Can’t keep our heads above water

[Drowninginshit]

DH and I both work. I’m more than full time. He’s part time / self employed. We live abroad so no family help. Kids are 10 and 12.

We are drowning. Can’t keep on top of the house, the food shop, the washing, the hoovering. The dust everywhere is horrendous. The kids are struggling a bit at school - partly because we’re not on top of what they need to do and they are not yet quite old enough to take full full responsibility for their school work and the numerous bloody tests/exams they have each week. We need to de-clutter. We need to eat better. I need to exercise. We have a social life that we need to nurture. Let alone a marriage and our own individual well-being.

I need a cleaner back that’s for sure - she stopped about 6 months ago and we thought we could cope without and clearly we can’t. I’ve also ordered Hello Fresh to start from this week but once the discounts run out I’m not sure it’s sustainable.

But even with that we’re drowning. Winging childcare, extra-curricular clubs, basic day to day cooking and cleaning, we are exhausted and barely keeping up.

DH more than pulls his weight as he’s around more than I am. But it’s all just so overwhelming.

This isn’t fun. It’s monotonous and thankless and boring and tiring. I feel like I’m losing my marbles on this merrygoround yet increasing my blood pressure / cortisol or whatever shouldn’t be increased.

What is it all for ffs?

Where are you OP? Just trying to get an idea of the standard family routine where you are.

from the clues you’ve dropped, I’m guessing France 🤷‍♀️

personally, I think that if you are working all those hours to support your family and allow your DH to pick and choose how much / what he works as, he should be taking on the great majority of family admin / organisation / donkey work. especially if he’s good at it. You definitely need to buy in help.

i just spent a week with a colleague who may have adhd. If you are anything like her, I can see why you get so overwhelmed. She’s very good at her job when she focuses on it but everything else around her tends to the chaotic. I definitely recognise what you said about not being a finisher - she did that all week! Half baked plans revisited multiple times and rarely finished.

Aa I’ve said upthread, DH does the vast vast majority of it all. He has to. And he does what he can with the time he has. But he also has to work. On balance he does far more than I do. He does all the cooking in the week, all the washing (but the washing bin is always full), all the kids running around stuff. He buys birthday presents for parties, he takes the returns back to the post office, he goes to put petrol in my car… we’ve had cats for 5 years, I’ve never taken them to the vets, he’s done it every single time. He pulls more than his weight. He can’t work more because he has no time or energy after all that to run his business. His invoices and quotes are late because he’s scrabbling around trying to fit stuff in school hours, then come home and run the house. There’s only so much he can do.

So I feel like total shit because I feel overwhelmed and I’m not even the one doing the overwhelming stuff. I feel pathetic and weak and useless tbh.

Half baked plans, that’s me. Can’t stick to anything, no discipline etc. I’m like a walking talking version of that meme where your brain has a 1000 tabs open.

I put my make up on this morning, along with my fucking game face and felt like a total fraud. Because here I am smiling and talking corporate bullshit when I underneath I’m barely holding it together.

And now I can’t stop crying.

All the cleaners I’ve contacted are full. Next doc appointment is 2 weeks.

I totally get you. It’s like you both need to have the same week off, when the kids are at school, and have an initial blitz. Then get the cleaners in place. This is proper overwhelm and I have it too

Yep but massively resent using precious annual leave for this.

Hope you can get out from under the overwhelm too.

Hugs and sympathy, OP!
been there!

Here are some things which helped:

• getting kids to take more responsibility for own stuff
• getting a cleaner (or right now, an unemployed husband, but that’s not recommended in general, lol)
• THE BiG ONE: keeping weekends low-key. Not too many plans. View the weekend as your time to get on top of the house stuff and recharge. Give yourself down time and unstructured time then. Leave social engagements/extracurriculars etc for just once or twice a month.
• THE OTHER BIG ONE: let go of the small stuff. Kids want to wear the same clothes three days in a row? (Even if it has a largish tomato sauce stain..) Let them. Your clothes hasn’t been ironed? Who cares. Buy the ready made cake, the ready made meal. Don’t volunteer for contact parent/neighborhood activities whatever, cut everything non essential for now.
• THE FINAL BIG ONE: bike or walk to work so you make sure to get a little exercise in as part of your daily routine.

This time will pass. Good luck!

Sorry two more points to add

• I love cats and all, but you gotta let go of them if you’re overwhelmed, or at least reduce the number. FIVE CATS!??

