My last first date was over ten years ago (yikes!). I often wonder how I would handle dating these days, especially given things like the blow-up of technology. When my husband and I met, I still had a MySpace account. These days I’m not even on Facebook so I don’t know how I could handle dating sites like Tinder.
The thought of dating sounds scary and intimidating and like it takes a lot of energy that I simply just don’t have these days. Kudos to those of you in that spot right now of dating while also juggling being a mom!
While I might not have to figure out the current way of dating, I have found that being a mom means I have to do something even scarier. I have to ask other moms if their kid will (play) date my kid. It’s easy when they are little. We don’t ask our babies who they want to play with or try to find other babies that have similar interests.
We just find moms with similar interests who happen to have a baby, and so grow friendships, if we are lucky.
But then, overnight it sometimes seems, those babies grow. And they start having opinions about who they play with and realize they bond with one kid over another. They start expressing this and it’s your job to take action. Now, I don’t know about you but that can be sort of awkward and scary.
What if that kid doesn’t want to play with your kid? What if this kid that your child bonds with isn’t someone you would necessarily want them to play with?
Until recently, my five year old son has been easygoing about who his friends are and allowed me to take the lead on it. But then he started at a “real” school and has started to form some wonderful relationships with some amazing kids. It truly fills my heart.
But the other day, I found my time was up. I had told him too many times that I would arrange a play date with his favorite little girl in class, and put it off one too many times. He was finally calling my bluff. So I did it.
I walked over to this girl’s car as her mom was loading her in and I asked her mom if her daughter would like to (play) date my son.
The clouds parted and the sun came shining through when her mom said yes! I was relieved and realized, hey that was easy! Until the awkward moment when I realized I didn’t even know this woman’s name. Relief came again when she didn’t know mine either. We exchanged phone numbers, chatted about how amazing our kids are, and that was a wrap!
But, getting the digits is only the first part of dating. The task ahead of me now is to go on the date. I would have never thought when I got married seven years ago that I would be dating other moms and kids. But here I am. I will let you know how it goes!
Can you share any tips/funny stories on this journey we all face as our kids start to form their own relationships?
