***The All New 2 or More Under 3 Thread!*** Join the Madness Here!

[TattooedGrrrl]

Here we go again- join here if you have 2 or more kids under the age of 3. Feel free to update / whinge / look for advice / gloat about how sleep you've had

For any newbies, I have 2 boys, aged 2yrs and almost 9mths.

pinky yes the odds are very slim that we have the same birthday - never mind that that is xmas day! Mad or what!! Yes, we do need a regime of sorts because our current savings are just looking too small [never mind paying for our christmas goose - free range organic farmed locally - think that alone is about £70!!]

simpson the rice crispies is a good idea, and letting her eat them with her fingers. Will try that, and yes, she can always have a yogurt too just to make sure. Am going to try that tomorrow infact! And your poor DD - must be very awful for her because I hate having a sort throat and obviously she cannot help but cry, which makes it worse! Maybe try some ice cream!!

Oh I know 31 is not old at all and I am not one to wallow on birthdays - time is just whizzing by right now though, have to get Freya enrolled in nursery in Jan - nursery!!!!

Afternoon all .

Yup, I had a fab weekend of girly gossip, pampering spa treatments (although I did manage to fall asleep during reflexology and let out an enormous snore !). Had nice meals out, shopped til we dropped and danced til 2am at a reflex 80's bar!!! Got home at 7pm last night, DH had done a stirling job looking after the girls on his own all weekend and even admitted that it was actually very hard work looking after 2 young kids on your own all day long .

grrrl how is dyl today?

jewels can't believe both you and your DD2 were born on Christmas Day.....you should definitely be playing the St Etienne song in your house on Christmas Day!!!

traceyface I am in complete awe of you.....5 children?? I know the older 3 are old enough to look after themselves (I'm guessing?) but wow, you do have your work cut out!

I have done well over half of my Chrimbo shopping...might start wrapping them soon as it's too much doing it all in one go.

DD1 saw a big Christmas tree in Sainsburys today and was saying "WOW! mummy, look at the big tree!!!" This year is gonna be so cool cos she is 2.5 yrs old now and really will understand the whole santa thing.....

Oh and I ended up buying this dress to wear to the wedding and family do's I have coming up. Looks great with black opaque tights and patent dolly shoes .

he seems much better gooddays, but has been up since before 4am. George has also decided he wants to get up, but i've refused and put him back to bed several times. He was hollering upstairs, but has now gone quiet.

I am so sick of this sleep thing, or no sleep thing. I went to bed before 8pm last night

Glad you had a nice weekend, sounds amazing!

Morning Grrl

my day started at 4 too
i'm sick of it too, had a meltdown about 4.30 sat morning and dh took over but he's nor here most of the time during the week.

Good days - the weekend sounded lovely - just a bit!
Once i've stopped bf......

welcome newbies

i'm rubbish at keeping up sorry.
serious sleep deprivation building up.
gave both boys some calpol night yesterday in hope - will do a few more nights i think and hope ds2 gets out of his night-time habits.
not sure what to do about early mornings though - chocolate bribery isn't working!

Evening, All

Glad you had a good weekend, Gooddays.

Sorry to hear all the early morning folk. As usual, no suggestions here. We've got the opposite problem as Freya has finally realised that she doesn't have to go to bed (or doesn't have to sleep when she does)... and so she refuses to. Actually, she refuses to do most things at the moment and seems to be growing out of being easily bluffed into doing what we want. Two-year olds

Night all!

Justkeep- i'm trying pushing tea time 30mins later and their bedtimes 30mins later than usual. Managed it last night, and they slept until 5am (although i did get up in the night with them both)I'm going to keep this up and see what difference it makes. I was HORRIBLE yesterday morning- so shouty and horrible Felt better in the afternoon though, and went to bed at 8pm again.

Taking them both down my Gran's on the bus this afternoon, then DH will pick us up after work.

Aaaaargh! The curse of MN strikes again . Why oh why did I say that we didn't have problems with early mornings (see previous post)? I've been up since 6am (which is early for a baby who went to bed at 9pm) - now we have one child who doesn't want to go to bed and another who doesn't want to stay in it [yawn].

How will I survive work today? (Although I have the same problem as you Grrrl and tend to be all shouty when I need sleep, so maybe it's better they're at the CM's.)

