Do you ever feel frustrated at being left to hold baby while DH goes off to work?

[Abi12]

I have a really good relationship with DH - but I can't help feeling really angry when he is late back from work and I end up holdling the baby for 12-14 hours. I know it could be so much more difficult if I was single but my 11 week old DS is suffering with colic and takes medican for reflux which upsets him and sometimes I feel so irritated that he is out the house for so long. DH thinks it is a normal amount of time to be left with baby but it doesn't make it any easier! Does anyone else feel a bit isolated and alone?

God this brings back nightmares memories! My DD didn't cry much but my DS cried nearly all the time for 13 months and my shoulders felt dislocated from carrying him around all the time.

I would have gone (even more) insane if I had stayed in the house. My DD was still pre-school at the time so I had both of them to try to keep 'entertained'. Our city has a Family Information Service run by the council, yours might have something similar which you could find on the internet, and they posted me a list of all the playgroups and children's activities in the city and what days/times they were on etc. I scheduled in somewhere to go on every day, except Tuesday there didn't seem to be anything on and I remember being miserable every Tuesday!

I gradually made friends and had people to support me and do things with and started to miss DH less during the day. For a while I also had that horrible dread when he was leaving for work that "I just can't do it, don't go". This thread is great, it's reminding me why I don't want to have a third baby (even though my body seems to tell me to) .

I used to love being the one doing it all.
I was almost posessive of them as babies.....

Not any more though,I've been a SAHM for nearly 10 years and I've had enough now.

ActingNormal - Thanks for that, I will have a look and see if I have a Family Information Service in my area - I hope I have! Even though I'm having a tough time with baby at the moment I still keep thinking 'I wonder if the next one will be a boy or a girl?'. Mother Nature has alot to answer for!

Ladytophamhatt - At ten they can go to their friends houses and play - I am looking forward to that stage!!

They do Abi, its great when they can go out and play.

Means I have to entertain the small ones though

They do Abi, its great when they can go out and play.

Means I have to entertain the small ones though

This is a truly hellish point with a colicky, refluxy baby, but it really does start to get a little bit better at 12 weeks plus, I think.

I used to be so jealous of dh swanning off to work with not a care in the world whilst I was stuck at home with a colicky, refluxy ds1 who wouldn't stop screaming.

I even used to watch neighbours pootling off in their cars and feel envious of them going about their day to day business.

MuffinMclay - I was sitting in bed doing the first feed of the day only this morning reminding myself of what is swiftly becoming my morning mantra ' your lucky to be sitting in bed, your lucky to be at home, look at your beautiful son'. 12 weeks is do-able - he's 11 weeks at the moment.

People kept saying at 6 weeks things got easier, but they didn't with ds1. At 12 they really did.

Hope it gets better soon.

I'm in Bishops Stortford in Hertfordshire

haven't had a chance to read all posts but YEP i know exactly what you mean - its a huge adjustment to make and i think dh and i have only just about worked out how to deal with it now - and our ds is nearly 2!
seriously if you can afford it, get someone to come and look after your baby a morning/day a week - just so you can do something, anything else! And get out to mums and baby groups/toddler groups of course your baby is too young to appreciate them but most of the mums there will know how you feel and everyone loves to admire a little baby! I ad just moved to a new city when we had ds so i knew no one and found the first few months of going to groups really daunting and sometimes depressing (i felt like everyone knoew everyone else, even if they didn't) but after plugging away for a few months it improved and now they are my life line.
For my dh and myself it has taken a lot of talking about how we feel about our new roles to appreciate what each of us is feeling (eg some days he would much rather swap roles with me and vice versa!) - but mu dh is VERY understanding and sympathetic, i know a lot of mums who partners think they sit around all day which would be infuriating.
Hope you can work things out anyway, all the best

I would definately second the idea of a few hours a week in a nursery/childminder if you can afford it. I did this with ds1 and it transformed everything.

I used the time to do all the housework/shopping and a quick trip to the gym. It meant that the rest of the week the pressure was off to try and get stuff done and I could concerntrate soley on DS1.

Even though I mostly did cleaning it was nice to have some breathing space

Fairylights - I have just moved to a new area too so joining a few groups will help loads. My DH is understanding and tries so hard to help but I'm so stressed at the moment that I have become totally unreasonable and poor DH catches the brunt of it!

SazzlesA - The local HV has mentioned a local group and we do have a local NCT group so I will have a look into what time and where they are.

ConnorTraceptive - I will look into getting someone to look after him for a few hours in the week - the idea of getting some shopping and having a really good tidy-up is bliss!!

When mine were babies dh was ordered to be leaving work at 5 on the dot and be walking through the door at 5.20 (20 min walk to work)
He wasn't allowed to go on conferences either.
He wasn't happy but tough.

SaintRiven - your so lucky! My DH is self-employed and works all over the place. He leaves the house at about 5:30am and usually gets hombe somewhere between 5:30 and 7:00pm! If I could make demands I would!!

it didn't do his career much good but I'm disabled and needed him home. Now he's given up work all together to be a carer.
Self employment is harder of course.

Oh dear yes I remember this well. It's why I now work 3 days a week

I have to admit to the fact i still get fucked off when ds has been whingey with me all day and just worn me out and then DH gets home and its all "dada, dada" and smiles.

Thanks son. Don't mention it.

TBH I felt guilty that he was working his socks off & I was frankly faffing around at coffee mornings for a significant part of the week.

Often.

DD now 8 months so it isn't as bad (she had colic and reflux too, some days she just seemed to cry all day unless I fed her).

I found that I would expect DH to completely take over once he was home, still do this (but trying not to

I used to find that by 5pm I was at breaking point. I remember one night calling him on his bus journey home (15 min journey) several times, demanding "where is the bus now". And even meeting the bus so that I could hand DD over!

DD is my first baby and I think its just a huge shock (for anyone).

Saying that, he has been off work today and taken her shopping for the afternoon and have missed her like crazy!

I had a colicky baby, wish now I'd seen the GP and got some infant gaviscon for him. I found the local council run leisure centre with creche great. The creche was ran by 2 middle aged women who coped really well with babies and the other kids kept my son entertained and happy. I was in the gym in the next room and could be called in if there were problems. Having that break for 2 hours twice a week made a huge difference. You may find your leisure centre runs something similar.

Yes, I used to want to write "help me" all over the walls in lipstick, just so someone would take me seriously.

Be careful you don't get PND, Abi. It is a lonely existence, being a mum, especially if you don't enjoy mother and baby groups, etc (which I always hated )

I found this a really horrible stage. It does get easier.

I'd agree with what everyone else has said about getting out and meeting people - loads of other mums will be there with crying babies. I remember my biggest lifesaver was making friends with another mum and taking daily walks in the park with our babies in slings/baby bjorns. We pretty much took it in turns for one of us to cry and the other to say 'you are doing a great job'. With my NCT group it took most of us a while to admit when we were finding things difficult, but once we did it was great to realise that all of us had problems.

What helped me was DH taking over with our daughter as soon as he got in from work so I could go and have a cup of tea/start clearing up from breakfast/stare blankly at the wall for half an hour.

I also joined a gym with a creche and went for a swim twice a week. Bliss. Silence. Just me and the water.

The other thing that helped was my mother pointing out that although new mothers have always looked after children the idea that you would do it on your own with no family support around is very new. Previous generations might not have had partners around to help that much but they had mothers, sisters, aunties, grannies on the doorstep. Its the isolation as much as anything which is hard. So if you've got no family close by you need to see making friends as part of your job (building a support network so you can cope)