On Being A House Husband

Having written a variety of articles on my previous relationship experiences, I do feel that I ought to have given a little more time and space to the subject of what I brought to the situation, at least with my first relationship breakdown.

Looking back, I do think that after we were forced to downscale our house due to the loss of my well-paid career and salary, I got a little lost in trying to get us back on track.

My ex, for her part, said that she wanted to go back to work as she was tired of dealing with the children all day, every day. So I agreed to a change in roles. She could go out to work and I would work as a freelancer from home and be a house husband at the same time. I knew it was going to be difficult, but it was a case of needs must.

Now you would have thought that she, my ex, above all, having been a house mum herself, would appreciate what extremely demanding, hard work it all was. I have to tell you, bringing up three very demanding young children is so demanding on your mental and physical energy, it has the effect of just sucking all of the life right out of you. I think all men should give it a try before they complain too much about a hot meal not being ready when they get home from a "hard day at the office."

With young children you simply do not get time to think, it is one demand after another, not to mention all of the childish bickering and squabbling between siblings. It is incessant, all bloody day long. The only relief is when you can drop them off at school for the day. The rest of the time is full-on, in the eye of the storm dynamics. You spend half of the time nurturing them and the other half stopping them from killing each other.

And when they were not trying to commit infanticide, they seemed hell-bent on killing themselves, albeit without any conscious intention to do so.

I remember one morning whilst I was in the garage getting one of my daughter's coats to go to school in, she was happily skipping up and down the entrance hallway on a highly polished wooden floor. She skipped onto an oblong rug, which flew from under her feet and sent her hurtling straight for the fluted glass window in the front door. Her head smashed straight through it. That was when, from the garage, I heard the very loud crashing of crystal, accompanied by an ear-shattering, unworldly scream.

I immediately knew it was serious as I ran to the hall. My daughter was lying on her back with her hands covering her eyes. Blood was trickling from underneath her fingers. Shattered glass was neatly arranged all around the shape of her entire body. The glass was of the old type which broke into very large, highly dangerous, shards, as well as a myriad of smaller pieces.

Looking down at her I was horrified. It looked like she might have lost both of her eyes. I could almost not bear to look. However, I knew that look I must, whatever the damage. Gingerly I reached down to pull her little hands away from her bloodied face and, oh my gosh.......

I was absolutely amazed to see that the blood was running from the bridge of her nose, a small cut of no serious degree. Incredible. All it needed was a small dressing and an Elastoplast, not even stitches.

Another time, when I was distracted by a business telephone call up in my attic office, my eldest son climbed up the ladder to see me. He got to the top of the ladder and on reaching the top step he tried to stand up straight. He leaned back a little too far and suddenly lost his balance and fell backwards, upside down onto a concrete floor. Even as he was swaying at the top I reached out to grab him, but he slipped away from my grasping fingers.

And even as he was still falling I leapt out of my office chair, phone handset still in my hand and jumped down the hatch behind him. His head made a direct hit on the floor and not a sound came from his mouth. You know, a scream tells you that at least they are still alive, but when nothing emits from between their lips, then you instinctively know it is serious. I let go of the phone with its coiled cable at its maximum stretch and it flew right back up through the hatch like a bungee rope.

He was barely conscious and I knew I had to get him to a hospital fast. An ambulance would be too late. I gently picked him up and put him in my car.

I will willingly admit I intentionally broke every bloody speed limit there was. I must have at times touched 100 miles an hour through town. To hell with the law, I thought, I was an excellent driver anyway, and my son's life was on the line.

In the hospital, I ran straight to the emergency department, to reception. A nurse came to see me and asked me to sit down and answer some questions. What happened, when and where...? Ok, this I understood. However, she then started to ask me things like did he have accidents often and if so how often? Did he have any brothers or sisters.....I could not see the relevance of those questions and asked her about them. Amazingly, my son maybe only minutes or seconds from death, she told me it was a health service survey she was conducting! I told her to go away and got back up to go and ask the nurse in reception for a doctor immediately.

A porter came and my semi-conscious son was put on a trolley and wheeled into a curtained-off cubicle. I was told a doctor would be along soon. My son was coming round a little and I asked if he was ok. I turned him over gently and lifted his pyjama top to see a series of horizontal ridges up his spine. He had clearly hit every bloody ladder step on his way down. So I gently touched the bruises and asked if it hurt and he said "No Dad, it's my head that hurts." So I lowered him back onto his back and gently touched the top of his head. It felt soft, like a marshmallow. I knew that that was not normal.

The doctor came in and I alerted him about the head. The doctor also felt it and sent him for an immediate X-ray. I went in with him to comfort and console him. I tried to soothe him as they took the x-ray by softly singing a lullaby. At that point, a nurse came in and told me off.

"I don't know what you're singing for, he's got a very serious head injury."

I won't say what I felt about her at that time, I can assure you it would not be nice. Then the doctor came and put the X-ray film up on a screen to show me. My son had fractured his skull, from the very top right down to the top of his nose. Suddenly I was totally overcome with emotion and started to cry at the prospect that I might lose him that very night.

