Am I really a bad mom???

I cant handle stress very well, and I start getting frustrated with my children.  I do not hurt them, I just get angry, and I keep it all bottled up, and I dont know what to do with it.  I tell it to my husband, and he says that I just dont know how to handle stress, and that I just need to ignore the crying.  I cant, no matter how hard I try.  It is completely impossible for me to ignore it.  Well, tonight I talked to my husband (actually this morning, like 10 minutes ago) and I told him I wanted to leave for a little while (like a few hours, not days or anything), but he said, "I let you sleep and do your thing."  Well, I am still in the house with the children, and I sleep in the living room, WHERE THE CHILDREN ARE.  I have a one year old who doesnt like me sleeping.  He likes to pull my hair, get right up next to me, and touch me with toys.  What good is that doing me?  I need to get away for a little bit, and I told my hubby I was going to go with my Grandma, and he said "Like thats gonna help".

Am I a bad mom for wanting to go away?  My hubby goes away 3 days a week for 12 hrs. of work and about 1 hr. of driving time.  He gets out, and he says that he is just getting out to go to work.  Well I cant get a job cuz no one will hire me.  It is just so nerve wrecking to know that he doesnt want me leaving the house.  How much of this can I really take?  I am getting so stressed out just thinking about it.

Sorry this is long, and I hope no one really thinks I am a bad mom.  God bless EVERYONE!!!!!

[BabyHardiman]

No, I do not think you are a bad mom.  I see you are pretty young with two kids.. being cooped up all day and night does not help any situation.. you need fresh air!  I know how it feels, I stay cooped up here all day until he gets home from work, even on weekends when I am able to be with the kids during the day it feels like eternity before he gets home.  By the way, we only have one operational car right now.  =(  He has a truck that is in the shop and he has a gas guzzling work van and we CAN NOT afford gas on that.  So, he uses my Intrepid to go to work.  Booo Hooo, I know!

[rebbecca]

i dont think ur a bad mom either. at times i feel the same way u do, i am a stay at home mom also. i think u need to get out by urself and relax a little bit. i do little things to get away from the kids like, go to the store, or to the laundry mat. its not much but it gets me away from the house  and the kids. and it does help. and then hubby can see what i go through everyday.
we also only have one car and that can be a pain in the butt when there is dr appt or anything else i need to do with the kids.

[maddysmommy]

Id have to agree..your deft not a bad mom at all.  Being a stay at home mom is very difficult when your unable to have any "YOU" time.  You have the majority of the household responsibilites, you take care of the kids and most likely your husband, its very tiring and quite frankly we should have a salary for all we do lol.  Lucky for me we have other vehicles, but bc  my son has a trach and its cold and flu and season Im pretty much stuck inside all the time anyway and cant "technically" drving any where myself with the baby in the car.  So Im seriously feeling trapped.  We cant have many people over to visit bc they are carrying too many germs.  Its crazy but its a sacrifice I have to make for my child.  I basically care for my son 16 hours of the day then we have nursing so I can sleep.  I am able to get out once a week for a mere 2 hours.  It's usually with my 3.5yodd but its still out of the hosue and away from the chaos.  My suggestion to you is to pick one day a week or start withe every other week for you time.  Even if its just groccery shopping ALONE!!  Make sure your husband understands you need this time for yourself.  Also, the best thing to do when your feeling upset or angry or stressed is to pick up the phone and call someone, vent to a friend or family member before its taken out on the kids with yelling and tension.  If you cant seem to fix it that way talk to your dr.  perhaps taking an anxiety medication will help with the stress...and depression..if there is any.  Sorry this is long and rambled Im typing in between opeing juice boxes and changing diapers lol with the baby on my lap..lifes great : )  hope you feel better

[peekawho]

I don't think you are a bad mom, but you are definately under a lot of stress.  Much of it may have to do with the sleep schedule that goes on at your house (I'm referring to your post below).

A schedule like that can't continue without doing serious damage to your family.  Serious damage.  And its already starting to affect you badly.  It will only get worse.

I hope everything works out for you.  I have no other concrete suggestions other than what the others have said.  But do try to get yourself and the kids on a normal schedule.  You'll feel vastly better, and so will they.  

[Avas_Mom]

your not a bad mom. I am the same way as you are and i feel like im a bad mom too but its stressful being home 24/7 with kids. My daughter drives me crazy too. I also keep telling my bf i just want to get away from here for a day! I look forward to my showers because its 30 min all alone no noise!

