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climberchic
Sep 18, 2002, 2:44 AM
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Married Moms~
Does your husband play an equal role when taking care of the kids when you want to go out to climb?
Single Moms~
What steps do you have to take to get out to climb? Do you take them with you? Who takes care of them?
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fiend
Sep 18, 2002, 4:39 AM
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I'm not going to speak for my mom ... well, not too much
But I have a ton of respect and admiration for the amount she climbs. Every weekend she is out doing trad, sport, bouldering, or ice depending on the season and she hits the gym twice a week... on top of getting up at 6am to go teach all day (think what you will but teaching is hard work ). She also takes numerous trips each year to areas like the New River Gorge, the Adirondacks, Bon Echo, and even comes with me to places like Rumney and the Red River gorge to do some sport climbing.
Now, it's not a big deal for her as far as kids are concerned... I'm reasonably grown up and my brother is off at school this year so she doesn't have to take care of us or anything, but I've noticed that it can be hard for her to find partners to climb with regularly. A lot of the men her age are of that whole climbing is a man's sport mentality and will often try to reduce the women they climb with to the secondary role of helpless female as they brave all the leads and 'help' her up the climbs.
Did I mention that she's also an ACC member, active in local access issues and commities, and a Local Rep for the RRGCC?
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climberchic
Sep 18, 2002, 5:12 AM
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Wow, Mark! I remember some posts about your mom and thinking that it was exactly how I would like to raise my children. Not only does she climb regularly, but she has helped to raise 2 wonderful, intelligent, grounded men like yourself and kriso9tails. Serious goddess kudos to her!
Martha~She may not be able to climb, but Vermont Philharmonic at 87 ?!?! What any amazing feat! My question to you is this. When did you start climbing/skiing and has she been playing the violin her whole life? What I'm getting at is, being childless myself, I am wondering how moms do it. How they can still live out their passions on a regular basis when they have small children?
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climbinganne
Sep 18, 2002, 1:13 PM
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i take the kids with me...or i get a big boy/girl sitter...
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calamity_chk
Sep 18, 2002, 2:03 PM
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(single mom of 6 yr old boy)
For me, there are several factors, some of which include what climbs are planned, how many weekends I've already dragged him along, and if there will be any other kids there.
Thankfully, my kiddo also enjoys climbing (and seems to be fairly good at it), so I generally take him with me as often as he likes; however, I also enjoy doing heinously long routes from time to time, so bringing him along when multipitch is on the agenda would be inappropriate.
I also consider how many weekends I've already had him out climbing. As much as we enjoy my addiction, he also likes spending time at grandma's and such .. which are usually the weekends that I focus on "my" climbing.
As focused as I can be at times, people who've climbed with us can attest to my ability to still be cognizant of what he's doing while on a route. /amber cranking through some weird move shouting "hey, put that down!"/
As for "special accomodations," he always brings his own little pack (which is really just an old school bag). He hikes in his own food and some games to play in case boredom should strike, maybe some webbing or a draw or two. I try to find a nice balance between teaching him responsibility for hiking in stuff and not weighing him down too much.
He's comfy with the outdoors so that's never an issue and he's probably more patient with long approaches and scrambling than I am.
There are also some good threads buried in the general forum about entertaining kids and the crag ... I'll try to dig them up and post some links here.
[ This Message was edited by: clymbr_chk on 2002-09-18 07:09 ]
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fiend
Sep 18, 2002, 2:31 PM
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I think it's important to remember that you need to expose your kids to a lot of different things while they're very young to get them comfortable during their formative years. My parents took us on an interior canoe trip when my brother and I were at ages 1 and 5. Because of things like this we were always comfortable in an outdoor setting and were well behaved when my mom took us on outdoor activities.
I see a lot of parents not wanting to take their kids outside climbing with them while they're young because "they'll get too bored, they won't be able to handle it, they'll hurt themselves" but it's only because they didn't get that exposure when they were young. Keep a kid locked at home with video games and TV and then take him outdoors for the first time and yeah, he'll be bored out of his mind
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climbinganne
Sep 18, 2002, 2:32 PM
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hahahahaha....amber...yup!!!
I also have that ability too...
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calamity_chk
Sep 18, 2002, 2:48 PM
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Mark,
I cant help but agree with your statement, but I think it also depends on the context. For example, my kiddo gets bored when we're climbing sometimes because we're in a large-ish group (~6 climbers or so) working the same route on a small-ish belay ledge.
This leaves him without much room to run and play for the time that we're in that area. There are times when he'll look around to find little boulder problems to work, but he also gets bored with those after a while. *gasp*
I guess that I would argue that it's partially situational, but I see your point and concur for the most part.
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fiend
Sep 18, 2002, 3:00 PM
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Oh, I was fully generalizing.. even though kids may be accustomed to the outdoors then I agree that they can still get bored.
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daisuke
Sep 18, 2002, 3:48 PM
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it's amazing how effectively and quickly the TV and nintendo can turn kids into mindless idiots
my sister's bf has a son whom he was raising in a pretty much TV free environment. healthy and smart kid... talked a lot, etc etc etc... then came the problem because his mom wanted him back and came to get him with a court order.
about 4 days later he calls his kid and he could immediately sense that he had been watching TV when he called because it was like the kid couldn't wait to hang up and get back to watching TV.
this thread is really good on showing experiences of how to raise a kid in a healthy environment. I myself will take into account the things being said here and put them to work if I'm ever lucky enough to be a father. keep em coming because it's very interesting
kudos amber, sounds like you're doin a great job!
D
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calamity_chk
Sep 18, 2002, 3:59 PM
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Thanks D .. I'm also pretty anti-TV, though ..
My kiddo has an allowance of tele-time where he can watch (heavily censored) network programs, a movie, or get his butt kicked at some N64, but the TV is not a free-for-all escape. We spend lots of time coloring, drawing, playing match, etc.
(off topic, sorry)
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russmanswife
Sep 18, 2002, 9:30 PM
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if i go climbing my husband goes with me which leaves the problem of finding a babysitter, i can't wait until hunter is big enough to go and we don't have to do that anymore. as far as other things go such as going to the gym or wanting to just get a break he is really good about watching him so i can go. we do have a wall in our garage but then that means one of us gets to climb and the other gets to chase the little guy around the yard.
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climberchic
Sep 19, 2002, 1:14 AM
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Some great responses...
This topic kind of came up because I think I take it for granted sometimes. I think about everything I have to do in a day, how I'm SOOOO busy, and try to think of how I'll get out to climb. Then I realize~
How in the world would I find time to climb if I had children?
Seems like you have the right idea Amber and Bobbi!
~Erica
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climbsomething
Sep 19, 2002, 2:44 AM
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Yeah, and sometimes I stress about whether/how to get my *dog* out to the rock I hope that when I have a junior I can still climb, and even take the little bug with me Little tinies in those full-body harnesses wriggling up the wall/rock just make me giggle! Too cute!
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dondiego
Sep 19, 2002, 8:37 PM
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I am recently re-married and I have two kiddos from marriage number one. During the period in between I had to choose my friends and partners very wisely. Many people are all about being around your kids for the first few hours but get really testy when a whole weekend is in the works. I took my kids with me whenever I could and most of the time it meant I coldn't climb nearly as much as I wanted to but I also got to watch them learn how to climb and smile with pride when I showed how impresssed I was with their abilities. I used to think kids would cramp my style, they didn't, they taught me what style is. Now I have a new wife and they love her to death and between the four of us, climbing is our preferred family vacation (after Disney world).
-Don Diego-
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