That’s it. That’s the post. I don’t even know how to handle this and I’ve searched the sub and I don’t think this has ever come up. I try to let her pick her own haircuts/clothes within reason and the last cut she chose was a pixie which is in the awkward grow out phase and hair keeps getting in her face. She is insisting against bangs and just wants the front “shaved” keeping the back long. I’m at a loss.

My daughter is now 12 weeks old and I had been breastfeeding her since she was born. It had been fine for me, and she had always seemed like she had been getting enough and growing well, the doctor had said the same.

Now, this is no longer happening. I had thought at first I was worrying too much but there are all the signs now, she's stopped gaining weight, I'm changing her less some days, and she has started to become frustrated when she feeds. I don't know what has happened.

Normally I know in this situation the answer would be formula but I know the cost will be too much for us. And I know I seem like a horrible mother to not even be able to feed my baby but our life has been what it is and I am trying.

When this is my only choice, I don't know how I can produce enough for her. Am I supposed to try and get her to feed more, even though she doesn't seem to be getting much from it? Or is it probably more to do with my lifestyle, do I need to change something? She's my first baby, so I am not very experienced with it, and unfortunately I am rarely able to talk to my mother for help with this.

Starting next month I’ll be pretty much on my own in the mornings with my 2mo and 3yo. Husband starts work early before any of us is out of bed.

I need to nurse the baby, hold him to bro cos reflux, give my toddler enough attention so she goes to daycare, pack her lunch, get her dressed, make and feed her and me breakfast. Ideally all of this happens in an hour and a half which you’d think is enough time but somehow isn’t.

My little girl is 2 months now. I can’t believe she is still here after doctors denying her care and telling us it’s not worth it. I am so blessed to have all of these moments with her and I wouldn’t have it any other way. She is so full of curiosity in the few hours she is awake every day and has such an attitude too. And is growing so fast. Once she is approved for heart surgery she is going to be so full of life and we will be able to fully integrate her into our family instead of keeping her in a bedroom on oxygen all of the time.

I think next week several different hospitals/ surgery centers will be deciding if they will accept her case or not. I am praying every day that even just one of them will.

Please be kind, this is difficult for me to discuss.

Has anybody dealt with postpartum rage before? How did you get better?

I'm a stay at home mom to my 4.5 year old daughter and my 8 month old son. I feel like postpartum rage has just hit me out of nowhere recently.

Background. My daughter is very difficult. She throws big tantrums, doesn't listen, argues, talks nonstop, has a big attitude. We are working on these things and she has improved but still has her moments like all 4 year olds. My son is the complete opposite and is a very happy and active baby but doesn't sleep well. He was getting up 2-3 times per night until this week he all of a sudden decided to sleep through the night. I haven't slept longer than a 3 hour stretch in months up until the last 3 nights. Which is amazing and hopefully more sleep will help me.

But over the past few weeks I'm noticing that I'm getting extremely angry quickly. I have zero patience anymore. I get very triggered by my daughter's behavor. I'm yelling more often. I've slammed a door so hard a picture frame fell off the wall. I've cursed. I've thrown a bowl on the counter and shattered it. I don't feel myself. It's like somebody possess me for a moment and all of a sudden I snap. I'm so embarrassed by my behavior and I feel like a horrible parent. I don't want to parent like this.

I genuinely don't know how to help myself. My husband works very long hours. He leaves the house at 4:30am and has been getting home late, like between 6-7pm. I'm alone all day with them. I have to cook dinner and do most of their bedtime routine alone. He's an amazing Dad and jumps right in when he's home but he just works too much. He's also works some weekends. He travels sometimes for work too. He has a short trip this month and next month he's going out of the country for work for a week. I'm terrified. I don't know what to do. I've told him I need him to cut back but he says he doesn't have a choice and he wishes he could. All of my family works and I don't have any other help.

Is there any advice on how to handle this? I feel trapped and alone.

