My DS has turned 2 in early August. He started walking at 9 months, has defeated many age appropriate challenges in the playground, doesn't talk to other people including kids but isn't shy as such, just very observant. He talks to me and is getting better at it daily.
I am a single mother, his father works interstate 4dpw and sees him 1 day a week which is all he can manage right now.
Early on I noticed if I gave Ds a toy wagon, he'd flip it over to play with the wheels, but no matter how many times I demonstrated putting a toy in it and pulling it around by its stick he continued to play with only the wheels but then suddenly a few months later he upgraded to not pulling the wagon with toys by the stick, but rather pulling the stick off the wagon and obsessively wondering around with it in his hand for hours refusing to let it go. I tried to give him other sticks... nope.
I gave him a hand kite with ribbons hanging off of it, but he pulled off all the bells and spends sometimes hours a day dragging it along the floor by only the red ribbon, no other colour.
Wooden blocks, he has a tub of 100 he got that for his 1st birthday.
He started stacking blocks got to about 2 and ever since (1year on) no matter how much i ask him, show him or playfully encourage him or even if i rotate his toys he tips them out or picks up the whole bucket and throws it, scattering the sharp blocks everywhere then carefully spaces them about 20cm apart, all 100 of them or his cars, crayons, chalk ... anything that comes in a "lot" spaced about the same distance every time and don't I dare try to move them, stack them or play with them as intended or he will come and demolish anything I try.
He's really destructive, i am unsure about creative at this point.
He hates flowers and if i try to show him a bug he will kill it multiple deaths.
Crayons and any art materials are off limits because he eats them and wont stop when asked or at just one. It got to the point that whole chopped crayons were turning up in his poo and i just couldn't accept that, so no arts.
Instead of sitting with me he takes the materials off me throws them on the floor and jumps on them or buries them in the couch or eats them including chalk paint and playdough.
Playdough, he wont try and smush it or make a ball or anything and wont really watch me do it either. We have all kinds of easy stamps and colours and cutters... nope.
Even after teething he still insists on sucking on markers and eating crayons.
Before he started that he was taking all his puzzle pieces, cars, blocks, balls playdough fridge magnets you name it and sticking them in the corner of the couch. I am rarely able to sit on the couch, he does this at his dads as well but before that, his dad just didnt believe me.
I have to take him out (i know my language is droll but i'm damned exhausted)
Daily for at least 2 hours otherwise he wakes at 6am and can push it until 8pm to go to bed. I am sick as hell of sleep training, it always ends up back to square one again and again.
If I try to pack up the messes he makes, he gets fussy and angry and tries to pull me away or fetches them and throws them back on the floor, and kicks them under furniture so I can't get them. I have to pack them away and hide them.
The only way to get the space back is to give him an ipad or a bribe to distract him and even then he may be distressed.
I read to him but can only do so when in the bath now, so he cant take the book and toss it across the room.
I have tried playing games to pack up toys ect... he only does it if on a rare occasion that i am so tired and fed up that I start kind of laughing and crying.
Then he feels bad and goes and packs up all his toys.
He use to help me sweep and do dishes and cooking, not anymore.
I know that toddlers throw things and can be weird about their toys but for at least a year now or more I have not seen my son mimic anything I have shown him except for the shape sorter after that achievement at about 9 months he basically just ...doesn't play with me unless its rough. Wont even broom broom a car around the mat.
He can count to 14, is naming colours and using language meaningfully rarely however is slightly delayed it seems by choice.
I have sat him down and asked him to try talking and to stop biting me at swimming and throwing hysterical tantrums in the change rooms, we've been going for 1.5 years and he still doesn't listen and throws ballistic tantrums 9/10 times in the change-rooms. I come out completely defeated but cant hand over to his dad because he doesnt understand "gentle" he told me he's going to just shove the poor boys head under water.
The only reason his dad would take swimming is so he can infiltrate any men or friends i have made or to pick up woman and have me too embarrassed to go back.
His overly possessive personality chokes me and i cant stand 5 minutes around him but at pick up he hangs around for hours trying to kill time so he doesn't have to put in.
Once he realises he cant manipulate me, he will go get another girlfriend and try to get her to move in and act as DS mother, he has already tried.
I cant take him to the Library where instead of sitting with the other kids and listening to the books or playing along to the songs, he will run off and rip all the books off the shelves, its totally pointless going. I have tried the jo frost strategy of looking him in the eye, one hand on shoulder one on his arm and telling him carefully and directly how it is, it doesn't work or takes months and months and months to see minimal changes then he just goes back.
He also doesn't come or listen half or more of the time when I call him or his dad calls him and refuses to talk though can say quite a number of words clearly to only me.
He also developed this "chucky face" multiple times a day he screws up his face and just stays like that for a minute or more... I have got no idea whats going on there but it takes a large amount of effort and physicality to make this kid laugh or even smile.
