To not be able to forgive myself for the way I treated my babies?

[Notmyusual80]

They're 11 and 7 now but when I think back to how I was when they were babies, I absolutely despise myself. Having young babies turned me into someone I didn't recognise- so angry, a control freak, completely and utterly obsessed with sleep.

To be clear, I never did and never would hurt them. But my god I used to shout a lot. And lose my temper. When they were tiny. My first was an absolute angel of a baby, so easy. But I didn't know that at the time as I had nothing to compare her to. I had a really hard few months getting her into a sleep routine and I'd lose my rag if she wouldn't go to sleep/ had unexpected night wakings. I was so obsessed with the knock on effect it would have if sleep didn't go just right. The poor little thing was and still is such a good girl.

I thought I'd be better with my 2nd but he was more hard work than my DD and I think that made things worse because I thought I'd know it all the 2nd time around and it would be easy. I frequently lost my temper with him. What an awful thing to admit. And I'd snap at my sweet DD who was a toddler as I was wound up. One time, the baby had been unwell with tonsillitis but was almost fully over it. He kept waking one night but rather than thinking he might still be feeling poorly and therefore being sympathetic, I got cross with him and was swearing and huffing. It was almost like I felt he was doing it on purpose?!!! My mum reminded me of it the other day and said she wanted to shake me at the time. Another time, I'd had a few really bad nights and the baby woke in the night and when i went to settle him, i realised he'd pooed and I said something like "great, you've pooed,course you have you dirty little xxxxxxx". My DH had a real go at me and rightly so - I apologised straight away. I feel so awful and ashamed admitting to all this.

I clearly remember when my second was a baby feeling really angry a lot of the time, where my whole body would be clenched and I'd be almost shaking. What the hell was wrong with me? I must say, I wasn't like this all the time - just when sleep was going badly and I was feeling anxious about it. I completely love and adore my children and I did and do show them a lot of love.

The thing is, there was so much about the baby years I absolutely loved - playing with them, taking them to baby groups, watching them interact with other babies and toys, just feeling like I had these little sidekicks with me. I'd give anything to go back and be the mum I should have been. It completely haunts me and I pray they don't remember any of it.

I spoke to a friend the other day who has just had her second (3 weeks ago) and she just sounded so thrilled and kept saying she can't believe how happy she feels. She was expecting it to be awful because her 1st was really hard work but this baby is really easy and she just feels so happy. I voucher cried remembering what a snappy, stressed, nasty cow I was at that stage with my two.

I'm scared to post this as I expect a lot of people will think I sound like an absolute monster. But i just need to know if anyone has had a similar experience at all and if so, how they've learned to live with it?

I found parenting so so hard with both of mine until they slept fairly properly (took over a year with the second...). It is so so difficult to have disturbed sleep every single night with no end in sight and still be an angelic loving mum all day every day. There is a theory I learnt about for work called Maslow's hierarchy of needs - if your (mum's) basic needs for sleep/food/warmth are not being met it is extremely difficult to focus on anything more complex and that is normal. Some people do cope better than others, some have more support from partner and/or local family than others. Formula feeding Vs breastfeeding affects how easy it is for partner to help, especially in the early weeks and months. Just because some other people managed a bit better doesn't mean you are an awful person for struggling with it. When I hear people talking about how much they enjoyed maternity leave (I know a few who did a lot of decorating with their newborns, absolutely no idea how!!) I feel a bit envious that I spent the first year or so with both in a sleep deprived stressed moderately depressed blur. Baby groups and meeting up with other mums saved my sanity with the first one especially and I feel so so sorry for new mums at the moment who don't have that option. Anyway, as everyone else has said, properly problematic parenting would not involve this type of soul searching. Enjoy your children now and don't berate yourself for an understandable reaction to severe sleep deprivation.

