Brief history, I am 29, currently a stay at home mum to our 2 beautiful DS's one age 5, one 14 months. DH is great with the kids, very hands on and works very hard. To the whole world we must seem like the perfect family. We've been together for 11 years and have a stable loving marriage so no issues there.
BUT I can not find myself to feel happy. I remember feeling similar after DS1 was born for the first couple of years. I feel bored and restless yet have zero energy.
The baby is hard work (as was DS1 as a baby). He whinges and moans most of the day, not full on crying but just grizzling if things get out of his reach or he gets bored or tired (all normal I am sure but it is literally one thing after another and very extreme with him). I am exhausted every day by bedtime. I ache from sitting on the floor trying to appease him. I find that I feel torn between the two boys every day. If I am busy with DS2 I feel suilty for DS1, if I am with DS1, DS2 whinges. I know people manage more kids, busier lives etc but every day I feel like I am scrabbling and drowning just waiting for DH to come home and relieve me of DS2. 
I feel so drained by him and the whinging. I can't go to many places as all my friends have placid happy babies while mine is moaning and frustrated. He's not yet walking so I think it's frustration but I am not sure. DS1 was much the same til he could talk. I just keep thinking I am doing everything wrong.
When DS1 was a baby it nearly killed me suffering like this until very gradually he became older and I fell in love with him nd love doing things with him.
I just feel like I don't really know what to do with DS2 
. I find myself talking to him because I have to not because it comes naturally. I iver think everything I say to him so that he can get the maximum amount of understanding from it if that makes sense? I try to interact with him 'perfectly' to help him with his language development and I am exhausted by trying to be 'perfect' because none of it comes naturally to me at all.
I don't even know why I am rambling like this. I know I felt like this with DS1 and it was actually the most miserable time of my life. I genuinely sold all his baby things and kept only his first sleep suit and first pair of shoess because I couldn't bare to be reminded of how he used to be and how I felt being around him. Of course that makes me feel hidiously guilty now as I autterly adore him.
I do love DS2 but like DS1 he's just always been such a grumpy hard to please baby. I went to the doctors and got citalipram anti depressants when he was 7 months old because of how I felt. I got referred to counselling which I still go for but basically none of it can help because it's just ground hog day, every day I just cope because I have to. I genuinely get no enjoyment from anything except DS1 but even then he can stress me out when DS2 is whinging. I rarely snap at them and have never ever hit them but sometimes I am biting my tongue not to just tell them both to FUCK off because I am so stressed out which I know is horrible and I have never done that but that's how I feel.
I don't even know why I feel like this. All my friends with babies seem to be all over their cooing bundles of joy. When mine were tiny babies they cried so much I was honestly suicidal. DS2 is now nearly a toddler yet I really hate being around him. I just seem to make difficult babies and I can't see a way out of this. I really can not see the point in anything right now.
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Mental health
Feel like there is just no point to any of this. I need to talk.
MrsDonnieDarko · 07/03/2013 19:42
You poor thing. I just could not read without posting. I totally get what you are saying. I have 4 children and I can remember moments when they were smaller when it literally felt that all value had suddenly dropped out of the world.
And when it's cold and you're in a park somewhere, trying to do the right thing and you're BORED out of your mind. It is relentless. Two of mine were awful sleepers and cried a great deal. I distinctly remember thinking that the whole baby market (clothes, fluffy toys etc) was a cruel lie. Firstly: you are not wrong - it IS very hard, and you sound as if you are a lovely mother. Secondly: I strongly feel some people are never meant to be babies IYSWIM, they make much better big people! This will come, believe me. As mine get older I love taking them one at a time up to London for the day, for instance. Really joyful times. You are so nearly past the worst with DS2, who will be toddling about and answering back really soon! My youngest is now 20 mths and immeasurably easier. Please go easy on yourself, my heart goes out to you.
Ps I also discovered i had a seriously under active thyroid for years, and since that has been treated, nothing has ever seemed quite so impossible. Worth a thought? Excuse the essay!!
Oh thank you futureperfect you have no idea how much posts like these are helping me. Thank you for taking the time to respond.
That's exactly it, I feel like all the value has dropped out of the world, all value of ME has gone. I have given up my job since having DS2 and I am so incredibly bored. I love being around DS1. I find him genuinely interesting, I love his personality and he makes me proud and happy every day. I just find it so hard juggling his needs with the whinging of DS2! I look at DS2 and obviously I love him. I really do want the best for him, I want him to be HAPPY and he's just not a happy baby. He never has been. I think if DS1 had been a happy baby I would have perhaps realised it was just his personality but because they have both been like this I find myself constantly thinking I must just be crap. I must have done something wrong. I must not be maternal. Maybe he's picking up on something that others don't see. Maybe he doesn't feel safe and loved enough. I don't know.
