Is it possible to be fulfilled as a SAHM

[Prufrock]

Without getting all "self-actualised" , is there anybody who does actively enjoy being a SAHM, and if so, how can I?

It's not that I'm unhappy. I recognise that I am very lucky to have been able to make the choice to stay at home with my kids, and wouldn't change that choice. Working would be horrendous given the pressures of the only type of job I would enjoy doing as I'm kind of an all or nothing type person. But I am finding it quite difficult to get any real pleasure from being with my children all day.

We have a fairly full routine - toddler groups, classes, play dates. And I have a good "mummy" friend locally whose company I like. But whilst our days are pleasant, I can't say I really enjoy them - more like endure them. It feels like every activity I do with the kids is just done to tick of another hour before bedtime, and every day is just got through so I can tick of another day until the weekend. Then the weekend arrives, and it's not actually that special, and soon enough it's the beginning of another week......

I feel like I am coping very well with life as a SAHM - but I don't want to be coping. I want to be waking up each morning looking forward to spending another day with my two wonderful children, who I do love to bits. But insteadI get woken up each morning and I think "Ok, 12 hours to go, lets start filling them".

Please tell me - well something. I'm not sure if I do want to hear that this is normal and tha all over the country there are other women feeling like me, counting down the hours until their children are grown. But I'm also not sure if I want to hear that there is something wrong with me....

Emkana I quite fancy Kevin McCloud too.

I love being SAHM and enjoy every minute with dd.
would not want to go back to work (till shes older)have a great family life, but would like a life outside THE FAMILY too.maybe even have, what are they called? oh yeah, friends. is it possible to have a family and a life.Or am i just being greedy?

Perhaps the problem is that we've all made being a SAHM a career in itself....music classes, coffee mornings, dance classes, french classes, baby signing classes, lunch at a specialist childrens cafe, special baby swimming classes...I'm sure the children would enjoy doing something their parents liked just as much.

Seems in the US (the other thread) women are now competing over their baking and homemaking....!

As a f/t working mother with a p/t SAHD we don't get the benefit of anything other than swimming classes because he's made to feel like a leper by most of the mothers at these classes. I dream of going to them but am chained to a desk during the week and find no-one wants to do anything at weekends. The park is a highlight for me on a Saturday.

When I first had DS I was quite shocked at how competitive mothers were in groups.

I fancy Kevin McCloud too....heard he has 6 kids...not sure if that's true.

Excellent observation morningpaper! I've been going to one of these music groups with mine for years. Each week it rolls around again and I wake up with a heavy heart.

Even heavily pregnant with twins didn't exempt me from a rousing few verses of 'Heads and shoulders, knees and toes'. That very nearly became 'Heads and shoulders knees and toes and ambulance' one week.

I have given DH (SAHD) special dispensation not to take DS3 to one of these music groups. I figure he's suffered enough with DS1 and DS2...

Ha ha, you have all just confirmed my prejudices about toddler music groups! Personally I would rather eat slugs than sing along to 'The Wheels on the Bus' in some grotty hall. I have a babysitter who takes dd2 to playgroup/ticktock/one o'clock club -- I tell myself this constitutes 'delegating'. I am under no illusions that I would continue to delegate these activities even without the excuse of needing to earn a living.

emkana, you are not alone! (see my post way way way down somewhere nearish the start)

morningpaper's post made me laugh slightly, re. the toddler groups, but it was reiterating a point from a Guardian article recently about how parents 'nowadays' make fools of themselves to entertain their kids. I basically don't agree. And you may all barf or roll your eyes but the singing sessions I sit through with dd at small community toddler groups (I don't go to any bigger ones as have to cross London) I find very touching. The kids do join in, the mums act daft and sing their hearts out and to be honest I find it fun and touching. Plus dd sings very cutely as a result.

But I am a soppy mum despite myself. Motherinferiors post was very interesting to me because my mum HATED being a SAHM, she didn't want to give up her career but it was the 'done' thing and she even now tells me she was rubbish when we were at home, very bad-tempered and bored and basically climbing the walls. I can remember all that and expected to feel the same. But I just didn't. It was a huge shock to me and everyone I know how I took to it. I think I partly find the toddler groups touching because at last I'm enjoying childhood in a way I never enjoyed mine because of my mother's reluctance.

