Tag Archives: residence life

Tales of a Res Life Spouse

Hubster works in residence life and we live on campus. Our living arrangement often produces a lot of intrigue, so I thought I’d address some of the most common questions here. Enjoy.

The Myths and Realities

We live in a “dorm” room. First, let me correct you with the proper term. If you’ve ever worked in residence life, the word “dorm” probably makes you cringe. It’s not a “dorm,” it’s a residence hall. Since Hubster is a professional staff member, we actually live in an apartment within a residence hall. Most professional staff apartments were former student rooms that have been renovated into an apartment (unless it’s a newer building and the apartment was in the building plans). We currently reside in a building that consists of 4-bedroom student apartments. Our apartment was renovated into a 3-bedroom apartment with a small laundry room.

Hubster is a state employee; therefore, he works short hours and earns a fat paycheck. When I hear this myth, I want to punch someone in the throat. People who dedicate their lives to residence life/student affairs do not do so for the money – or the hours. To give you an example, Hubster has night meetings every weeknight this semester. He comes home from either his normal office hours or an evening meeting, only to leave a couple hours later for another meeting. At our current institution, he has duty one night/week and about 4 weekends/semester. During those nights and weekends, he must stay on campus and may receive a call on the duty phone at any hour. There are also certain times of the year when I expect that I won’t even see him; he’s only home to sleep. These include the entire month of August while student staff undergoes fall training, and hiring season in the spring when they recruit and interview student and professional staff.

Hubster gets a spring break and summer break like students do. Um, no. The university doesn’t close during these times, and neither do the residence halls. He may not have his days filled with meetings with his student staff, but he is quite busy catching up on other projects. Summer brings summer work – special projects, summer conference housing, and training.

You have an unlimited number of babysitters! Let me tell you, after overhearing some of the crazy crap that I have, there are a select few students that I would trust to care for my children.

The Funny

Sometimes I overhear ridiculous, hilarious things. Here are a few of my favorites:

Guy talking on phone: “YOU SLEPT WITH MY SISTER THIS WEEKEND?!”
Ladies chatting in hallway: “If I ever got pregnant, I would just die.” This elicited an eye roll from me from within my apartment, and it made me wonder if she knew there are places to get free contraceptives on campus.
Guys in hallway: “Dude, bitches can’t get enough of me!”
Female resident to her friend: “My life is so hard!” Oh sweet, naive young woman…life after college has loads more responsibility.

The Get-Me-Outta-Here

Students drive on the sidewalks. I have never experienced this at any other campus, but apparently it’s acceptable to just drive right up to the buildings here via the sidewalks. Are you kidding me?! First, how lazy are you? Second, I hate that I can’t let my toddler run just ahead of me for fear of some jackwagon zipping up the PEDESTRIAN SIDEWALK in his vehicle.

We live below a bunch of stompers. These people walk so heavily, I almost can’t even believe it. I don’t understand how anyone can make so much noise by walking. Sometimes our windows rattle. It’s obnoxious.

Our neighbors cook beef every. single. day. I really think I should notify them that there are other meats in existence. This has been particularly problematic because beef is one of my pregnancy aversions. Sometimes they even cook beef for breakfast. *gag*

Sometimes people are really unfriendly. Usually toddlers and babies make people smile, but most of the time I encounter students who think that parenthood must be contagious or something. You wouldn’t believe the amount of dirty looks I got when I was pregnant (both times, different campuses). Students could really stand to be friendlier. My nice, “Hi,” is typically met with a scowl or a quick aversion of the eyes. So weird.

We park in the resident parking lot. Read: a bit of a walk from our building. Before we had kids, this wasn’t a big deal. Now it’s rather problematic. I need to have a free hand to hold C’s when we cross the street to get to our building, which drastically limits how many groceries I can carry back to our building. Pretty soon, I’ll have to hold C’s hand and carry Baby Deuce…so I think my solo-with-the-kids shopping trips will be very limited. Yes, I can take the stroller; but since our building doesn’t have wheelchair-accessible automatic entrances, that option is also difficult.

While I’m happy that Hubster enjoys what he does and our living situation does have its benefits, this is why there are days when I find myself browsing the real estate app on my iPhone and daydreaming of moving OUT.

Becoming a Working Mom by Anna S. {Guest Post}

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Anna, a college friend of mine, is here today to tell us about her surprise entry into motherhood and how she balances being a mom and working full-time. Anna and her husband are also raising their son in a residence hall. I had to laugh at her hubby’s reaction to her positive pregnancy test – that was Hubster’s exact reaction as well! Thank you for being here, Anna!

Hi, I’m Anna, a wife, first time mom, and full time working professional. My family lives in Ripon, WI. My husband is a hall director at Ripon College. We live in a 2-bedroom apartment on campus all year long. Our son was born in July of 2011; which was the best surprise ever.

My husband and I were not trying to have kids; however not preventing either (we will say). I never thought I would be raising a child in a residence hall; however my life quickly changed. An October morning, I woke my husband up early to come see the results of the pregnancy test. Yep, there it was on our bathroom sink = POSITIVE. He hugged me and went back to bed. Gee.. thanks for the chat and guidance. I guess I will continue to get ready for work and carry on.

My pregnancy was healthy. I gained a lot of weight; however my doctor never said anything and it all came off now J I had awful morning sickness that lasted the first 4 months. Otherwise after my 2^nd trimester, I did great. (besides a co-worker calling me a whale; due to the amount of weight I gained). I was doing well until July 11^th (my son’s birthday).