[potts20]

Thanks for all the advise.  I also only have 1 vehicle, and it is a truck, extended cab, and it is a gas guzzeler.  All of our other vehicles broke down, and the wonderful van we had, my hubby hit a deer on the way to work and ruinied it.  I will try and change the sleep schedual, but everyone knows how a 3 month old baby is.

[peekawho]

The reason I said that, is that you said your kids were staying up routinely until 1 or 2am, and sometimes were up the entire night!

Everyone knows how babies are, but why is the 1+ year old staying up?  That has to be exhausting for both of you!  No wonder you are tired and stressed out.  

[potts20]

My one year old stays up because he is used to that, and if I put him to bed earlier, and my daughter doesnt go to sleep until early morning, then we would get less sleep.  I just cant wait until my baby is my sons age, then she will hopefully start sleeping better.  Actually, I cant wait till she is like 6months.  I think that is how old my son was when he started sleeping really good.  He was a good sleeper from birth, but he still woke up a lot.  

Our whole routine is off.  It will take awhile to get back to normal, but I think (and hope) we will manage.  I am used to staying up late though.  With my husband working 3rds, I used to like staying up till he got home, then we would sleep together.  Now, he only works 3 days instead of 5, so we are working on getting the kids to bed around 10pm.  After we get that settled, we will try for a little earlier.  

At least by the time they are in school, we will have them on a much better routine.

Yea, the kids staying up is TOTALLY exhausting.  It gets hard.  Do you have any tips on how to get our 3 month old to sleep early peekawho?  ANY advise would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

[peekawho]

Andi would be the one to ask--she's done it all much more recently than me!

3 month olds go to bed when you put them down, after they've been fed, changed, and cuddled.  At least that's the way I remember it with my boys.  I think I'd give them their last feeding at around 10 or 11, and they'd get up once during the night at that age.
I think that's pretty much the norm for most 3 month olds.  I'm trying to think why a baby would stay up all night, and I'm pretty much scratching my head about that.  

And a 1 year old up until 2am?  I don't have any good ideas about that, b/c I don't know any toddlers who routinely stay up that late.  They should go to bed when you put them down at that age. Which I'm guessing would be around 9 or 10 at the latest.

No wonder you are exhausted.  I work 3rds, so I know what you're struggling with.  But you don't work 3rds, and the kids shouldn't live a 3rd shift life.  Its been firmly linked to cancer and now diabetes--that came out in todays news.  If your husband has to work 3rds, then he'll have to.  But you and the kids really might want to try to live a day time life.

Of course, only my opinion.  You may feel otherwise, and you may be right.  But you seem so tired and so stressed.  Sleeping at night and being up in the day may help you and the children a great deal.  

[potts20]

I thank you very much for your response.  You are right about everything.  I really want to get on the normal routine, its just hard.  My son usually goes to bed when I put him down, I just think it is more me that has the problem.  I choose to not put him down.  I just need to work on Riley, my daughter.  Like I said before, I am trying to work on the schedual change.  

My husband already has type 1 diabetes :(, so since he works 3rds, it will probably be worse than it is.  He doesnt take as good care of himself, but he is working on it.  He eats all the wrong foods.  He did switch his pop from regular to diet, but he just cant seem to eat anything healthy.  He loves pizza and hates anything that is good for him.  I LOVE healthy food, and it is difficult to make food because he doesnt like what I like.  Is there any specific cancer that 3rds cause, or is it any type?

[AndiJ78]

My dh worked nights for nearly a year and it is rough with little ones! It was hard to keep my toddler quiet during the day so he could sleep, but we managed. My boys were always night kids, but by that I mean they were in bed at 10pm versus the 7pm bedtime they have now. I used to feel they were stuck on the later bedtimes as well, then I started simply putting them to be earlier and it worked. My baby still stays up with my until 9 or 10, but I could probably put him down at 7 with the other two and he would go to sleep.

If you google nightshift and cancer risk you should pull up the recent information in the news. It was interesting, though not surprising. So much is tied to our circadian rythyms and throwing those off by staying up all night is a surefire way to wreak havoc on your entire system. Increased depression, altered seratonin levels, problems with Vitamin D as a result of not getting enough sunlight, and the list goes on and on. You see how it is affecting you, imagine your kiddos.

I understand the temptation, really i do. But in the end you need to concern yourself with your health and well-being as well as what is best for your kids.

