Still grieving my old life one year into motherhood 😔

[ColourfulCaterpillar]

I feel so ashamed and embarrassed opening up about this. 1 year in and I thought I'd be in a better place. But I'm really struggling. Before anyone kindly asks, I've been to the gp and its not PND. I think it's genuinely just grief for my old life. 😔

I try not to let my LO see me upset if I can help it because I dont want them to ever think they make me unhappy. Doesn't always happen, but I'm trying. I love my baby very much. But the life that comes with it...well, I definitely dont love.

Before my baby was born I had such freedom and my husband and I we're really spontaneous and loved life together. But it still just feels like an endless stream of tag teaming and I miss our own time together so badly. My family help out here and there and have my LO for a couple of hours once a week. But other than that, we dont get much of a break.

Surely it's not normal to still feel this way a year down the line? I really want to just lean into it and try to enjoy it, but I'm finding it so hard to. I'm always trying to be the best mum for my baby, lots of cuddles, play, we spend lots of time together. I am grateful for the sweet, lovely child I have. But also wish I could go back to how things were. I'm so ashamed..😔 please tell me this will go away.

As someone said it’s a lifetime’s job. And it’s one we signed up for (unless it was a surprise pregnancy). So yes I did mourn my old life but when I was past the first stage of babyhood I realised this was a ‘problem’ I had created with DH by choosing to become parents so I had to ‘solve’ it.

First and foremost we made our lives slightly less child centric. We began doing city breaks, hikes, things we enjoyed but with modifications. We didn’t expect our child to behave like a grown up. But I was also prepared for him to get bored- and have to tag along sometimes. I read somewhere that it was my job to prepare him for when I wasn’t there. So learn to be a bit bored, learn to accommodate a little hardship (while leading a very privileged life!). At the same time we changed our expectations. When we did city breaks there were naps and early dinners and lots of playgrounds. No long boozy lunches.

The next thing we started to do was get him to do stuff WITH us. Introducing him to OUR world and our interests. My kids are 10 and 15 and share a LOT of our interests. We put in a LOT into parenting- we didn’t do ‘date nights’, both of us worked compressed weeks so kids spent minimal time in childcare. We were a low screen family. We indulged their interests. But at the same time we also began to bring them into our world so when a trip to an art show I really wanted to go to was a bit boring I didn’t feel guilty because I had spent the rest of the morning doing things for them.

We had all the usual stages, tantrums, terrible twos, sleep regressions- all of it and now I have a sarcastic teenager. I am not a perfect parent. I get cross easily. I find the noise a bit much at times. I find the need to constantly have food available for two hungry boys draining. But once I changed my perspective I did lose a lot of my early resentment about what I had signed up for.

And yes, the older they got, the more interesting and easier they keep getting.

I think people who don't miss their old life in some way probably had terribly boring lives. Of course you miss it. At 1, you haven't even got any freedom back yet. If anything, it's going to get worse before it gets better. Try and focus on the positive. Everything is temporary.

It took me a long time to adjust. On paper, I knew what to expect but while I knew the theory of it I didn’t know how it would actually feel. I knew I’d be tired but I didn’t know how it would feel to be repeatedly disturbed night after night. I knew babies and toddlers took a lot of time but I didn’t know how it would actually feel to not be able to have anything for me at all.

The things I used to enjoy are not enjoyable with little children and I can’t justify getting childcare for them.

Unlike others going back to work was an additional stressor for me - although nursery did mean I could have a day for me if I took a day off when they were in nursery. But by and large I found juggling work and motherhood (especially during phases when sleep was poor) very challenging.

But I did adjust. My children are now five and three (in July) and it has got notably easier of late. I used to dread having them both together, but now it’s a lot better and having just my five year old feels so incredibly simple. If someone had told me even three years ago a day with ds was like a holiday I’d have laughed most sardonically, but it really is now.

There is a period with under twos when your life is just kind of … gone. I remember having a three year old and a one year old and everyone was talking about Baby Reindeer (which I think is rubbish actually) but the point was at the time even watching something on Netflix was just not a thing I could do. Now … well, I can! Gradually your old life comes back, it isn’t quite the same of course and there isn’t a point where it comes back in it’s entirety but you start to recognise bits of it here and there, like coming to land in the uk after time abroad, you slowly start to see landmarks and recognisable shapes and places.

Do remember as well you would have changed anyway, as we do. I’m now 45, nearly 46, and I would have changed from being 40 anyway.

With respect, I don't think you're quite understanding the situation here.

@pushontheswings I resonate with a lot of what you've said. Thank you for taking the time to write this out, it's very reassuring x

I think you have loads of good advice here already but just to empathise. It’s hard! I still can’t quite get around the every single day of it all and my kids are 9 and 13. My husband and I are immigrants so we never had a moment without them. It’s so great that you get some couple time every week as our relationship has definitely crumbled a bit after 13 years. That’s a wonderful thing you are prioritising.

For me, I felt much, much better after going back to work. I was off 14 months with my daughter but went back after 11 months with my son as I found the toddler part really hard. My husband travelled a lot for work at the time so the nonstop every day on my own was a lot.

Personally I loved 3-9 the most, but there’s a lot of fun with a teenager so far too. It’s really interesting to see the people they turn into.

Helpfully mean. I bet people really love you in real life.

Hang on in there, it does get easier.