I had gone in for my 40^th week check up to have an ultrasound and see my doctor. However, after the first few swipes of the ultrasound on my belly; we found out my son was frank breech. I went from being a full time working professional (I was suppose to go to work the next day) and wife to being a mom within hours. I was supposed to see my doctor at 3:30pm; instead I was being prepped for a c-section. At 5:07pm; my son was born. My husband describes the event as “NASCAR pit stop.” It was absolutely crazy, between the nurses, phone calls to family and work, other medical staff coming in, and prep for surgery. Off I went down the hall….

Hello Motherhood! The best part of my life!

After surgery and on my way to recovery

I spent 3 months home with my son before returning to work. It was a difficult first month for me. I was recovering from a c-section, breastfeeding and hormonal changes. I cried one time when my husband was trying to open a garbage bag and it woke our son. I was so mad, because I had just spent the last 15-30 minutes try to get him to sleep (I love hormones). By the end of the 3 months, I was ready to return to work.

I work at a nursing home that is about 20 miles from our apartment in Ripon.

I had babysitters from the college coming in and out of our apartment. I developed a schedule to cover from 9-5pm every day. I had 6 girls that rotated and divided up the hours to care for my son while my husband and I were at work. He got 1:1 attention and never had to leave the home. The college girls loved the break from schoolwork and enjoyed watching my son grow up. My husband would stop in throughout the day, so if any problems he was around.

I felt comfortable leaving my son home. I never had to worry about him having enough food, diapers, clothes and etc. I continued to breast-feed; I knew he always had extra milk in the freezer if he had a growth spurt that day and ate like a pig. It worked for us and that’s what mattered to me.

My son with a college babysitter

My son is now 10 months old, the school year is complete and my husband is off for June and July. He will spend his days with daddy now and will be going to daycare in August. I want him to be around other children; exposed to germs, learn to share, interact with others, and have fun. I feel okay about this next transition; as he is older now. I have given him a good base. I breast-fed for about 8 months and kept him healthy through it all (only 1 cold); he has been exposed to different people on campus; and got the 1:1 attention he needed for that first year. It’s now his turn to explore and learn.

Our family (yes he loves any bottle!)

Nighttime: An Open Letter to C

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Dearest C,

When you were super little, I very much enjoyed sharing our one bedroom with you. It was such a comfort to know that you were just a foot away from me. It was so easy to come to your aid in the middle of the night when you needed one of us. In the first couple of weeks, when my new maternal instinct was in overdrive and I had to check to make sure you were breathing, I didn’t need to go far.

Fast forward seven months…

You are quite a wild little sleeper. You like to bring your legs up in the air and slam them down on your mattress. You move your arms around all the time. Even though you still have no interest in rolling over, you rarely wake up in the same position that we set you down in.

In short, you’re loud. You’re also the lightest sleeper I have ever encountered.

When your dad or I enter the room to go to bed, we slowly turn the door handle and silently slip into the room. Regardless of how stealthily we attempt to be, we disturb your sleep. I don’t know if you can sense our presence or if we somehow disrupt the airflow of your sleeping radius. If we’re really lucky, you go back to sleep. But 90% of the time, you completely wake up just as I am drifting off to sleep. You wake up crying. Did I mention you’re a loud little person? Then we need to get out of bed, make you a bottle, feed you, put you back to bed, shut the door and cross our fingers that you fall asleep very quickly so that we can begin the process anew.

This entire process has become so troublesome that your father and I have contemplated moving our bed into the living room. The living room, C! Do you know what that would mean? If someone came to our door, the first thing that they would see is our bed. *sigh*

Raising you in a residence hall environment certainly has its pros and cons. I’m filing this under the “cons” and counting the days until your dad graduates and we can move on to a larger apartment.

Love,
Your tired mother, who wishes you were a heavier sleeper

Living in a Small Space With a Baby

Fire Alarms Galore!

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There are numerous benefits to living on-campus for Hubster’s position as a Hall Director, but there are moments (or nights) when those seem to be outweighed by the negative experiences. Tonight was one of those nights.

Less than two hours after C went to bed, the fire alarm went off. Now, this is not just your typical fire detector. Imagine an air horn siren and flashing strobe lights with a male voice saying, “ATTENTION, ATTENTION. PLEASE MOVE TO YOUR NEAREST EXIT. ATTENTION, ATTENTION.” It is truly terrifying to wake up to that. My poor son woke up to that noise FOUR times tonight. FOUR!

For the first alarm, we spent maybe 15 minutes outside. Less than 30 minutes after we came back inside…just when I got C to fall back asleep…it went off again. We spent significantly more time outside for that one. When we came back in, the strobe lights continued to flash for about 45 minutes. In the amount of time it took me to breathe a sigh of relief when the lights went off, the alarm sounded for a third time. Off we went…this time, we didn’t need to exit the building because it went off during repair. Go back to the apartment…get C to fall asleep…prepare myself for bed…and guess what? Yes, the alarm goes off AGAIN.

This time, C and I waited out at the front desk until the electrician and security left the building. Hopefully that means the rest of our night will be quiet.

As for Hubster, he’s lucky enough to be on duty tonight (sarcasm intended). He’s pretty much having the worst duty night he’s had since last spring, so he’ll probably end up pulling an all-nighter. Poor guy.

Here’s to hoping the rest of our night is alarm-free!