To be able to post a thread looking for support and not be accused of being a bad mother and generally a lazy and bad person.

[lucyellensmum1]

I know it is bad form to start a thread about a thread, but i am really angry and hurt.

I posted because i am worried about my DP. We have financial problems and it is taking its toll. I don't work but am now looking for a job. All i get is GET A JOB and someone actually had the audacity to say to me that i should basically send my DD to nursery because she would be better off there than stuck at home with a mother who has depression. WTF???

YES, i know i need to get a job, but that doesn't stop my DP from being dangerously stressed this week, it doesn't help NOW does it. That was not what that thread was supposed to be about, i wanted to know what i can do, in what i predict are going to be a difficult few weeks. I am worried about my DP and yes, i know it is all my fault but to tell me i am a bad mother - i am devestated.

I really felt i had turned a corner and starting to look for a job was one of the positive steps i have made. But hey, it just seems that maybe i am toxic to my family and maybe, as some posters apparently think, they would be better off without me.

Time for me to go i think.

lucyellensmum
YANBU. I dont post on mumsnet for support for precisely this reason. The perfect people always manage to find out just why your problems are your own fault because you are such a bad parent.
mn used to be a small community, it isn't any more. better look in real life for support.

LEM - I know the feeling. You want everyone to say 'everything is going to be ok. You are not a bad mother, you are doing everything you can reasonably be expected to. ' Unfortunately, mumsnet is not the place to do that. We can't see how fragile you are, or whether you have had a few. Sorry, but I think you've ony just come back from whereever it is you went the other day!

I keep in touch with LEM via emails and have done for some time now. She has been a great help and support for me and I try to help her too.

She is a lovely lovely girl. She makes some great contributions to MN offering very valuable help and support to other MNrs. I know, from my own experience, when I have been low she has always replied to my posts/threads and I have always found her words comforting and they've helped me enormously.

She came back to MN because she clearly has problems at home and needed some support. Some of you have posted with some great ideas, some of you haven't.

She didn't flounce a few weeks ago. She took a break from MN simply because she needed a break...some of us take breaks (me included) and some of us stay on MN permanently. We're all different. But she DIDN'T flounce.

I've had an email from her today. She has asked me to post the following....

"Would you please thank revjustabout for the offer of coffee and say that I am sorry but I'm not up to meeting anyone right now. I am having counselling and don't want to confuse that. That, I think, is going to be a positive thing for me...."

She's added that if revjustabout would like her email addy to post on here and I'll get it to you.

We're all different on here. We all have our own different problems in life. Perhaps some of the posters on LEM's threads could've thought about the fact she is clearly very depressed and unhappy with life right now and take this into account before they post what they do.

LEM...if you're reading this....I'll email you later today....xxxxxxx

I wish her the best of luck, whispy, but I do hope she can focus instead on getting together a stronger support network IRL.

I am depressed myself, but a net board which is not specifically dedicated to people dealing with it can be problematic if a person is feeling especially fragile.

I'm glad she's getting some counselling and professional help.

Thanks expat...xxx

I'll let her know you've posted.

The 'get a job' advice is something I have to deal with too. But those people haven't got out their calculator and done the maths.

If in real life, somebody says something you think is a bit off, or a bit strange, you say 'hmmm' or there is an awkward silence. Somebody changes the subject to Desperate Housewives or the weather.

In real life if somebody says something that upsets me, I am inclined to think that they didn't mean it unkindly, but were a bit thoughtless because their sphere of reference is so different to my own.

In RL people overlook things, and give the benefit of the doubt.

But on an internet board, people do tend to pile in and attack somebody with different views.

Every person has thousands of opinions. Millions even. But it is possible to make 'enemies' on an internet board because your views or experiences on one particular matter differ. Which is so ludicrous, because none of my friends in real life would ever agree with eachother about everything.

Not totally knocking internet boards, but I think the knocks and the support received can be about equal.

Wonder if you are going to look in again LEM?

I actually took the comments on that thread you were referring to exactly the same way you did and was . Maybe they were not meant in that way, but if that is the case you are not the only one to misinterpret them - me too.

I just noticed the link to the other thread asking about job suggestions. It's well beneath your skills but I wondered whether working in a secondary school either as a learning support assistant or as a science technician might be something you could consider? If you get in with a decent school they might aupport you in becoming a teacher in future years, in any case it would help you decide whether you are interested in a career in academic circles or not.

The money is shite but the best thing is that you get school holidays off.

Because of the above jobs like this are like hens' teeth, but you could send around a CV asking if there was any cover work available.

Hi Korma! Yes all ok here. I'll try and email you later. Yes I did get your msgs but with so much to-ing and fro-ing with DD2 doing half days at school its been a case of not finding the time to do much other than all the trips to school and back. Full-time from Monday, thankfully. x

Haven't read the whole thread so I don't know what people have actually said.

TBH, if you are feeling the strain financially why NOT get a job? It's a luxury in this day and age to have one parent not working, and TBH it's madness as clearly the financial situation is a huge strain on you and your DH.

Putting your child in nursery is NOT being a bad mother (and nor is any one saying that it makes you a bad mother not to use nursery I shouldnt think!).

