Yev has a super power that most of the Pinchuk men possess. They have this incredible ability to put babies to sleep, effortlessly. When I hand baby V to Yev to hold, I often have to tell him, “Don’t let her fall asleep. It’s not the right time.” And almost every time, he tells me to hurry up five minutes later because she’s falling asleep. What the heck?? This little girl can give me a hard time for over an hour when I’m trying to put her down, but Yev holds her for like five seconds and BOOM: passed out.
I used to get really angry and jealous. After carrying a child for basically a year, vomiting the whole time, hobbling through debilitating sciatic pain, and struggling through breastfeeding, sure pick your dad, hun; he’s obviously the better parent.
Yev would laugh so hard at me he had trouble breathing, “Are you actually mad at me for putting her to sleep?”
Laughing at your sleep deprived wife is a bad idea, husbands. Anger quickly turned to rage, and in an effort to avoid a fight at 9pm at night, I would wave him off. “No. Of course not. It’s fine,” but underneath I was seething. What does he have that I don’t?
I’m going to let you ladies in a little secret, get yourself a man with a dad bod, and if you’re already married, feed your husband some cookies or something. All of our children fall asleep instantly because of Yev’s little belly. It is soft and inviting and warm and safe. He just needs 5-10 minutes, and the baby will be asleep.
So I used to be really upset about this, but then I decided to harness this skill. We’ve worked it into our nightly routine, so that baby V is asleep by the time I’m done putting the twins to bed. It’s been really nice to have some quality time with my hubby after a long day. We don’t get much time alone with three under three, and we really value our after-the-kids-go-down time.
Like last night, I ate a peanut butter, Nutella, and banana crêpe that was not gluten-free (and my stomach was totally arguing with me after), while Yev ate a Frosty. But the food isn’t what was important. We had time to talk to each other and debate whether or not deceleration exists. From Yev’s perspective, and the perspective of all Physicists, deceleration is not an appropriate term to describe the rate at which an object slows down. This is because acceleration is a vector; therefore the proper way to look at the misnamed process of “deceleration” is actually “acceleration in the negative direction.” Well I told Yev that although deceleration does not exist in the realm of science, it is still a very real word in the dictionary.
This is literally what we do for fun 😂. What does your night look like after the kids go down?
Jacqueline Pinchuk 