To be crying at this

Sorry but you have no idea what other people are thinking unless they tell you. At least some of us are looking at you thinking thank the gods that I am no longer in stage of life. And you simply do not know that you are in the best years of your life. I find it very sad that you think that child rearing is as good as your life gets.

I think it is really important for women not to make their life just about their kids. Of course they are the most important part of your life, especially when they are younger. But it is really important to focus on yourself as a person and have friends or hobbies or work or other things going on.

Yes, it is an emotional milestone when the kids leave home. But you can then move onto a different stage of life with other happy memories and also live a life of your own. If your life is empty, then it will be much easier to focus wistfully on the busy, chaotic years of early childhood. As long as you have other stuff going on for you, you don’t have to weep about the years gone by. You can also think about the future that lies ahead for you, a different stage of being. It is not necessarily all sad and empty.

Awww I quite liked it! I look at my stroppy pre-teens and sometimes don't even recognise them as the little creatures they once were.

Anything to do with seeing or speaking to your mum again always gets me though.

Yes obviously everyone is different that's true that some mothers are glad to be past those days.
I guess there's just something sometimes in the way they look that seems like there's a sense of wishing they could go back, and you do sometimes hear older people say that their years with young children were the best years of their life.

Wow, so much vitriol! 😳

I often see middle aged- older ladies looking wistfully at me with my little ones and can tell they are probably thinking how lucky i am, that these are the best years of my life and to relish that.

Don’t assume! As a middle-aged older woman, I am not remotely like that. I would rather be now, having mini breaks with my young adult kids and watching crap TV with them, rather than pushing swings in a playground or sitting through an interminable school concert! We are all different and not all full of regret. I adore my children but I prefer them grown up ;-)

I'm in my 30s and it really got me, but I'm an emotional and sentimental sort of person and mothering young children is a dream come true for me, so it's sad to imagine it ending one day.

My husband read this out to me the other day and I was bawling, and it's making me cry again now.

I often see middle aged- older ladies looking wistfully at me with my little ones and can tell they are probably thinking how lucky i am, that these are the best years of my life and to relish that.

I dread being like that one day :(

It's a nice little piece, obviously manipulating the heartstrings but truthful enough.

I quite often have similar dreams where I'm back in the company of lost loved ones, and relishing the moment. They're really very comforting.

It’s very badly written and twee. Short sentences to hide the fact that they can’t write.

That's a negative way to look at it. It's not even just about parents. I struggle with my mental health at times and one of the things that helps me is to practice gratitude. So if I'm having a tough time at work, I'm feeling skint, I'm having issues with my friends or family, I'm not feeling well or something, it does help me to put it in perspective and think 'the good news is that I have a job, I might be tight for money this month but I can afford the essentials and some, I am healthy and mobile. It could be a lot worse'.

I don't read it that way. I'm a very happy 56 year old with a life I love. I wouldn't want a pernenant return to my 30s. But one day to go back and visit my small children and see and hear my mum again? I'd be there for that in a heart beat.

It's really not nice or reassuring either. So when im feeling shit I should savour it because in 20 years its going to be soooo much shitter?

🤣 sorry, I know that's not exactly what you meant. But I still think whatever message it's giving, about 80% of parents reading it will wish it hadn't bothered.

It's not completely different

It doesn't happen overnight

And it's just normal

I don't spend my days living in the past

Crying here too. I think its something that's only meaningful to people at the age of looking back though. If I'd seen it in my 30s I'd be rolling my eyes and it wouldn't have made me stop and be appreciative. You rarely do know what you've got till it's gone. Such is human nature.

Exactly. It’s all so extreme and unrealistic. And always aimed at mums.

Well, that's my reaction, and the reaction of most people who are well acquainted with working and parenthood. But if you'll read some of the posters experiences above, there are some veteran parents out there who'll have you believe different.

These things are always written about tired mums with younger kids. Mums who are not meant to care about housework and cleaning, but are instead meant to gaze at their little kids, savouring every moment. It makes me cringe and it is too much pressure.

You are... Again I think you're totally missing the point. It's just about counting your blessings and could apply to any stage of life. The writing is presumably aimed at a 32 year old young mother, but could just as easily be aimed at a 55 year old mother of adults in their 20s. Imagine you're having a bad day, your boiler has broken, you've had a fight with your daughter, your washing has been caught in the rain, and you're totally fed up. It's more about realising that one day (all being well) you'll be older or sicker and will look back on these days as the 'good old days'.

It's really not that deep guys.

Because all that equally nauseating “18 summers” bullshit makes women (again, not men), think that once your children turn 18, they disappear in a puff of smoke. It’s just not true.

Your cleaning up right away made me remember a woman I used to know when my eldest was a toddler.

She always said she loved every second with her children, so she did nothing but play. Which is great (her child was one of those ones who was just so easy going and lovely, my ds was Damien in comparison, so no, I did not love every second), but no one loves everything about something.

One day, she invited a few of us from playgroup to her house and christ, it was in the days of Kim and Aggy, and it was like a house off one of their programmes. Everybody suddenly became extremely hydrated and refused a drink as the kitchen was disgusting.

Anyway, she stated going on and on about how she spend every second with her child, how we were all wasting our time tidying up. One very blunt women stepped on a stray cat shit and said, “for the love of fuck woman, shut up and clean your hovel, your kid won’t thank you for this no matter how many puzzles you do with her.”

I know that’s an extreme example, but she’s who I think of when I hear people say the cleaning can wait. She took that and ran with it.

Why are we not allowed to enjoy life when our kids have left home? Wth my kids, we are still very close, and communicate nearly every day via WhatsApp. We go on holiday together and have fun as adults. They discuss the importance stuff in life and seek out my advice. It can be incredibly rewarding. In many ways more so than the days of changing nappies or doing the school run, exhausted and drained.

I think it’s actually quite weird to yearn for the days when the kids were younger and not value the time you have now with them. It is just as special but different. The relationship will continue to change and evolve, but it can still be great.

Who are these ‘older people’ you’re generalising about? Those who’ve brought up kids know the relentlessness and the hard work and would never go back to it. That poem is fanciful bollocks and most posters on this thread have said the same!

Yeah it’s lovely and sentimental. but let’s not pretend life is all roses when you are trying to bring up kids, keep a full time professional job, keep house tidy, bills paid, pets looked after and trying to stay healthy.

to be honest bog off with this shit