Neither of my children were easy as babies, they fed 23 hours a day, they didn't sleep much and especially with the first I was clueless. My (now ex)dh was zero help and I felt under scrutiny from everyone. It can be a hellish time. I was run off my feet, anxious, depressed and sleep deprived for years and although we did the loveliest things together I can distinctly remember points of all I can describe as rage. The worst was probably at my 5 year old when my youngest was a baby, he wouldn't do something himself and was rushing to go to an activity and I just screamed at him. My then dh had just pulled up on the drive from work and was waiting in the car for him. I beat myself up for so long about that, but I did also have only 2 broken hours of sleep the previous night, I had tonsilitis, a baby with croup attached to my bleeding nipple and crying because he could not feed fast enough, the washing machine had flooded our carpeted kitchen, the unwalked dogs had pooped in the living room, my friend had died a few days before, and my husband was never home. It later transpired he was actually having various affairs at this point. He still made me feel like a monster though. The truth was I had zero support and it was all too much. I have learned that anger spills over for me when I am anxious and this is immensely heightened by lack of sleep. I have had therapy and I take medication and I try to forgive myself knowing I am really trying and would never intentionally be like that.

You poor thing OP. I just wanted to comment because I also found the lack of sleep thing so, so hard and I think some people are affected by it much more than others. I remember being similarly obsessed with sleep. I got depressed rather than angry, mostly, but it still isn’t good. Mine are 13 and 11 now and appear completely normal and unaffected! Nobody is a perfect parent and you did your best.
Focus on now, not on what you wish had happened in the past.

I think it's called PP rage now? It's fairly common so don't worry! I used to scream at my oldest in the night when he wouldn't sleep. I now have a 2 year old an a six month old and am really happy and calm and I can recognise at the time I had PP depression/rage and was severely sleep deprived. They won't remember... I had a mum who was angry a lot and it didn't really affect me until she was still like it when I was a teenager! Yet now we have a good relationship and I can forgive it. Just look to the future and the great relationship you have with your kids now

I understand OP but like other posters report, my mother shouted A LOT and I was always afraid of her.
I do think MN is brilliant at telling mothers it is fine, normal to shout and swear at babies but if a Dad does it just once the cry is LTB. I have saved a thread where a mother screamed 'I want to kill you fuckers' at her children and people piled on to say the fact that she regretted it showed she was a good mother. Same day someone complained that their husband was brusque and curt with their baby at night time. So many posters shouting abuser.
It isn't easy coping with a baby but if posters don't acknowledge that they need help in changing then it becomes the norm for them. I really think it is wrong to excuse, minimise shouting and swearing at babies and toddlers whether it is mothers ( always excused on MN) or fathers ( log his behaviour with the police).
I hope like Scotland, England bans smacking and a more serious view is taken of mothers who swear and scream at babies and children.

I feel for you OP because you obviously are struggling still with this. I am a mum to a 2yo and they stretch you right to the limit! But i will say i had a shouty, snappy mum and it massively affected my self esteem growing up, and our relationship to this day. She did love us and i did feel loved sometimes but it was the unpredictability that was so scary. I vowed i wouldn't do it to my kids and thus far i haven't.

The difference is though my mum will never admit her behaviour and in the past has got really angry and defensive if i ever brought it up. You seem very self aware and reflective. That is what will mean something to your children IF they carry any effects from how you were (big if!!!).

Anyone reading this can tell you love your children and are a good person. They will know that too.

To be honest this sounds to me like PND. There is also something called postpartum rage which I have heard of but don’t know much about.

Forgive yourself, we’ve all been there.

I think you sound normal! Small children and Babies are such hard work arent they? I remember being cross with my DD (About 3 at the time) we were in the lounge and I marched out banging the door .Felt awful as she was crying in there ,went to get her out and comfort her , and realised door was stuck! My SD had to come and unjam it .Still feel awful to this day TBH

Oh OP, please forgive yourself. Sleep deprivation is hard, I've clenched my body so hard in rage at times due to no sleep, and shouted more than I wanted to. It's normal, motherhood is hard work and nothing can prepare you for it! You need to let it go, your children adore you, you are their mum and you sound wonderful.

