It takes a village to raise a child?

[newmummy21]

Bear with me. I'm extremely sleep deprived and mentally and emotionally worn down.

How do you cope with a new baby when you have no "village"? Our baby is almost 3 months and we are on our knees. We have no family help - we are just an exhausted 2 man team. We speak to each other like we hate each other most days (not all... but it's a LOT). It's a constant game of oneupmanship - "I had less sleep than you" / "you had 5 minutes longer in the shower than I did"... etc.

I kid you not, yesterday I started an argument with him because he had a shower that lasted five minutes longer than mine, and this isn't "fair". 🙈

To listen to us most days, you'd think we were sworn enemies. Yet pre baby, we were the best of friends and very strong in our relationship. I am so sad about where this has gone and if it will ever come back. 😥

So my questions are - at what point do you stop wanting to kill each other after a baby? At what point do you get any semblance of your pre baby relationship back? And are we finding it harder because we have no village to help us? Or would most couples be like this post baby?

Thanks for any thoughts

Because I am not a perfect mother, like many pp’s, I’ll put my hand on my heart and say I do have a village (4 very invested grandparents within half an hour of me, a hugely supportive and hands-on sister and my best friend living three doors down) and I still find it bloody hard. My ‘village’ helps me clean my house, do laundry for me, take the baby out for walks, give me people to chat to, offer endless love and support. IT IS STILL HARD. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with acknowledging the reality that babies turn your life upside down and put an enormous strain on your relationship. And OP, I take my hat off to you because I can only imagine how much harder without that support.

I honestly think parents who claim having a baby didn’t change their life that much are either lying because they’re (understandably) cowed by the enormous social pressure to present motherhood as a state of perfect grace, or they had nothing good going on in their lives before they had a baby, so have nothing good to remember.

I absolutely detest “it takes a village”. It’s the biggest heap of crap going. It does not take a village. It takes the parents.

@DifferentHair

OP - Do you feel your partner has acknowledged that you've been through a lot in terms of pregnancy, birth, changes?

I just wonder if your urge to tell him all the time comes from feeling like he doesn't understand or validate your feelings / respect what you've been through.

No I don't feel he always does validate and acknowledge this to be honest. He is a great practical help - he does a lot around the house and very hands on with caring for baby etc. But do I always feel validated from an emotional point of view? No, I honestly don't.

The first few months are tough. You're sleep deprived and trying to get into a new rhythm that the tiny human lets you get used to and then decides nope! They like to mix it up.

Sometimes it's that acknowledgement that things are tough is appreciated from other people.. Those who have been through it know how hard it can be but then forget as they're in the easy stage now.
Maybe have a word with your HV, they can signpost you to somebody you can talk to. Being able to vent may help both of you as it won't be at each other.

Aww Love 25 years ago I could have written your post. 3 grown up DC later, all I can say is that it may not feel like it right now but things do get better.
I had undiagnosed PND, I knew I had it but (even as a HCP myself) I wrongly thought I'd be judged as a failure if I sought help. My advice would firstly be to go to your GP and tell them how you are feeling.
Things that helped me were submitting to fact that I had a baby as my priority and shoving everything house work related on the back-burner. Do what you need to and let her fit in around it. If you want a shower, sit her in her baby seat in the bathroom if you have to. You don't have to entertain her 24/7.
If you want a night out get a babysitter.
If she falls asleep in the day, you have a snooze too.
Mine would be quiet in the car, so I used to drive her around with the radio on, just for a bit of peace sometimes. Or I would strap her in the pram and go out for a walk. The turning point for me was when I joined a gym and it had a creche. Absolute heaven being able to exercise or swim in peace.
I wish you all the best and hope things pick up soon.

I raised my DS completely by myself. I had my DF who helped alot buy having a non sleeping baby and then toddler was very hard.

You just manage. Hopefully your baby will settle and sleep.

It IS tough without a village. When we were raising our two we had two sets of very involved GPs living locally, and it made such a huge difference. I remember one day nearly kissing my MIL one day when she turned up after a sleepless night with the new baby, and ordered me back to bed. Off she went with the baby in the pram, bought dinner from the shop, prepared it whilst the baby napped in the garden and then had tea and toast ready for me when I eventually did resurface downstairs after a long uninterrupted nap. That is what it means by needing a village and you really do. Being on your own is TOUGH. Hold on in there - it will get better

@Holly60

It IS tough without a village. When we were raising our two we had two sets of very involved GPs living locally, and it made such a huge difference. I remember one day nearly kissing my MIL one day when she turned up after a sleepless night with the new baby, and ordered me back to bed. Off she went with the baby in the pram, bought dinner from the shop, prepared it whilst the baby napped in the garden and then had tea and toast ready for me when I eventually did resurface downstairs after a long uninterrupted nap. That is what it means by needing a village and you really do. Being on your own is TOUGH. Hold on in there - it will get better

Yeah, this is what I mean. It's about that support network isn't it. Thanks for understanding! x

@PinkiOcelot

I absolutely detest “it takes a village”. It’s the biggest heap of crap going. It does not take a village. It takes the parents.

