Should I stop asking for help?
I’m a single mum to my baby ds and before he was born I always found asking for help so hard. I felt like a burden, I felt a lot of self-hate when I had to admit I was struggling or couldn’t do something. So it felt like a bit of a personal achievement when I asked my mum for a bit of help with ds without beating myself up about it. But now I’m wondering if the cost of help is greater than the benefits?
Take yesterday: ds is going through a stage where he’s really sweet but he needs to be constantly kept entertained, so I wasn’t getting anything done and just needed someone to come and cuddle him while I did some stuff. My mum said yes but then didn’t turn up until close to his bedtime by which time he was starting to get grizzly. She was complaining, calling him miserable, asking why he was always so grumpy whenever she came around, “doesn’t mummy feed you?” etc.
Then he started grabbing her face which is a new thing he does, and she was complaining in this really whiny voice that it’s hard to replicate online “why are you hurting nanna? That’s so mean. Owww owwwwww. Naughty boy. That hurts nanna.” I tried to explain he’s grabbing her face because it’s interesting, he doesn’t know what assault is!
I asked her to give him his food while I did stuff and she was making passive aggressive comments to him like “mummy treats nanna like a slave, poor nanna” and when I told her I didn’t mind him getting food on his clothes she said “well maybe YOU should feed him for once” (I am his 100% carer, whereas she had been here for 20 minutes)
When he started crying she was so mean to him. “Why are you so naughty? Why are you so grumpy? What an idiot. I can’t fight you.” He’s nearly 6 months old so he has no concept of naughtiness or behaviour or anything. He’s such a clever, smiley, sweet little boy, I feel teary even typing that she insulted him.
I feel rubbish. I feel like a rubbish mum. My old feelings of having to ask for help means I must be rubbish are coming back. She calls me a rubbish mum all the time. I think the fact I didn’t defend him makes me a rubbish mum. And I guess I overestimated my competence when I decided to go through with becoming a single mum.
It’s also bringing back old resentment about how she gave me to my grandmother when I was a baby.
I don’t know what to do. It feels like an impossible choice. All the parenting websites are like “don’t be afraid to ask for help 😃” but not about how to cope with the emotional cost of help.
Has anybody been through anything like this? What did you do? Have you ever cut off your only source of support & did you regret it?