I have mentioned this to maternal nurse but DS behaves different around other people than he does at home so unless i show her footage?
He refuses to say hello or goodbye or make gestures as such though he can.
He will sit in the sandpit and just throw sand out on the grass, wont play with cars or dump trucks or even just finger drawing in it.
At the park, he will jump in the mud until he is so wet he wants to go home, so thats all of 10 minutes in wet seasons, and we are in 4 seasons Australia.
I am mentally exhausted and have to solve constant problems while his dad gets to go off dating and getting hair cuts and blowing money on stuff we cant afford and hiding it from me, like $6000 of solar panels, he doesn't even have a house to put them on keeps saying he is "building a trailer" but rarely provides any updates.
I cant take Ds anywhere without gumboots and he goes out of his way to get to a splash of water but thats all he wants to do, no playground, no digging, no swing no climbing no other kids just puddles or throwing dirt or bark. I got him a splash suit but he wore through it and i'm cleaning piles of mud caked clothing daily as well as shoes.
He likes to wrestle but goes too hard, hits me in the eyes and scratches my face, pulls my hair and kicks me in the stomach often times deliberately which he learned from his father who i asked to stop going so hard but he denies he's doing it, I have seen it. If i pull his father up about anything he just lies and attacks me, its totally useless. Ive seen his dad play with him so roughly he's had a blood nose or wound up in tears and instead of apologising or comforting him, he attacks me verbally for just being there because it damaged his ego, he totes that he is "a great dad", i have yet to see it.
This kid is starting to really hurt me and go at me and I am only a Quater the size of his dad.
I come out looking like a meth junky, all scratched up face and wirey ripped out tufts of hair. He tries to horse kick me in the face and lundges at and bites me randomly all day, refuses to stop and i cant figure out why. I pretend to cry sometimes but then he just starts crying.
I am down to 48 kg's due to stress and constant illness this year. I am really ... unhappy and hardly getting my period anymore and rarely get any private time to see doctors.
DS will scream through the entire appointment, its pointless taking him along.
Ds is completely bi-polar with food as well for lack of better term right now and has refused since day 1 to eat anything vegetable or anything tastes like vegetable including veg chips, sweet potato chips, orange juice with even a tiny bit of carrot or veg loaded burger patties, bubble and squeak or even fresh corn or beetroot...he will inspect food hard for any flakes of green red or orange and will refuse to eat them if found. No frittata or omelette, no pastry the list goes on.
I am down to sausages and bacon with the occasional addition of bread with cheese.. unless its junk he wont eat it (because his father keeps taking him to McDonalds)
but had once a wide variety of cheese, fruits, some veg fish chicken and mince Avocado, he wont touch roasts of any kind or any red meats and will only eat pork if its in a meatball (sometimes) wont even eat hot chips because potato. NO sauces either. This is all since his dad started visitation, we were fine before he decided to start force feeding him behind my back, STEAK by the way, while he was teething.
Kid wont even touch lasagne anymore.
I have tried varied shapes, toppings and cooking methods. I have tried picnics, restaurants, cafes and every kind of vegetable i can get, he even hates potato. I have tried different cutlery, even different plates and bowls.
He refuses to use a spoon or fork and wont allow me to feed him that way either, not even playfully.
It's probably nothing to readers... It's probably normal but I feel really tired of it and like my life is a joke and I am just a loser, and I deserve this.
I realised long ago that losing my cool and yelling doesn't help, I am beyond that but now I have no ventilation but the occasional desperate crying call to lifeline.
I feel like the last year I have gotten nowhere and should stop trying so hard to teach him and socialise him though i can see he's falling behind because it all just falls apart.
I gave birth alone because of lockdowns, he went to playgroup but ALL the other parents quit 3 different groups because of Vaccine mandates, I was the only who got the jab so i could take him out, he was the only kid there.
Same with his initial swimming group, there really are no other activities in the area suitable.
when i try to talk to other parents about DS I get comments like "he's trouble"
because I am a single mother or, people nod smile and just pull away. I am not delusional about that.
I am always kind and helpful to other mothers, i dont get the same. I feel like they hate me for success and they hate me for perceived failure, i cant win.
The only parents that have been nice to me, are the ones with kids that have Autism because at times i empathise that they really need someone to just listen.
I have tried everything with vegetables and I cant afford to keep it up, its becoming really wasteful even with a compost.
I am shunned socially as a single mother and can't get him into daycare anywhere. He was in 3 weeks ago then I got an email at 9pm saying they were shutting down suddenly forever from the next day, and also charged me for it though he couldn't have attended.
He had 1 2hr session then they kept telling me i cant bring him back for varied reasons, shut down suddenly and charged me $400 for 2hrs.
I have put him on waitlists for all other local daycares, but they're all fully booked for 2023.