[Trialanderror]

Of course you are not a bad mom. Especially if you have been trying to maintain family time with all of you together, even if it was at 7am. Exhaustion is tough though and a break for you is well deserved. Good idea to start adjusting the sleep times for everyone. And best to start with your little one (after you have gotten some more sleep yourself with your husband`s support)..
At 3 months she is only learning sleep patterns, so you can still get her off to a good start. She will probably sleep in 3 hour stretches or maybe 4. So for each cycle you can "practice" the following:
at the first sign of her getting tired and overstimulated, go to a quiet area with her where she would nap and spend some time helping her to wind down from activities. It doesn`t take much, just some lowering of lights, sounds, no TV, no other people around you, some singing or soft talking - and she will know that it is wind-down-time. It is not at all that infants do not want to sleep, they rather need help getting to that stage. Only if you miss her signs of getting tired during playtime, infants tend to get overstimulated and once that happens you have a cranky bundle at your hands who refuses to sleep all together. When she wakes up you can feed and change her and then it`s off to another play cycle during the day or another feeding during the night. Well-rested....
Once she has her routine, you can use the time she is sleeping her first nighttime cycle to get your one-year-old to bed. If you have about 3 or 4 hours to do so, he can have all your attention and bedtime story, bath etc. whatever your routine is before your little one wakes up for another feeding.
Let`s assume all of that happens between 7pm and 10:30pm - you could catch some nighttime sleep yourself on a regular basis. Main thing is that the kids` overstimulation needs to be avoided for your own sanity. I only have one child and I can see it will not be as easy as I am writing here but you probably get the idea. Good luck for the New Year.

[potts20]

Thank you very much on the information.  I will make sure to try that routine.  It sounds like such a good idea.  

Happy New Year everyone!!!!!!!!!!

[Trialanderror]

Happy New Year and you are welcome. Just wanted to add - the signs of her getting tired during activity time would be the first yawn, her pulling her ear, scratching her head, rubbing her eyes or just having a blank stare. Between that and an infant being over the edge it is only a few minutes. So you would have to start the winding-down soon after. Anyway, activity time at 3 months is only about 20 minutes. Most of the feed-play-sleep cycle is feeding and sleeping. Hope it works...

[peekawho]

Great suggestions!

[tiredbuthappy]

my dd stayed up very late the first 4 months of her life. i was very tired and frustrated. she was a very good baby, but wide awake til 2 or 3. we managed to get her to bed by midnight or so by 4 months, and that was by getting up earlier with her. that was very very hard to do considering how tired i was. the baby was staying in bed til 10 am, so i would stay in bed til 10 am. at 4 months everything changed when i went back to work. i had to get her up by 7 to get her to daycare. sure enough by the end of the week she was going to sleep by 10. the transition was very easy for her.

[randol16]

Don't ever think because you may want to throw you kids out of the window sometimes, that you are a bad mother! Never! ALL mothers feel that way.. My 2 year old drives me crazy all the time.. I work full time and I am a full time mom when I come home.. Its crazy.. taking the kids to school, going to work, coming home, cooking, doing homework, cleaning and trying to get my kids to bed at a decent time is almost ridiculous!! I have found with my second child that I don't have as much patience as I did when I had my first and plus my second whines more than my first.. I feel the need to go out and you know.. sometimes YOU HAVE to do what you have to do to stay sane.. Even if its once every two weeks or just taking a walk around the cornor.. you have to do it. My kids are 7 and 2 and they are night owls always have since they were babies.. My girls will stay up to 3 am If I let them. I never believed in letting my kids cry themselves to sleep but the second child is making me rethink that.. My sister in law let my nephews cry themselves to sleep at 3 months.. I am totally against it that young but maybe at 6 months.. its something that you may have to do.. If you have to leave the house when the baby is crying and make the hubby deal with it. Do what's best for you.. If you can create a nightly routine-bath, story, bottle like at 8 or 9 every night.. he/she will get use to it and after a while.. they will naturally start to get tired every night at the same time.. It will get better don't worry.. GL with whatever you do!---------Cece

[potts20]

Thank you very much.  I feel the same way you do about the baby not crying themselves to sleep.  I hate it when my kids cry at bed time.  I either hold my son, or I have him lay on the couch.  He is afraid of the dark I think, so I have to get him a night light.  My daughter though, omg....she is worse than my son was too.  She cries a lot, cant sleep worth anything.  I love them both to death, but sometimes I..like you said..I want to throw them out the window.  I will never do that.  

Thanks again, and good luck to you too.

God bless you and your family.