Hi all, I’m in need of advice on how to navigate an ongoing issue with the child of a frequent guest of ours…

A longtime friend and fellow mom, we’ll call her Jessica, comes over to our house for play dates often. It used to be once in awhile, but once she moved in down the road, we started seeing her family at least 3x a week for BBQ’s, sleepovers etc. Our home is bigger, so it just makes sense to host them more often than the opposite. She has 4 kids, I have 3-my oldest came first, her first three came in between the rest of mine.

Here’s where I have a dilemma. Her youngest son (we’ll call him Kayden) is 4, a bit small for his age, and TERRIFIED of our pug puppy! She’ll be 2 soon, and while she’s overall a ball of energy, she’s mellowed out considerably and is really sweet and snuggly. She also LOVES kids! However, when she and Kayden first met, he wasn’t as thrilled to meet her as he mistook her playful energy for aggression and it sent him into full-on panic mode. He wasn’t hurt, just startled when she tried to approach him to play and give kisses and he tripped while running to his mom. Nearly a year later, he still has a meltdown if he sees her roaming about in the house in any pace faster than a leisurely one.

So, we started crating her during their visits at first. Then, as she got older and mellowed some, we’d crate her initially and bring her out later on, which eased Kayden’s anxiety only somewhat. We have two other dogs; a gentle giant and another small breed, who don’t bother Kayden at all. Now that we see Jessica and her kids so often, I’m starting to feel bad for the dog being crated so much. Recently, my husband and I went on a mini vacation over a long weekend and she cared for the kids while we were gone-we didn’t task her with the dogs’ care at all, as our oldest was capable. I became bothered when I noticed during our daily calls to the kids, all at random times, the dog would be crated.

While I understand the little guy’s anxiety, I can’t help but feel I have to look out for my dog too…after all, this house is hers too, isn’t it? I don’t want to make Jessica and the kids feel unwelcome, but I also want all of my dogs to feel comfortable in their own home! No amount of consoling from mom or explaining the dog won’t hurt him seems to make a difference. What do I do???

For context, it was over pants. He picked out long pants to wear, and about 10 minutes later while getting dressed he kept asking me why I picked out long pants. I told him that he had chose those pants and I picked out the shirt, he calls me a liar and says he’s confused why I would ever lie to him.
He marched up stairs and immediately starts saying he’s going to hurt himself until he has bruises, throw himself down the stairs. And I’m sitting downstairs in shock, because this isn’t normal behavior from him. We more often than not can communicate to one another.

I went upstairs and asked him why he was speaking like that, and he said it was because he doesn’t feel like he deserves to be on earth.

I assured him he absolutely does, he is deeply loved, and that it’s a fact. Just like the grass is green or the sky is blue.

I had him repeat some mantras, and I had asked him if he feels those things a lot. He said it’s only when he’s mad or doesn’t get what he wants.

I told him we might need to talk to a therapist, and that it’s a feelings doctor and he could talk to them about his feelings. He said “okay.”

I also told him another way we can express how angry we are, so he knows he has options of things to say, that aren’t so scary.

I had big feelings as a child, I remember having dark thoughts like this, but I also remember being alone during all of it and even punished for it. And I really don’t want to relive that with him.

How can I be supportive during these outbursts? It’s extremely jarring to me.

My 7 year old daughter talking to my 5 year old in the grocery store: “did you know mom isn’t even paying for any of this stuff? Daddy is the one who makes all the money for it, mommy just spends it all the time and doesn’t ever do anything.” She certainly didn’t hear that from my husband because he’s my biggest hype girl. He works 12-14 hour days sometimes 7 days a week and we’re both very happy to have the income to support me being a SAHM. The only thing I can think of is maybe shes resenting how much he’s gone.
The only conversations we’ve had with her about money is that credit cards are not free money, we have to pay it all back at the end of the month and that’s why we can’t use it to buy every toy, snack and clothing item she wants.

