just feeling like the most useless mama on the planet atm, need to vent
ds (2.1) has hurled himself deep into toddlerdom, with quarter-hour meltdowns over the wrong colour cup for his milk, turning the light on (or off), etc., and starting to be defiant. Even though I sort of know where he's at I don't feel I can keep up with him because...
...dd (1m) is, like her brother, unputdownable during the day. (How does she know it's night, when she'll usually fairly happily sleep in her cot? HOW? I ask you?!) She feeds LOTS, spits up LOTS, 'talks' constantly, usually to complain bitterly at being put down while I chase/cuddle ds. And has an unfailing knack of waking for a couple of hours as soon as ds goes down for a nap.
So then I was reading some parenting book, one I had unreasonably high hopes for, and between the lot of them (dc's and book, that is) have ended up feeling like some kind of loser butthead for having a ds who still, at 2, needs to be cuddled off to sleep; for never having figured out how to make a baby take both breasts in one feed; for not getting anyone to bed before 8pm because we like to have dinner with dh when he gets home and let ds feed himself; for having dd and even (whisper it) ds in bed with us sometimes, and on and on.
I can, I think, usually tell when ds is trying it on and I try to set the boundaries - well I'm not very good at it, because he hasn't been doing it long and he keeps finding new ones to test - but god I miss feeling competent.
rant over. I should totally go to bed...