Have decided Im actually not a very good Mum

[losinggriponthings]

Anyone else feel they are really not doing well enough?

WWW - sorry you have been feeling the same. shit isnt it?

i can really get resentful thinking, hang on a minute ALL i do is help and look after other people, what about me??

the monotony of it all is mind numbing too

i feel like this sometimes, ds's are 2 and 3 and constantly terrorise each other, or if they are in a group situation they band up together and do it to someone elses child. Yesterday, for instance, I went to take them to an indoor play area they love, as it was pissing it down there was a que to get in, for the ten minutes we were in the que they both hurt the little girl behind us, they were warned if it happened again we would be going home, and then they made the little girls brother cry by being to rough. Hence they were taken out and taken home, with much crying and I felt awful. But at least they seem to have learnt, and even tho it may seem mean I would do it again. I guess the underlying thing is altho there are snippets of enjoyment its bloody hard work at this age, esp if you have a few close together!

Yes I'm rubbish but ds and dh love me anyway - hooray!

I think these feelings are all a normal part of parenthood. You sound like a great mum LGOT, and I'm not just saying that!

And really don't feel bad about enjoying time away from your kids I quite often go on long (ie 1 week) overseas work trips and to be honest I only really miss my dd in the last couple of days the rest is bliss!

As a SAHM, I threw myself into the maternal role which I don't think I had a natural bent for. It was a bit like my project. I'd never had any interest in kids before, nor housework or cooking and I tried to be SUPER-good at all of it. I read everything I could get my hands on related to that role, never raised my voice or used any kind of punishment with dd, cooked, baked, did artwork and played 7 days a week from 7-7pm like I was saving the universe with it all.

Five years down the road, I can feel a reaction setting in. The thought of going to a playground bores the heck out of me; if I do go, I take a book so as not to get roped into playing with kids or conversations with parents.

At home, I really have to force myself to spend half an hour hitting a shuttlecock about with a raquet. I get impatient practising writing after about 10 minutes. I couldn't give a ::: about cleaning the windows or doing the ironing. All that just isn't the real me.

I did somethings right and somethings wrong. Think dd really benefitted from all the input I gave when she was small. The hours and I mean HOURS a day I spent playing, drawing, singing, cooking and baking together, going to toddler groups and the playground, having friends round and so on. But I was wrong not to do something for myself and occasionally put my own needs and wishes first. I think I was kidding myself by imagining I would be fulfilled with the lifestyle I have. I also raised expectations with her. So if she doesn't get that full-on personal-trainer treatment, she feels let down.

Good post sssandy

really good post, that has really struck a chord with me

i feel like i have become a worse mother since becoming a SAHM and the whole point of that was to be a better mother!

I threw myself into it like you say and aimed to be perfect housewife, mother and chef. We have beneffited alot from this - cleaner, tidier house, more time for the kids, cooking every day and providing really healthy meals but now its coming to bite me on the back as i just feel so tired, demotivated and just cant be bothered!

hmmmm i think you have hit on something there.

I had my first at 18 and i do think that part of it is that im becoming to reflect on everything that i havent been able to because i have been a mother ever since i stopped being a child myself!

You could be right about having kids so young... had my dd fairly young too and I sometimes think that I didn't have enough time to myself as a grown up before becoming a mother...
Sounds like you really need to carve out some regular time for yourself, an evening class or regular night out. Then you would have something to look forward to outside the home?

this is where i feel like a fraud. im quite lucky in terms of getting out with friends. i see my friends very often with the kids but also get lots of opportunities to go out. The thing is it comes in waves. my dh works shifts so i can through a block of time with no freedom but when he is home i can get out and about.

When i go out, I have a brilliant time (bt usually get very drunk) so feel like im slipping even further behind at home because i have taken that time out iyswim

God, what a timely thread. I feel as though I spent the whole weekend shouting and moaning at my two DDs (5). I've been a real miserable cow and have taken it out on them. This morning I said to them that if they had to draw a picture of me would they give me a happy smiley face or a miserable moaning one, fully expecting them to say the latter, but they immediately said a smiley face. This makes me think that perhaps we our too hard on ourselves and our kids don't see it quite like we do.

incidentally, today has been a better day kids wise, the house is still a tip though which does get me down if its not tidy.

