City lawyer with toddlers can't cope

[RosieIrene]

I work FT at a city firm and have two dd 1 and 3. Have a full time daily nanny but still can't cope. Work all day, come home and put kids to bed and work all evening to make billable target or have to go to client functions. So stressed out that on weekend just want to sit in garden with kids and do nothing. Can't sleep, can't talk to anyone. How do people manage?

There was a thread on this in the men's room from a bloke's perspective , but it looks like the challenges are pretty similar for men and women if you want to be a parent and full time employee.

I once ticked off dh for ringing me to ask about something (rice pudding iirc) during a live studio

Dino - DS had awful ear infections as a baby along with horrible glue ear. All of it cleared up, almost overnight when we excluded dairy from his diet.

Might intolerance be a problem for DS3 (especially given his recent diagnosis)?

I didn't know that about xylitol, how interesting.

dino - he would like nothing better!! (Has just discovered DrWho in a sizable way - has read 7 "novelisations" in the last two days. What does ds think?)
(and dd has a very fond memory of ds2 & some frozen peas, I believe )

(This thread probably doesn't need hijack apologies, now, does it?)

The novelisations are wonderful Bink
Xylitol does not work for everyone. It did for ds, didn't for dd. But I think it is always worth a try.
It is a major ingredient in the Boots Chamomilla teething powders btw dino

Message withdrawn

The other symptoms are excess drooling, constant snotty nosedness and any red contact marks around the mouth, or in the nappy area!

Goats milk is better than cows milk but still has a fair bit of milk protein in it - it might be worth trying a full dairy exclusion for 3 weeks just to see?

Excluding dairy can be a help but we found it made no difference to dd either dino

Good grief! DH and I email each other, often two or three times a day. They are short snappy messages with instructions, domestic information, jokes, observations, links to interesting bits of news or weird websites. I haven't thought about it much before, but they are an important part of our relationship. My nanny also sends me quite lengthy emails about the DDs if I'm overseas or I happen not to have had a chance for a chat with her for a few days.

DH and I also phone each other occasionally but there is an understanding that either of us can terminate the call very briskly if it's inconvenient to take or continue it.

Ah! I see.

DS's glue ear/ constant ear infections was causing speech difficulties and generally ruining his quality of life, so it was a much easier sacrifice IYSWIM!

Issy - sure, we email too, several times a day. But we just don't call unless it's an emergency.

Dino - DS had around one ear infection a month! Entirely different, I agree.

I think not starving him sounds like a good idea

BTW - nanny all sorted for next Friday! Really looking forward to it

I email everything important. Sometimes I actually wait till the weekend is over to email DP about something important. Much, much better to get it in writing

I do phone him too.

"Coming too?" Absolutely!

I'm sitting at home right now, feeling as sick as a dog, with some kind of virulent viral stomach thing picked up from colleague (odd - I never really thought we'd got that close), so am having a little difficulty being enthusiastic about drinks (ugh) and canapes (ugggggh) but normal service will be resumed by next Friday.

Talking of phone calls, I've just phoned DH to ask him to get some sort of medication that will allow me to crawl into the office tomorrow.

Ooh! Can't wait to meet Issy

DH, DCs, Nanny and I conference call........trump that if you can ! Now get back to work/mothering all of you,( except RosieIrene...she deserves a nice, long , hot bath...run for her by the ever caring Mozhe..).

I can't imagine not speaking to my husband during the day. I would also hate it if he didn't make any personal phone calls during the day as presumably that would mean him touching base with friends / family etc in the evening which as far as I'm concerned is family time.

I honestly believe that most SAHM's have no idea how hurtful some of their remarks to WOHM's can be. Just at the weekend, my husband's stepmother said to me "you're children are so much more settled since you gave up work". This is of course utter utter bollocks as A) I gave up work 4 years ago before the youngest was even born B) she barely knows our children and has certainly never spent any time them on her own and c) they have simply grown up, not become more "settled". She sat there beaming as though I should be delighted by the obvious implication that I had damaged my oldest 2 by working for the first 3 / 4 years of their lives.

Funnily enough the worst behaved of my three is the youngest - the only one who has been looked after solely by me!

Only read the beginning bit and I'm not suprised you are sad and exhausting. It sounds intolerable. You can't go on like this. Surely there is another way to live your life - working fewer days, finding another branch of law that lets you go home at a reasonable hour, something - the status quo clearly isn't working for you.

Same as Aloha.

You don't sound as though you are enjoying life one little bit atm. This level of stress will end up being detrimental for everyone in family if you don't deal with it soon.

Have absolutely no knowledge of city lawyers/firms or that type of working culture. Quite glad really - it sounds very family unfriendly.

If you don't need the money then do some voluntary work. Your skills will be valued anywhere surely?

good luck