Fraeyalise

I mean think about it- you want them to know realistically the hardships because I feel a lot of our generation is dealing with generational trauma. I know for myself, I feel if my mom knew how hard parenting was going to be for her she never would have had kids and I wouldn’t exist. She neglected us a lot and eventually abandoned us to go partying, drinking, basically pretending like she didn’t have a family. So if I can save someone else that might end up feeling the same by being realistic about the reality of parenting, I’m gonna try. Of course I’m not doing it consciously and I do try to include positives. But it’s hard to know if a potential parent will love having kids until they’re here, and the consequences of being wrong is high. I feel if you know how hard it’ll be and do it anyways theres a level of commitment there. Like those people who get “seasonal” pets, like rabbits and ducks around Easter or puppies around Christmas.

This was a good deciding factor for me, too- thinking about having a teenager help me carry groceries into the house, thinking about an adult son helping old lady me do stubborn old lady things. Thinking about having a baby scared me so much, but a toddler? A child? Not so bad.

I really was against children for most of my life. I had a horrible childhood, terrible relationship with my alcoholic, mentally ill mom who abandoned us but kept coming back when it was convenient for her only, and I was very selfish. I didn’t have children in my life and I also didn’t really have any mother/parent role models to look up to. I didn’t want to give up freedom or money or time.

And then I got a little older and my husband started to want kids. And I did a lot of therapy around my mom issues and realized being a mother doesn’t have to be like my mom.

I realized the thing keeping me from kids was fear of the unknown and my self doubt. And I realized I wouldn’t turn into my mom because while I also have some mental illness, we cope with it in vastly different ways.

And then my husband said “if we decide not to have kids, and I lose you, I’ll feel a lot of regret because I won’t have anything left of you.” And that just hit me because I realized I felt the exact same way about him. We ended up going through infertility treatments that were so, so hard on me. It was one of the major low points of my life, and even made me reconsider having kids. But I kept thinking about myself and my husband when we are 80. What would that look like? And I just keep envisioning our grandchildren, our adult children. It feels right with them in it vs without them.

And now, 4 years later, I have a 16 month old. I had severe postpartum depression, I didn’t bond with him until he was around a year old. I had multiple postpartum ER visits and I’m still dealing with some health PTSD from it.

Babies are terrible (I am not a baby person). I had a “good” baby and it was still more than I could handle a lot of the time. Having a partner that did most of the baby care so I could focus on feeding our son and taking care of myself was vital. I did what I could when I could.

But now he’s a toddler and I love him so much more. We are definitely more bonded; having his feedback helps me so much. Even when he’s having a tantrum, it’s great because I usually can understand why and I can help him through it. His communication is more varied, and he is beginning to show preferences. It’s wonderful. Seeing him learn something new, figure something out, is so freaking cool. Seeing little bits of us in his emerging personality is also really cool. Everyone says to soak baby time up because it goes so fast but to me, that was a blessing.

I say that because if you DO decide to have a baby and it ends up being like nothing you thought and that’s scary and makes you regret, it’s normal, and you shouldn’t feel bad about feeling that way. It’ll pass with time.

(ADHD + chronically ill mom) Reparenting myself has been, by far, the hardest part of parenting. When my 15mo son throws a tantrum trying to get away from me because I’m carrying him inside, or gets mad I said no and tries to hit me, it’s so triggering. My home as a kid was incredibly strict and included physical punishment and I don’t want to do any of that for my son. I know he is developmentally appropriate for his age and not being overly aggressive or “bad”, he’s just having big feelings and expressing them the only way he knows right now, but it’s still hard to react without angry yelling and urge to hit back, and it’s hard to not take it personally. Both of those reactions come directly from my childhood.

I will say the biggest help has been learning what other options for discipline are out there, and I’ve learned that and started practicing even before my son is old enough to understand what I’m doing. The ABCs of Parenting class on Coursera from Yale (it’s free) has been amazing. I’ve also read Happiest Toddler on the Block by Harvey Karp. Happiest Baby saved us, and I think some of the Happiest Toddler stuff will be helpful, too. And learning sign language has been the most helpful. I plan to continue learning sign language for myself and teach it to my son and husband so I can continue to communicate with my family when I get overwhelmed and can’t talk, or when I have to wear heavy duty earplugs.

I love Katherine May. Her book Wintering is also really good if you haven’t read that.

I love this. I did tell my friends this but no one ever reached out to make plans.