MT ate my post
Dammit.
OK, I’ll try again.
I’ve talked to Kelly and Eve about this and certainly Meagan and I have joked about it. My sister and I have this conversastion almost daily, too.
I love my kids and I love being the mother of two but you know, having children kinda sorta ruins your life — or at least derails it for two or three years.
Since Madison arrived, I don’t do anything well. I don’t sleep well (understatement), I don’t write well, I don’t parent well, I don’t cook or clean or manage the household well. In fact, I’m just barely holding it all together. I am hanging by the skin of my teeth. I am getting by with a lick and a prayer.
I’m certainly happier since Madison showed up but it’s happiness with a modicum of despair. Without fail, my first thought upon waking is, “Dear god, 16 hours before I can go to sleep again.” And a twisted, interrupted, desperate sleep it will be, too.
I’m an insomniac anyway — an insomniac who is also a light sleeper, which means that I get up anytime Madison snuffles, Brett snores or Noah rolls over in his bed and knocks his knee against the wall. And then I’m up for about 45 minutes or so, worrying, before I drift back to sleep.
I am exhausted.
By 3:30 or 4pm every day, I am literally counting the minutes until Brett gets home (and if he stops for gas, I’m in tears by the time he finally makes it through that door). He gets the very worst of me because in the evenings, it all comes to a head. There’s dinner to make, there’s the work to do that I didn’t have time to do during her nap, there’s the bed calling but by the time I fall into it, I’m so wired by worry that I even look towards that with dread.
I don’t really know the answer; maybe there isn’t one. It would probably help if I got some exercise but that’s not going to happen. (I tried doing step aerobics and Madison stood on my feet and screamed for me to pick her up. I tried dancing with her in my arms and threw out my back. I tried putting her in the stroller so I could walk and she fell asleep and I lost a nap to do work so I came home and cried.) It would certainly help if I got some childcare but that’s not going to happen yet either. (We all know how that turned out.) It would probably help if I took a weekend away except that I would be so unhappy and guilt-ridden and worried that I wouldn’t sleep anyway and for the rest of her life anytime Madison did something rebellious — shaved her head, dated a Republican, came home drunk — I would blame that weekend and regret it.
I think this is just how it is right now. I think it will get better. Meanwhile I remind myself how fortunate I am to have these two kids and this nice husband and this good job. And it’s wonderful that Madison screams for me a lot because if you’ve adopted and glanced at anything inspired by Nancy Verrier, you’re happy to see normal toddler signs of attachment.
But man, I’m tired.
Oh Dawn, I feel for you. I remember feeling like you do right now. My youngest turns 4 next week and almost every day, at some point, I just revel in how pleasant life can be with older children. Why, just yesterday both girls helped me clean up, really helped (though they argued the entire time over who would get to do what), not that “practice” clean up where you actually end up having more work but at least the baby/toddler was happy and it’s a good learning experience.
When my two were little I had the same exercise vs. work dilemna. I always picked work over exercise. I still don’t have a good solution.
I hope you can catch a nap or sleep in soon.
This is just temporary. Really. I know you know it, but believe. Dawn that was my life for a decade (because I had 4 kids). Bert would walk in the door. I would hand him the youngest, snark about it being his turn to parent. Then I would go to the grocery store or a drive or a walk or something. It helped a little.
Bert has basically been on bedtime duty since the beginning. I always took the littlest one that needed to nurse, but he did everyone else. Now he does everyone. So at 8 I am no longer a parent. When he is gone I actually tell the kids I am tired of being a parent and really need them to go to bed quickly.
Having short people dependent on you is exhausting. It’s going to get better though. By the time she is 4 or even 3 you are going to start feeling like you have children, not babies. She will become more independent. I know you know all this.
I would risk the Republican son or daughter in law and go away for a night or two. I do it once a year and love it. It changes my attitude for a month.
I know you’ve tabled the mother’s helper for awhile, but why not consider hiring cleaning help for a bit? The money should be about the same, and valuable time spent sweeping up cheerios could be devoted to writing, or to making the reading fort under the kitchen table (where Madison may decide to cavort solo and you can get some work done). Just a suggestion (and one i’d like to take advantage of as well).
I feel exactly as you do (though I suspect even more so, because my solution is that I simply can’t be a stay at home mom). And, I have lots and lots of help.
I really believe that adults were not meant to stay home with young children alone. It would drive me stark raving insane. My mom, who raised us in India when we were very small, expressed shock, at the idea that a woman would have to be at home alone with her young child. She said — how would you go to the bathroom? I love what I do outside of the home, but if I didn’t, I’d need to find an environment where I had other adults with me when taking care of my children.
But, yes, even when your mom lives near by, you have a partner husband, and full time day care that you like, having children still rips apart the fabric of your existence, and makes doing everything harder. My greatest loss is the feeling that I don’t get to finish my thoughts (not finish saying them, but finish thinking them, following through on ideas).
bj
Help - I just glanced over that site by Nancy Verrier, and I have to say that I believe the Primal Wound is BS, at least with regards to the child. I don’t deny that adoption involves loss, and that, for the birth mother, pre-natal bonding will definitely occur, but I simply don’t believe the same is true for an infant. A baby bonds with his or her mother after birth. Any struggle that a child might have with “abandonment” or being adopted will come at a much later age, when it is intellectually able to understand such a concept. A baby that adopted right after birth and is warm, fed and loved doesn’t feel loss. Thus sayz me.
