My trips and my daughter
Find a Conversation
| Wed, 12-29-2004 - 7:23pm |
Hi becky…I wanted to respond to a question you posed about my various trips a while back…
Yes I travel a lot during the winter months, and my daughter usually stays home. My trip to California last week was for family so ofcourse she went with! But she doesn’t come with me on my work trips. I am usually gone for 2-3 days at a time, rarely more than that, every two weeks. With the exception of one time where I had to spend a month in Fairbanks, AK training staff. She was young, not yet in school and I took her with me.
During my shorter trips, she stays home with D and the boys while I’m gone. Before D, she would stay with her daddy, or with her aunt. We always have quality mommy/me time before and after my trips.
I felt a little guilty at first about my traveling so much this time of year, but I have realized through the last couple of years that it has actually benefited us to a certain extent. I notice that she really appreciates me and does not take me for granted like I see many other children do with their parents. Those brief periods when I’m gone help her realize how much I really mean to her and how much she needs me and would miss me if I wasn’t around. And vice versa for me. It brings us much closer together.
Plus we have email and she sends me text messages on my phone all the time. At 8 years old, she is an excellent speller!

That sounds really great G. I was just wondering how it worked out and if her dad was OK with her staying with D. What a GREAT GUY D is to keep her along with his boys when you leave!
I can understand 2 or 3 days every few weeks being a very good thing for you. Especially at her age and older. It's time for our kids to start learing how to cope a little better on their own with space from parental authority I think. I would LOVE that for Ty and I. And then coming back together would just be SO much fun!
DD's dad is fine with it. He knows he always has first option to take her whenever I'm gone but rarely does because he works so much and can't work the school schedule as well as D can. Yesterday, dd said she misses her dad because she hasn't seen him in almost 2 weeks, so we called him and he is picking her up today instead of tomorrow. We do what's best for dd. :)
As for D watching dd when I'm gone, I guess I just take that for granted? I couldn't imagine D refusing to watch dd while I am away on a trip or asking me to take her to her dad's or me doing that to him with the boys. That seems so foreign to me. D and I and the kids are a family and if one of us is not around the other steps in to take care of the kids because that's just what parents do, right?