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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think that having children turns your life into a long series of things you don’t want to do?

221 replies

Cheekysquirrel · 31/12/2018 09:12

Does anyone else find this? I spend my life basically doing things I don’t want to do but obviously I do them for my children’s sake.
I don’t want to watch ds play rugby / football in the cold / rain while trying to entertain a bored dd.
I don’t want to take dd to boring toddler / preschool parties.
I don’t want to go to soft play.
I don’t want to troop them to swimming lessons and have the hassle of getting them ready before / after.
I really really don’t want to go to any more adventure farms
I don’t want to do boring trails around places like national trust properties

Argh. I am a terrible selfish parent clearly but I am so BORED. Today I’m taking them to some children’s museum. Ds(9) is moaning already because he will have to be removed from his iPad which he had for Christmas. They will fight while we are out. So it’s not even like they are grateful / enjoy it themselves!
I would love to be able to go to the shops and have a look and get some lunch, on my own.

Aibu? Is parenting just always this dull?

OP posts:
Lweji · 31/12/2018 10:02

There's a fairly short window when they are fairly independent but you can still drag them along. Save it for that time. Wink

OneStepMoreFun · 31/12/2018 10:02

@hazyjane sorry to hear that. It's horrible, DS2's life wa slike that for a few years. Maybe that's why I adore all the 'dull stuff. It beats hanging round hospitals being told they've found yet another complication.

AlaskanOilBaron · 31/12/2018 10:02

Posts like this make me seriously reconsider whether I actually want kids. I know people say the good bits make up for it, but is it genuinely worth it? If you had your time again would you still choose kids?

I would absolutely have my children 1000x over again, but I was worried that I would find it boring, and I absolutely did.

They are so gorgeous and it's a love affair you can't imagine, but playing Legos or whatever is mindnumbingly dull. I generally just narrated what they were doing rather than doing it with them.

Kescilly · 31/12/2018 10:02

I'm a little worried about this. I have wanted a child for so long and I'm finally pregnant, but I think I may have gotten too used to a child free life. We went to a crowded toy store the other day and it made me wonder what we have gotten into.

PippaParty · 31/12/2018 10:02

What about good quality toys and play, at home.

Lego, Duplo, train sets, dolls house, k-nex etc. They need to learn to occupy themselves, to build their concentration, to persevere and be self reliant. It maybe short bursts at first but through developing their interests can be extended. I am sure we have all forgotten that children need to be children.

MariaNovella · 31/12/2018 10:03

You aren’t supposed to play Lego with them. They are supposed to play on their own.

abbsisspartacus · 31/12/2018 10:04

I call it a series of unfortunate events

nokidshere · 31/12/2018 10:05

Don't get this. I loved doing these things with my children - a second, lovely, exciting childhood for me as well as interesting, entertaining and educational for them. I miss it now they are grown up. Why have children if you find them so boring?

She doesn't find her children boring, just some of the things they do. I've done plenty of tedious and boring things with my children but I did them because they loved it not me. The most boring thing I found was the park. Omg I absolutely hated it, but we went, with a smile, because they wanted to almost every day for years.

And what is more boring than cricket? Hours upon hours upon hours watching other people's children play. I've been on a cricket pitch every week from April till September every year for the past 15yrs, sometimes 4/5 times a week. It's Boring with a capital B. But I wouldn't have changed a minute of it for that brief moment of joy when they hit a six, or were man of the match, or showed particularly good sportsmanship, or for the absolute joy they get out of playing. But my goodness, cricket is boring!

They are 20 and 17 now, they take themselves to cricket and everywhere else. I sometimes miss the little boys they were but I will never miss not having to go to the park ever again.

MariaNovella · 31/12/2018 10:06

*What about good quality toys and play, at home.

Lego, Duplo, train sets, dolls house, k-nex etc. They need to learn to occupy themselves, to build their concentration, to persevere and be self reliant.*

Absolutely. A really good dolls house or train set is the sort of toy that lasts for years.

KingLooieCatz · 31/12/2018 10:07

You have a tough gig with a three year old, an age gap and the older child having ASD, not interested in playing with friends. Is there any scope to get the older child into the kind of time consuming but not terribly expensive hobby that typically appeals to the kind of children he might have more in common with, or at least take the pressure of you entertaining him?

Model building? Table top gaming?

Do you have to stay for the whole sport session? When DS did rugby there were definitely more children than parents, and he was younger than 9. There may have been lift shares going on.

ladybee28 · 31/12/2018 10:08

Posts like this make me seriously reconsider whether I actually want kids. I know people say the good bits make up for it, but is it genuinely worth it? If you had your time again would you still choose kids?

This, 1000 times over.

It makes perfect sense that everyone feels totally different about it, and that there is absolutely no way I'll ever be able to predict how it is for me until (if) it happens, and that scares me silly.

I've always thought I'd much prefer to regret not having children than to regret having them, so I've not done it. But the possibility of regretting not having them / always wondering how it might have been doesn't feel the best either!