Again I apologise.
I’m not inferring that mine were all good sleepers. Sometimes they weren’t. I had two close in age and out of sync. I remember it.

OP let it go. Easy for me to say...I have my own past parenting anxieties to revisit me, so I get that. I’m sure your children and fine and dandy. There are many more challenges ahead so lay this one to rest.

FWIW, my mother shouted and screamed at me regularly and I've never held it against her. It hasn't damaged me in any way that I'm aware of. I don't do it to my kids.
She also gave me a very undeserved thrashing one day whilst holding me up by one ankle. We then immediately went to the doctors where she told the doc what she had done who gave her a prescription and from then on it never happened again.
I've never bawled and screamed at my kids like she used to but I often feel completely exasperated and frustrated - being a parent is hard - and now I realise she found it hard too but went about the exasperation and frustration the wrong way.

On a slightly different note, I used to fantasise about smothering DS1 when he had colic and would scream non stop for hours on end, all beetroot red and angry looking. I just wanted 2 minutes of quiet as I sat there looking at him, feeling completely empty and drained and obviously suffering PND that I never got assessed. But obviously I didn't. And yes I've beat myself up time and time again for even thinking it but I don't anymore.
You have to learn and move on and keep going and do better.
They get louder and spottier and more expensive to keep.... but just as frustrating. Though you can reason with them and have a good laugh with them which helps a lot. I have admitted to my eldest on the odd occasion that I don't have a clue what I'm doing, I'm just trying to do the best for him, keep him safe and that I love him more than life itself. He usually has a little think about what he's doing and says he appreciates me. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Krazynights34 That sounds tough! You are doing a fantastic job there .Sorry to hear about your first baby .Do you have any sort of respite care for your little one at all ? Just to give you a bit of a break .Sending hugs to you xx

OP, remember also when reading some of the comments on here that it’s VERY easy to be a perfect parent on the internet.

I wonder how many of the perfect parents making the nasty comments you’ve received on here are also among the 1% of women who exclusively breastfed for six months. Seems statistically unlikely. I wonder whether they’d take kindly to the suggestion that their parenting clearly wasn’t so perfect, then.

I’m not criticising women who don’t breastfeed, by the way. My point is that we all have our own struggles in parenthood and no one is perfect.

My children are adults now but funnily enough DH and I were talking about this the other day. We decided that looking after babies is not that hard, it’s the lack of sleep that is the killer. If you could have 8 hours a night it would be a lovely ‘job’.
DD (23) didn’t sleep through until she was 2. I have just asked her if she can remember us shouting ‘go to fucking sleep’ at her and she thought it was hilarious, and no she can’t remember.
So op I think you are being much too hard on yourself.

@Parkperson the OP has not stated anywhere that she smacked her babies or ever physically harmed them.

OP for what its worth, I dont know many parents who havent lost their temper before. there is a reason HVs tell you to put baby down in a safe place and take a breathe elsewhere if you start to feel overwhelmed. sleep deprivation absolutely sucks. I have a 1 year old and the only way I deal with it (she is still an awful sleep :( ) is to keep telling myself that one day she will be better and that these young years will go quick. and reminding myself that although I feel shit right now, I cant die from a lack of sleep so keep doing what I've got to do to get through the day. aslong as she is loved, warm, fed and safe then I dont think can beat yourself up.

I think men get a harder time because 9/10 they arent the ones who have given birth, who do most of the night feedings/wakings and who generally do the brunt of the childcare. I know that's not every man/father but possibly the people on here commenting to "ltb" or that it is wrong is the ones who have been in that position. in my household I would expect my partner to hold it together because he is getting a full night sleep (hasnt done any night wakings since she was about 3 months old) and doesnt do anywhere near as much childcare. so maybe the people responding on those threads are worn out mothers who have been there themselves.

*never given birth obviously lol!

