Parenting Styles

I have officially found the perfect, most reliable test to see what type of parent a person will be: give them a dog.

Chris is absolutely cracking me up right now. I would have never guessed he'd be such a worrisome parent - but you should hear how worried he is about Sir Henry right now. Who, by the way, just has a bad case of itchy ears.

Chris is practically putting a hot towel on his head, throwing him in the car, and speeding to the emergency room.

Meanwhile, I'm in Utah rolling my eyes saying, "Is he bleeding out? Are limbs missing? He'll live."

A while back Chris told me his dad was the type of dad who would never let his kids "cry it out" and his mom had the "they're fine" attitude. If one of them cried in the middle of the night, his dad would sneak out and hold them until they fell asleep - meanwhile if his mom was just home they'd sit in their crib crying all night until they learned to self soothe. 

If someone would have told me that is how Chris would be, I would've never believed it. Chris is pretty much an ultimate tough guy. His military, "feel no pain" attitude has gotten him through 3 marathons, more than 20 triathlons (one of which he crashed in and was bleeding head to foot, and still finished) and a half ironman. He takes no rest days, pulls all-nighters studying, and worked all day through a severe hay allergy reaction. Meanwhile, if I even so much as have a backache, I'm taking the entire day off to re-cooperate while eating copious amounts of ice cream and watching trashy Netflix tv shows.

So you would think because of our attitudes towards ourselves that we would be the same with Sir Henry. Nope.

So since this morning every time Sir Henry barks, he shakes his head and scratches his ears. Bad case of itchy ears, or maybe he has some water or something in it. Regardless, he spent the first year of his life living in the woods. Am I concerned? Not even a little bit. He's a dog, afterall, and even though I love him even more than I could possibly ever express, dogs are itchy! 

But what does Chris do? He has a Monday morning 9 am appointment at the vet and he's talking non-stop babytalk to Henry about how he'll be just fine and to not worry about it.

Because I'm sure Sir Henry is all sorts of worked up. He does the same thing when Henry so much as sneezes or coughs....

*Henry clears his nose*

"SHOULD WE TAKE HIM TO THE VET!? I googled his symptoms. It could be any combination of bronchitis, asthma, a cold, or pneumonia."

Between me and Chris' personalities and activity levels if we ever have kids someday, they're going to be tall, gangly, have huge ears and eyes, and be off the wall energetic (not to mention wicked fast and smart). They'll be running marathons before they can talk. And I'll just remove all sharp objects from the house and let them loose. If they're still alive at the end of the day, I've done my job. 

Meanwhile, Chris is going to pad all walls, wrap them in bubble wrap, make them wear helmets, and have weekly checkups at the doctor to check their vitals. He'll also probably install cameras and motion detectors in their cribs. "OH GOD, HE MOVED."

I think I'm just going to let him do his thing, there's no use in trying to change him. We all have our roles...besides, the more Chris worries about, the less I have to worry about! 

Love,

me