Finding this thread really interesting – thank you to PPs who have already shared how it feels!

redexpat · 31/12/2018 10:09

Im not in the Uk and reading Mn i often feel exhausted by the amount of activities all of your dc do. We sometimes do one thing at the weekends, and even then my colleeagues commented on how busy we are. The dc have one club that they go to during the week. Playdates happen more for dd but are also occasional. I think if I was raising them in the UK I would probably go down with stress.

formerbabe · 31/12/2018 10:11

I saw it as a very complicated catering project. It seems just like one meal after another.

Grin All I do in school holidays is prepare food and clear up the kitchen....ALL DAY!

JudasPrudy · 31/12/2018 10:12

Yes I don't like soft play etc BUT the alternatives are worse:

  • stay at home and everyone gets cabin fever + you have screen time guilt

Or

  • not having the little buggers in our lives - can't think of anything worse!
Satsumaeater · 31/12/2018 10:12

Totally agree! But when they grow up, you get a lot of time to yourself and kind of miss it

and in a lot of cases get a dog or dogs and restrict your freedom to do what you want massively, again.

I think some people just need to be needed. I am not one of them and perhaps the OP isn't either.

QwertyLou · 31/12/2018 10:12

@Pachyderm1 yes, I would still have had my son! I can relate to what OP describes... he’s still the best thing to ever happen to me so I feel very lucky.

But people who don’t have kids are certainly not missing out on an elixir of undiluted joy, nor is life incomplete without kids, the way it is sometimes portrayed.

OneStepMoreFun · 31/12/2018 10:12

redexpat, we're nto all like this. DC had one maybe two activities a week and a playdate every fortnight. But they had many classmates with two activities a night and playdates lined up all around them.

MrsJBaptiste · 31/12/2018 10:13

Hell, I must be weird then as I loved toddler groups, soft play and swimmin when my two were little. Generally we did always go with friends though which does make it easier as you can sit drinking coffee while all the kids charge off.

What I don't understand are people like my sister who have to go somewhere every single weekend - farms, train museums, parks - what's wrong with staying at home once in a while and letting your kids play? It's ok for children to know what it's like to be bored, you know!

pictish · 31/12/2018 10:13

Ha ha...I am laughing at this because I recently coined this feeling to dh as Kiddyshit Fatigue and I’ve definitely got it.

We have three children. Our eldest is 17 our youngest is 9. I’ve been doing kiddyshit for a looong time now and find I am growing increasingly weary of activities, parties, play dates, school gates, brownie camps, scout fundraising, Christmas fayres, permission slips, the PTA and picking up and dropping off. I was a sahm for 10 of those years and more enthusiasm and time for it all back then. I work full time now and it’s just yet another chore, another requirement I have to fulfill.

I has got me down a bit recently because our house is being renovated as well. I’m tired and stressed and somehow have to find the reserves to keep it up for my younger children who are both super. My dh is wonderful but owing to personal circumstances is unable to provide much support with social kiddyshit - he makes up for it in other ways.
That gig has been mine from day one. 17 years on and it’s getting old.

Yanbu.

JudasPrudy · 31/12/2018 10:14

'If you had your time again would you still choose kids?'

Yes. I'd die for my DS so going to soft play or the park isn't that much of a problem.
It's quite nice to have somebody to make you get out of the house and to share things with Xmas Smile

Deadbudgie · 31/12/2018 10:14

Sorry, I genuinely don’t get this. Surely as a family you do things you all enjoy doing and You take it in turns to do things you want to do? Eg my son wants to go to soft play so we usually go as a family or go as a friend. Then DH and I enjoy time together or DH or I enjoy time with a friend whilst DSgetsto play. I want to look round a national trust property The family come too, usually there’s a child friendly angle to nearly everything once you put some effort into it. Want to go to the pub? Either get a baby sitter or go as a family to a family friendly place. Make it interesting for the child, eg allow them to go and buy a bag of crisps on their own.

We make sure as a family even the dog gets to do stuff for her too.

It’s important that families learn to give and take. That’s what family life is like. Children should learn this as early as possible.

Child centred activities are great, to see the joy in a child’s face as they learn a new skill, achieve something.

I think the mistake people make is trying to live up to stupid expectations and competitive parenting. Under 10s only really need to learn to swim and maybe one other activity. Child centric trips out maybe once a month. It does them a lot more good to learn to live in a family taking into account all members needs and wishes.

XOhTriangleSquare · 31/12/2018 10:15

I was forced to watch 20 mins of My Little Pony YouTube videos this morning.

I tried saying no, but the sad little face guilted me into it.

LiveSleepSnore · 31/12/2018 10:15

Listening to Pokémon reenactments is boring.

The op has listed the the "funnest" bits imo!

BertieBotts · 31/12/2018 10:16

The thing is for 2010s kids it doesn't work to leave them to imaginary play/bikes/dens/lego alone or with neighbourhood kids because they all have fucking iphones and spend every spare minute wheedling to go on fortnite or watch yet more awful droning "life hack" videos on youtube.

And even if you limit them it doesn't work because all of their friends have them too. It seriously makes me anxious, and furious, and despair all at the same time. Smartphones weren't even invented when DS1 was born, I didn't see this coming at all.

brizzledrizzle · 31/12/2018 10:17

The thing that gets me most with parenting is when you want to have a day out somewhere and ask where they want to go and it's always 'I don't know'
We don't get to go out often because of money so I guess they just don't know where they'd like to go because they rarely go anywhere other than sports matches that they are in.