There's a direct correlation between how old your children are and how much time you spend on the floor.
I have two small kids, 6 months and three, so nearly all of my time is spent on the ground with them. Sometimes we're playing, but most of the time I'm just setting one of them down, or crawling on hands and knees to pick up toys and putting things away. Most of my days, despite working full time and writing, are spent scooping up legos and wiping things up off the floor from mealtime.
As kids get older, parents enter the sitting years of parenthood, which is another way to refer to elementary school-aged children. The sitting years of parenthood are less intense than the early floor years; this period is reserved for school drop-offs and pick-ups, recitals, parent-teacher conferences, and schlepping your kids around in a vehicle. Children still require supervision, but there's less scooping and wiping involved.
Then you reach the standing age — high school, and beyond. Kids can drive themselves places so there is less sitting; you may be invited to attend a game, but you’re standing in the bleachers observing. Long gone are the days of the floor.
The intensity of a weekend as a floor parent is a lot, as I write this I’m exhausted from the manual labor of it all. It is hard to imagine myself as a standing parent, it’s been so long since I’ve just stood upright. I know I’ll miss the floor days, even though my neck is sore, my rotator cuff is killing me, and the only thing I really want is a massage.