Oh wonderful.
So, please do share with me how you coped and managed when you raised a child without any support network around you? I'm all ears and willing to learn from you, since you found it so easy.

Super Mum is overrated; the small things like cuddles count the most. Don't stress about insignificant things, stop and breath it all in as you'll regret it later if you don't.

@Popcornbetty

I LOVE this. I will hold onto it. Thank you

@barnanabas

So much empathy for you, OP. It's really really hard. But it passes.

We had a pretty easy time with our first baby. She slept well, which is everything. And there were still all those adjustments you make - how your identity and the way you see your partner alter and the new people you are both becoming evolve separately and together. We didn't have a village, but I did meet up with a group of other new mums regularly. And it was hard, but fine and good in many ways.

Next baby was twins. And we moved to a new place and DH got a stressful new job. And one of the babies was colicky and refluxy and didn't sleep. And if the rest of our relationship had been like it was in that year or so of our lives, I think we would have had to split up. We were just a badly functioning tag team of competitive tiredness and competitive stress.

But we're basically solid, and we're a good team, and we came out of it. To a large extent, it's just really, really hard, and you've just got to hang in there and get through it (obviously it's different if you have PND, which I didn't - it sounds as if you think you might have and hopefully you'll get help with that and I'm sure it'll make a big difference).

Some practical things we did which I think helped:

1. Threw the money we could at help - cleaner, takeaways, mindless late night amazon orders. We took the view we'd just get through that year and then take stock.
2. DH had two nights a week and I had one where we slept in a different area of the house and couldn't hear the babies. He'd get me for the feeds and then I'd go back to sleep. Knowing that you'd only be summoned for the feeds, or in a crisis (I woke him up once, because I really thought I was going to lose it!) made such a difference.
3. We prioritised one of us having a good time sometimes. So if DH had a night out I'd cover the early shift in the morning and if that meant I had a bit of a shit day so he could have a good time that was OK (and vice versa, of course!). That approach definitely worked for us, but it does need to be fairly equal.
4. We dredged up a bit of sympathy and stepped up if the other person was going to totally lose it. Hard, but necessary, and we both managed to do it at times (though probably not as often as the other one would have liked!).

In essence, it's really hard, but temporary. I hope you've found some support here.

Thank you - your story gives me hope. If you can do it with twins, we can do this with just the one!!

What helped us was realising that we shouldn't be against each other but we should be united against the problem.
Once we started to have each other's backs, it helped a lot.

I'm a SAHM and he works full time but we both work our arses off around the house, we're both really hands on with the kids and on the weekends, we split lie ins. I get Saturdays and he gets sundays.

Everything will get so much better when baby starts sleeping xx

I had no help and exh worked 12 hour days 6 days a week. Young babies don't need much, just milk, clean nappies and being kept warm. I found going out for a couple of hours a day was better than staying home for my own benefit.

It was harder with 2, still no help, but we muddled through, I have a very laid back approach which probably helped and breastfed both so no bottles to deal with which seem to be very hard to manage when I've stayed with friends.

Oh and I had an hour or two each evening where I went to sleep and exh rocked and comforted them before bringing them for a late night feed (we coslept) he's a nightowl still. I always did morning in return

I think some people find it harder than others because some babies are considerably more difficult than others. And people who have had easy babies often do not get it. My first baby was a nightmare - did not sleep through for a very long time, I was totally knackered, I bf until he was a year - I am a very small person - baby was huge - and I lost so much weight just trying to keeping up with feeding this massive child And mothers who's babies slept through were presumably judging me for looking a complete wreck.

My second baby was much smaller, slept through from 10 weeks and was a very very easy baby - I couldn't believe the difference I had to keep poking her to check she was OK because she slept !

So I would say don't be hard on yourself for finding things hard - chances are all the people saying unempathetic things are talking out of their arses. Ignore them, they are the same people who say 'you are pregnant not ill' when they haven't actually experienced throwing up all day everyday for their entire pregnancies, or haven;t had SPD or any other of the delights of pregnancy.

Just try to get through it as best you can, a day at a time have an agreement with your DH that things said during the first few months of having a baby are the words of exhaustion and despair and are not really meant. If you can tag team to some extent and grab a hours sleep while the other person looks after the baby, then do it. It does get better, there's nothing wrong with the way you are feeling it's a normal reaction to the situation you are in, They don't use sleep deprivation as a form of torture for nothing !!

I wholeheartedly concur with a lot of what @barnanabas says.

I found my first pretty much because like you I had no village. My family is on the other side of the world; DH's family are about 3 hours away but utterly useless about providing support. We'd lived where we are for about 3 years but didn't have that local network of people because we both commuted.

