BellaOnline Forums Family Moms Needing support-can't deal with children anymore

I don't know what to do. I've been through councelling 4 times, and am currently doing so. I've been medicated, I've been vacationed. I can't stand having children. They don't let me live. I give them everything in the world, and all I feel is suffering. I can't relax, I can't think, it's amazing I get them where they need to be through out the day. I want my life back. I want to be happy again. I don't want to feel like the local crazy head on the block. My councellers over the years have told me..this'll pass it's just a phase. Things will get better, blah blah blah. It's been 5 years of pure hell. I feel awful all the time for thinking this, feeling this..but I can't stop. I don't want children. I never ever did. I got pregnant, and had the support of a million hearts. Now, all I get is criticizm. I can't get enough of that. I can't get a sitter, I can't get a break and I can't stop hating my children in my head. Of course..there's fun times, there's laughter. But it all comes back to this feeling of hatred and depression. When i was treated for depression I just felt worse, and when I switched to another pill, it was another kind of sadness. I just don't know what to do, I can't do anything!!! I know deep down I love them, and want to see them grow. But I just can't take this [censored] anymore..it's so unfair and its so un-enjoyable. I feel alone, I feel like i'm the only one who feels this way. My kids are 5 and 7, so they won't "grow" on me..if u know what i mean. I just feel like I can't take it anymore, and I'm scared that one day I'll just up and leave my kids with out realizing what I'm doing. Maybe I should be commited..but there's my excuse to stop being a mother. So thats just an escape, not a solution..Man..i'm so lost and alone..am I the only one like this that feels like this ?? It sure feels so.

I feel a little differently today, so again I'm going to try and make a difference for myself. Again, i'm going to try and prove to myself that being a mother is the best job in the world. I try every day, and every day I fail myself. Today, we are getting out the pottery wheel, and are going to make some dishes. I hope that with this project I can bring out the best in all of us. Every day I try to erase those feelings I listed above. I hate feeling the way I do, and I do try every day to change.

Hi LivingProof,

I understand a little of whaat you are feeling. I suffer from depression and bi-polar, and there are days that I just can't handle the thought of being a mom. Heck there are days I can't handle the thought of being a person!

I'm lucky in that I have family around me that understand thst I suffer from depression, and can take the kids from time to time.

I noticed you said while you were pregnant you had a million supporters, but none now. Is it that you no longer live near family, or that they don't understand?

I know you said you've been treated for depression, but it made it worse. Have you been to straight out counseling? Taking family members with you might help them to understand what you are going through. Just getting the kids to grandmas for every other weekend could be a tremendous help to you. It would give you a break, but also give you seomthing to look forward to.

Also, I noticed that you said you are getting out the pottery wheel today...are you homeschooling, or is it just that the little one isn't old enought to be in school yet?

Maybe instead of getting out the pottery wheel to do a project together, you can get it out to do a project for you. It is so easy to become overwhelmed as a mom, and lose our identity as a woman. Finding hobbies or taking classes can sometimes help reestablish thst sense of self that has nothing to do with our children.

Hang in there, and give yourslef credit for all the effort you are putting into it.

You need a mommie timeout! take the kids to grandma or loan them out to there friends and take a break! At our church when i as in the youth group we had a big brothers big sister type thing going. each teen would take a child from one of the parents for a saturday and hang out with them. this was the best birth control for me because I would take a child at that age where they have non stop questions about everything and they pick up on your worst habits and annoy you to insanity! anyways it gave the moms a day off and the teens the chance to see what mommie life was really like at different ages. It was a win-win deal.