Delurking to reccommend this book:Mother Nurture,
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0142000620/qid=1121440476/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-1916117-1809745?v=glance&s=books&n=507846
This book helped me so much when I was feeling like you after the arrival of child #2. This book is a collaboration involving a nutritionist, a psychologist, and an ob/gyn. It has a lot of practical advice–the things that helped me the most were the chapters on nutrition. I was amazed at how taking their advice on diet and vitamins (I don’t mean to sound like Tom Cruise here) changed the way I felt physically. I noticed you can get it used on Amazon for less than 3$. Hope you get some good sleep soon!
Oh gosh, I feel like I could have written this post. I come home at night and just feel this utter despair that I KNOW I’m not going to get ANYTHING done that I actually want to do — knitting, writing, cleaning off the freaking kitchen table and catching up on bills — all equally out of the question at the moment. I just keep telling myself it will pass, but geez. When?
Dawn–I’m so sorry it’s so hard right now. Many hugs and as much strength as I can muster your way!
Jessica–I read Verrier’s entire book, cover to cover, and I must say that it is CRAP. I’m not saying this (just) because I’m about to become an adoptive parent, or because my own experience bonding with children not biologically connected to me tells me otherwise, but because it is intellectually untenable. Verrier writes in a pseudo-scientific manner but offers nothing in the way of evidence–no studies to speak of, just a very small pool of self-selecting adoptees who were unhappy for what could be a myriad of reasons unconnected to adoption. I tried to look up her credentials, and all I came up with was a tiny unaccredited college at which she got a master’s degree on the thin project that turned into her book. Verrier is not an expert; she is an adoptive mother with experience. That’s all. If she had written the book about her experience, and left the scientific speculation for someone with an interest in logic and substantiation, the book would have been fantastic. In fact, such as book would have been beautiful, and indeed, very helpful to all members of the triad. I am not suggesting that you have to be formally well-educated to write about adoption. But you should at least have enough of an informal education (as in, go read about it extensively, then use that reading in your writing) before pretending to be an authority. I think people buy it because it seems to make sense, or echoes their own sense of loss. But although loss is a part of adoption, a huge part, it cannot be explained in her simplistic, underdeveloped way. Well, it can, but it will suck, as her book does.
(stepping very slowly off the soapbox, now…Dawn, if this starts a firestorm I am very, very sorry…)
Oh girl, I’ve been there before and I’m in the thick of it again (and with #3 on the way!).
I was thinking this morning that my measuring stick for quality of life is very simple: how many good days I have vs. bad ones. Lately there have been more bad than good and that scares the &*%$# out of me because what if this is it? I am pretty certain things are not going to get easier anytime soon. In fact, I know they’re going to get harder. And yes, I know it will pass but for the first time in my life I’m not feeling very optimistic about my (near) future and THAT FEELING SUCKS.
I just had to post to tell you, you’re not alone!!!
Yes, it does pass. And damn quickly too. But I don’t think you need to relegate yourself to suffering through it either. I have come to believe very strongly in the power of connections and have gotten very, very unafraid of asking my friends for help. We trade kids, do errands for each other, cook extra food for each other, etc. Use your wonderful connections Dawn. Nurture yourself. Parenting will remain challenging and draining even past the toddler stages (says I with an 8 and a 12 yo). Start healthy habits of self-care now; don’t wait.
Dawn,
Oh, I feel for you. I’ve been there. Any mom has been there. And like the others, take heart that these tired, tired days will pass. My kids are 7 and 11, and my days of utter exhaustion are long past. That said, I was a single parent for 3 days this week. Most of the time, it was great. The kids were great, it was nice not to have to check in with my husband to co-parent. Kids wanted to watch tv? My say so, ok!! But…by Wed. night I was yelling and short-tempered, and I was SOOO glad when my husband got home from his fishing trip.
It is hard, hard, hard being a parent. Just accept that no one does it perfectly. I would urge you to try to get that bit of walk in–maybe when Brett gets home?? It is what saved my sanity during my kids’ baby days. I got to where I didn’t care if they napped during the walk. I just HAD to get outside. I also got diagnosed with diabetes when my daughter was 3 months old, and walking was what I HAD to do for my health. It is so easy when we are mothers to let ourselves go–to not try to balance things out.
I also vote for YOU napping/laying down when Madison naps. That was also something I did frequently when my kids were babies–even if it was just 10 minutes.
Sending support across the miles.
HMBalison
Yes. It’s a difficult time, and I know I keep telling myself that it won’t last forever. I won’t feel like a terrible, ineffectual mother for the rest of my life. At least not in this way. But right now? Every day I spend some portion of time listing the thousand things I want to do in my life that I can’t because I am a mother. I feel your pain, and I know you know it.
I can completely relate. (And I only have one.) It is HARD. I have lots more to say on this, but Ping is napping, and I must take advantage of this time to cram in as much work as I possibly can. Forget cleaning the house . . .
Ah! Thanks again for saying stuff out loud that is at once obvious and yet a deep, dark secret.
I have trouble understanding why I can’t get myself back together now that the baby’s been here for five months. I think my expectations are skewed.
And I think my hair is totally falling out–fistfulls per day (well, almost). Can stress do that? Maybe I need more green leafies, but who has time to do anything but pick up a milk shake and a large fries at the Steak and Shake window, these days?
Not I.
Thank you so much for this post.
Earlier today I was fantasizing about next year (when they’ll be 4 and 14 months) when they can entertain each other by fighting for a minute or two. It’s sad that the best fantasy I can come up with is actually a nightmare.
Parenting is the world’s most widespread, grueling athletic event - parenting a preschooler is long term endurance training. Not sure what single parenting a preschooler or (God help us) single parenting more than one child should be called… but a medal is definitely in order.