Tips for FTM, 1 year old, exhausted

[FTM6781]

I'm a first time mum. My son just turned 1. I work full time, so does DH. DS still wakes once a night. I handle all night wakings since he was 7 months, we tried several times to persevere with DH going in for a good 5-6 nights every time and it just led to split nights and baby being awake for hours.

I'm exhausted. My head feels like it's going to explode.

We have a nanny although she only covers my working hours. DS is a handful so she can't do more than tidy and some dishes.

I'm supposed to be working right now (it's 4pm here, I'm not in the UK) but I'm sort of paralysed and crying at how long my to do list is both at work and at home.

Does DH pull his weight? Not entirely.

The second I log off work/come home, I'm on mum duty and he is exhausting. He's sort of walking and stumbling into everything. Literally cannot take my eyes off him for a second. And when he goes to bed at 7.30, I have to log back into work and work some more. I'm crying at the thought of it.

I don't know what I want. A hug maybe. Someone to say they get it. Hand in my notice at work? Realistically I can't handle DS 24/7, he's a lot. Although I've been working since he was 6 months,I have no idea what it's like to be at home 7 days a week with a toddler.

My annual leave request has been rejected as September is a busy month.

I've also been totally fucked on my bonus and promotion because of my mat leave so I'm feeling particularly demotivated.

Do you have any family who can help have him for the night so you can get some proper sleep or would you be able to afford a a nanny to do nights once or twice a week. Working full time and having small children is absolutely exhausting there is just no spare time to relax at all. It will get easier as he gets a bit older

@youalright thank you. No, we don't have any family (they'd be useless anyway, they have visited before and let's just say they are not very hands on) and it's a small house anyway, his room is on the other side of my bedroom wall, I can hear him moan in his sleep even! He screams when his dad tries to go in so i imagine anyone else would get the same treatment. He has started sleeping through the night here and there so things are improving I guess.

Definitely sounds like you need a hug.

Financially, do you need to work or work full time right now? Would a short career break be a possibility?

What happens when your son wakes in the night? I found getting a single bed so I could climb into it and cuddle maximised my sleep, although I know plenty of people wouldn’t approve of it but sometimes you just have to do what it takes to get you through the short term.

Sending a big hug, caring for toddlers can be brutal. Have you thought about a play pen so you can keep DS contained if you need to. It was a life saver for me at that age as I could take my eyes off the DC for a minute/use the bathroom.

Also, could you afford to pay the nanny for an extra hour a couple of times a week so you can have some downtime?

Otherwise I can only echo what other people have said, hang in there, it does get easier.

I agree, if cutting your working hours or taking a career break is possible, it could take the pressure off a bit. Being at home with a 1 year old is hard work but you can at least sit on the sofa and cuddle and look at picture books or make one room safe and let him toddle about while you sit!

I co-slept with my youngest until he was 3 1/2 and he went into his own bed with no trouble. I know it's frowned upon by a lot of people but it meant we both slept well and I didn't feel like a sleep deprived zombie when I had 4 other kids to get up and off to school in the morning!

Thanks! I do have a HUGE and expensive playpen but he's figured out that we sometimes leave for a minute if we go in there so at the moment he is refusing to go in there. He is also refusing the pram, his trike, his car seat, his high chair, basically will not be contained 😂

It gets easier, hang in there. My daughter started sleeping when she started walking and we made sure to ‘tire’ her out everyday, and it worked

Cosleeping does not work for us unfortunately as I still have a lot of SPD pain from pregnancy, I toss and turn uncomfortably all night.

I am contemplating a career break in the new year, yes. Especially after they declined to give me my promised promotion because I got pregnant.

It's difficult as I am the main breadwinner and make 3x my DH's salary so it will be a huge adjustment in living standards. And I've heard so many stories of miserable SAHMs, I'm scared of being one.

I will put my notice in with work towards the end of the year but I have to play nice until then. And then I still have a 3 month notice period. It's a niche industry so I can't drop the ball, I need the good word of mouth/references.

Oh OP, you sound absolutely done in.

Do you have a friend you can stay with or have the money for a hotel for a night? You need a solid night's sleep. I found the only way was to be physically away from baby/DH.

Could DH stay in baby's room on an air mattress for a week? I think split nights are grim, but your current set up is not sustainable.

The only other thing I can say is that it can improve quickly. My baby woke multiple times a night and then one day (at about a year ish) just started sleeping all the way through. No idea what changed. So it can and will get better.

