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Notes -
I would agree 100% with this - kids are lots of fun. However, that caveat is a big one. The trade-off isn't 12 hours of play vs 12 hours of work; you have to include all the other things you don't get to do in order to hang out with them. As someone who is childless (but has a niece and nephew who I adore spending time with), my schedule looks something like:
If I were parenting my niece and nephew instead, it would look more like:
This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but there definitely isn't as much room for deviation in it. If I wake up and I've got a migraine, I still have to do the morning routine. If I get off work and I'm super stressed because my boss is hinting at layoffs, I still have to prep and cook dinner. I can't decide I'd rather go out to the bar with my wife for drinks; we have to put the kids to bed or they'll be hell the next day.
(Before anyone asks; I'm assuming both parents are working in the above, and that some of the time blocks (like dinner) could be done by either parent, but the other parent is almost certainly in charge of managing the kids during this time. I didn't schedule pickup from school, for example, because I did dropoff and presumably my wife is doing pickup in this hypothetical).
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