Ignore people like seelybe who is being a dickhead, even in a job you love you still get off days and want a day off.
It's totally normal to feel this way and the feeling will come and go over time as things get easier, but you will still get the odd (bad) day when kids are acting up and money is tight and you are thinking what the fuck have i done I could be living it up right now.
But then you will also have days where you kid comes home from school with something they made for you, or a lovely family day out and feel the opposite and that you wouldn't change things.
Hang in there, once they are in school you get some of your time back, it helps if you have family who can take dc for a day or have a sleepover and you can do a date night then.
One day they will leave you and you will feel bereft! 😂

I really resonated with your post. I do think 1-2 and especially that circa 15-20 months when they are babies in a way but moving and starting to tantrum babies is very, very challenging and you’re often back at work, and people expect you to be back to normal and you’re just … not.

Having a baby was like a truck through my life and I did resent it and him. Not so much with no2 as was prepared by then. My DH isn’t also the most hands on and causes more work than he lessens. But your new life has a lot of joy I promise. It just takes a while!

It will be 18 years of changed life, it might not be for you. But you’re there now. No shame in admitting you don’t like it. Hopefully you can get through it.

I'm not going to lie, I am dreading those tantrums, they're already starting a bit now. But thank you for what you said about joy. ❤️ It's comments like yours that help me feel like things will improve and be worth it. X

Honestly, it will. I didn’t enjoy ds at all as a baby or toddler, particularly. The lack of sleep was just awful and it felt like it would never get better. Starting the day at 530 on a cold, black winter morning and he didn’t even have the attention span for CBeebies … argghh. I was constantly tired and ratty and resentful. I had no patience.

I did (do!) love him on some level but the love was buried under tiredness and frustration and resentment and so it wasn’t easy to access.

I tried hard. We did toddler groups and soft play and parks. So many people would trill about how much I did with ds (often as a thinly veiled criticism) but it was because I was honestly scared of having him in the house as time would drag and I’d live through a lifetime in twenty minutes. (I am still not sure about the much trotted out ‘it goes so fast’ as personally I feel like empires have been lost and won since I was pregnant with ds but anyway!)

But somehow we’ve come through it and it’s so much more enjoyable now he’s five and a few months. It’s the small things: I can plonk a dinner in front of him and he will eat it. If we’re out and about food and drink isn’t a stress. He goes to the toilet himself. We read books I enjoy! He’s stating to get into films that are reminiscent of my childhood like Toy Story and the like (well, it came out when I was a teenager actually but you know!) I am so proud of him; he is a funny, clever, kind little boy who plays well independently and is interested in the world around him. We’ve been reading this book so this weekend we’re going to have our own little walk at twilight to see what animals we can spot. He can tell me foxes are predators and rabbits are prey, he can tell me the planets in order from the sun and he knows tri is three and oct is eight. And hasn’t a clue what day it is 😂

My DD is three in July and more challenging because she’s at a funny stage of not needing a nap but needing a nap … she has tantrums sometimes but she’s potty trained (although still needs help with the potty and washing her hands as I’d expect) she’s smart - can do puzzles for children aged five and above, knows the highway rat and superworm by heart, she loves swimming with me and is just starting preschool in September.

I know a lot of that looks like a boast and it isn’t intended that way. I guess I just never thought I’d be here. I had a fantasy when ds was a baby that I’d win the lottery and hire a nanny because I just didn’t want to look after him (apart from maybe a couple of hours a day!) but somewhere along this strange road we’ve fallen in love and they are my favourite people.

It’s OK not to enjoy it all the time. My DH is into classic cars; it makes me want to fall asleep. Likewise I’m sure some of my interests baffle him.

@pushontheswings It doesn't seem like a boast at all. Thank you for telling me those lovely things, it's good to see some long range perspective ☺️ x

This was me 24 ish hours ago.

This afternoon I cried because of feeling overwhelmed of wtf I was going to do in the next wake window that I hadn’t done 1000 times before.

Hang in there. The rollercoaster eventually has to stop!

I totally agree. Returning to work massively helped me (and I am not particularly career driven!) Just to have conversations with adults (not about baby stuff), lunch out etc was really helpful

It depends on your job!

But while yes, some women find returning to work helps others find it yet another hoop to jump through and another juggling act. The thing is that you don’t stop being a parent when you’re at work, so your child still wakes in the night / wakes super early, still demands and craves attention after a day at childcare, still needs feeding and clothing and entertaining at the weekend and you have to manage that PLUS work!

I also think sometimes avoiding the ‘problem’ perpetuates it; I definitely have fallen into this trap with ds in the past, I find him tricky so he’s in nursery and he won’t mind if I pick him up at 5 not half four, one extra day won’t hurt, he’ll be fine .., but then he is trickier as he is trying on some level to connect with me and so I pull back …

Last summer ds left nursery at the end of July and so I had the whole of August with him. His sister continued going for two days a week and I felt I really ‘connected’ with ds in a way I hadn’t before. I think just having that time just us, no other interruptions for the first time since my maternity leave ended really helped. I bonded properly with him which is strange to say as he was nearly four and three quarters then!

I am absolutely not saying don’t go back to work, I just think we need to be wary about seeing it as a cure all.

Very sorry about your situation but that is literally not comparable to OPs. Someone else will almost always have it worse than you. Does it mean one is not allowed to vent/be upset about one's own feelings/circumstances? Never understand the purpose of such extreme comments.

I was talking about what helped me and my own experience, as was clear from my post.