• stop wearing makeup. I have a fairly formal high profilish job and I only EVER wear makeup if I’m going to a conference or formal dinner. I don’t wear it in meetings, not even with a bloody cabinet minister. Men don’t and it’s ok. Putting on makeup and maintaining a nice wardrobe is another task that women have disproportionally, so let it go! At first you’ll feel self conscious but you’ll get used to it and it’s quite freeing. Just wear clean clothes and do your job well, no one cares if you wear makeup or your hair is very well done or not.

I usually have a Monday its Mince ,Tuesday Sausages type of thing .Also do enough for 2 days if you can .No shame in a couple of takeaways a week either .Can DC manage 2 days with the same clothes sometimes? A robot hoover is good too .Try not to have impossibly high standards , Kitchen good wipe down with bleach spray ,same bathroom as well.Its a lot to work full time with 2 children, and a house to run. Not so long ago being a housewife was seen as a FT job!(Not wanting to return to that time ,but you can see the point)!

We only have two cats!

Lol ok don’t know where I got the five from!

I said two cats for five years so there maybe. I feel solidarity in not being the only one to misread stuff 🙂

We can't have it all.
It is not possible to have a full-time job, a clean house, nutritious home cooked meals, and quality time with family.

In terms of food, Hello Fresh is a good option: saving you the planning and shopping. There are also some companies that deliver cooked frozen meals, if you don't have time to cook at all.
We also spend a weekend every two months where we stock up our freezer (we got an extra freezer for more space). Making lentil pies, fish pies, bognase sources, veggie lasagnas, curry, etc.. food that freezes well so we can defrost it any time.

If you can afford it, hire a cleaner. Even if it's just an hour or two a week. Also, maybe you can get the children involved - when I was smaller, I got my sweets as a reward, and later, I got pocket money when I did cleaning around the house.

Deep breath, op.

You can’t have / do it all, either as a family or as an individual. You can’t stay on top of a demanding corporate role AND keep a grump boss happy AND be home for your kids whenever they need help with school work or reminded about a test AND have a perfect home AND have a self employed husband trying to run a company and a home AND have a full social life AND look after pets AND plan / take holidays AND do all of this without any help, either family or hired help etc. Temporarily at least, something has to go on hold.

Has your DH got any idea of what you need to get on top of? Can you discuss it btw the two of you, and agree the priorities?

Kindly, op, you need to use some annual leave for a reset this year. Do some decluttering, organising and cleaning as a family.
See it as a gift for your future self.
I have used the majority of my annual leave for years for childcare, or getting shit done.
And, yes, I am up super early and the first thing I do is coffee and laundry. For a routine to work it needs discipline to get to the point of it being as natural as cleaning your teeth.
You can't do everything and you can't have everything in this season of your life, but it won't last forever and don't let excess snowboots in the basement take away from finding enjoyment.

Thank you for being kind with me.

Yesterday I was just useless. DH did everything. I just sat at the dinner table feeling like a blob of grey. My poor kids need more than this.

I’m fine at work - productive, organized etc. That structure and pace means I’m totally on it. At home I just seem to go in reverse and can’t get started or motivated to do anything. I feel exhausted which i suppose is a symptom of overwhelm.

I will go to the doctors and say I don’t know if it’s burnout or depression or peri-meno or adhd but I don’t think I can just wing it going forward, and that I need some help, somehow.

Pretty sure there’s a hormonal element… After my big cry yesterday (thank god for wfh) I then felt totally normal. Like it was weird to think “30 mins ago I was bawling my eyes out - what was that about”. Like going from the depths of despair to then feeling fine. I feel like I’m going slightly bonkers.

We have some public holidays / long weekends coming up. My boss is out this week so I’ve really taken my foot off at work and doing the minimum. And I’ll strategically plan some sick days to catch up with bigger jobs at home.

Hello Fresh starts tomorrow. Plus DH and I can start to tick some jobs off our declutter list, that will feel good and productive. I have time 1-1 with each of the kids over the weekend and will see some friends for a vino too.

When you put it like that it does sound a lot. But other people seem to cope fine….

Empathy op, my kids are a lot younger than yours but i don’t enjoy life and my house is a fucking shithole.

Did you see this thread? Might be handy? Lots of tips from school-aged parents too. https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5003333-tell-me-at-one-or-two-small-thing-youve-done-to-make-your-life-easier

One tip, as you mentioned shopping lists, was to buy and store things in bulk that the household will always use eg soap, toothpaste, toilet roll, shampoo, washing up liquid, washing tabs, so it makes your shopping list a bit less each time :)

Every single one of my mum friends post all that ‘happy family’ shit on social media, then call me about how miserable and exhausted they are.