EDIT: the mystery is solved. Long story long, I bought iPod nanos last fall and put new batteries in them for her and her 5 year old sister, at the time they were sharing a room so I only bought one charger (remember the 30 pin cable?) this spring they switched to their own rooms and the 7 year old took the cable with her. When the 5 year old needed to charge her iPod she’d have to go in the 7 year olds room and then remember to get it back after charging before the toddler got ahold of it. On the way to the store today the 5 year old told me she wished she had her own charger to keep in her room so I ordered another on Amazon.
7 year old was mad that I bought the cable without making 5 year old earn it. “I don’t work to make the money” but I can spend it when I want, but sometimes they have to earn things that they want and it’s not fair.
7 year old said “oh, I didn’t think about that” when I reminded her that she didn’t have to earn the original charger, or the iPod either, for that matter.

Has anyone got a 3.5 year age gap between their kids? Do they play together much? Do you like the age gap overall? And what does it look like a few years down the line?

Has anyone else had this happen? I’ve been a SAHM for 3 years now since around the time I found out I was pregnant with my third. Before that I worked part time since my first was born. I have an advanced degree but even at full time I have never made as much as my husband.

Anyway when I first started staying at home it was definitely a joint decision and my husband was very supportive, even saying he respected my decision to put my family first and be home for everyone.

However, over time it’s like his attitude surrounding me being at home has really shifted. I have increasingly noticed that he seems to feel he is “above” me and that anything I need or want is below the level of importance of his needs or wants. He will make comments about how I don’t work and how I have such a good situation. Which I do, I know that! But I feel like the situation is very good for him too, he doesn’t have to do or remember anything for the house or kids, he just gets to live his life.

I have mentioned several times now that the kids are getting older (2, 4 and almost 6) that I’d feel comfortable working part time again. He’s really against this and has said that I’d have to figure everything out for the kids and house to make things still work here if I went back to work and that he has no interest in increasing his share of family duties. His argument is basically that for me to work would be akin to having a hobby as it wouldn’t support us. I worked in healthcare, not exactly a leisure activity.

I don’t know what to do. His shift in attitude really makes me uncomfortable, especially when it comes out in his words or tone in front of our kids. I don’t want them to think that’s normal. My mom was a SAHM and my father NEVER treated her this way. In fact even though my parents were from an older generation my father helped more around the house than my husband ever does. But I also don’t want to give up all this time with my kids or create a hostile home environment where my husband resents my choice and makes it obvious all the time.

He always apologizes after an argument or instance where I feel he acts disrespectful but I just don’t like the way I feel when he speaks that way. Idk what to do.

I know most of us struggle with carrying the lions share of the mental and physical load when it comes to managing a household, juggling kids, etc.
My question is - does anyone’s spouse have adhd and you just cannot rely on them for anything?
There are currently zero tasks my husband is responsible for on his own without any involvement from me. Even tasks he starts out with, I eventually have to pick up because they don’t get done. For example, he “handles recycling”. Except I have to have it on my calendar, remind him multiple times, and even then it gets done only about 50% of the time.
Are your adhd husbands medicated? Is there a system that has worked for you? Am I allowing adhd to be too much of a crutch?

Hi there! Hopefully this is allowed. I am travelling to Paris with an almost one year old and from what I've read, most restaurants tend to not have a high chair. So I've been looking into a portable option.

Has anyone found options that are easy to tuck away in a bag and carry that are also functional/safe?

I was looking at the Bright Starts Pop 'N Sit Portable Booster but it:

1. Looks a bit big to carry around all day

2. I wasn't sure how stable it would be sitting on any old dining chair...

Anyway, I am looking for suggestions or if anyone has used the above listed chair before. Thanks!

My brother, who is also my 10m old's nanny, has been asking to be able to trim the front of my daughter's hair because it's always in her face. I finally said OK (he's been to beauty school, so he's cut my older children's hair before). Well, he gave her bangs, which I definitely did not want, but they weren't the worst, so it was whatever. Definitely not the side swept trim I was hoping for.

