What is parenting like for you?

[MIstletAOU]

What was the first thing that popped into your head when you saw the thread title? Positive or negative - all views are valid.

So different. Was chaos first month. All being equal, with only one ds I find it fine in terms of coping now. What I love is the slowness and smallness and detail and basic-ness of everything. It's a wonderful experience added into our lives. Sometimes I want to swell and pop with different feelings when I'm with the boy: happiness, pleasure, concern, cheekiness. All sorts.

quite good

My first thought was positive (although today I lost it a bit with them as ds1's crying woke up ds2 and I really wanted them to sleep as we have a dr's appt soon).

Anyway, for me it is a lot of juggling, but very fulfilling and fun. When they're happy and laughing I feel that this is as good as life can possibly get.

A bit grim TBH. And quite a lot worse for reading this thread.

i'm going to refer myself to a local parenting project.

Constant.

i love it, but that doesn't stop me being a grumpy cow occasionally... i find having 2 dramatically different to having 1 - a whole lot harder, but we're finding our feet again now that dd is 5 months. ds is a delight, & pretty easy as almost 4 year olds go. he often makes me laugh with the entertaining stuff he comes out. dd is a gorgeous bundle who looks to me for everything (though dp is better at making her giggle). i really appreciate the pace of life, the wandering to the local park then going for coffee and being much more involved in the commmunity. having a part-time job which i enjoy, excellent & reasonably priced childcare & supportive families all contribute i'm sure.

A learning curve! I'm learning about my baby constantly and (scarily) a lot about myself. I'm not a brilliant parent but even I can see that I'm getting better. Most of the time it is fun and i love being with her, some of the time I want to scream and step out of my life for a minute or two. The saft thing is, even when she is being a right madam, I wouldn't be doing anything else in the world right now, she's the best thing I've ever done iyswim!

Gobbledigook, you brought up an interesting point about how our attitudes towards parenting are probably affected by our circumstances. I know for a fact that the reason I find it so positive is that it is shared with dh at least 50/50. He is great at the answering questions, talking about feelings, respect for others, bolstering self-esteem etc - and although I can do all these things it is so much easier when you have someone to share them with.

MI, you picked up on my use of the word "parenting" as opposed to "being a parent" - I thought hard about that before putting it in the title! And yes in this instance it was the act of parenting that I was interested in rather than the fact of being a parent.

Some really interesting points of view here - thank you for sharing

Like being inside joy every day of my life. I finally understand what people mean by "I would die for you" even when she drives me completely cracked I am still completely overwhelmed by the intensity of my love for her. My life is no longer a mundane slog of one day drifting in to another, it is absolute extremes of joy and laughter and love to heartbreaking worry and sadness and exhaustion.
It is wonderful, every day is different and exciting!

Fantastic - I love it, every stage of their childhood, sharing their world is fascinating and teaching them grow and learn is the best job in the world. Most days!!

Fantastic!

But the hardest job I have ever done in my life, for no pay! But then the rewards far outweigh how tough it can be sometimes.

Ok, parenting as opposed to being a parent...
I like parenting - I like reading stories and tucking in bed and stuff. I don't like how cross I feel sometimes (I NEVER used to feel as cross before!) and how frustrated I get at times trying to get ds to get out of the house and walk down the road. I do know from my stepdaughter that it gets easier and easier as they become more independent and you lose that sense of being a victorian scullerymaid and constantly shovelling shit! I've also been vomitted on more times than I care to think about recently and I thought to myself, 'ah, this is what parenting is, when you try to encourage the baby to vomit as much on you personally, rather than the sofa or bed, as you are more washable!

Very different from how I imagined, but then I didn't imagine severe autism or that I would have a 6 year old who couldn't talk.

As a consequence my parenting is far more behaviourist than it would have been and I have to think about my responses to him.

It's far lonlier than I would have expected. The majority of my friends have disabled children, and I feel miles away from and uninterested in anyone who doesn't get it. Also we very rarely do family things. One of us deals with ds1 and the other takes the other 2 somewhere. Life is much easier since doing that.

OTOH it has made parenting my other 2 very enjoyable because even the tricky bits seem easy. I really do take time to enjoy them. And when ds1 is happy he's wonderful to be around as he is so off the planet. When he's stressed it's a different matter.

Exhausting.

I feel that it is not the children themselves that are hard work (although can be). It's the volume of washing, cooking, cleaning etc that goes with it that makes it so much hard work.

These celebs are so lucky with their cleaners, nannys, etc so they can really enjoy their children!

It has been very traumatic.

I have discovered many things I don't like about myself.

It has also made me realise that I have had a very poor role model and has completely fractured my simplistic 'rosy' idea of family.

Sorry to be so pessimistic, but that's just how I feel at this minute.

It can be hard work but it is so much fun and my boys amaze and entertain me everyday. I had our babies late and wouldnt wish to go back to pre children life for anything

like living in colour when everything before was black and white (I robbed that from someone else!)

brilliant

I'm knackered because I haven't had a decent night's sleep in nearly a year. The kids are ill and vomit all over me at night.
Ask me when dd is sleeping and I'm sure all will be far easier!

Tiring but rewarding.

The only thing DP and I miss about our child free days is lie-ins together - no chance of that once sprogs descend

A whole mixture of emotions across the board. I couldn't begin to dewcribe them all but for better or worse, I really feel like I am living life to the max.

Now that ds is 2.4 and more independent - and my depression is gone - I love it. Would not have said that a year ago, though.

Bloody hard work a lot of the time, and spend a lot of my time running around like the proverbial blue a**ed fly. They are great kids though, and make life great fun (at times ). Wouldn't change it for the world...

a knackering grind.

immensely frustrating...and the guilt! jeez

i'm feeling at the moment that it has turned me into a fat, socially inept, bored, boring, lazy, nothing....but i'm hoping that is just a phase i'm going through

i laugh more every day than i used to in a month before ds

i love more in an hour than i used to in a year before dh and ds

and i know in my heart that despite how i began this post, i'm happier now deep in my heart than i've ever been...however up on the surface....

the best of times and the worst of times.