Just about to start on a shepherds pie, the shopping is done and the kids are playing nicely. Just need to keep up the momentum.

Sandyballs - my DD drew a picture of me today with a big tick and a big cross. I said what does that mean and she said most of the time your good and get a tick and some of the time your horrible and get a cross. Thats me told then!

losinggot and sssandy: I wanted to let you know that you are far from alone. As the number of supportive post suggest, our feelings are not unusual. Today, all families fend for themselves and are held to a very high standard; you are bound to burn out unless you find time for yourself. Your posts could be mine...

I barely even know who I am or why this all started. I don't think that I would even know what to do if I did have time to myself. I know that I was a much better mother to our older two than I am to the younger two and I feel guilty for having wanted a big family.

I can't get the baby to sleep so I am often up until 2:00 am and then my day is full on until 7:15 when DH comes home from work expecting to eat and then pack the kids off to bed without ANY commotion.

I think that it is true that you spend the early parenting days full of energy and paradoxically, exhaustion but I am sure that it must become less physically demanding as they become more independent. I just hope that I haven't ruined any chance of a healthy relationship with my teenage children by driving them away.

I was not as young as you were so I don't have the same reasons but the feelings are so much the same.

We have also moved an awful lot and compensate by filling our days with endless fun outings and forgetting to just be ourselves. I pretend that I don't care about not having a proper routine but sometimes I envy the mothers who leave the park at X:XX for tea and a bath before bed time tickles.On the days where we stay home, I am running around cleaning, tidying, cooking, cleaning, tyding, cooking while they are at each other.

The only guarantee in my children's day beyond chaos is books before bed and sometimes they are rushed and read by a grumpy parent that has been threatening NOT to read books...

Makes me very, very sad to admit that your thread could/should be mine.

I am so sorry if this feels like I am crashing rather than offering support. My intention was to illustrate by example that you are NOT ALONE.

Sounds like you are doing brilliantly today. Things are relatively calm here as well. (That should be obvious since I just wrote a NOVEL!)

I really think that you must be a very thoughtful mother or you wouldn't bother to worry about it.

I hope that the rest of your day goes well and that the flow carries you through the week.

(My place is a tip as well and we are expecting company today. ) I was up until 2:20 and I am simply TOO tired to tackle anything beyond the kitchen and the bathrooms. I intend to clear a path through the door to a spot on the sofa and call it done.

Only just found this thread. I have found since cutting down my ours I shout lots more for one. I have to be really conscious of myself to react properly. DS2 is now 15 months and into everything - including whatever ds1 is playing with. And being a typical almost 4 year old, ds1 is not amused in the slightest.

Because I work less otside of the home, there is a lot of personal pressure- mainly from myself - to doing most of the hosue work. It is a shit hole most of the time. neither me or h are tidy people and we have so much stuff. We make resoultions about tidiness then it goes tits up. I am back to a pile of clean clothes on half of my staircase......

BUT!
I feel so much happier and have surrendered myself to the fact that being at home with the boys can be stressful. I always have one 'event' during the day to break the day up. May just be a walk to the shop or going out to playgroup.

But I really wouldn't change it.
What I am saying in a very long-winded 'going round South Shields to get to Gateshead' kind of way is....maybe you need some sort of plan for each day. maybe a visual timetable thing that your kids can see so they know what is coming next?

Don't be so hard on yourself.
Would you be happier doing some work outside of the home?

Your picture by your dd rang a bell. I have been ill today so dh made dinner (a rare sight these days) and ds1 said to me: ' So are you just going to sit on the sofa then?'. I said I was. To which he replied 'But where is daddy going to sit'

quite!

and i have cut down my hours not ours..........

the shame

Just read through all this quickly - feel so much like SSandy, and Cadmum too. I have been at home for most of the time for the last 13 years - had bouts of p/t working/study - but always had a pre-schooler at home in that time.

I am now going back to work, hopefully full-time, because I literally can not do it any more. I am sick, as you say, of forcing myself into a role of SAHM which doesn't suit me, and probably never has, and of putting my own needs a very poor sixth after everyone else in the family.