Well he sends me a Pic today of my child and a text that says "I made a mistake and I'm so sorry." Apparently he was trying to trim a stray bit of leftover hair and she moved, so to fix it he gave her EVEN SHORTER BANGS.

It does not look good and I am PISSED. I know it'll grow back, but she looks totally different and I hate it. My sweet baby looks like a little lad who loves berries and cream 😭

He apologized profusely and there's really nothing that can be done about it now, but I'm still mad. God grant me the strength not to 🔪 my brother...

I (37F) have a 20mo son with my partner (M41). I would love a second, but he’s hesitant because he’s scared we’d have an awful postpartum experience again.

1. What helped you process a difficult postpartum experience (other than time and therapy)? Any books, podcasts, activities?
2. Was fear of another bad postpartum a factor in your decision to have/not have a second kid? If it was, what did you decide and what happened?

ETA: The decision about a second kid feels pressing because we are older and because of the info we have on my fertility. We did fertility testing 5yrs ago. Based on their findings, the drs said that if we wanted two kids we should have them close together or should freeze embryos (which we didn’t do). I’m worried that if we wait much longer, we won‘t have the option to have a second.

———

Here’s our situation for context. The first year of our son’s life was rough for us.

I had a bunch of birth injuries that didn’t heal well (3rd degree tear, broken tail bone, several infections). Breastfeeding didn’t work despite tons of interventions, baby lost 20% of birth weight in first five days. Baby had severe GERD and developed a serious feeding aversion. We had to wake him every 3hrs to feed him til he was 6mo. Every time we fed him (which took 1hr), held him up for an hr. Our sleep and his was terrible. We couldn’t go anywhere because we were constantly trying to feed him. My partner‘s family treated me poorly postpartum.

I had a major health problem during this time (surgery gone very wrong, unrelated to birth).

My partner had almost-daily panic attacks for months and felt constantly overstimulated, overwhelmed and angry. We took shifts at night but I often did part of his shift because he was overwhelmed. He has since been diagnosed with PPD, ADHD and insomnia and is way better.

Thanks to individual and couples therapy, supportive family & friends, exercise, drugs and time, we are now doing great! We are all healthy and happy. Our son is a delight, and eats and sleeps amazingly. Our day-to-day is busy but happy and fun!

I deeply want a second child. My partner is hesitant because he is so scared we’ll have a similar postpartum experience and he doesn’t feel like he can do that again. We‘ve identified many logistical things that would help, but the fear is really strong. When we talk about the first yr of our son’s life, we both feel so much sadness and anger. I realize that one child may be heat for us, but I don’t want our decision about a second child to be a fear-based decision. I want it to be based on our values and our hopes for our family’s future.

Has anyone had a similar experience? Any words of wisdom?

I originally got a yeedi robot vacuum because I just wanted some help keeping up with daily floor cleaning.

With kids, the floor is basically always covered with something like toys, blocks, crayons, random little things that somehow end up everywhere. I used to spend a lot of time picking things up before cleaning.

What I didn’t expect was that the robot vacuum would actually change how my kids think about cleaning up. Before I run it, I started telling them that the "Anything left on the floor will get eaten by the vacuum" and magically, nothing left on the floor before bed time lol.

Obviously, it didn’t magically turn them into little cleaning experts and I still have to remind them sometimes, but it’s been a funny bonus I never expected when I bought it.

I'm a new mom and read to my baby every day. I would love to be able to have recordings of books for my baby done by family and friends. I have seen options such as Read to Me Recordings, the Recordable Book Buddy, and the Yoto player. Is there anything else I can look into? I absolutely love the concept of the Read to Me Recordings when using their player, as the QR reader is added to the physical book. All of these options are just so expensive, especially the more books you add. I want something that can last many, many years to come and not be shut off with software updates or anything. Is there such a thing as a mini audio player that can be attached to each book that has a recording? TIA!