Hi all.

Just a quickie as I really must do some housework while DD1 at CM and DD2 asleep.

Yes, my weekend was lovely, but unfortunately the PND seems to have struck with a vengeance since I've been back. I was sobbing (literally ) into my bran flakes earlier.

Thankfully my girls are good sleepers, think I would be leaving home if I had to cope with that aswell. I really do feel for you all. I have been shouty horrible mum from hell for the last few days, but not due to lack of sleep (although I'm not sleeping well with PND....typical).

One day all this will be a distant memory.........

Hi all

Took Dcs to Ds's old playgroup today as they had a photographer and got a lovely (I hope!) pic of the 2 Dcs together. Don't have one nice pic of them together at all

Sorry to hear of the early morning awakenings. DD wanted to start the day at 5am this morning Thunk its because we went to a baby group yeterday afternoon and DD was so excitied, she didn't sleep in the day at all Surely 9mth is too young to not sleep in day? As predicted we had melt down at tea and she went to bed at 5pm

Gooddays - Not very MN but ((hugs)) when are you seeing HV again?

Hi everyone,

new to the thread but really impressed how upbeat you all seem to be about having such little ones. I have 2 under 3:-

DS1 - 25 months
DS2 - 8 months

and to be honest I find it really really hard. When DS2 first born I was diagnosed with mild PND and went to a brilliant support group, but a referral for extra counselling fell through, and as I was on anti-depressants before having kids anyway, GP an health visitors feel that it is taken care of. Thing is, I love my two more than anything, but just recently,keep crying all the time, as although I love my kids, I really seem to hate parenting. Is that awful? Did another Edinburgh questionnaire which came out quite low, but how I feel seems to fluctuate so much from week to week that sometimes they have come out high and sometimes low. I just need to know whether how I feel is actually normal and am I just in a slump (had very bad back problems following SPD with DS2 and also had 2 weeks solid of colds/gastro with the bubbas)or whether it's not normal to feel like this and I should go back to GP? I was absoulutely fine with DS1 and all this has happened since having DS2. Apologies for the long depressing thread!!

Hi cloudbase- you're not alone, unfortunately Gooddays is feeling down too, so you're not alone. I'm no expert, but i'd keep in touch with the professionals and try to make time for yourself. (Which is easier said than done!)

oh and Gooddays- here's a big hug with an extra squeeze (((((((((( )))))))))))

cloudbase welcome......Your story sound just like mine. I was fine after DD1 (now 2.5yrs old) but since DD2 was 3 months old (she's now 6 months) I've been feelign pretty much how you are describing. I kept wondering if I had PND. It sounds awful to say this, but I just didn't think I was the sort of person to get it (that's not meant to sound derogatory at all btw), just that I am normally so strong, happy, in control, mega organised (to the point of envy of all my RL friends). I feel like I am the complete opposite to my normal self.

I kept putting off seeing the HV/GP as I was scared that it was PND, but also, I kept having good days, even good weeks....the thing that made me talk to someone was one of my BFs telling me she had had PND (never told me at the time although I had my suspicions) and she said she didn't get help for 9 months as she would have the od good day. It made me think I had to speak to the HV, which I did last week.

I have since spoken to several friends who have 2 young kids, and they all agree to finding it bloody hard work, but when I described the tearfulness and extremely short temper (poor DDs ), feeling of not being able to cope and that I'm just about treading water, they all said they didn't feel like that. It was hard to admit, but it did make me realise I do have PND.

In a way it's been easier now I have a diagnosis. DH has certainly been a lot more respinsive (instead of just thinking I'm a moody cow!).

I'm not saying you have PND, but I do strongly suggest you speak to either your GP or HV about how you are feeling, esp if you had PND when DS2 first born and have a history of depression.

So sorry for the 'selfish' post the rest of you...

Thanks for the (((hugs))).

I'm sending good sleep vibes to all the little early birds.....

jesus...3.5hrs sleep. I should be dead. Time to start sitting next to his bed in the mornings and putting him back in over and over until he stops this. I did everything right yesterday- he had lots of exercise, a nap, went to sleep around 7.30pm

Things not good here ATM and DH had another wobble last night saying he couldn't cope etc

He has just left to go to doc's and am dreading him coming back as if GP signs him off from work again he will use that as an excuse iyswim. Think the best thing is for him to go to work. How will he know what he can cope with if he doesn't try?

