I hate having kids

[Throughautomaticdoors]

I love them but I hate being a parent. It's dull, it's relentless, it's worrying, it's thankless, it's demanding, it's monotonous, it's exhausting.
I'd throw myself under a bus for them but being a parent has made me totally and utterly miserable. My first one didn't sleep through until he was 4 and a half and the second one is also a terrible sleeper. I'm starting to think it's something I've caused as everyone else I know has had at least one good sleeper.
I can't wait for them to grow up.

[benbry]

Mine are adults and the work load is less but the worry is much, much worse.

Cheers

[Obsidian77]

Parisgellar if you hate it this much now, please see if you can talk to your old company about taking you back. I've now been a SAHM for several years, have hated it more every year and despair that the gap is too big and I'll struggle to rebuild my career.
Thanks for an honest and unsentimental thread op

[imnotbeingfunnyright]

That's a brave thing to say/post. I've said it out loud to friends and other mum's at groups etc and felt like a leper. I do love my children but God, I love it more when I'm home alone.

[Yayme]

Sorry it gets worse. I had a friend who told me this and I didn't believe her but it's true. Year on year there is more worry, more hassle, more nonsense, more expense.

[PopPopRadio]

I'm the same and I'm a dad. DS is 4 and extremely hard work and my DD is 14 months and currently shoving her feet through her cot and refusing to go to sleep. I love them both so much but after a day looking after them I'm always desperate for beer!

[wheat32]

Can I join your misery OP? I feel like I'm rubbish at everything. Trying to do a 4 day job in 3 so I can look after the kids and the house and feel like I do a rubbish job at everything. I actually came home and cried a little today at how rubbish I am. Glad I'm not alone

[StrongTeaHotShower]

I love my dd, love the very bones and essence of her but gahhhhh. My frustration reaches boiling point every live long day! Dd is 100% a mummy's girl and like you Dp works long and late hours. I feel like the first time I breathe out of a day is when she's finally asleep. I feel awful writing that

[girlandboy]

I had 2 non-sleepers which frankly nearly finished me off.

I always said I wasn't going to be a shouty mum, but I turned into one and that makes me sad.

Now DD is nearly 21 and is great.
DS is 16 and is a horrible angsty, awkward, stubborn, rude, door slammer. I hope he comes out the other side soon.

I have honestly found the last 21 years really hard. I love them so much, but if I knew then what I know now? Well, I'm not sure I'd have had children.
And that makes me sound horrible and ungrateful, but it's all been so much harder than I'd hoped.

[formerbabe]

I always said I wasn't going to be a shouty mum

Me too..pre kids I thought mums who shouted at their children in public were terribly common...what a fool I was

[PoisonWitch]

Thanks for being so honest. This honestly terrifies me as I think I'm the sort of person who will martyr myself as I have been heavily socialised to be nice and accommodating but am secretly quite selfish. I worry I will resent the loss of my freedom, time and money. I have a good life and love being able to go away on a whim or lie in till midday on a Sunday.

I don't really want children but sometimes I forget and daydream about lovely, clever children who will be a joy to me and not test me until I break. Unfortunately DP and I are stubborn barstards and any children would be a pita I am positive.

[Lorelei76]

OP "but if I could have seen a snapshot of how it would be before I had them I wouldn't have done it. It's absolute shit."

can I please offer an unmumsnetty hug and some ?

[Juanbablo]

I think we all feel like this sometimes. I had a complete freak out this evening. I pointed out that nobody thanked me for the dinner that they didn't eat. I suggested that when I collect them from school they say "hello mummy, how are you?" Instead of demanding snacks and sulking if I haven't brought one. Ds1 has SEN and he's being fucking horrible at home because he's holding it together at school. It's always a worry.

[DianaMitford]

I'm a single parent of two girls (14 and 9) and without boarding schools I very much doubt that I would have hung on to my sanity.

[donajimena]

I posted on another thread today how much I hated parenthood (early years) with both now in high school its lovely but I am more than aware that this is probably the calm before the teenage storm.
I just wish I had found this site when mine were younger. I felt trapped with nothing to look forward to...

[Wheresthewine36]

Thank you! I often feel like this and was beginning to think I was the devil incarnate for not wanting to spend my every waking moment with them! I must be a special kind of stupid because I managed to have 5 children before realising that I'm not a fan of the mum thing.
I love them. I do everything they need me to do and always put them 1st in everything...but for fucks sake, this isn't my life! There must have been a mix up at the sorting office. I was going to be a relaxed, fun, spontaneous hippy-mum who took my troupe of adorable, inquisitive Littles for barefoot walks in Summer downpours. I was going to climb trees with them and teach them the names if wildflowers and make puppets and all kinds of lovely...shit. Instead, I am bogged down by the plethora of utterly mundane shit that goes into keeping them alive! I spend at least an hour a week fantasising about walking out of the door empty handed and never coming back and another hour crying about what a monster I am for fantasising about leaving my children. I know I would never actually walk away because being without them would be far, far worse than being with them but if I could have somehow known I would feel like this about motherhood...I would have got a cat.

[ssd]

this is one of the most honest threads I've seen in a long long time

I feel I've disappeared, under mountains of laundry, never ending dinners, worry, worry and worry.

[ssd]

saying that, I couldnt be without them.

[benbry]

When mine were young I used to daydream about being sent to prison and being put in solitary confinement for a week with just a pile of books for company. Oh the peace!

[searchingfortheanswer]

Very honest thread. Those who have posted about a loss of identity, I can relate to that. I have been considering whether I should give up work (currently on mat leave but work a very very demanding ft job in the city), some of these posts are food for thought x

[Believeitornot]

Can you train your seven year old not to shout? Tell her to come and find you instead.
Why does your dh need to work away 1 any option of him getting a new job?

[benbry]

No maternity leave when mine were young, you had to leave your job.

When my eldest was a baby I woke up in a cold sweat from a very realistic dream where I had tied him to a chair leg for the day and gone to work. Oh dear.

[formerbabe]

When mine were young I used to daydream about being sent to prison

This really made me laugh...I used to wish I'd have a minor illness which would require a short hospital stay!

[goddessoftheharvest]

It can be shockingly awful at times. Your first had a good run of being an only child- did you always feel this way or is it since DC2 came along?

I had DD very young, and have been a mum all my adult life. I had more patience and time to do hippy mum stuff when she was younger, weirdly.

I have secondary infertility now, and while I get terribly sad about that at times, I think realistically it's probably better if I have no more children. DD is great and just enough for me. I'm quite selfish in some ways, horribly practical and introverted. I think one, at a push two, would be more than enough

There are only so many boo boos I can kiss, you know?

[Msqueen33]

God I love you lot

[kidsandcatseverywhere]

Don't worry op everyone feels like that sometimes. I have 6 - sometimes I love being a mum the day goes well.

Today I woke up to my baby having diahrea and poo all the way up to her hair, I set fire to my blender , I spent all day worrying about things . We didn't get through everything we planned in terms of home ed and I was so tired this evening I fell asleep next to the baby's cot leaving the other running riot. Total rubbish parenting.

I'm lying in bed waiting for takeaway - which yes I will eat watching tb IN BED.

Tomorrow is a new day