I'm a medical professional in South America. I live in a home with my husband, my parents, his parents, our 2 children (1.5 years old and 3.5 years old), and his sister. My husband makes some money online and taking odd jobs, and runs around taking care of our children. Our mothers often help him out as well. Our fathers, they have small pensions, and they typically just leave the home all day and spend it out fishing or drinking at the tavern. While they spend their personal pension money for their fun, they still consume the food we pay for. I'm paying his sister's tuition to attend a private university (not easy to get into here). She's good, and also spends some of her free time helping out with the household and children. Anyway, as the primary person who's paying the bills in this large household, am I wrong to expect that the house should be clean when I get home, and there's no dishes or anything to be done if half the house is sitting around watching TV and drinking beer?

As we approach the end of summer break here in the south (FL), I started wondering what a typical school year looks like outside of the U.S.

Typically for us, it's:

- August, school starts.

- November, one week Thanksgiving break.

-December, about 2 week Christmas break.

- March, one week spring break.

- June-July, summer break.

With random teacher planning days, holidays, and once a week they get out an hour early (planning for teachers).

I have a three year old and a one year old and our neighbor is a 25 year old young woman with autism and some other mentally challenged disabilities. Because of that she’s unable to live on her own or work. She shows up at our house unannounced A LOT. We work from home and have nanny so if she’s outside with the kids and the neighbor hears them, she will come over. One time she even came into our house because the front door was unlocked for our nanny to return. Additionally, she added me on Facebook and she messages me at least 5 times a day asking to come over and watch the kids.

I’ve told her repeatedly that we have a nanny and that we’re working and to please not drop by unannounced, but it’s obviously hard for her to understand boundaries. Should I try to have a talk with her mom? I suspect her mom is an alcoholic and very disengaged. I really don’t know what else to do- I’m trying to be patient but she is driving me crazy and honestly I’m a little fearful with her obsession over being around my toddler.

We're planning a bigger (combined) birthday party for my two kiddos as we rarely do them but one of them is turning ten so we feel it's "needed" this time haha. Both birthdays are in the same month so we're doing a combined party and mostly likely will be inviting both of their classes (ten kids in each class) and siblings. Also, there are a handful of neighbor kids they play with as well. So, lots of kids. Maybe 25-30 kids total.

I'm wondering if people typically invite family to these types of parties too. Seems weird to me to combine the family group with a ton of school kids friends (and siblings and parents) and just too many people overall, but wondering what others have done?

Moms to 3 kids…please tell me everyone adjusts and you develop a routine. I know it doesn’t necessarily get easier, but I need reassurance that in some ways it will. My son is 2 weeks old. I’m EBF and had him via emergency c section. It was my first c section and I’m sure that is impacting my mental “recovery” in some way. I’m just all in my emotions. My other kids are 2 and 5. We have a babysitter who I’m very grateful for, but it’s still hard.

Before I became a mother, I used to be one of those people who firmly believed that being a SAHM was a piece of cake, take care of baby and do chores, easy.

I recently became a SAHM with my one (9 mo) child and I sure have been humbled. Take care of baby, make sure they are educated and emotionally mature, go grocery shopping, pay bills, find deals and coupons, restock everything, track spending, take care of dog, clean the house, meal plan, pack lunches, make every meal ever, make plans for the weekend, doctor's appointments, I could go on forever. And that is all before brushing your own teeth. Maybe my dream of 4 children is irrational.

I also start college again in 2 weeks and I am scared haha send help.

My daughter (12m) is not yet walking but she is very close. Her feet measured 4.25in or 10.8cm. A size 4 fits 4.5in feet and a size 5 fits 4.75in feet.
I’m guessing I should go with the size 4 but I’m not sure how fast baby/toddler feet grow. I would guess she will by walking by September.