is it just my hormones?

[elportodelgato]

I just want some views please, and fully expect / hope to be told to get some fucking perspective and / or that it is just my hormones playing up. Might be long...

OK so I wanted to start by saying that generally DH and I are very happy. We have been married 3 years with a DD 2yo, I am 16 wks pg. We both work fulltime and as a consequence we split the childcare and housework etc pretty much 50/50 which suits us really well and I do appreciate it a lot as I know some people have DHs who don't do much in that regard. I also have my mum living very nearby and she is very willing to babysit as and when we need it so we feel supported. We don't have money worries, we both love our jobs, we have lots of ace friends who live nearby. I really do look at my DH most days and feel blindingly lucky and happy that we are together because he is a wonderful man and I love him enormously

But at the moment I feel as though we don't really 'get' each other and can't communicate properly and I feel really frustrated and trapped. I am starting to dread going on maternity leave again because I absolutely hate being the one at home doing the same stuff every day while DH goes on with life as normal.

An example: DH recently went away for 2 weeks which was kind of for work but also for fun and he had an amazing time. But the impact on me was quite big as I was juggling my job and my hour-long commute each way, and all DD's needs, and the household jobs - plus feeling appalling and knackered being in my first trimester. It was really exhausting tbh - I know lots of single parents do this week in week out but it was a shock to me and I couldn't wait for him to come back. Now he is back and instead of offering me some kind of payback for what I did when he was away, he is arranging nights out for himself, a full day out with his mates on Saturday coming etc. This is fine of course and I am not the kind of woman to deny him a life outside of the family, but I kind of think that it is my turn to catch up with friends, have some time off and relax. When I mention this he just brushes it off as though I am making a big deal out of nothing, it's as though he just doesn't understand that I need some space and how exhausted I am with work and toddler-wrangling etc.

I can see that this is just going to get worse the more pregnant I get and then the first 6 months after the baby comes can also be written off while I sit at home bf-ing and he continues to jolly off having a social life knowing I am basically stuck indoors with the kids.

I get to the stage sometimes where it just feels hopeless and I cry and cry for ages for no real reason. The whole thing has completely turned me off sex as well so DH is quite frustrated and I am starting to use it as a weapon against him

So is this just what motherhood is all about - losing your figure and your mind and not sleeping and it never ever being fair? Why do I bother trying to fight for some kind of equality? it seems so pointless and that I should just give in to it being unfair forever

OK if anyone has read this far, can you please come and tell me it's my damn hormones and to pull myself together and get on with it? And also to tell me that I am lucky and have lots of things to be grateful for and to stop whinging? Sorry this is such a rant

I'm sorry, it's not your hormones. Your dh sounds generally very good (50/50 on the housework is impressive to me!), but he is being very unfeeling.

Can you take a week's holiday from work soon, and go somewhere with friends? Or go on your own on some kind of thing, like an art or cookery course? Leave your toddler with him. It sounds as though you would benefit from a break from the daily grind, but he isn't seeing it.

thanks for responding AW, and telling me I'm not going mad.

I really really want to start swimming and doing pregnancy yoga every week ie: 2 early evenings a week. I wanted to start this about 3 weeks ago when he got back from his trip, but for various reasons it hasn't happened because it's not a priority and there is always something else - a friend he hasn't seen for ages is in town and having drinks somewhere, he needs to work late etc. I just want him to commit to perhaps even one night a week on a regular basis where I get to relax for a few hours and get some headspace. I don't think he sees the connection between this and having a much happier wife.

He seems genuinely shocked and kind of disgusted when I cry about not being able to cope and needing some space - I think he thinks it's the pregnancy making me volatile and so he can ignore it. We're going on a 2 week hol with some friend and family in a few weeks which I can't wait for, but I have a sneaking suspicion from overhearing some of his phonecalls that he will be off doing outdoorsy sporting stuff with his dad and leaving me and the other women preparing the dinner and doing the childcare. So not really a holiday for me, and not much time spent as a family either

He is so brilliant with DD and I love spending time all together. Perhaps its partly that I feel fat and old and unattractive and that he is seeking out other people to see so he doesn't have to spend time with me

Go away for the weekend, get "unavoidably" held up (blood pressure, whatever) and stay until Wednesday. leave him to deal with the lot. Upon returning home, start conspicuously phoning aound friends to organise evenings out.

