Years ago, when I was still giving cardio workouts, there was a rule, a creed of sorts, that I told every single person, and it served as a kind of guidance, which guidance went like this.

There's a huge difference between being unable to do something but pushing through, and doing something foolish.

That something doesn't feel good to you, and it would be more comfortable to give up, but you don't stop and you keep going, is the most basic expectation, because that's the only way to develop. This is clear so far. Foolishness starts when you keep going even when your body clearly signals that you can't go on, that you have to stop, but you keep going even when you shouldn't. 

You have to know where the limit is, and you have to stop at that certain boundary. 

I reached this boundary on the fifteenth day. This was the critical, this was the decisive day for me. This was the day when I very seriously considered giving up this whole thing because I felt I had taken on too much. 

I’ve used words like "difficult" and "I can't take it," and "I'm tired" and so on, but this day was different, and honestly, I don't remember the last time I was in such a crisis. I've had a few critical periods in my life, especially since I started LifeTILT. I've had quite a few difficulties, I've burned out several times, I've fallen into deep depression more than once, many people wanted to destroy me, but I always knew how to get back up, where to draw strength to continue. I lost many battles, but I always won the important wars, but this time was different. 

A little guy came along and in 2 weeks achieved what others couldn't in years. He completely floored me

and didn't even give me a chance to pull myself together.

The worst thing about parenting is that it never ends, there are no days off, there's no evening to rest, no chance to recharge. Work is hard too, but at least there you know that in the afternoon, or worse, in the evening, you put down your tools, then at home you relax, unwind, let off steam, and tomorrow everything will be better. But here you don't put anything down, at most you put the child to sleep five times a day.

But childcare is only one problem, because if we're talking about never-ending things, let's also mention housework, which is also a task you do every day, and then you have to do it again every other day. You wash the dishes, and 25 minutes later you find dirty plates and glasses everywhere again. You tidy up, and tidy up again, and again, and again, and again. But the worst are the laundry piles, because until now I thought there were four of us living in this house, but looking at the laundry, I think there are about 30 more people living here, because I can't really explain things otherwise. 

I deliberately took a photo. I emptied this laundry basket 2 days ago. I took the clean towels into the bathroom, and this is what greeted me. So, shouldn't I be annoyed?

Thinking about it, this is the worst part of it all: that

you do something all day that you can do again the next day, and while you're doing it, you know that you're doing what you're doing completely pointlessly.

On one side, you're constantly stressed and unable to rest, all this accompanied by an average of 9-12 hours of child crying in your ears, and on the other side, you feel as if you have to mop the bottom of the Danube every day. These two things drain a person so terribly and are so damn frustrating that, honestly, I'm surprised women haven't set the city on fire in their anger and desperation. Not just this one, all of them. 

I felt despair, fatigue, deep apathy, but you can also imagine all the negative epithets here. Reni saw that I was in big trouble, I know this because she didn't speak to me. She didn't speak to me, I rather didn't look at her because everything I didn't want her to see was on my face. Despite this, I saw her anxious gaze on me because she clearly saw what state I was in. 

I don't know who has been to the Kosovo public hospital lately. Well, I looked worse than that.

That afternoon, Reni was visited by one of her friends, which I honestly was very happy about, as it allowed me to go to the hairdresser. Reni, even though she is at home, cannot be alone with the child. She can't lift him, meaning she can't even get him out of bed. She can't bend down, not just for the child but for anything, and she can't even be too close to him, because the child either climbs on her like an animal, which is not good after a recent surgery, or she can't even take care of him, because she instinctively reaches out with her left hand, which she can't use at all yet.  

In short, I have to manage our daily life as if I were at home alone with the child. If I want to leave, I have to call someone over.

I left the kid with the girls and went to the hairdresser. I really needed this outing; I went to the hairdresser as slowly as I could, because the later I got home, the more time I had in peaceful surroundings. I sat down in the hairdresser's chair and, believe it or not, I fell asleep. I woke up to the guy's voice asking if it would be good like this on the side? I already felt something was wrong here, but it was only at the second incident that I really felt I had problems. I'm driving, I see the light turn red, but I keep going. My brain didn't register this change. At the last moment, I slammed on the brakes at the red light when I realized I should have stopped. It's quite amazing to experience these things, and all it took was for me to stay home with the child for 14 days. 

I went home and told Reni not to be angry, but tonight she would have to get up for the child. Give him milk, I prepared it, it's on the kitchen table. I slept for 15 hours that night. 

Before I fell asleep, I knew three things, and I was happy about one.

I knew I wouldn't give up.

I knew I had to completely reorganize everything.

I knew I had to ask for help.

I was glad Ádi was much better.

As expected, Ádi got sick. 

It's incredible how much children sense these emotional changes, though maybe it wasn't a great idea to take the child to the hospital to his mother, he probably picked something up there, but what was I supposed to do? Not let his mother see the child on her birthday? Forget it.

