The Trouble With Motherhood

[Rhubarb]

I thought I would start this topic as I feel really fed up right now! As some of you will know, dd wasn't planned and I have had a hard time adjusting to motherhood. She is now 2 and it is getting worse than ever. Don't get me wrong, I love her to pieces and will never regret having her, we share such a strong bond and she is an absolute joy to be with (most of the time!). It's just everything else that comes with motherhood.

The toddler groups, the group outings to farms, generally mixing with other mothers and kids. I always thought toddler groups must be such a nightmare, I never used to have any contact with kids as a rule as I didn't really like them. I didn't know how to react to them or what to say to them and they generally irritated me. Now I find that I am living my worst nightmare and going to toddler groups every week, even having children back at my house! I loathe doing this, I do it because she needs friends and my love for her overrides my own thoughts and feelings on this. But I find that I am becoming very depressed and down about it all.

Me and dh have just come back from a holiday and whilst it was very nice, we realised just how much our lives have had to change. We could no longer go or do what we wanted to, we had to think of her and what she wanted to do. We couldn't go off backpacking to remote villages, we couldn't do anything on the spur of the moment as we had to pack her lunch, change of clothes, sleeping ted, buggy, etc. We couldn't even have an evening out on our own. As a baby she would sleep in the buggy, but not this time! As soon as we sat down for our meal she would want to get up and sit on mummy's knee, eat what mummy was eating and have a play. Many nights we spent in our hotel room staring glumly at the walls.

Then we came back and I took her on a group outing to an animal farm. It was a nightmare! Being with so many other people and their kids was just not me. I'm not a group person and I hated every minute of it! The kids were boisterous and running around (as kids do I guess), the mums were being, well mums, but something just made me want to scream and kick "get me out of here"! I feel that I am losing my identity. I am being forced to adopt a role that I am just not used to. And to be totally honest, I have thought about just walking away, walking and walking to god knows where, just to get away. I know that sounds awful, but I am getting really depressed and I don't know what anyone can do about it or where I can turn. I have told my HV who referred me to HomeStart, but I don't see what they can do. I'm just not cut out to be a mother. Please tell me that I'm not alone in thinking like this.

So Azzie, did you get to do any of these exciting things?

We're starting to get there now. Ds (just 5) has climbed Ingleborough and Cairngorm, and got 2/3 of the way up Snowdon in the snow last New Year (we would all have needed crampons to go any higher, so decided it probably wasn't safe with a 2yo in a backpack and a 4yo in wellies ). We did a cyclecamping trip when ds was 3.5 and dd 1.5 - not exotic and foreign, but definitely an adventure (most friends and family thought we were mad to attempt it, but it went well). Last summer ds did 23 miles on his trailer bike one day, so were now looking at being able to do some decent cycle trips. We're now trying to decide what to do next summer - we want to go somewhere a bit more unusual, not just stay in a gite in France again. I'm dying to travel with ds, and now that dd is coming out of the terrible twos and will walk a lot further, so we don't need buggies and backpacks so much, we should be able to do it. I would love to go back to Nepal and take my kids - the malaria tablets and the long flight are still putting me off at the moment, but it's definitely planned for the future. And I would love to take them to the jungle one day, show them leafcutter ants and stuff like that. They're pretty used to roughing it, sleeping in tents or in corners on floors in sleeping bags - they seem to find that sort of thing very exciting.

Making me twitchy just typing this .

HI Rhubarb,
Just got a few minutes peace and have been reading your threads. I know exactly how you feel, having an unplanned baby is no joke. I love him to bits and I think that in other threads I have outlined my life story for all to see. I can fully understand how you feel, I have just returned to work too after my maternity leave and it is as if I am someone else looking in at my own life. I may behave as the same person on the outside but on the inside I have had days when I wanted to scream, run away or just be someone else!!
I love my baby to bits and will always do what I believe is right for him as will my DH who is totally besotted with him, to the extent that I feel sometimes excluded. My DH and I got married in the last year also and I am not quite sure if it is married life or motherhood that is the biggest shock to me. It is almost as if becomming a mother automatically makes you master of all trades, the one who knows how to do everything in the house... ie work the washing machine, the iron the cooker,the hoover.... need I go on???
I do not know what to say to you for the best but it strikes me that if the mothers in your M&T groups come across as having the ideal lives then they have to be either extra special or very good at lying!!!!
I was once that fiercely independant woman with her own life, and this year I have gone from that to wife, mother, housekeeper, bills payer, cook, cleaner etc... and now I have gone back to work myself,..some days I do not mind, other days I want to get into the car and just keep going, most times I would be happy enough to take the baby with me!!!!
I hope that things work out for you, I got great comfort from your web page and really hope that things get better for you. You are not, as this thread has emphasised on your own in your thoughts, if most women were completely honest as those here in mumsnet are, then perhaps those of us who really feel like you do, would not feel like such failures when faced with those mothers/women who come across as being able to cope with it all do??? Does that make sense???