TBH, it's not playing or doing things with the kids that gets me down as much as the constant, unrelenting pressure of cooking/cleaning/washing while trying to do things with them. I can no longer bring myself to go to toddler groups, music groups or whatever with dd2 - fortunately she loves nursery. I can not bring myself to do the routined days with her that I did with the first three, and that makes me sad. I am glad I have spent so many hours with my children - I like children generally or I wouldn't have had four - but I too, wish I had done things a bit differently. I just feel completely worn out with it all!

I am now obsessing that I will harm dd2 by leaving her in nursery 4 days a week (DH is looking after her 1 day) and she will miss me, but I have been getting so depressed at home I know it is the right decision.

I try not to get myself too worried about these things but you can't help it sometimes.

I was really struck with what Thomcat said about stroking her hair and thinking I haven't done enough with you today and so on....

I am a student and so she is in nursery 2.5 days a week, I think that helped me not to be full-time mum 24/7 and I have to admit I have been a little worried that the holidays - 4 months of them - are coming up with just me and two year old dd together.

My plan is to do something once a day like popsycal, be it a wee class or a group or a walk or something - just to get out! And then arrange a bigger outing once a week - like a farm visit. Plus for myself try to do more writing and drawing which I don't manage while I am at uni.

God knows how it will all work out.

Reading this thread makes me feel ok about me being a mother....all that has been mentioned doesn't need to be re-written by me! If we'd have known what was ahead of us who would actually be 'a parent'?

LGOT i feel very much the same most days recently, i am now 35 weeks pregnant and am so short tempered and grumpy, even though my DD (13 months) is well behaved i still find myself getting irritated by her and not playing with her as much as i should.

some nights when she goes to bed i feel so relieved and then later on absolutely miserable for feeling that way and knowing i could be doing a lot more with her. sometimes in the evening i just want to go and get her back up and give her loads of affectiona nd attention but of course its too late by then.

i am presuming its just pregnancy making me feel this way, hopefully things will get better once baby 2 is here.

you are not a bad mum just a normal one :) xx

Hi lgot

Sorry to hear you're feeling like this. Have read lots of the messages on here, but not all - there are loads! - so apologies if I end up repeating stuff.

Just wanted to say that I feel like this too about one week a month. It's usually in the fortnight running up to/just past my period, and I am a different person. I used to think I was going crazy, until I made the connection between my monthly personality change and my cycle. I go from non-analytical, confident, happy-go-lucky, fun-fair-and-firm mummy, to anxious, ridiculously short-tempered, I-can't-cope-and-my-son-would-be-better-off-without-me mummy - just like that. And then back again.

Last week - pre-period - was like this for me. I felt sooo cr*p. Moaned about everything to anyone I started chatting with. Was a wreck. This week, I'm much better.

So I wonder if it's worth looking to see if it's a cyclical thing for you. PMT does exist, and for some women, it's so severe it needs intervention.

I started supplementing vitamins, minerals and healthy fats to try to balance hormones a bit. It worked quite well, but I became slack with the pill-popping during a recent house move, which might explain last week's extreme low. Once I'm out of a dip, I can't believe I was ever in it or what I was worried about. Bizarre.

One other thing, when my son was tiny, my partner got so fed up with my excessive parenting book reading that, one night, he put my book-of-the-moment in the bin. In my uncertainty in the early days, I read sooo much, got so overwhelmed and confused, and basically felt I was doing everything wrong, whatever I did. Now I'm in a place where I can just pick the best bits from everywhere, and trust my own gut feeling most of the time. The most positive time I had parenting-wise was in January and February this year, when I managed to stick to a New Year's resolution to read no parenting books except in an emergency. It had to be intuition and instinct only. I was a different woman! :)

That's not to say it's a bad idea to be open to others' ideas on parenting. It's probably a really good idea - and that's why I pop on here. Maybe we just sometimes need a break from all the conflicting information and pressure-to-do-it-"right" out there.

That said , have you read "Britain On The Couch", by Oliver James? It explains a bit about why a lot of women of our generation are experiencing similar things - inwardly feeling inadequate, a failure, not good enough, despite our best efforts; but outwardly trying to maintain an appearance of perfection, success and having it all under control. Quite insightful.

Really hope you feel better soon - and can completely relate to where you're at :)

EBAB