Sounds to me like people have just tried to respond with practical suggestions for you.

and if you do have a partner, it is actually possible to swap out shifts with them and get a job.

it really is.

especially this time of year - there's seasonal work out there that gets you back on the map and that all important referee or even a perm job.

it can help, too, if you are depressed. i'm not saying it's for everyone, but it certainly helped me and i hope to pick up some seasonal stuff here once wee one is born.

you have to be creative, but if and when you are really hurting for money and you are in a couple, you find all kinds of things.

again, i understand it's different for single parents and some of the disabled, but it's not beyond the realms of possibility.

i did post earlie just felt i had to post again i,m new to MN and only been around for a short while really but must say first i have,nt read every post but feel as LEM was jumped on in a way i think its not about whether she should get a job fgs she,s crying out for help and support at a bad time is what i see LEM hope things start to go a bit better for you well done whispywisp you seem like a great mate !{grin}

LEM has a long history here, deb.

And she really and truly does need to take a very long break from boards in general and work on RL.

I can only speak from my own experience but I've too been a SAHM for a number of years (10 to be exact). I am finally in a position to look for a new job with my youngest starting full-time Reception Year next week.

When you're a SAHM you can take a major dip in confidence and when it comes to going back to work I'm finding it hard to even contemplate going for an interview let alone trying to juggle being a Mum to two kids plus work.

It's not always possible to get your partner/husband etc to change his hours so you can work. My husband works very long days - like LEM's - and whilst it'd be great if he could cut his hours down/do a different job with less hours - its not financially viable for us.

We too have money difficulties like LEM and like loads of other people in this country atm. I too have suffered with serious bouts of depression - mainly stemming from the tragic loss of my Dad...I've never got over his death and probably never will.

However....when I come on MN I try my hardest to take the rough with the smooth. Perhaps coming on MN when you are so desperate isn't a great idea but neither is it simply telling LEM to 'get a job'. Perhaps she can't? Perhaps she just doesn't feel able to? Perhaps she's got so little self confidence she is finding it really hard to even go out the door?

I'm disappointed to read that some posters on this thread, and the other thread, have slated LEM saying she comes on MN moaning about her relationship with her DP, depression, lack of money etc.....why not? Why can't she do that? If you're that bored of reading about her and her problems go and read someone else's thread and leaves her be. She needed some help and advice but she also (perhaps) wanted a shoulder too.

'However....when I come on MN I try my hardest to take the rough with the smooth. Perhaps coming on MN when you are so desperate isn't a great idea but neither is it simply telling LEM to 'get a job'. Perhaps she can't? Perhaps she just doesn't feel able to? Perhaps she's got so little self confidence she is finding it really hard to even go out the door? '

Yes, but to be fair, this is a huge board. There are thousands and thousands of members here.

It's also unique in how it's moderated.

And that is very, very obvious and easily found out even before you join, when you're signing up for it.

It can't be expected that everyone is going to know your history or take it into consideration or even be able to express themselves in a way that others construe as always pleasant.

That's why like you say it's the type of board you have to take the rough with the smooth because that is what you get here, just like IRL, and that's why a lot of us hang around so long and like it so much.

It's not always what you want to hear but that's not always the best.

So if it gets to the point where that's not possible it is truly a good time to take a long break and get some RL perspective and work on things there.

I do agree with you expat but maybe she just came onto MN cos she was so desperately fed up and just wanted some sympathy rather than some stern advice? 'Knocking someone when they're down' comes into my head on this.

It's hard to hear the truth and truth does hurt. LEM is such a lovely girl. I just hope she'll be ok. Wish I lived nearer and I'd go and help but unfortunately I can't.

She is very unhappy at the moment. Staying away from MN is clearly the best medicine but I just hope she'll get the help and support (and shoulder) that she needs in RL too.

'I do agree with you expat but maybe she just came onto MN cos she was so desperately fed up and just wanted some sympathy rather than some stern advice? 'Knocking someone when they're down' comes into my head on this. '

I saw the other thread now and I just didn't get that impression that she was knocked with down.

I think some posters just waded in as they do and didn't know her history.

Again, I think if you're looking for only sympathy either state that in the OP or truly, this isn't a good place for only that.

It's too big a board to expect everyone to post one way - some people do have more limited ability to express themselves, for one reason or another, and others have a different definition of what might be helpful.

Again, I wish her all the best and hope she gets things sorted out, but it's never going to be possible on MN itself to have a thread go exactly in the direction you intended, IYKWIM.

tbh,mn is so busy posts are stand alone discrete entities and people will just pile in

ask a bunch of strangers an opinion, expect to get it.you may like, you may not. the anonymity does add a a candour people wouldn't say in RL (and that may or may not be a good thing)

don't know the thread - which topic did you post it in, not aibu i hope

i suppose you take your chances on MN, but nope i wouldn't fash about what a bunch of wimmin with pc said - it isn't real

switch off and switch off

no MN grudges.life is too short to get the hump about what some anonymous woman said

revjustabout....I'll email your email addy over to LEM now. Thank you. xx