I Don't Need Help. I Need A Parenting Co-Worker.

When my husband gets home from work, sometimes he does the worst thing imaginable: He sits in his recliner, and he puts his feet up.

On a weeknight. With four children who need to be bathed, dishes that need to be washed, laundry to put away, homework to be checked, backpacks that need to be emptied, a cat who needs to be fed … should I go on? Do I need to keep going here?

I know, I know. He works long days. He commutes 45 minutes both ways, works a full eight hours in the office and rushes out the door at 5 o’clock to get home so that he has a few precious moments with our kids before bedtime.

And more often than not, those kids are with him in the armchair, which is why I hesitate to voice any complaints. He's cuddling his babies, they're occupied, I can get dinner on the table. And yet…

I used to work outside of the home, and I know how tiring it can be to jump from one full-time job in to another. But now that I work part-time from home with no change of scenery and no lunch breaks, I can’t help but feel like I’m having Mad Men flashbacks the second the recliner goes up.

Now, I know my husband is not Don Draper; he’s an involved dad, a devoted partner, and a genuine help around the house. But I’m not a ’60s housewife, and I don’t need help. I need an on-the-clock co-worker from 5:45 until each and every one of our children is asleep.

When they’re little, there’s so much they can’t do on their own. They need a grown up to fill their sippy cups. They can’t quite reach the cereal boxes in the cupboard by themselves. They need someone to put toothpaste on their toothbrush the “right” way (apparently there’s a wrong way). And these and so many needs can’t be filled by someone who is sitting down.

Until our kids are older and a little more independent, I don’t understand how any adults in their vicinity are sitting.

My husband has taken enough solo day shifts at home to understand that their needs are unrelenting, and he truly does a fair share each evening (he never sits for long). But once he gets out of his work clothes, he longs to sink into his armchair and cuddle his babies. I long to get dinner cleared away, dishes into the dishwasher, laundry into the dryer and children into bed so I can have just a few minutes of quiet to regain my sanity before we do it all over again tomorrow.

I still remember the first time an older and wiser mom made me privy to the adage: “The days are long but the years are short.” I had a two-year-old and a newborn and she had two grown children, and I felt a wave of relief learning that some day I wouldn’t be quite so tired. It meant a lot to me to hear her acknowledge that this stage of life with young children is a lot. These days can feel so, so long. And all I want is to get through them with some level of success, and that’s much easier to do if I have a partner working with me.

And it’s easier to do knowing that a few short years from now the days won’t feel so long. Our little people won’t need us every waking moment. They’ll be bigger people able to refill their own water bottles and reach their own cereal boxes and put the correct amount of toothpaste on their toothbrushes all by themselves. And our work days will end a little bit earlier.

Then we can both put our feet up.

Lauren Davidson is a Pittsburgh-based writer and editor focusing on parenting, arts and culture, and weddings. She has worked at newspapers and magazines in New England and western Pennsylvania and is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh with degrees in English and French. She lives with her editor husband, four energetic kids, and one affectionate cat. Follow her on Twitter @laurenmylo.