Hope it gets better for you soon

I’m not sure his sleep his the issue here - 1 wake up a night really isn’t that bad, you shouldnt be feeling that knackered. You could tackle it by sleep training but the bigger issue seems to be you have absolutely no time to yourself. Why are you working in the evenings? Do you not have enough childcare to complete your hours in the daytime? Can you pay for more so you can work your work hours in a block each day thereby freeing up your evenings? Why isn’t your DH pulling his weight? Tackle this with him and get chores fairly allocated. Have you considered a nursery setting to get DS out the house and give you some space? Even part time nursery part time nanny might help? Can you outsource anything else eg cleaner?

P.s I really wouldn’t leave your job. Make other changes to make it sustainable. It’s perfectly do able to work full time with small children. Not saying it isn’t tiring, but it doesn’t need to be as bad as it sounds like it is for you.

@SErunner I'm a corporate lawyer. My work never ends and I am at the beck and call of my clients. If they want something done at 8pm on a Tuesday, it gets done.

The nanny does take DS out a lot, baby groups, soft play, playdates, every day.

As to tackling things with DH, well, that's tricky. We had a massive blowout this morning. He is on best behaviour now. But 1) I'm drained and 2) it will end in a week or two and I'll slowly go back to doing more.

Are you a high enough earner to throw some money at the problem for now? Get a cleaner or housekeeper. Increase your nanny's hours. Healthy meal service for days when you're too tired to cook. Laundry service. Etc etc. Basically, outsource any domestic chores that you find particularly overwhelming so that when you are with your DS you're just focusing on spending time with him, rather than trying to get chores or cooking done and stop him killing himself at the same time. And if you're always either working or looking after him then get DH to look after him a bit more while you have a break. (If there's a good reason why he can't, increase your nanny's hours instead.)

Baby has significant allergies and we're currently working up the milk ladder so cooking for him is not easy. We have to cook everything ourselves basically. Which is fine, we can both cook, but it makes it harder to outsource.

@willowpatternchina I'm a high enough earner, yes. But I work so many hours, I feel guilty at taking time for myself as it would mean not spending any time with DS. At all. But when I'm with him, it's exhausting. And as soon as I put him to bed, I have to log back on. So I'm doing my best to maximise every minute with him but I'm cracking.

Can you and your husband book the same day off. Ask the nanny to cover and you both go out for a day. Away from work, parenting and housework?
things will get easier though it’s hard when they are toddlers. If it’s any comfort many us have been there pulling out hair out wanting to scream or runaway. You come through the other side though. Try and get some you time. Even if it’s just a relaxing bath. Sending a hug from one mum to another

The late Dr Christopher Green, who wrote Toddler Taming, was a fan of giving kids phenergan for two nights when life got to this point. His reason was that nothing, absolutely nothing, could be done when the parents (in this case, mum) were totally strung out. Get a couple of nights sleep and life will look different and you will be able to think it through better.

Another thing to try is you going to a hotel for a night. Make sure dc sees you leave so he knows that mum simply isn’t in the house to scream for.

Hi OP - sorry things are rough.

Would DH consider going part time? May not be an option - or indeed any use if he still wouldn’t pull his weight. Can your nanny step up her hours a bit to give you more breathing room? I assume she makes dinner for DC so that’s off your plate (so to speak 😂).

What’s your plan career wise? Are you committed to making partner (I’m assuming you’re not already a partner)? Would you consider an alternative route like going in-house or becoming a PSL? I speak as someone with a US/MC law firm background who became a PSL - total sanity saver!

Currently on 15mo mat leave, but I work 9-5 in a low stress job with none of the external client hassle. Lovely team. Obviously it’s a significant pay cut - I now make £120k FTE and will be going back 3.5 days - but entirely worth it to me, whether or not I had children. I hated fee earning by the end - the unpredictable long hours were a killer.

Depending on your plans and financial situation, I’d be wary of quitting your job with nothing else lined up though - I would find that stressful in itself.

Are you getting great physio for your SPD? I hope work are facilitating this! We are a bedsharing and breastfeeding on demand household and it’s what makes things sustainable for me with a 10mo. Can’t believe a PP is suggesting giving a baby unnecessary meds just because they wake once a night - what are we doing 🤦🏻‍♀️

Anyway, all this to say I feel your pain on balancing a greedy job and having a life. It’s hard!! Let us know how things go.

I guessed you'd probably want to spend as much time as possible with him when you're working such long hours. Most mums would. I'd definitely be pushing very hard to make your time outside work all about DS though, rather than doing chores at the same time - it is absolutely exhausting trying to do chores and domestic admin with an energetic toddler who just wants your time and attention. Could the nanny or DH take responsibility for batch cooking for DS's special diet (you could choose the recipes if you want him eating specific things)? And it really would be fine for him to spend a bit of time with his dad while you recharge. Even half an hour with a cup of tea and a book might be helpful. At the moment you're doing it all: long working hours, chores, night wakings. You need to be able to hand over responsibility for some of it in whatever ways would feel like a relief to you.