I cant drive, so cant take him out too far.
I take him to neighbouring towns via the bus or train and i deeply feel like he hates that i dont have a car, which his dad deliberately mentions often.
His dad takes him out in the car all day when he has him, and I don't agree with that it completely messes up the routine. He never takes him to the park or does the hard yards excusing that he has only 1 out of 3.5 days off for no reason to spend with DS.
DS needs to be outdoors or he doesn't sleep easily and can get really rough. From 9 months on if I didn't take him out daily for at least 40 minutes, it'd be a bad day and sometimes I absolutely dont enjoy it, recovering from diastacis made it hard to.
Now his dad is trying to force me to get a car and license I cant afford to run it or maintain it let alone buy it. I have tried to explain this but he doesn't listen.
He doesn't listen to me at all even when i told him DS tantrums started at 22 months, his response was with a screwed up face "Well you better fix that or he's going to be like that FOREVER". It was wiser not to respond.
He also verbally attacks me in the car in front of our son and brings up rude and often nasty discussions about our previous relationship that are NOT PG what so ever and just doesn't care that its humiliating. He did this during our relationship so that i couldn't walk away when he would start at me, yes it is a crime.
I can't get DS into daycare and cant afford a baby sitter plus he's too young for a BBS, there-for I cant go back to work or study. There are no playgroups in my area for 2yr olds.
We cant afford to re-locate, housing market it stuffed here badly and that is a long story. His dad works minimally and earns good money but is really bad with money. He offered to rent us a house but that's just another way to gain control and i refuse to go back to him for help for that reason, if he even thought i had met another man he'd kick me out.
I am so stuck here and cant talk to his dad because he's a coward who will just say the worst thing possible that comes to his mind like well if he's being naughty "throw him in a cold shower" or "well if he bites you bite him back" when I asked him if he meant any of those things seriously, he said he would never do them so... no help from him just advise that would put me in the area of abuse to gain one up on me...sabotage.
His father says that because he works 4 days a week, he "has a life" and has "shit to do" so can't take DS for even a fraction longer week after week even if i have pneumonia.
I have no reliable family to call and no friends.
Some of his best excuses are " i cant because i am getting my hair cut" or "i have to mow my lawn and wash my car" once when i asked him for more help he said he was just "too lazy" other times after agreeing at mediation to "consistency" and dates and times to have DS he has often simply said "NO" when i have asked if he's coming to see his son with no reason, the reason i knew was another woman but he just lied about it for 6 months, I knew but said nothing then they broke up and he gave me her smashed phone?
I don't know to this day what really happened to her.
Even though he has a 25 year old son at home who is currently unemployed and could be helping him with the "stuff to do" he doesnt want that because that means he has to take DS more.
I asked him why he doesnt get his son to take on those tasks and help out and he laughed at me sayign repeatedly "he wont, i have hinted it to him by ect..." I said "have you directly just asked him nicely" again laughing "he wont" the true answer here is NO, he hadn't asked just expected and tried to manipulate unsuccessfully and there-for it is his son's fault and not his poor communication, end of story unless you want to fight about it.
His son suddenly quit his job recently and instead of talking to him about it or putting down any rules or ultimatums, he shirked the responsibility onto his son's mother who lives 3 states away, who he constantly calls crazy and laughs about how she tried to kill herself in front of their kids, she tried because he left her after 27 years after being accused of affairs (to this day i believe her)
This is what he is like and part of the reason i am struggling so hard. When pregnant and trying to tlak about baby names, he was sitting on the bed txting his ex's sister who i found out he was confessing his undying love for, shes now shagging her own cousin.
By the way, he's 53... so if that changes the game?
The truth is his father is horribly oppressive and is afraid to be alone. Within 3 months he tried to absolutely ruin my life after meeting stalking and pressuring me to be with him. He would send flowers to my work and turn up side eying all my colleagues. He blackmailed me to quit my job, stalked and harassed my friends and family and tried to manipulate me to share a bank account. he attacked me at 18 weeks pregnant because he misheard something i said.
I left because he was constantly picking fights, blaming me for everything, gaslighting me, sexually assaulting and being an absolute sex pest. He even tried to force me to tell my obstatrition I wanted a C section, so that he could have his way right after birth and verbally abused me in the car for not mentioning it on my first appointment.
I am tired of being treated like garbage.
He treats DS like an object and a nuisance and on his 2nd birthday bought yearly zoo passes and booked a hotel in the city. I said the zoo might be ok but we wont be there long, i was right because his dad didnt tuck him in and he peed all over his clothing under his splash suit but the worst part was he booked the wrong hotel, lost it at the service clerk over his own mistake...DS was screaming I had to take him outside and sing Bobby Mcferrin to him to calm him down for over an hour.
We went to the booked hotel which was horrible and he booked a room with only 1 double bed then denied it and blamed the hotel. He said our room had a balcony and spa, it was all a lie, he's a liar.
