Feel like I have zero spare time is this normal?

[Notami]

I’ve got two children. Eldest is 3. Youngest is 9 months. I work 4 days. DH works 4 days. We each take our day off on different day so we only have to worry about childcare 3 days a week.

Kids typically get up 6, sometimes earlier. Then it’s either nursery drop off by 9 latest and onto work. (Or on my day off I have both kids from 7.30 when DH leaves for work.)

Then it’s finish work pick up kids have tea. Bath-time story bed by 7.30. But my 3 year old, no matter what I try, will not go to sleep before 9pm and insists you lie with her until she falls asleep. If you don’t then she shouts and cries at the top of the stairs and so we can’t get the youngest down to sleep. So it’s 9pm by the time they both go down. Then it’s downstairs cleaning and packing bags/sorting outfits. Then my youngest usually gets up at least once between 10 and 12. And then pretty much every 2 hours after that. So my Dh and I do 2 hour alternating shifts of sleep.

So I don’t have any free time other than maybe 30 mins at lunch on a working day which if I’m working from home I usually need to use to tidy house.

Weekends we are off. We try to give each breaks but it’s so full on with the teo. Sometimes it just doesn’t feel worth asking as you know you have to repay the favour.

I just wondered if it’s like this for other working mums with small kids and if/when it changes. At the moment feels like I’m on call 24/7

I think I spent about 10 years feeling utterly done in and drained and then... it got better.

Teens go to school/ come home without help.
Couple of clubs a week is manageable.
They make breakfast and lunch for themselves at weekend. I'm up before them go to to the gym.

But the emotional load increases- especially when they're in yr7 and the Great Friendship Shift begins and you want to contact the mums and say:"get a fucking hold of your daughter and teach her to be a decent human being", but you're an adult, so you can't.

It is hard with young kids. With dd1 it was back to normal, evenings out and hobby from about 6 months. Felt just as well and healthy as before dc. Dd was a good sleeper who fell into a routine. Life was easy.

after dd2, 2 years later.. she was so resistant to get into a routine and didn’t sleep well, evenings were shorter and nights interrupted for .. a long time! So then that with a toddler who was hard work (later diagnosed with Asd) was just exhausting for both of us. It got easier once they started school.

I'm glad you clarified about working and SAHMs. I've been both and remember after 4 years of not working realising the amazing freedom of the bit between nursery drop and work. Be it car, walk or train was fucking bliss!

It does get better. I remember not having time to watch a film for some years s because films are 2 hours long and I didn't have that to spare.

I think the only way to handle it is to put yourself aside totally. Then gradually you start to get some time back for yourself. And then suddenly they go in a residential school trip and you feel like a ship without an anchor!!

This with bells on. The emotional load.

That when I do my emails now.

I think it's normal not to get a break. I work 50 hours a week get up at 5am to do work, work 9-3 around drop offs work 7-11 to catch up, work weekends when they're busy in clubs (take laptop and sit on thr car outside dance and sport clubs).

Doing housework on your day with the DC helps, so I try to get them involves rather than separating childcare and cleaning, it all has to happen at once.

It's get easier OP, your youngest will sleep through eventually and that will make you feel like a new women. Then your oldest will start school which gives uniformity for 5 days a week. Main thing is to stay as a team with your DH.

The toughest couple of years for me was straight after maternity with my second.

I would suggest however trying to do bedtime from 6pm for your oldest, some kids it naturally takes longer to fall asleep it's not about the time of night so start the process earlier to try and claim an extra hour in the evening.

@cherish123 I wonder what you were trying to achieve with this post? Seems really unhelpful to me

Yes exactly the same here. I have bigger age gaps. Kids are 9, 5 and 1. I don't remember the last time I did anything for myself and we almost never use our living room as we never sit down! I wouldn't say it gets easier, but it changes. The oldest one now stays up later so our evenings are not child-free, and she has a lot of homework etc. And taxi-ing around for clubs, or seeing friends etc every evening too! I love it, but it is relentless!

We're in the midst of this right now. I just let my 2 year old stay up until he's tired. I wasted months sticking to his old routine that used to work fine. He just isn't tired at the same time anymore. So we trialled getting them both ready for bed and then just putting the older one to bed before getting on with doing the housework whilst the 2 year old potters around us. Then when it's close to his natural sleep time 8.30ish one of us takes him up to settle him down.

Tends to work better for everyone. All the housework gets done in that 'dead' time one of us would've been waiting for him to fall asleep.

cherish123 · 28/02/2024 23:08

Just wait until you have teenagers. Then you will definitely have no time. Pre-school age was a breeze by comparison.

This wasn’t my experience, I found the preschooler stage the most difficult. I really enjoyed the teenage years.

It gets easier. DC2 was in a consistent nap routine from 12 months which made non-work days easier. He was sleeping through the night at 16 months which also made things easier and then we moved him to his own room at 18 months which also made things logistically easier. Now at 5 and 2 they actually play together sometimes which means we have time to do some quick urgent chores and so on.

I think societal and cultural misunderstandings of what "normal" childhood sleep is like are to blame for a lot. For a three year old, average sleep needs start at 10hrs in total per 24hrs (so if your oldest sleeps 9pm-7am then they are actually within the average sleep needs zone for their age) and as little as 8-9hrs is still quite common.

Our seven year old sleeps 9pm-6:30am (his total of 9.5hrs per 24hrs being bang in the middle of the average needs of 9-11hrs for his age group) and our toddler goes to bed around 9:30pm (up at 6:30am with a 2hr nap so again, in the typical sleep needs zone for age).

So I would definitely stop trying to fix/change/alter/train your oldest's sleep and accept it as normal (unless they're consistently getting up earlier than 5am with the 9pm bedtime). In most other countries it's normal for kids to be up in the evening and go to bed around the same time as their parents (usually, with their parents in the same bed or at least the same room). The idea that 7-7 is the norm is evidently wrong for a significant proportion of children!

We just roll with it, it does get easier as they get older 🙂

Thanks all. Def interesting to hear about the experience with older children/teenagers. I’m definitely expecting the way in which they need me to be much more challenging and emotionally draining.

I’m actually really hoping to cut my work hours at they get older as I read a really good mumsnet post a while ago from someone with older children. She was saying with very young kids as long as you have a relatively decent amount of quality time with you then they’re quite happy for other caregivers to fulfil their needs - say for example if you have to work (like me). But with older kids the time/advice/support they want is specifically from YOU and you can’t get someone to cover that for you.

On the other hand I am expecting/hoping it might be easier for me to say once/twice a week I am going to do XYZ for an hour or two. Or even to go up for an 30 mins in the evening to take a bath. And that way I can at least try to recharge a bit.

I don’t know tho, I remember thinking a toddler would be easier than a baby and I sure as shit got that wrong 😂. So I'm def learning that each stages brings different challenges