Name changed as could be outing.
DH and I have twin toddlers at 19mo. They are a handful and a half to manage but we do our best. General day goes as follows:
8am Twins wake - we change nappies and clothes, give them water to drink and morning snack then let them play in their room together (room is secure with little to no risk of injuries)
9.30am Proper breakfast downstairs in high chairs. I either eat with them or read to them during this period.
10-11am play downstairs, a bit of Hey Duggee on the television if I’m feeling particularly knackered. Nappy changes and and when required for the rest of the day.
11am-3pm Bottles (for nutritional supplement). Then they take their one long nap of the day (they are still low weight following premature birth so sleep a heck of a lot. HV doesn’t think this is a concern). I use this time to do what housework I can during the week and DH chips in at the weekends. Usually I manage the most important jobs (clothes washing/drying, pots, sweeping and mopping floors, general cleaning of the areas they like to make as messy as possible haha)
3pm They wake. I take them another drink of water and snack in their room and get their dinner ready. If DH is home he will play with them in their room, if I’m alone I will alternate between sorting dinner and playing in their room.
4pm Dinner served. We eat together.
5pm - 7pm they play downstairs roaming about with toys on offer for them to choose from. Might have a bit of Tele on in the background. Water/Juice available as and when needed.
7pm Light snack
8pm Upstairs for bedtime routine. Asleep by 8.30/9pm and sleep through (generally) until morning.
Now here comes our AWBU - the above is our standard day at home. Things change a bit if the weather is nice and we can take them out of course (that’s like a military operation in of itself most times 😂). Today my PIL (DH’s parents of course) have visited and decided to tell us that we have no excuse for wires being in places DD and DS might grab them (we tidy them away as best we can and never leave them in the living room unattended) that the house is not as clean as it ought to be and we don’t do enough for the Twins to stimulate/exercise them.
When PIL visit the twins normal routine is often at the point where they’re winding down for the morning and due to go for their nap so they don’t SEE what we do for the rest of the day, nor do they think to ask. They just came straight down with their judgment of the situation.
To make matters worse, DH and I are currently grieving the loss of our third child, our second son, who was stillborn on the 25th of April this year. We are just about keeping our heads above water.
We have a lot of ongoing financial difficulties that we are just about managing but this adds stress too. Sometimes I have to leave the twins in their room a little longer than I would like so I can make some much needed phone calls and such....
It just feels like we’ve been told today that regardless of our “excuses” we need to do better... and we’re extremely upset by this. MIL cried when we defended our position because she didn’t think we’d react badly (we didn’t get aggressive we just didn’t appreciate their decision to say all this now!) and basically it’s left us feeling that we’re never good enough.
My mum and dad visit more regularly and they’ve never felt the need to judge our house and when I’m apologising for the mess (toys everywhere, pots not yet washed sometimes, or before I’ve been able to sweep up after a meal where half the contents were dropped on the floor etc.) they laugh and say don’t worry about it, it shows we have two very normal toddlers...
I guess I just want to know were we being unreasonable to be defensive as PIL said they only mentioned these things with their DC’s best interests at heart... or were they being unreasonable in their expectations of us?
Sorry for the long post - just feeling utterly exhausted at the moment and I fight my “mum guilt” a lot for already feeling like I should be able to do more for my lovely twins - so this has knocked my confidence and then some.