I feel like if after school I take DS1 to the park, DS2 will be whinging to get out the pushchair yet he can't walk so I will take him and put him on the baby swings etc but by doing that I am ignoring DS1 on the big swings. If I take them swimming, DH stays with DS2 in the baby pool, I go swimming with DS1 or vise versa. I feel like DS2 has somehow devided our family. I don't resent him for it, I am sure many families have this it's just that if given the choice I would always choose to go do an activity with DS1 not DS2 which again adds to the guilt. I don't like him at all :-( I feel stressed and lathargic just being around him. I sound like the worst mother in the world I know. I am really hoping that as DS2 becomes a toddler, walking talking, he'll become an amazing little person in the way DS1 did. I just don't know how much longer I can keep faking it. I am dreading the Easter holidays already as I struggle with them both round the house but like I said getting out with them is so stressful. I end up trying to do too much, bking with DS1, building towers with DS2 whilst feeling guilty for DS1 watching TV, colouring with DS1 while DS2 whinges, I want so much to keep them both happy and end up just failing them both.
Sorry, this has turned into a dissertation not just an essay!
If you are still around futureperfect can I just ask you, if you have felt like this, how did you have the strength and courage to have 4 children??? That is not in anyway a critisism, I am in awe of you! I'd have loved a bigger family. I look at DS1 and I want a house full of kids, then I look at DS2 and think NEVER AGAIN
Hi - MrsD sounds like you are getting worn down. I just wanted to post to let you know you are not alone with the whingey, grizzly, hard-work baby. My dd is now 5.5 mths and is like this all the time. It is hard work! She does enjoy things but quickly gets bored. She requires constant attention just to keep her ticking over. After a few months it was wearing me down a little. The first thing that helped me cope was viewing the day in little slots. Maybe an hour at a time. It seemed ok if she was going to groan and whine for an hour, I could manage that. If I thought for a second she was going to be doing it for the next 10 hours I started to feel awful! In each 'slot' I make myself do something, even if it is just bobbling her around the house looking at the cats and pictures, or out the window. Time can drag but I don't let myself think about the monotony because I don't want to let it get me down. Easy for me to say though.
The second thing is I have two slings. One is a comfy, inward facing one that she can go in if she needs to sleep and I can't make my arms carry her anymore. The other is a more rigid outward facing one that she can look about it, still giving my arms a rest. This is by no means a grizzle-free solution but I can't leave her alone and the movement helps keep her from getting really cross.
The third thing is find classes that can give your baby something to stimulate them - and you'll be around other people. I'm very shy and don't really talk to people but I exchange hello's and it's nice to not be alone all the time. I've been going to book-time, baby sensory, singing groups and we're going to start swimming soon. She does still grizzle but I found that she did enjoy it and I ignore the noise. Usually you can't hear her over the music/activities etc!
I don't know if this is helpful to you. Everyone is different and although you are overwhelmed with your own feelings and how they affect you I don't think you are in that different a situation from a lot of other people. It is ok to feel like that and totally expected too, in my opinion. Your dc1 has turned out beautifully so you are obviously a fab mum. 
Happy Mother's Day mrs donnie (love that film btw) hope today is easier for you and you're having a fuss made of YOU
I can relate to what you say about ds2 somehow dividing the family. My ds1 was my sun moon and stars when ds2 came along and I've felt incredibly guilty that for a whole year I've effectively had to ignore him a lot (compared to how lose we were) BUT it has done him good, he's growing up and needs the Seperation from me to allow him his own interests. We were like a little double act but he's becoming much more his own little man.
I think once your ds2 is walking it will make things a whole lot easier. He will be able to interact more with his brother -following him around and playing (whether ds1 likes it or not!) you're so nearly there, the relief I felt once ds2 was walking and starting to spend some time independently however briefly was immeasurable.
Just now they are all playing on the floor and I'm sitting here chatting to you- a month ago there is no way I could've done that.
Chin up xxx and have a great day 
I'm still here Mrs DD. Yes, four children, but well spaced out in age! DS1 is 16, DS2 is 13, DD is 9 and DS3 is 20 months. So all of the older ones can hold/ play with the little one, which makes things easier. Also, like you, I have a very supportive OH, which helps. I bet you are your own harshest critic. I expect from the outside people think you are doing a fantastic job. Sometimes as a mother you just need to be good enough - you don't have to be perfect. TV is fine, just folding laundry with a toddler is fine - you don't have to do special 'activities'. Unfortunately our society does not always value the real work of being a parent, which can be soul-destroying. (It must be similar to caring for any needy and dependent person 24/7). You are very brave to voice what many people feel but are too afraid to admit: it is sometimes HARD. But the fact that you are worried about getting it 'right' shows that you are a lovely mother. Be kind to yourself. You are not inadequate at all - quite the opposite. The sun will come out soon, and things will get easier as DS2 grows. You know yourself that the highest-need infants can grow into the sparkiest kids. Do tell your OH that it is sometimes tough. But keep on keeping on!
MrsDD - if you are interested I have a copy of a book ('What Mothers Do: Especially When it Looks Like Nothing') that I could pass on. Some of it may be helpful to you? Do you know how to PM me with your address (I don't!)
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