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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To sometimes find the school run completely dreadful?

85 replies

ICameOnTheJitney · 26/11/2013 21:45

I find that I go through periods of just hating it....the drag of getting the DC ready....mid week is worst when they're tired and the long week stretches out. I hate getting ready....I hate smiling that early in the morning....it's 2 miles for me so means a bus if I've not got a lift....it's so frigging WEARING!

I know it's not like going down a mine or something....but what a fucking commitment! Twice a day EVERY day while they're little. All that "Hi...how are you? Cold isn't it!" drives me NUTS.

OP posts:
Pogosticks · 26/11/2013 22:38

It can get a bit groundhog day, you're right.

Cindy34 · 26/11/2013 22:45

Its the worst part of my job (i'm a nanny). The battle in the morning to get then dressed, the reminding them that they need to take everything yet once in car a child will say they need x, y, z. The traffic jams, tricky road junctions, everyone in a hurry.

So nice come 9:15 when school run done, alas repeats again just under 6 hours later. Nope, can't walk... won't make it between schools on time - multiple children, multiple schools.

Ilovemydogandmydoglovesme · 26/11/2013 22:48

Brush your teeth. Brush your teeth. Brush your teeth. Get dressed. Get dressed. Get dressed. Eat your breakfast. Eat your breakfast. Eat your breakfast.

Then it's

Have you got everything? Why not? Where is it? Why didn't you tell me this last night?!!!

Etc.

I hate it. And then all the smiles and hellos to all the people you see twice a day every day and have absolutely nothing left to say to.

And then you do it all over again six and a half hours later. Except then it's

Where's your cardigan? Put your coat and wellies on please. Where's your book? Put your coat and wellies on now please. NOW!

Original poster
ICameOnTheJitney · 26/11/2013 22:52

Thank you for the sympathy and especially to those who understand that not ALL kids make walking a joy. I'd happily walk 2 miles if it were pleasant but even then, neither DC is a natural walker....they ride bikes there in the summer as there is a bike route which is longer than the road way but you can;'t walk it in the winter. It floods and besides it would be dark sometimes when the DC have clubs after school.

Sigh. Wednesday tomorrow...halfway point. I always feel better by Thursday!

OP posts:
PocketFluff · 26/11/2013 22:53

I don't think people are trying to be smug, just trying to put a different slant on things. Giving people the chance to look at things through fresh eyes. People are happier when they take pleasure in the every day, in the little things. Life is about trying to make the everyday special.

Then again, I haven't started the school runs yet so I could be talking a load of bollocks.

Original poster
ICameOnTheJitney · 26/11/2013 22:53

Oh and re driving....DH has the car....we can't afford two! And no...I could not pay for a taxi. It would cost me 12 pounds a day there and back! I could almost hire a bloody car for that weekly!

OP posts:
realblueprint · 26/11/2013 22:54

I like the walking and the chatting in the playground. I LOVE the school run when I only have to drop my 5 yr old.

It's dragging my 3 yr old along as well that nearly kills me. Fucking hell - argues about putting shoes on, refuses to go to the toilet first, sits on the pavement and refuses to walk, I take a scooter and she's on again/off again ad infinitum/runs off and gets lost in the big playground.

I nearly cried on the way home from school today because of her behaviour.

But the chatting and walking is all good!

Lilacroses · 26/11/2013 22:54

Completely agree with you. I was overjoyed when Dd was old enough to walk on her own. I do enjoy going to her school to events etc but I was sick to death of the boring routine of it and the hanging out in the playground making polite conversation day after day.

lolaisafuckertoo · 26/11/2013 22:54

I actually wept with gratitude last week when DH said he would drop dd off to school. Throw a starving woman a cracker and she'll think its steak. THe crowds at the old school freaked me out that I would end up behind a tree crying. People pushing, utterly oblvious to anyone else trying to complete the simiple task of getting the child and getting out. just why do they make such a meal out of it? all the clichés who won't fucking shit out the road stand there like great herds of wildebeest pissing on about bollox.
hate it too. that should say clicques but could read as cliché just the same.

Original poster
ICameOnTheJitney · 26/11/2013 22:55

Yes well Pocket it's hard to take pleasure in a walk when your child moans all the way. I do take pleasure in things thank you...but your last sentence tells me that you've got it all to come and you'll learn! Grin

OP posts:
Lilacroses · 26/11/2013 22:55

I did quite like it for the first 4 years though!