One of my big learnings was that it's worth the effort to build a village, even now when it feels like you're absolutely on your knees. The first bit is to keep the village you have. I LOVE the advice to remember that the teeny tiny dictator in the corner is 'the enemy' and you and your partner are on the same team. If nothing else it will make you laugh. Tag teaming is super important but so is throwing money at every problem you possibly can. Every bit of breathing space is important.

Second, do build your village, however you can. It's so worth the investment. Only you will know your particular NCT group - some are obviously full of Perfect Mothers, some aren't. I remember so vividly the time in the middle of the night when one of them emailed saying 'my baby is doing this really weird thing and it's freaking me out, anyone else?' and I just thought 'thank fuck, not just me'. My eldest is nearly 10 and all but one of the group are still friends. I've built a broader village through nursery and classes, so that when my second was born I didn't have to worry about who would look after my first - we had so many offers of help any time of the day or night.

And remember that your baby is much, much tougher than you think. Babies will deal with babysitters, they'll deal with being left to cry for a few minutes, they'll deal with mismatched clothes and no socks,. And usually around three months they TOTALLY turn a corner and it gets easier.

I have a theory that babies are brilliantly adapted by evolution to get you to a point where any self-respecting cave person would leave them to be stomped on by a mammoth and then they develop a totally engaging, loving new trait to keep you hooked. They are teeny tiny drug dealers where the drug is dopamine.

(Please note that despite talk of babies being evil dictator drug dealers who should be left for the mammoths, I do adore and always have adored both my babies....)

Very few have a village of help when babies. It comes into play when they're older with friendships, we take turns watching the DC out playing and take turns shouting at whichever DC is misbehaving, it is a community thing.

Babies are like a bomb in a relationship. Plus sleep deprivation, no one is in their right mind!

Get some paid help (child minder/ mothers help) you trust. Just for a few hours here and there.

Get a cleaner. Even 3 hrs a fortnight helps.

It happens again when they're 3 as Dh and I are finding, having completely forgotten after ds1!

The good news is you forget quickly. Take lots of nice pics, that's all you'll remember.

@newmummy21 where exactly did I say I found it so easy?! Reread what I said! I didn’t.
I said “it takes a village” is crap. It’s a pathetic saying IMO. It doesn’t take “a village” at all!

Of course it's hard without a family network around you to help out. Anyone who says otherwise is lying. My DC have no grandparents well no useful ones..it's very hard. I have two DC and struggle...I know a woman with four kids who find it's much easier than I do because she has both sets of GPS around

[quote PinkiOcelot]@newmummy21 where exactly did I say I found it so easy?! Reread what I said! I didn’t.
I said “it takes a village” is crap. It’s a pathetic saying IMO. It doesn’t take “a village” at all![/quote]

You said "it takes the parents". Thus implying that parents don't need anyone else (ie a "village" or support network) - they can do it alone. Since you confidently declared the concept of a village as "crap", I assumed you were speaking from personal experience of having raised a child without said village and finding it easy. If however you're saying you didn't find it easy without a support network behind you, then surely you see how the concept of the village isn't in fact "crap" and might hold some validity...?

@Comedycook

Of course it's hard without a family network around you to help out. Anyone who says otherwise is lying. My DC have no grandparents well no useful ones..it's very hard. I have two DC and struggle...I know a woman with four kids who find it's much easier than I do because she has both sets of GPS around

Exactly this. Having extended family around you counts for a lot, I believe.

Second, do build your village, however you can. It's so worth the investment. Only you will know your particular NCT group - some are obviously full of Perfect Mothers, some aren't.

Yes. The perfect mothers exist within my group unfortunately. But some are just normal like me thankfully

@Cloudninenine

Because I am not a perfect mother, like many pp’s, I’ll put my hand on my heart and say I do have a village (4 very invested grandparents within half an hour of me, a hugely supportive and hands-on sister and my best friend living three doors down) and I still find it bloody hard. My ‘village’ helps me clean my house, do laundry for me, take the baby out for walks, give me people to chat to, offer endless love and support. IT IS STILL HARD. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with acknowledging the reality that babies turn your life upside down and put an enormous strain on your relationship. And OP, I take my hat off to you because I can only imagine how much harder without that support.

I honestly think parents who claim having a baby didn’t change their life that much are either lying because they’re (understandably) cowed by the enormous social pressure to present motherhood as a state of perfect grace, or they had nothing good going on in their lives before they had a baby, so have nothing good to remember.

Thanks for this x

Sorry to hear it's so tough. Can you try more of a timetable? I'm an overthinker and DH is (probably) ASD and we got on better at this stage with things like a whiteboard that we wrote feeds on, a rota (I got Friday and Saturday nights "off") and a lot of tag teaming. I didn't breastfeed though which made it easier. But somehow if you can apply a bit more of a schedule you can blame that instead of your other half? And you have something specific to look forward to, even if it's extra long shower morning or something.