I know what it is like to give up the pursuits of your youth. I used to do a lot of somewhat dangerous (in retrospect) outdoor activities. I used to mountain bike (serious single-track stuff); now I only take a casual jaunt along paved jogging trails, and only once in a blue moon. I used to salt-water kayak, reading tidal charts and plotting navigational courses in treacherous waters; this can be a very dangerous sport if you don't know what you're doing. Now I hardly get out more than once a year in a canoe on flat water lakes. I also used to smoke, drink and go out late to pubs and bars with friends. I don't do any of that stuff any more either.
By the time I became a father, I had given up all these foolish or reckless activities. I did so willingly, because God had blessed my W and I with children after nearly ten years struggling to start our family, and I wanted to be around when they were all grown and married and having kids of their own. It would have been the height of irresponsible folly for me to carry on like I was a single, unmarried young man when I had a family who now depended on me. Seriously, I love(d) sea kayaking, but it can risk your very life if you don't take careful precaution.
And yet those "sacrifices" (or more appropriately, "trade-offs") were still not enough to satisfy W that I was committed to her and our family. She still wanted to exert more control over my interests and direct them solely onto what she felt were important.
Paradoxically, at the same time, the fact that I was becoming more "tame" probably disappointed my W -- she has undoubtedly felt some guilt, remorse and disappointment that I willingly domesticated myself for the sake of my family -- and became less "interesting" too. So W did not really appreciate how I changed my lifestyle and interests to become a father.
I guess with W, as in so many things with her, it was/is a no win situation either way.