Forgive yourself, OP. You love your children and have a good relationship with them now. They will be fine. And for any smug mothers whose babies who slept through the whole night, in my family it turned out that the easy baby grew up to be the difficult teenager, and the difficult collicky baby became the responsible teenager. Just saying!

Tiredness, stress, maybe some depression, it changes your personality. I was very similar to you. I beat myself up about it, but try not to too much - I cant change anything, it was what it was. You want to make up for it...then put it behind you and parent as well as you can in the day that you're in. We're all a bit or a lot crap at times in our own way. Anyone who says differently is lying!

I could have written the OP and so could many of my friends. You are certainly not alone in how you felt and behaved.

Don't beat yourself up about it. It's bloody brave of you to speak out about it.

You mention that both your Mum and Husband observed your difficulties at the time. But, you don't mention what actual support you had. This really jumps out to me.

Sometimes we have a vision if being a mum, I blame tv ads. Cuddly, snuggly latched on or having the bottle, fresh faced, in fact it’s 3AM some how there is poo in their hair, up their back, leaked out both sides of nappy and now also suddenly very hungry the exact situation that we just dealt with less than 3 hours ago and sleeping beauty is still snoring next to us 😡 it’s hard, Chuck a toddler in and a bottle of Breast milk that’s just been knocked over and it’s we are all going to be snappy, shouty, our hormones are all over the place. Sometimes we are suffering without realising. It’s ok to reach out and knowing we’ve made mistakes makes us a good person.

My first was a breeze, second was sent straight from the school of never sleep, if she’d been first I’d would not have had any more haha! It’s tough. Both mine were c sections so I to move slowly as well.

Be kind to yourself

No parent is perfect. I look back at my childhood in the 60s and 70s and some of the things my parents did to my brother and I would now be bordering on abuse ie smacking, locked rooms etc. But I still love them as they did their best. I look back at my kids childhood and again at times I was exhausted. I had little help from my H (now ex) at the time. We have all shouted, huffed and swore. But some people can look back with rose tinted glasses. Bringing up children is bloody hard which is why so many people fail and social services have to step in. But I bet your children are loved and cared for unlike millions of kids across the world who unfortunately are not so lucky.

Sorry I disagree about the supposed “sexism” in responses. It is hugely more likely to be the woman that takes the no sleep hit and has had all the physical and mental changes of having a baby. So in this circumstance I would judge the behaviour differently and be more understanding to the mother losing it than the father.

To be blunt it was horrible behaviour to inflict on a defenceless toddler. But you know that. I guess in an ideal world you would have stopped dealing with them at night and anything around sleep for a period whilst you resolved your anger issues and your husband would have taken over. Did you seek any help at the time?

If these episodes and feeling anger ended at the time ended when they were toddlers, you may be lucky and they don’t remember. But if you were also like this towards your youngest too when they were a toddler then your eldest may well remember.

I grew up with a shouty aggressive father and I remember the things he said and did from when I was about 3/4, unfortunately. Even now I flinch when someone shouts.

Perhaps when your children are a little older you could sit them down and ask them if they remember you being shouty and scary when they were younger, and if they do, reassure them that this was your fault and they hadn’t done anything wrong. And apologise too. Personally I think this would be very important...it won’t make it all better but hopefully they will understand in time it wasn’t their fault.

Of course I am no child psychologist, it’s just my thoughts. But an apology and regret is something my father would never do (complete narcissist - which you are clearly not) and i think this plays a huge part in that you aren’t a bad person.

You sound like a wonderful mother now, OP. It could well have been undiagnosed PND at the time at the root of things. Have you thought about seeking some kind of counselling for yourself so you can start to forgive yourself and move on? Also to ensure you don’t overcompensate with the children in the coming years, feeling so guilty you don’t put in appropriate boundaries and let them have whatever they want (not sure if this may be an issue for you or not, of course).

I don’t believe in monsters, this is all human behaviour, but if I did you wouldn’t be one.