We have been separated for over 2 years, but he wont stop sexually harassing me making sexual and inappropriate comments or rude comments about my appearance and trying to love bomb and groom me back, he's not interested in DS. When the pattern fails he starts stonewalling us and not showing up.
He demanded via mediation "special days" only to shirk easter and Christmas since, stonewalling myself and Ds for 7 days over christmas so he could secretly holiday with his now ex "new girlfriend" and lied about it, then blamed my family with the most ridiculous excuse, he's never met them.
He's oppressive to a point where he makes his sons dinner nightly when at home and actually takes it into his bedroom and serves it to him in bed, then complained endlessly that his son is lazy so he sabotages his son so that he wont leave by giving him money and pampering his entitled butt, but also blames him for being entitled and basically acting just like his dad.
When we take Ds out for lunch his father deliberately picks restaurants that arent for kids and complains and acts like an absolute bugger if I pick one.
Nothing I ever do is good enough. In the relationship he demanded that i dont need my own money, that I should be dependant on him.
Thats when I got the tip to leave, but it still took a long time and homelessness while pregnancy to get away. He tried to seperate me from my family and I have at least 4 hours of footage of him screaming in my face while we were meant to be on holiday due to my declining mental health.
4 hours of swearing, screaming and insulting me and my family and friends for no reason. The police couldn't do anything because we were interstate so when we got home he made it his duty to knock me up quick because in his head i would be too beaten down to leave.
I know this is true because as soon as dad gets a girlfriend he's all about kicking his son, who is 27 out, chews people up and spits them out.
He's the guy that shags you for 20 years then leaves with this line: "I never loved you" and i am NOT doing that to myself for ANYONE.
His son has major entitlement problems and is constantly quitting jobs because of rifts with his boss.
He has a knowledge complex and thinks he's right about everything, argues with everyone.
He has no friends or girlfriends and spends all his time gaming in a dark room.
His dad perves on his nephews and other son's lady friends and gets oddly obsessive over them, adds them on facebook and sends them cutie messages.
He jokes often about finding another woman to knock up. His younger son has already 2 kids to 2 different woman and is only 22. His nephew has 4 kids to 4 different woman and is only 26, already Dad has tried to knock another woman up since we split, when he found out she was Barron, he dumped her and tried to come back to me.
His father has bought him near no clothes, refused to buy him the right nappies, at 2yo still lies him on his back to wipe while he screams bloody murder when the boy can put his own nappy on! The man is an actual creep.
He has barely any toys at dads or even a bed and 2 years on he still has not child proofed his home, not even basically and he blames me for it.
He argues he doesn't need to protect DS from jamming a knife in a socket because his house is new? though DS stays there 1 day a week and often comes home with nasty gashes, bruises on his face from the same issues every time, who can I talk to about this? His father constantly makes side comments about how DS projectile vomited last night or was up at 5am, but has no solutions though i have given them to him he belligerently refuses to follow my instructions.
He constantly brings DS back with dihorrea or unfed and bed time problems or tells me DS projectile vomited or hit his head last night but can never seem to part a reason for any of these things that never occur at his primary home. This happens every single week.
He;s a selfish and vindictive man with serious vindictive and belligerent issues. He refuses to recognise problems and shirks blame and responsibility onto everyone else while expecting constant credit and when he doesnt get it, he reacts.
The only reason he bothers to see DS is on the off chance I might sleep with him again. I wish i was joking, he's an absolute F of a person.
basically he shirked the whole responsibility onto me as a punishment for leaving him because he was really nasty and i tried so hard to mitigate but he just wanted everything his way.
Now anything that goes wrong is instantly my fault while he txts me that he "has a life" and cant see his son on his days off. Truth is he had another skirt for over 6 months who was more important and introduced DS to her behind my back, she satyed the night while my son was there.
Since they broke up he turns up and on time, so... no proof needed.
I could write a book about how difficult it has been to deal with his father.
I have talked about this stuff to maternal health but, its hard to really explain sometimes and feel like I am not getting things out properly.
All I have is myself to talk to because people have become so judgemental and the problems are so complicated.
I really feel like ... I am starting to become really isolated and depressed and trapped and things just go around and around with no sense of achievement and I try to beg myself to stay awake one more hour just so i don't close my eyes and wake up to the same back breaking boring mentally and emotionally draining life.
I love my son, but i am becoming completely joyless and mentally exhausted having to plan absolutely everything because his dad refused even from day 1 to come to the table. Anything he plans is half assed and usually a disaster.
I think in a nut shell I am feeling like my experience of motherhood is way more hell than love or fun and if things don't start looking up soon I don't know how I am going to keep going on.
If you have any advice or relative stories or comments about any part of this long long rant that i really needed to part with, please help a lady out.
Thank you.