"I think I partly find the toddler groups touching because at last I'm enjoying childhood in a way I never enjoyed mine because of my mother's reluctance"

That's interesting MLL. I think that some of the pre-school activities I do enjoy doing with DD are due to a sort of nostalgia from my childhood. I love the sight of a painting easel and the smell of poster paints.

So, what activities do people like? What sort of things would you enjoy leaving the house for?

I love this thread - it has made me feel almost normal. I don't want to go back to work, I consider SAHM as a career for now but OMG some days you just want to scream. I love my kids to bits and want the best for them but oh for just a break for a few hours, just once.

Mummylonglegs: I don't mean to imply that the mothers are making fools of themselves to entertain their kids, I don't think they are at all. But I DO think that most of them feel (like me) that they have completely vacated their brains in order to bring up their children in this way. Every week I look around that room and every single woman is staring vacantly into space - I don't believe that (of my particular group anyway) there is anyone there finding much personal fulfillment.

I am available to teach anyone alternate versions of The HokeyCokey, as learned on the demos of my longago yoof and exhumed on the rare appalling occasions I ventured into Song and Storytime at the Liberry on maternity leave.

I find it difficult to sing "When I was two I buckled my shoe...... blah blah, we're going this way, that way, forwards, backwards, over the Irish sea" without thinking about the group of rugby lads drunkenly singing their own version during my student days.

robin3 - I like going to the park too! I'm looking forward to when DS3 is able to toddle so it will be easier to take all three of them. I have spent a lot of the last few years taking DS1 and DS2 to various parks on my own.

me too dinosaur. we practically live in the park! I enjoy getting out but I do get a bit bored of the same old places.
Things I like - goign to see friends; toddler groups where I know people; staying at home with boys pottering while I read the paper
things I don't like - groups where I don't know anyone; trying to do craft activities with both boys; trying to cook with both boys.

Oh, pmsl, just had to post after mp's description of toddler music group. I do take ds to one but really can't stand it. It's the closest I come each week to rocking backwards and forwards and dribbling - not that anyone would notice, they'd all just think I was being super-participatory Something in me shrivels up and dies each week when the hokeypissingcokey rolls around.

Although, having said that, he also goes to the dreaded TumbleTots, adores it - and so do I!

So, horses for courses, blahdiblahdiblah.

Gosh, that was a terribly eloquent post, wasn't it? Sorry, I must have left my brain at Musical Minis...

Almost worse at the music group is when you find yourself getting really into it and suddenly notice the other mothers staring at you in horror - that has also happened to me.

I love the park, mainly because we always meet friends there even when we haven't arranged to. And the cafe does nice lattes and lemon cake.

dh used to take dd1 to a music group and i went once: none of the children joined in, but all of the parents did! lol! but this was islington dahhhling..

You grab your walkietalkie and you sling them in the van....

MARRRRGGGHHgrat Thatcher's bootboys! MARR...

I have only skimmed the thread so apologies if I repeat anything.

I suppose I'm not really a SAHM (I've worked part time in a supermarket since ds was about 6 months old) but it feels like it as it's evening work.
This whole time I've felt rather disillusioned, dp occassionally makes 'baby holiday' jokes and rubs in how he's the major wage earner, and I just felt like in 5 years I'd have nothing to show for it. A happy child, granted. But dp would have the same happy child - plus a career, a degree etc.

I'm now working as a childminder and it has improved things immensely. I still get the odd feeling of 'occupying time' - which I've always had due to a problem entertaining ds. But I'm working on finding things to fill the day up with, it's staying at home that gets me down.

Now I'm shortly going to get my evenings and weekends back, I want to take up a hobby, something crafty probably, but so I don't just plonk my bum in front the tv each night and do nothing with my spare time. I'm also intending on doing a lot of short courses for my childminding - I want it to be a career, not a job. I hope to do a degree eventually.

I have to fill the weekend with something though, if I don't do something fun with ds and dp, I feel immensley disappointed.

ROFL at Snafu at her music group. Absolute stiches!!! Embarressing myself, laughing so hard.

have even lost the ability to spell - sorry!