What are the hardest years?

[isntlifeacrazyride]

As a parent of a 14 mo, I wonder what would you say are the hardest year(s) of raising a kiddo?

Teens but every year has its difficulties

Toddler

8-11 were by far the hardest years for me.

Between about 18mo and 2yo - old enough to be "naughty" but too young to reason with.

Teens have been easy for me so far, fingers crossed (eldest is 16).

Birth to 14 😂

13 for me (so far!)
I have an autistic teenage girl, so many worries 😩

Teens can be the worst, but it's not guaranteed. Oldest is nearly 14 and still lovely (and my sister and I were 'nice' teens) - from friends' experience it seems that if they're going to be eye-rolling and door slamming that tends to kick in quite early, for girls at least, around 10-11. I think if they don't get that way by 13-14 they may remain fairly easy to deal with, though as others have said there may be issues with poor judgement nonetheless!

I think I found 3-10 months the hardest and most slog perhaps, after the maelstrom of newborn but before they can be that interactive - I enjoyed them more after that age.

But any age can be a challenge depending on context - as PPs have said: bullying, being unhappy at school etc can make things hard.

@TheLightSideOfTheMoon

Teens, when they're bullied.

You may as well have ripped out my heart and broken it in front of me.

This

Teenagers - but most of us get through it, my DS is 21 now, charming, hardworking and confident ... now I can relax and hope all my years of parenting have been worthwhile ...... although my 88 year old DM still worries about all her adult DC ... we are all 55+ !!

100% 14-16 for ds. Very angry young man, big enough to be very scary, & I was the only parent in sight to take it all out on.

He's nearly 18 now & mostly lovely, but I had quite a few dark nights when I seriously contemplated telling him to fuck off to his dad's, then. I resisted because I knew that would be the end of his academic potential - he's super bright but dyspraxic & highly disorganised. He'd have had a lovely couple of years playing GTA with my ex, but forget any idea of post 16 qualifications in those circumstances.

I can absolutely say that I tolerated verbal abuse, pushing me around physically on occasion, & appalling entitlement, whilst living in squalor in his room, to an extent where if he'd been a dp not a ds he'd have been yeeted into the bloody sun.

He was such a delightful baby & toddler, too!

With his sisters, it's definitely been age 11-14. Friendship dramas & general misery. Nothing to equate to ds's behaviour.

Although I did not love 2020, when all 3 dc's various crises coincided with lockdown. & my menopause. That was fun times.

It (mostly) feels that we're all OK now, but strewth, I wouldn't want to go through any of that again.

0-4

So sorry @TheLightSideOfTheMoon and @somewhereonthe517

Definitely 14/15 onwards. I didn’t enjoy the primary school years as a single parent but at least I felt I knew them. Then they all became unrecognisable angry aliens.

They’re all in their 30s now, successful professionals with under-5s of their own.

Teens… soul destroying

I'm still waiting for DS1 who is 23 to transform into a lovely young man but he's been high maintenance from the start!

Under is hardest.
I’m loving the teen years so far, but at 15 and 17 I guess it could all go wrong yet.

Depends on you and depends on the child. Looking back DS was a perfect baby but v difficult in last few years of primary since then he has been much easier now and 18 he has been a dream teen and I couldn’t be prouder. DD was a little harder as a baby a dream child at primary but 13 to 17 awful. She is 17 now fingers crossed we have turned a corner or are about to.

Teens definitely! The toddler years seem like hazy days compared to age 15 onwards 😢

0-3 then 11-13. Admittedly dd1 only 15 so if it gets worse beyond then I wouldn’t know.

Primary years are lovely.

DD is 9 so I haven’t experienced the teen years yet, but so far the hardest ages were between 1 and 3 - she was a lightning-fast bolter, so my life was on tenterhooks between the moment she learned to walk and the time when she developed enough sense of risk and road sense not to dash into traffic…

So far after 4 it’s got progressively easier. It’s quite nice right now actually. 6+ has been lovely because they can properly talk to you and have all their own interests and thoughts and they also at least eat stuff, have some common sense starting to emerge, and sleep without terrible issues for the most part. Although DD still ends up in my bed half of most nights!

The hardest years are where you decide to have a bonus third and therefore have a toddler and 2 teen daughters at the same time as hitting the menopause. I aged 10 years in 5!

13 turns on a sixpence. All is fine then she comes home in tears because her friendship group have thrown her out, she sat on her own at lunch and walked home on her own crying. And there’s nothing you can do about it. Then suddenly it’s all fine again !

Newborn was by far the hardest for me and then each stage has got easier than the last, apart from the teen years which have their own challenges. Still not as bad as the newborn stage though!

I would say 0-2 so far.
(My DC are 12 and 15, so I might be speaking too soon )

Teens definitely and by far!

Yep teens. Watched bf my DS17 go through his first break up was torture. They are in the twilight zone between child and adult and have no idea what’s hit them when the “love” chemicals first kick in.