Original poster
ICameOnTheJitney · 26/11/2013 22:56

Lola I know! In our school WOE betide you if you come in one moment after the bell because then the herds of humans won't let you enter the frigging gate! They all rush and flood out oblivious to anyone trying to get in!

Bastards.

OP posts:
lolaisafuckertoo · 26/11/2013 23:00

You know what else I hate? When dd has a friend and the parents are obviously less than interested in a chat but you have to FORGE ON with endless chitty chatty when both of you would rather noodle along in a blurry daze. they don't want to, I don't want to but social niceties must be observed. I have enven tried to get dd to just let them walk ahead. which makes me sound very weird but I am so there.

realblueprint · 26/11/2013 23:01

Pocketfluff, yes you're talking bollocks Grin

Or else you'll be one of those Mum's at the school gate who live a 5 minute walk away and have one well behaved child of 5 to drop off turning your nose up at those of us who have to drag more than one child a couple of miles.

SauceForTheGander · 26/11/2013 23:01

I hate it too and mine is pretty easy though got 3 DC to get ready. Ground hog day. Stuck saying the same bloody shit every day.

PocketFluff · 26/11/2013 23:04

That's why I wrote it!! I have done school runs, but as a job ages ago, not with my own yet.

I'm sure you do take lots of pleasure in things, I just thought I'd write it as if someone (anyone!) is getting frustrated/exasperated with children it's sometimes worth turning it around and making it into a game. Life is so much better when the mundane is fun!

WhoKnowsWhereTheTimeGoes · 26/11/2013 23:04

I hate the getting ready part with the need for endless reminders but the minute we step out the door I love it and I miss it on the odd occasion I don't do it. Ours is a 10 min walk though, so it's easy. I love chatting with the other parents, I have to remind myself I need to get off to work and not stand and chat for ages. Going to really miss it when DD starts to go on her own (DS already does).

bababababoom · 26/11/2013 23:05

YANBU. Biefore I took my lot out of school, it was something i used to dread. Bus there and back, twice a day, day in, dfay out, and hanging around for the bus back, in all weathers. Soul destroying. You have my sympathy :-(I

giraffeseatpineapples · 26/11/2013 23:05

I mostly hate it. Often late but that means far from avoiding everyone I see even more parents sans children on their way out walk of shame

lolaisafuckertoo · 26/11/2013 23:06

some days the method of making it fun is effective. but when it feels like a relentless treadmill, even the heartiest of us feel our sunny disposition take a nose dive. Some autumnal mornings are just a blessing to be out in, others less so. it is also one of those things that there are literally no alternatives.
Unless you start a bit of a rotation with some other that might live nearby. give yourself one afternoon off a week when kids can be herded home by someone else.
though if the road is a bit of a danger then it is hard to relax if someone else is there.

Bedsheets4knickers · 26/11/2013 23:08

This has made me lol I'm not even at that stage yet . Summer lovely, winter Im going to be awful.

realblueprint · 26/11/2013 23:08

Nope, not with you there, pocketfluff.

It should be ok for some things that we do as parents to not be lovely and fluffy and fun. If it's shit, it doesn't mean it's shit because we choose for it to be shit. It's shit because it's fucking hard work, and tedioius and soul-destroying and people telling us to enjoy it just makes it even worse.

legoplayingmumsunite · 26/11/2013 23:09

It can be a nightmare, especially at this time of year. Last year I was on maternity leave so was doing the school run every day. One day DD2 peed herself on the walk home. The next day she was sick in the street. The third day we took the car!

Now I'm back at work DH has to walk them to nursery for wrap around care every day and doesn't have the option of taking the car. Sure it's lovely on a nice sunny day but when it's raining or freezing and still dark outside in the morning it's not much fun at all (they leave the house at 7.30).

realblueprint · 26/11/2013 23:10

Admittedly, perhaps I'm slightly jaded as I have one at school and one at pre school (on a different, further away site) and currently do a morning school run, a lunchtime school run and an afternoon school run totalling 3+ fecking hours a day.

LydiasLunch · 26/11/2013 23:11

Is there a childminder nearby you could drop them at? I am one and some days I have six moaning children to walk to school- I don't have a car either. They are mostly lovely though but I have one very slow walker and the rest race ahead...