without them?
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This entry was posted on Thursday, February 18th, 2010 at 12:37 pm and is filed under Health & Wellness, Life-Style. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.
My husband and I are due with our first child on February 27th (9 days!!!). My husband’s dad is planning a family trip to Hawaii for when our son is around 15 months old, and it’s already become a debate between me and my husband over whether we’ll be able to leave our son with someone else for the week or not. (I’m thinking I won’t want to leave him for a whole week and I will want to take him with us. My husband thinks I’m being silly.) It’s nice to read that someone else struggled to leave their child. We’ll see what happens with us!
My mom used to get criticized A LOT for sending me and three siblings down to Mexico every year for the entire summer so we could be with my grandparents. That’s three months a year. Because of that, we are the only family that spent valuable time playing with and learning from my grandparents. We also learned to be independent from my parents and to watch out for each other.
Also because of that, when my son was born three years ago, I had zero qualms about sending him to be with my parents for weeks (and once, even months!) at a time. We live in Chicago and he already knows that a plane will take him to Florida and we can Skype after he’s come back from the beach or the pool, or even just going for a walk with his grandpa, who spoils and loves him so much.
My husband and I haven’t really taken vacations away from our son, but we have let him take vacations to visit his grandparents without us being there and they always help remind us how much we love him, and it helps remind him of that, too. It also gives him a chance to feel love from other members of the family.
Maybe it’s not the same thing, but it’s just my 2 cents.
We went on a vacation to Puerto Morelos Memorial Day weekend this past year for a friend’s wedding (LOVE the destination wedding) without the boys and it…was…AWESOME!
Look, everyone probably feels a little bad leaving their kids to go on a vacation, but you shouldn’t. It’s great to be adults again and not have to worry about wiping or feeding someone (unless that person is your spouse, and then that’s a different story…).
Good times.
My wife and I have the same debate over the weekend, we had this plan to go for a vacation in a beach in the Philippines just to relax and unwind and escape the fast paced life in the city, but seems like we can’t as she won’t leave the baby behind..
We recently left our 22 month old son to go away for the weekend. We left him and our dog with my mother in law (who watches him four days a week) and went to the mountains. We spent a lot of time talking about our son and how much we love being parents. We also rediscovered “us”. It was fantastic.
Leaving your children with trusted GP’s or other friends/relatives is not only important to your marriage, but a gift to your child.
It enables your children to meaningfully bond with other adults, which has been shown through several studies to be an important part of healthy psychological growth for children and an indicator of success later in life. It demonstrates to them that they can trust you when you go away; you will come back, and their world doesn’t change. These are lessons you cannot teach your child with words, they are only taught through experience.
You can quote me on this: What is in the best interest for your marriage is generallly always in the best interest for your whole family as well!