Gosh it really freaks me out when people mention my site! I wonder if they have heard of the site from here, or read articles about it, then come on here and tracked me down!!!! So how did you hear about it mcm? Glad you found it useful anyway, it's still serving it's purpose and it makes the whole pregnancy experience seem better when I realise how many other women are admitting to feeling the same things and are now standing up for their rights to be taken seriously.

Like yourself I found marriage and motherhood came very close. I had only been married 3/4 months when I became pregnant. Luckily dh is a real star and we share all the household stuff, he never questions what I do during the day and will often tell people how hard it is for me looking after dd all day! (He knows, I've left him to do it himself often enough!) It's easy for men to be the favourites around their children, after all it is you who disciplines them during the day, cooks for them, wipes their messies, toilet trains them, weans them and so on, when daddy gets home it's time for fun and cuddles and you often feel disregarded. If I were you I would do what I am planning to do myself and go away for a night. After Christmas I hope to spend sometime with my friend in Brighton, leaving dh to look after dd. Perhaps you could arrange something similar? Let him do the hard work for a change and then he might have some appreciation of what it is that you do.

Also have you tried St.John's Wort? It's no good for me as I hate the taste of it, but you might like it. Mumsnet is also a big help, as you have said, you come across honest mothers who make you feel so much better and more human! It always helps to think you are not alone.

Maybe before Christmas we can dd to the Lake District and do some gentle walking, get her used to the idea! Never been camping though, I like my toilets too much! I'll save that one for better weather anyway. Good on you though Azzie, you give me inspiration!

Sorry Rhurbarb, I found your webpage through here, through you in fact and thanks again! My husband is good really, it is just me that finds it all too much to take sometimes. DS is now almost 6 months old and apart from attending a course the odd weekend DH has never had to mind him on his own for very long. Maybe you are right, maybe leaving the two boys totally alone with no planning ahead by me could be the solution!!! I have to work a long day on Saturday, maybe I won't leave out DS's food and see how they get on??..... I am sure they will be fine.
I do know how you feel though about having that running away feeling...men and women are equal until babies arrive, then men continue to be men, while women get to be everything else, and sometimes loose the person they were origionally, at least this is how I feel. maybe I should try some St. Johns wort, I have been on here before and am never sure if it is mild depression that is getting me or whether it is just reality hitting home. As I work 30.25 (and that .25 seems to be important!!) maybe I should go away with the baby on my time off??? I only work (officially) 8.50 hrs less than DH out of the home and about 100 more than him in the house!!
Never mind, I suppose I will get used to the whole scene sometime?
By the way, I could not even contemplate attending a M&T group meeting, I think my sanity would be called into question, however good it might be for DS!! I could not bear to be listening to all those doting mothers raving on and on about their darlings!!
I am a mother unexpectedly, ( I got pregnant before we got married) I love my DS & my DH unconditionally, but part of me is sad at the passing of my independance when no control over it was really given to me!!! Now I sound selfish, I'm not really. I think that sadness at that loss of control is something that will always be with me however hard I try to shake it off.

Rhubarb - When I had dd I felt like my world had been turned upside down - no more life as I knew it. I could not stand toddler groups - bored me to death. My only saviour was going back to work. 3 yrs down the line I still miss the holidays and me time and feel constantly guilty for not wanting to spend more time with dd although I lover her dearly. I don't know if you ever read 'Life After Birth' by Kate Figes - I found this a great confort

Azzie, your 5yr old sounds very strong. Have you thought about hiring a cottage in the French Alps and going walking there in the summer? Went with friends this summer who have a 10yr old and 7yr old and they were quite happy doing day trips, building up to a 3-day walk over to Italy - staying in mountain refuges, so not too much to carry. We were not so ambitious, put DS in the backpack and went for lots of walks using the cable cars to get up high.

Also have you read any of the books by Dervla Murphy (not sure if I spelt that right) - I read one where she took her 8yr old daughter to Baluchistan - and had an amazing time. Have to admit, everyone I know who has been to Nepal has been sick (I got giardia - urgh) and I would be a little hesitant to take kids until I was sure they were strong enough to cope.

Florenceuk, we were actually thinking we might go to Grindelwald in the Bernese Oberland for a few days in the summer. We stayed there one summer before we had kids, and there are several good high level walks between cable cars that ds would love and dd could mostly manage (with backpack backup for when she'd had enough). The mountain refuge idea is good too - I'm sure we could find one where the walk in wouldn't be too long, so we could walk in one day and out the next.

Ds is strong - big for his age, and very fit (one of those non-stop boys, just like his dad ). He's now desperately keen to do some proper rock climbing, so we're going to borrow a friend's climbing rope and take him up to the Peak District soon. Dd is also proving quite intrepid, so I think she'll want a go too.