Also my mom had the MOMMIES quite time! Every day she would set and sew and watch her tv shows and i had to be quite and leave her alone. I could watch tv with her only if i was quite and did not bug her. the only exeption she aloud was if i could not breath because of my asthma, or i was throwing up so loud she could not hear the tv, or I was bleeding and it was more then a bandaide could fix!
it may take a while to get this rule inforced but....my mom loved her MOMMIES QUITE TIME!!!!!
My mom inforced this by flat out ignoreing me. She told me this is her time and she said it one time. If i buged her she would ignore me and if i through a fit she would bust my butt and send me to my room with out any toys or anything and if i dared to come out she would bust me again. I only did that once and learned very fast mom gets her quite time and then i can have mommie play time later and she is soooo much happier.

anyways I am sure busting of butts is not allowed anymore but you can think of something I am sure! good luck!

if you are bringing out a pottery wheel i am unsure how you can think you have "failed". children just to have time w/ you, feel special and most of all make YOU happy.

it sounds like you could use some time being a woman, and not a mom. can you take a spa day, get a pedi, walk to shops alone, something that you like to do w/o children?! Hey, go get a cocktail w/ a friend (if you drink, of course).

reaching out is a good thing to do . . . i am looking for a new mommy support group in my area, maybe that is something you should think about doing.

Oh how I know what you're going through. I feel the same way. My 14-year-old is completely out of control and just told me to leave her the f**k alone and to f**king shut up. Part of me wants to storm into her room and smack the [censored] out of her for talking to me that way. Then rip out the lip rings she's not supposed to have in ... Part of me wishes she would go live with her dad or just run away somewhere. I hate feeling this way, but to be totally truthful, I've felt like this with her almost since she was born. She was a difficult baby who cried a lot, was very temperamental, and I honestly don't think I've ever enjoyed being her mom. She lived with her dad for four years because it got so bad I couldn't handle it anymore. So, you aren't alone. I've done counseling. I, too, am bipolar and suffer mostly from depression. I have no family around to support me. My mom lives 9 hours away and the entire rest of my family is 13 hours away. My husband's family has never really taken to her - not entirely their fault - so most of what I get is her dad and stepmom reminding me that it's my fault she is this way. I'm pretty sure my marriage isn't going to withstand four more years with her. I hate being a mom so much it's affecting the rest of the family and there's now a distinct line between my husband and his kids and my daughter and me. I hate that I'm sitting at home on a Saturday night rather than being at an event that was important to my husband because I can't trust my 14-year-old at home alone or even at a friend's house. I hate that I drove 45 minutes to get a hair cut and go shopping and only managed the haircut because I had to come all the way back and then drive 30 more minutes to pick her up because she was trying to go to a show after I said no. I hate that she takes so much of me I don't have anything left for the rest of the family. I hate that I count the minutes until she goes to spend some time with her dad, that I'll let her do something just because it means she won't be home making the rest of the family miserable, that she has all of my worst traits and few of my good ones. I guess mostly I hate me and I know that I can't really love anyone else until I love myself.

So, you aren't alone. I, too, wake up every morning telling myself today is a new day and I will show my children unconditional love and I will be a great mom. And I go to bed wishing I just wouldn't wake up tomorrow.

As a homeschooler, I feel your pain. I love my son so much, but I don't always love being always on-duty as a parent!

Can you separate those out at all? I don't mean that you have to have a career or something, but it has helped me so much to have some work that isn't parenting. A lot of what I do has to do with homeschooling -- I teach some classes to other homeschoolers, I edit a homeschooling magazine -- but still it's work that I can call my own, it's some money, it's a sense of self.

I'm also trying to make sure that I do things that are just plain enjoyable to me. It's so hard because work is so constant, but I do things like write goofy fiction that has basically no chance of selling, just as an escape.

Also, blatantly refusing to be a Stepford mom has really helped me. I mark out *huge* boundaries in terms of what I need. I'm a homeschooler who's a loner -- a really rough combination! And we live in a tiny apartment! So that's made me all the more adamant about making a space for myself.

I hope any of this helps at all...

My son turns 13 this month and first year doing school at home with california virtual academy so my freedom and gym time is gone. We get on each others nerves at times, but this is safest for my son.

Does your gym time need to be gone? Can you leave your 13 yo home alone -- or bring him to the gym so he can work out -- on occasion?

I've homeschooled my ds since he was 10.5, and I've found that as he gets older, I gain more freedom, because I am more comfortable leaving him alone for longer periods of time.

wow...this sounds like the story of my life for the past 5 years. I have a post on "mom" titled I hate being a mom. This totally sucks, HEY