Sometimes, You Don’t Have A Choice
We just got two rabbits and I am SO excited. They’re big rabbits, about the size of a cat. They’re soft and they let you hold them. Our kids are excited – like, beyond excited. Our dog is excited also, but a different excited. Excited like you are when you want to eat something.
These rabbits were part of a high school student’s project, and the project was ending soon. I heard about them on a Monday and the rabbits had to be given away by Thursday. Otherwise, they were bound for someone’s skillet. I was over the moon about this! I’ve always wanted a bunny and these were just perfect. I told my husband about them before I mentioned it to the kids, to see what he thought. He didn’t seem as excited, but told me that he knew I was excited, so I could tell the kids. And like I said, they were super excited, too! The rabbits showed up on Wednesday and they’ve gotten a lot of love, holding, and attention.
Over the weekend, I wanted to tell my husband that I appreciated him being on board with this. I started to say, “thank you for saying yes to this,” but halfway through my sentence, I realized that he hadn’t ever said yes…he just had gone along. Even if he hadn’t wanted the bunnies, he didn’t really have a choice because he saw what they would mean to the rest of the family. So I changed it to, “thank you for understanding that you didn’t have a choice in this.” We had a good laugh at that.
But, really, isn’t that often the case in parenting? There are a lot of things that we do that we don’t really have a choice in. You stay home from vacation because someone got sick. You eat those vegetables that you don’t like because you want to set that example for your kids. You attend some activities for no other reason than you want your child to look in the stands and see that you were there for them. I guess you do have a choice – technically – but not really. Not if you want to do this right.
So we have two bunnies, Trixie and Lily. And we love them! I don’t know if my husband wanted the rabbits or not, but it really doesn’t matter. He didn’t have a choice and he’s happy about that. I’d have done the same thing. It’s part of parenting.
