Looking for victorian values of forbearance and patience.

[wickerman]

I am not an SAHM, but a freelance WOHM who has fought really hard to establish her career after two (hyperbolically lovely) kids. I feel like I'm finally getting somewhere, over the past two years, after a great deal of hard work. My partneris a recovering workaholic - recovering because our marriage very nearly ended over his utter absence from it - who still works in a job which is very inflexible.
My younger daughter, who is 8, has had health problems her whole life. The past three winters have been appalling, with severe asthma and postviral exhaustion making her have to stay off school for up to two months at a time.
I'm now into week 5 of her illness this winter - two weeks before Christmas - most of the Christmas period - and a week off school this week. I'm climbing the walls with frustration at not being able to work, go to the gym, or exist as an adult - and it's making me snarky and snappy with her. She's quite depressed and needy atm, as you would expect, and also can't go out at all in the snow and ice, so we're completely cabin fevered. I managed to get a friend to sit with her so I could walk to Tesco Metro and it felt completely luxurious to be alone and adult, walking in the snow.
Others of you in this situation, or similar - how the hell do you cope? I am NASTY.

bumpin

have a drink.
and a good moan.
It will pass.

I don't. We had a wonderful afterschool nanny, but she went back to Spain and her replacement has not started yet. I will get through it, but it's just this gritted teeth feeling - every day is a day of her life, and mine, and I don't want it to feel SO drudgesome. "It will pass" is my mantra for a sick bug, or an acute illness. But this is fucking endless. I think it's because I'm fighting it - maybe if I kind of sunk into it more I could gain some kind of rhythm and acceptance -hence the ironic thread title - but I'm also deeply resentful about the disparity between me and h in terms of how much of ourselves we have to give over to the kids.

I'd be interested in hearing from other- parents with kids with health problems - there must be other alpha types like me who have had to make major adjustments and find some kind of equilibrium. I mean this could happen every year, so do I just start to think of the winter as a no work period and buy lots of workout dvds so I don't get lardy? And what about the longterm impact on my work? I say this repeatedly because I couldn't work at all when the kids were really young because h was working ALL the time - I mean 90 hours a week - and I did EVERYTHING else. And I finally got the point where I thought I was emerging. And I do resent him.

I have no experience of your particular situation so may not be of much use at all. But it seems to me you and your DH need to sit down and have a chat about this situation. You need to tell him how it is making you feel, including going into the past wrt your career, leading up to the present. Then if this situation could be a regular occurance you need to come to an agreement as to how you will both handle it, taking both of your needs and feelings into account.

Try and take a step back from the situation, view it objectively and try and find some solutions that work for you. I'm sure there are some options out there including employing a temporary nanny/carer for your DD to give you some relief.

Lots of hugs- know how you feel, very similar situation here, except I've got two dcs with permanent health problems.

Fortunately they are getting old enough to be left alone and I do work outside so sometimes just have to go off and leave them. But even so, I do resent all the things I never get to do. And I got very angry when my second was diagnosed. (THough not as angry as his sister did).

My career is permanently scuppered- after 5 years, I've lost the will to fight. And I am terrified that by the time they leave home I will just be too old and tired to do anything. I am beginning to think of myself as past it- and I'm in my forties.

The difficulty with nannies and carers is, it works for a predictable problem. But I can never know 5 minutes beforehand if either dc will be going to school that day or not. And I can't afford to keep a carer permanently on standby. So it's all panicky last-minute solutions.

So no answers- let's dig into that booze!