The doctor however assured me that it was nowhere near as serious as it might be in an adult. That is because an adult has a very hard skull and a fracture can lead to life-threatening results. On the other hand, a young child's skull is still not fully formed or developed, it remains soft for quite some time. And that makes a full recovery a lot more probable.

Eventually, my son was kept in overnight for observation with checks on his vital signs every half an hour. I was told I simply had to stay next to him to prevent him from moving around too much. Ha, fat chance of that happening. By the next morning, he woke up, jumped on his feet in the bed and wanted to jump up and down. In time he did make a very full recovery and, thank the lord, he is still alive to this day.

Of course, the above two accidents to my son and daughter are just two of many. Indeed, they had so many accidents that the hospital started to ask questions, to see if any child abuse was going on at home. Good, it is important they do that.

And even when the children are safely at school, it's all about tidying up their mess, washing and drying their clothes, doing the shopping, getting their meals ready, doing their homework with them, and getting them showered and ready for bed.....And yet I did it very well indeed, with lots of love and understanding. Indeed, my ex herself, upon being asked why she did not leave me if she didn't love me any more, replied "It's because he's very good with the children, he's better at it than me." And the fact that I managed to get any freelance work done at all during the day was nothing short of miraculous.

When my ex got home from work and we put the children to bed, if I hadn't done it by then on my own, I just wanted to relax a little, to close my eyes and lean back on the sofa. I also yearned for some adult male conversation. Other mums could go for a mid-morning coffee, or even visit a museum or hang out in the local park, with another mum. I could not do that for fear that my motives might have been be misconstrued, maybe it would have been seen as me hitting on other women.

So on the odd occasion, on a Friday night, I would go to visit a male friend to chat about cars and music, of which we were both fanatics. And sometimes, not often, we would go to a local bar to hear some live music.

Other women were most certainly not on the menu. In fact, I recall one evening when we went to a music bar to listen to some very good local band. We went inside the bar, bought a beer for him and an orange juice for me as I had to drive.

Over in a corner were four women giving us the eye, to which we simply turned away. Eventually one of the women came over to say hello. I think she was a little tipsy, and most certainly more than forward when she blurted out "We think you two are gay." When we asked why she said "Well, because there are four beautiful women over in the corner and you two have not shown the slightest interest. I think you with the beer are the dominant one, and you with the OJ the passive one in the relationship."

We laughed out loud at the preposterous idea of us being a couple and explained we were only there for the music. And at that, she scuttled off back to her friends.

On one or two very rare occasions I did have a drink of beer or two and spent the night sleeping on my friend's sofa rather than risk an accident or a fine for driving home under the influence. Of course, I rang my wife to explain, and she seemed to understand.

Now I realise how that might have looked to her. In addition, I guess due to me otherwise giving my undivided attention to our children, my wife felt neglected and sought attention elsewhere.

I recall with amazing clarity, one night totally exhausted from the day's events, I just wanted to go to bed and sleep. My ex climbed in next to me and suggested we have sex. I explained that I felt just too tired to perform. And just as I slipped into a coma of sleep I heard her say, in a tone of both hurt and triumph,"It's ok, I can always get it somewhere else." I much later realised that that was not a warning, it was a confession.

I now readily admit, I was unintentionally neglecting my wife's needs, they were being sacrificed in favour of our children and the need for me to do some work to make a financial contribution to the family income. That being said, what I was unconsciously guilty of, most certainly didn't deserve what came next.

And to finish on a somewhat ironic note, my love and dedication to the children that I adored was the very cause of my downfall and ultimate estrangement from them.

My ex and her family and friends undertook a sustained campaign of parental alienation which was so effective that to this day, my children don't want to know me. For they, my children, see their mother as a saint and me as the devil incarnate. How cruel life can be. How cruel.

I did once try to explain to my children what had really happened, but they saw that as an attack on their mother and grandparents and put up defences to keep me away. They did not, and still do not, want to know the truth.

Indeed, in 2010 the last email I got from my youngest daughter simply said "Dad, signing that last email Love Dad, was taking the piss."

And her elder sister replied to her email "I have lost all respect for you."

We have not spoken since, despite the fact that I have on two occasions tried to mend bridges with them.

My eldest son, now 38, has accepted me back on the condition that I never speak about the past. So to protect what little contact I have with him, I must step on a great many eggshells.

Getting to know the truth would require them to step out of their bubble and face reality, and that would simply be too much for them to take. They would much rather go on through life in blissful ignorance. They even said to me "Dad, even if it's all true, we do not want to know."

They do not want their little boat to be rocked. All they want is a peaceful, untroubled life. And really, I cannot say I blame them, because the truth of what happened sent me into an abyss I thought I would never be able to climb out of.

And so I must move on and give up my babies, leave them to their fate and hope that life never ever deals them the same set of cards as I was dealt.