to not be able to handle upsetting things since I've had DS?

[CheerfulYank]

Ever since I became a mother I just can't handle violent or depressing things like I used to. DH got the first season of Dexter on DVD and we watched the first 2 episodes last night. I thought it was a really good show, and I have a monster crush on Michael C. Hall, well-written and interesting and all that.

I know I'm not going to be able to watch anymore of it.

I think I have to believe that the world I'm raising my son in has a majority of basically good people in it, and I can't watch or read anything that challenges that. Anyone else, or am I just a big baby?

Congrats MamaL!

I am same, could watch anything before DD and cannot now. Even worse now I'm pregnant again.

I am same. I got better but then became pg again when DS1 was 7 and DD 5 and off it all went again. I find it one of the worst things about pregnancy and being a Mum TBH.

A few months ago - before this current news story flared up - I had a lovely photo of the DC on the PC desktop. DS2 was in the middle, holding the other two's hands and they were walking away from the camera down a pretty path.

After a couple of days it started to disturb me. Then I realised it reminded me of the James Bulger CCTV pictures of him being led away. I changed it immediately and have not been able to look at it since without feeling upset.

YANBU.

Since DS1 was born, couldnt watch anything 'gritty'. The NSPCC adverts with the baby saying 'mama' send me over the edge.
Since DS2 (8 weeks old) was born, have gotten worse. The recent footage of Haiti left me in floods of tears..thoughts of children without their parents made me beyond sad. I am now confined to pure entertainment tv...

yankncock - god i thought it was just me with the intrusive bad thoughts. its funny i've had a random invasion of them today but sometimes i think its when im a bit tired.

after i had dd my dh said to me 'god i'm so relieved everything turned out ok becasue (insert v distressing birth horror story which i wont inflict on mumsnet)' i think he just didnt think before he spoke cos he was emotional/tired/relieved that dd came out ok but the story sent me into some kind of melt down and it took me weeks to get over it. i couldnt get it out of my head and i worked myself into tears sometimes daily.

other things affected me too. i got v upset about that story in the news where the mother left her 4 kids alone for 24 hours while she went out drinking.

now dd is 5 months i am much better but i still self censor! i am watching the 5 Days drama on bbc1 but only because i read all the blurbs to make sure there was no suggestion of anything bad happening to the baby (besides being abandoned) because recent casualty knocked me for six.

i was NOT like this before i got pregnant.

It started for me when i was pregnant - anything with gruesome bits . . . Spooks, Silent Witness, Family Guy, nature programmes where animals die, horror films, Question Time (future too scary since DS was born), the news . . . . although i'm still ok with Midsommer Murders and Murder she Wrote (phew!) but needless to say we watch a lot of Dave in our house

YANBU I have to keep switching stuff off after about 10 mins, things that I didn't used to bat an eyelid at.

" I miss being the hard hearted bitch I once was"

@ MamaL - and congrats

Me too. That was 6 years ago. I have become the sort of person I spent years snorting at.

It started with me when I was pregnant too. I couldn't watch the news and had to turn over if a trailer for a horror film came on!!

To whoever mentioned sticking to Disney films, have you seen Bambi or The Fox and the Hound?!?!? I suggest you don't, they made me weep as a child so no way I could watch them now.

thats a whole new thread isnt it? Films that made you cry as a child and still do as an adult . . .. . Railway Children for me (and my sister). . . . . every single ruddy time

sungirl, if you search my name from about 3-4 months ago, I had a whole thread about the intrusive thoughts, got some very good advice.

Other Yank, yes, we are letting the side down!

Though I remember seeing The Lion King 10 years before DS and sobbing, asking 'how can this be ok to show to kids?' re: the dad dying.

I may have to stop the news. Nearly in tears over the boy kidnapped in Pakistan, when the showed his poor mum crying I welled up terribly.

I'm the same, especially with the Jamie Bulger case. And the Baby P case. They haunt me sometimes.

And then there's Sophie's Choice. Apparently it's supposed to be a really good film but there's not a chance in hell that I'll ever watch it.

(And I'm feared deeply respected for my sparring ability too. If it ever got out what a wuss I am I'd be a laughing stock down the dojo.....)

OMG, I thought I was a lonely freak! There are lots of you lol.

I turn over the news, skim over the papers until I get to the problem page, I feel sick to my stomach about some of the previously mentioned cases (can't even bring myself to say them).

Its horrible, but im glad im not the only one.

Before I had kids I liked the film Trainspotting. After kids, I started watching it on TV once and I couldn't bear watching that poor baby with those awful junkie parents.

Sophie's Choice is heartbreaking, read the book and watched the movie. Avoid it at all costs if sad kid's stuff really upsets you. I'm also a wimp since having the dc. I read the papers daily and cry often at all kinds of sad or plain weird stories and now at the point where I don't want to read those stories of child abuse etc. Saying that,l as a child my saddest songs were, 'Two Little Boys', 'Seasons in The Sun' and 'Billy Don't Be A Hero!' - guess it was a sign of things to come!!

Oh God Sophie's Choice! When DC2 was on the way I was so worried in case I might have a favourite child (I haven't) that I tormented myself imagining what I would do in Sophie's position.

weird. we went away for the weekend and stayed in a hotel which had a case full of dvds at reception you could borrow. one of them was sophies choice which i've not seen but i knew there was something risky for me in it. i texted my mum to ask what it was about (no dvd box to read). the reply i got was 'NO NO NO dont watch it, will give you nightmares!'

yank - do you have a link - sorry not being lazy just can't find the thread (i'm not v good at navigating mn)

thank you please

I sobbed over little Jamie for a good half hour last night. DS hugged&kissed me before bedtime and went upstairs, and I just kept thinking about it and I bawled. It was like I couldn't stop; I think DH was honestly getting worried. I think it has to do with realizing that he was DS's age, it make the protective part of me flare up.

I'm the same, but so is dp now. We watched the end of The Shield recently, which had a child dying in it, it was such a shock episode that it took dp the whole weekend to get over the sadness of it.

I am the same if not worse. My son has just turned 3 and I only have to hear the name James and see anything about what happened to him and I feel physically sick and can't breathe. I remember it when it happened but I was 17 then. When my son was exactly the age James was, i thought of him a lot as I kept imagining my son and how he would react if that happened and how aware of it he would be and it absolutely devastates me to think of it. How his mother lived through it I will never know.
I am the same about other cases and it is definitely a whole lot worse since having my two boys. I thought I was a freak so glad to see others are as sensitive as me!