Dear Heather,

My husband is pursuing a masters degree. We both work full-time and have an adorable 4-year old daughter. My problem may sound small, but it is becoming a big issue! My husband’s free time is filled with classes and studying, and I’m getting a little resentful. I have no choice but to take my daughter on errands with me. We can’t afford a sitter and have no family in town. I have become the mom with the screaming child at the grocery store, and I hate it. My daughter is understandably bored and wants to play. Our time together is less than I’d like already with me working full-time. I want her to have good memories of her times with me, and it feels like I’m always the bad guy who drags her where she doesn’t want to go! I can’t cut my hours back with my husband in school.  How do people do this?

A: Taking your question a step further: “how do people keep their relationships and joy intact while they do this?” 

Well-meaning grandmotherly types may tell you these are the best years of your life. Perhaps so, but that probably isn’t your first thought when your darling is the tantrum-throwing entertainment of Register #8. Motherhood is labor intensive. Throw in a full-time job and studying spouse and you’ve added another 12 hours to a 24-hour day. Life is good. All the elements for happiness are in place. But maybe you wish you could enjoy one piece of it at a time -- with a catered meal, candlelight and eight hours of sleep. Understandable.

Accepting that there is no option but to bring your daughter with you to the grocery, let’s look at how to minimize the stress and maximize the mother/daughter time, because that’s what this is -- time with your daughter. Mother/daughter time isn’t all pedicures and posies. It can come during the drive to piano lessons, while washing the dog or even at the grocery. 

The trigger points for the younger set generally gravitate around boredom, hunger and exhaustion. There’s no magic wand solution for these, but a little prevention can go a long way. With hunger, for instance: Yes, it would be nice to have a family dinner after you get home from the store. However, if your child is hungry and watching food go by from the front row seat of a shopping cart, it might be better to pack her a brown bag dinner that she can eat at the market. I did this many times with my own kids and found that carry-in picnics also helped alleviate boredom. Let her participate by either coloring lunch sacks ahead of time or by helping pack her own food.

Reframing the grocery trip as "mother/daughter time" means shopping a little slower to maximize the experience rather than to simply put it behind you. Make it a game. My kids enjoyed being given an imaginary remote controller. I’d ask them to push buttons to go forward, reverse and to pause while I picked items from the shelves. Another favorite game was to scavenger hunt for colors, animals or shapes on the packages. Get creative. The alphabet game isn’t just for long car rides. Try to find letters A to Z in sequence (if you make it to the ziti, it’s time to go home).

The most tedious meetings are the ones where you are an uninvested observer, so find ways to engage your daughter in the grocery experience. Let her judge the finalist between two food items, and when the last item is bagged, let her throw away the list. You probably can’t sell her on “the Grocery.” Save that experiment for your next kid’s formative years. But, if you exude an enthusiasm for the mother/daughter time, the grocery trips may be more fun. Or, at least not so horrible.

If you have a question for Heather, email her at Heather@heatherdugan.com and maybe she'll answer it in her next column!