Sitting at my kitchen table feeling miserable. DD1 was driving me crazy this morning. I lost my temper with her a couple of times and told her to shut up. One time I had to put her down and leave the room for a few seconds.
Over the past couple of weeks she has become increasingly stroppy. Now various things will reliably cause screaming, kicking, arching of her back eg. getting into buggy, nappy change, getting dressed. She also does this whenever something eg a toy doesn't please her and when she gets fed up of whatever we're doing. She might have eight or ten of these "strops" in a day.
A month ago I went back to work in a really stressful environment, working shifts, after 14 months off. Struggling to cope with the stress both at work and at home and sometimes feels like she is punishing me for leaving her. I think -and DP agrees- that her behaviour is worst when she's with me. Yet she never wants to be/go with anyone else if I'm around.
She has got a lot more mobile over this period too so sometimes I think, perhaps she is just feeling more frustrated in a normal-development kind of way. But she's only 13mo which seems very early for the 'terrible twos'.
When I first went back to work I used to look forward to seeing her afterwards all shift. Now I dread coming home because experience suggests she will be difficult and I am afraid I won't be able to keep my cool. I feel I'm doing really badly by her at the moment. And poor DP takes a lot of stressed-out phone calls from me.
When I'm with her I feel permanently tense because I have the sense that it is only a matter of time before things kick off. I no longer enjoy taking her out to playgroups etc and we used to have such a lovely time together. We still do in between the strops but they cast such a shadow.
What do you think? Any thoughts appreciated.