DS doing my head in. On Halloween I hid sweets round the house thinking he was too young for trick or treating and EVERY day since then he has nagged me to do it again. Grrr.

Grrrl - sorry on the sleeping front

3.5 hours, Grrrl? Oh that sounds terrible (I wouldn't be sane after that much). It does sound like you need some extreme measures (like putting them back into bed time after time). Don't know how well it works though [optimistic emoticon]

Sorry to hear those of you with pnd are suffering (and welcome, Cloudbase ) - I don't have pnd and 2 was much harder on my sanity than one. Hope you're all having good days.

God, so sorry to hear everyones been having a hard time with PND, early starts and poorly other halfs.

Im doing ok but had a difficult weekend visiting inlaws. They keep banging on about how we should get an extension like theyve done, even though theirs is illegal, but they say spiteful things like our backyard is an eyesore and we might struggle to sell it. We arent planning on moving for a couple of years and weve told them we dont want it, but they keep harping on. She also told me my varicose vein op coming up in january is a very old fashioned way of doing it, and cant believe how quickly Im getting it done, i should be waiting years like they do round where she lives. She then rang last night and said DH looks too tired, and pretty much implied I expect him to do too much . She is such a cow So not looking forward to xmas with them, thank god we dont live near them.
Rant over!
Jewels - Breakfast ideas, Billy got sick of porridge but now loves raisin wheats. I soak them in milk for a couple of minutes and pop them on his high chair for him to pick up and munch. You can also get cranberry, apricot, blueberry wheats so no chance of being too bored. He did like philadelphia and bagel for a while but I think I overdid it with him. Oh, and eggy bread for a special treat.

Billy has a bad cough, it cleared up for a bit with antibiotics but either a different one or the same one has come back. Means he coughs all night long. No sleep for me as I am on constant alert to get up .

Grrl really hope you get some sleep. And can I just say I totally relate to the shouty mum thing, that is me all over.

Hey cazwa I can totally sympathise woth the MIL thing. I don't need to say anymore...IYSWIM!

simpson does your DH have depression? (not that I'm obssessed at the moment !)

Grrrl sending you lots of sleep vibes.......hope tonight is better. Maybe you should get supernanny to move in . She would just scare them to sleep!

I've had a really good day today, and it's been refreshing to feel like me again. My very wonderful and helpful brother has come to stay, so I'm sure that's why.

Just thought it might be nice for me to post something positive for a change .

cloudbase are you still there??

Gooddays - am glad you have help How long is he staying for?

Yes DH has a form of depression and he tends to not cope with things very well. The medication he is on makes him very tired so he finds work a struggle Thank God it is not something he has all the time but has bouts every 4yrs or so

Its not helped by DD who whinges ALL day and will NOT nap in the daytime. Ds has just started pre school and comes home VERY tired cue a few melt downs etc.

Cazwa at your PIL. I get the same saying DH looks tired etc implying I don't look after him...drives me mad!!

simpson I'm sorry to hear about your 'woes'. Must be very hard for both of you. I don't really know a lot about it, but could he try different meds? Or something else like the CBT thing?

Melt downs are a very regular event in our house.

How anyone copes with more than 2 kids is completely beyond me. My neighbour has 4 and wants a 5th. I think she deserves a medal.

Sorry, Bro is staying til Saturday .

Don't think he can changes meds really think they are all the same

It's a worry and a lot of pressure on me.

Before DH had this episode we were thinking of having another Lo but that is a definite no no now which i a bit sad about but its for the best.

I am lucky my family are very good...my mum was going to have both Dcs this weekend but she can't because we have a birthday party to go to. So maybe next weekend. I am not sure if my mum knows what she is letting herself if for but I'm not going to turn her down!!

Hee hee, and Yay for mums!!! How old are your DCs?

DS is just over 3 (don't tell anyone I might get kicked off!!) and DD is 9mths.

I tell you if I had had DD first and don't get me wrong I ADORE her I might not have had any more

I didn't know a baby could be so strong willed. DS was/still is so laid back

What about yours?? Is your brother good with them?