And he will complain. And you will say "but you do it. I thought that this was the sort of marriage you wanted, where one of us can just vanish for weeks at a time and make social arrangements without consulting the other. If this isn't the marriage you want ... why do you do it?"

As for golf etc on holiday - you just say "oh that's lovely, DD will love that, won't you DD?"

And then he has to choose between taking his daughter to something or saying no and making her cry, and loving fathers cannot bear to see DDs cry.

Ooh, sneaky, colditz. I like.

Have you actually laid it on the line in words of one syllable or less, that you NEED a break, that for every week he has off you also require a week, that you WILL have one night a week to "do your thing" whilst he's quite welcome to have two nights of the same? You've said you can't cope, you need some space, but that sounds quite vague. If you laid an actual calendar in front of him and said look, THESE are the days you've booked off, THESE are the days I want off, there would be something practical and precise to get his head round, and he'd then either have to agree or give you a damn' good reason why it isn't possible. And it better be a reason rather than a threadbare excuse, because frankly, there IS no reason for it.

He doesn't seem to take the crying seriously, which is unkind; but it's a fact that some women cry more easily than others, especially whilst hormonal, so at a stretch he may have mistaken you for one of those. Maybe ass-kicking will be more effective.

Thanks for all the responses. You're all so right - I need to start kicking some ass round here

My problem is that I can cry at literally anything nowadays, I am a big leaking hormonal mess, and he just switches off when I start weeping. Understandably perhaps because often it is about nothing in particular.

I tried a new approach this morning though. He has been planning this day out with his mates on Saturday but we have all been invited to an afternoon party as well so he has been umming and ah-ing a bit. I asked him 'so what are you doing on Saturday?' and he said 'oh I thought I'd go down and see my friends, not sure what time I will get back though, could be late'. I just very quietly said 'I think you are extremely selfish. I started work yesterday at 6am and finally sat down at about 9pm. At the end of the week I will be knackered and I do not want to be left alone with DD all Saturday with no support. It is your decision of course but you need to think about how that decision impacts on me.'

Upshot is that he is not going out with his mates on Saturday - he caved in with very bad grace but I think he needs to think about it. In the last month he has had these 2 weeks away, plus about 4 nights out, plus last weekend we all went to a festival and he was out until 3am on all 3 nights while I was back at the tent with DD sulking being pregnant. Surely he should be bending over backwards to make life easy for me and accommodating my needs, esp now I am pg? Well, I am going out tonight for dinner and next weekend going to a friends wedding on my own. Very much looking forward to both. And you're right, I am going to book more things in the diary in advance.

Re: the sporting stuff on holiday - good idea colditz except it's not golf, it's canoeing and cycling and rock climbing, and much as I would love to pack DD off with him, I don't know if any of these are suitable for 2 year olds! Dammit!

The only way round it is to start doing those things yourself: wandering off for days out, weekends away etc.
I seriously loved Colditz's idea.

Ooh good for you! As well book a whole day at a health spa and get every treatment going. I would say as well because you are going to be at home alot soon to treat yourself to things like new tv/comfy chair/ new mobile/books/magazine subscriptions maybe not alllll of those but just things that will make you veing at home more comfertablw for you x

Dinkytinky very good ideas! ooh a day spa, that sounds like something I could do... and I was thinking this morning about getting some boxsets for those interminable bf-ing sessions

You sound like me. I feel really depressed about it as it feels like any life I had is officially over. While he is away, I can't book anything or do anything and am running around like a headless chicken.

Feel for you chick! You are not on your own. I don't think they realise just how bloody hard going it is working and managing kids on your own.

Thanks Warbride, I am basically exhausted and I feel about 105 years old. I know I just have to grit my teeth and get on with it as every mother does but sometimes it's too much. The stupid thing is that when I do get a break and have a day on my own, I mainly just miss my DD hugely and want to get back to her. What a loser!