Sick Days Are For Video Games and Letting Go

Control is an illusion, even before children. Sometimes, a sick day flips the script.

If getting a call from daycare in the middle of a workday isn’t the starkest reminder that you’re never truly in control as a parent, I don’t know what is.

Control is an illusion even before children, to be fair. Once a small person enters the picture, it’s just more apparent. Gaming analogy incoming: with children, you’re forcefully thrust into a New Game+. Keep your level and your loot, but the enemy scaling is out of this world, and there’s no load game button.

The comforting illusion of being in the driver’s seat comes back little by little as the tiny boss baby grows. Maybe they start sleeping through the night. Maybe the naps get more predictable. The fancy baby French toast ends up in their mouth at last, not on the floor. They take their first steps. You get hugs and eventually kisses. It all starts to feel… workable, even before the ultimate level up of toddlerhood arrives.

Daycare.

(Putting a child in daycare isn’t universal, or available, or even desired for many families, of course. I’m grateful to have the option; in addition to being a necessity, it’s what works best for mine.)

As I luxuriate in the quietness of my home office, with my baby away from home on weekdays, I finally have time to think, to work, and to focus. I even play games during the day here and there—sometimes. I justify it as work, especially if I’m reviewing a game or writing a piece that asks for a quick screenshot. I never played video games during the day before the baby came. It feels a little cheeky now.

Still, the list of things to accomplish during the day constantly replays in my head like a 24/7 news channel ticker. I’m hyper-aware of the time passing. A gaming session I can squeeze in must be short, half an hour tops, so I choose the games accordingly.

“Just one more run!” roguelikes like Cult of The Lamb (cute little satanic sacrifice, anyone?) or the deck-building Slay The Spire are a recent favorite for those. If I’m focused on a big RPG, I only boot it up if I have a specific in-game errand, a fun task, or a quest I’m confident I can wrap up in the short time frame I have. Like popping into Kingdom Come Deliverance II to look for herbs and brew some potions… Although I haven’t dared play Kingdom Come during the day—yet.

Big games like that are safer bets for nighttime, when I can finally get off the clock and go bum around the imaginary worlds for a few hours without real-life consequences.

To me, video games are a small way to safely feel in control. It’s a very necessary thing in parenting. Perhaps any hobby done purely for the sake of enjoyment outside of childrearing can do that—it is a revolutionary act to choose to step away and to do something ostensibly unproductive just to rest.

Gaming, though, offers an unmatched level of control reclaiming. You’re in charge of someone’s actions, decisions, and movement, and they don’t protest or complain about it. What would be harmful with real children is just fine in the video game context. The pixels are yours to command! There’s predictability, and failsafes, and only your own clumsy fingers to blame if something goes wrong. I love RPGs for that reason—I can role-play bad decisions or model good behavior and no one gets hurt!

One day, it’s a day just like any other. It’s 11:26 am, my coffee isn’t even finished yet, and the draft has barely begun to take shape. The phone rings. “She has a fever, would you please come pick her up?”

Whoosh goes the plan. Not just for the day—but for half the week. Forget unplanned gaming in the afternoon; in a fraction of a second, my brain has already begun rescheduling and canceling work calls and writing sessions. The baby isn’t going back until the day after tomorrow and that’s the best-case scenario. As I scramble out of the door, the anxiety catches up with me: What is wrong with her? Is it teething? Is it a cold? Is it hand, foot, and mouth? Again?

With all the mental gymnastics of frantically rearranging the work days comes that sinking feeling of loss. The reminder that control never existed. Once again, I need to surrender to it all. Sick days bring back memories of newborn days because of that. The routine goes out the window, not just the baby’s, but mine, too. I have more responsibilities outside of my child now, but she is my number one priority, always. This privilege of caring for her comes with the weight of shifting my own burdens towards the time I count on to rest.

I fight with everything I’ve got against everything I’ve internalized as a woman to reclaim rest time and feel no guilt over it. There is more of it when the household is healthy and everyone goes about their day in the usual way, but my mental load as a mother is still enormous. Gaming specifically is my chosen outlet that I not only need but feel I deserve.

When push comes to shove, how do I reconcile the motherhood responsibilities with my own needs? Is it the sleep, the quiet, or the gaming that will have to give?

It’s hard to make those choices when you have come to rely on the routine that allows you to accommodate all of the above. I try to find crumbs of rest here and there, everywhere I can. Everything goes on sick days, both for me and the baby. If that means giving myself permission to play a little during naps instead of frantically working, so be it. Gaming time is sacred time, and I try to give myself more leeway in these trying times. My husband reminds me to, as well.

Ultimately, sick days are the perfect time to practice letting go, while finding a bit of order where we can. A little semblance of control achieved through play is a big help in accepting that with everywhere else, we’re just along for the ride.

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