The point is, Ádi got sick. I knew something was wrong because my son, who until then lived his days like a Tasmanian devil, was now just sitting there, staring blankly. He wasn't emptying my sock drawer, he wasn't trying to dismantle the radiator, he wasn't trying to smash the kitchen counter with anything, he didn't feel like doing anything. 

Strangely, what used to drive me crazy and I would have given anything for him not to unpack and dismantle everything, seeing my son now I wished he would just unpack everything.

Meanwhile, I brought Reni home from the hospital, and as we were driving home, I thought, okay, this "At home with the child" thing wasn't easy even before, but what on earth am I going to do now with a sick child and my wife, who can barely move, can't lift, needs rest, and even if she wanted to, couldn't take care of the child? 

I feel like life is telling me, "Well, son, you were so cocky, and you thought mothers' lives at home were easy? Go ahead and show me, prove it."

The child already had diarrhea the day before, but on this day, fever arrived in the form of 38.9 degrees. Ádi was gloomy all day, not crawling, not playing, not eating. I put him in my bed because our favorite game is for him to burrow under the duvets and hide, and I find him, but nothing. He just lies there and does nothing.

It's a rotten feeling when your child is sick. Ádi had avoided illnesses until now; if anything, he recovered from everything within 1 day, but he was never gloomy. Back then, I thought he'd be better the next day, but he wasn't because night came, and it got much worse. 

Ádi went to sleep at 7 p.m., then woke up every two hours, and each time I went up to him, I didn't just have to change him, but I literally had to wash him because he had such diarrhea that it went all the way up to his neck, not to mention his pajamas and sheets. Child into the sink under the tap, clean clothes, I change his bedding, walk him around to calm him down, into bed. This was the procedure. After the last one, I thought I'd give him some milk in case he drank it. 

He drank.

The child, lying in bed, starts drinking milk, then a minute later he projectile vomits all over himself and pretty much everything within a 1-meter radius. After the usual cleaning procedure, I took the child's mattress, put it on the floor, and lay down next to him, because by this time the child was completely exhausted.

That night, the child could only fall asleep if I was lying next to him and some part of him was touching me. No matter how deeply the child slept, if I moved away from him, he immediately woke up and started crying. It was incredibly uncomfortable lying half on the floor, half on the small mattress, but making sure I maintained continuous contact with the child. I was terribly tired too; those who follow the posts know how exhausted I already am, but somehow I didn't feel this to be a burden. In fact, I think

I've never been this close to my son before.

Then it was morning. I thought I'd give him something to drink, because he had diarrhea, he vomited at night, he needed to drink. But he didn't want to drink.

And then, somewhere around 6:15 in the morning, I dressed the child and took him to the pediatric ward of Saint John's Hospital, because I was afraid he would become dehydrated. 

The child was examined and it was determined that he had caught some virus, so they would keep him and put him on an IV. I said that wouldn't work, because no matter how dispirited the child was, if a plastic tube was sticking out of him, he would most certainly rip it out. Well, then they would restrain him, there was no other choice.

NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT.  There must be some other solution, to which the doctor said the child had to start drinking. Now, believe it or not, I started talking to Ádi, telling him, "My little boy, you have to start drinking, be a good boy, do it for Dad," I was telling him things like that, and Ádi started drinking. First just a few sips, then a deciliter. 

The doctor said it was okay that he started drinking, but the child still had to stay in the hospital, but not to worry because the parents could stay with the child too. They brought a crib for Ádi, he lay down and I put him to sleep. 

While Ádi was sleeping, I called my mother to come to the hospital for a bit to Ádi while I went home and packed my things so I could sleep here with the child. My mother, clearly on the other end of the phone, had a heart attack, but she was there within 20 minutes. 

I know I don't matter at all in this story now, but by then I was really quite broken. I was broken physically, mentally, in every way, because I had really been up all night and it looked like I would be up for another night, but this time in Saint John's. I told my mother to stay here, I'd go home, sleep for 2 hours and then come back. 

The doctor said if Ádi drank 1000-1200 ml of fluid, he could go home today, so we got a paper on which we had to write how much he drank. 

Of course, Reni also came in the afternoon, although she wasn't well, but I think she would have gone in to see the child even if she was on a ventilator. 

Since the child drank and ate enough, didn't need an IV, didn't vomit, had no fever, and his diarrhea also subsided, we finally brought him home in the evening. 

I don't know if this whole motherhood thing is really this hard, or if we're just getting an extreme version of it, but it's starting to become too much for me. I feel like I'm at the end of my rope, starting to completely deplete my reserves, because it's no longer just about being home with the child, taking them for a walk in the afternoons, and keeping the apartment tidy. 

There's the child, who needs all the care and attention a child needs + is now sick on top of that. There's my wife, who also needs support, but honestly, I'm so exhausted that I simply have no energy left for her. Since Reni's been home, we've talked for about 20 minutes and touched on some pretty deep topics, but besides that, we don't really talk. When I pass her, I hug her, give her a kiss, but I can't give her anything more than that right now, which I also experience as a kind of failure. 

Reni is a smart woman. She always knows what to say or do to contribute to our family.

For example, this message she sent me. Sometimes, that's all it takes.