The terrible twos were a breeze, DS and I always had a great relationship, but now he is 3 I'm completely lost. He challenges me all the time, he is clingy, most of the time both things! Then I lose it, snap at him and obviously he starts to feel insecure and pushes my buttons even harder (we all know this dynamic. Not good).
He is the sweetest boy, I feel so guilty of being horrible to him, but I just can't help it. I grew up having to put up with my dad's terrible temper and see myself doing the same to him.
He goes to nursery one day a week and will start 2 full days. I can't afford him going more than that. I'm a SAHM and also have a 7 mo DS. I try to go out everyday, but hate playgrounds - joined a very nice playgroup once a week but two hours talking about children with other mums drives me nuts. I want to talk about interesting things, not about children and babies all the time.
Everything is much more bearable when I meet a friend during the day, but I don't have SAHF (stay at home friends) available every day...
I know that what DS needs is attention and love and patience. Every day I wake up saying I'll be patient and after a few hours I fail. Today I sat with him while the baby was sleeping and he climbed me, bit me, pulled my hair, said he loved me, grabbed me, etc... I endured it for a while, but I can't endure it all day!
(He goes to time out when he misbehaves, but there is a huge difference from a calm mum putting a child in time out, and a hysterical mum doing the same).
He is hitting children in nursery, and hits and shouts when DH and I say 'no'. Fortunately he is nice to his baby brother (although he interrupts be when I'm putting the baby to sleep, makes a lot of noise on purpose, etc.) When he is upset, he says he is sleepy and wants to have dinner, a shower and go to bed, even if it is still 10 am.
I want to be a calm mother, I want to make him feel safe, but at the moment I'm just failing miserably.
If I don't find a way to break this cycle, I can see it getting worse. Family and relatives are all overseas, so I can't ask for help. This relentless grind of 24/7 parenting is really wearing me down (I can't go back to work - I would earn less than the costs of childcare, and anyway DS2 is too young)