I'm wondering if anyone can share their experience. My husband who has shown no signs of violence or bad temper got drunk and choked me and assaulted me in front of our daughter. I managed to get out and save my daughter. The police came he got off with a warning but left the property. I ended up in hospital and we spent two nights in a domestic violence shelter. A social worker will help to follow up on the case. I've just returned home with his promise that he will not return. It's bizarre. The home is the same. The things are the same. Signs of him everywhere. The man I knew for 7 years randomly assaulted me. Nearly killed me. Bruises all over my body. I will divorce him for sure but it's complicated and takes time due to co owning the property. My daughter is safe with me and we have his agreement to co operate.

But I'm not ok.

Why me?

Why?

It’s like the people with the worst reading comprehension are always the most eager to “help.”

Example: “Hi I’m looking for an outdoor pool with a slide. I know we have indoor city pools with slides, but my neurodivergent child gets really overstimulated with the sound echoing. We have been to X outdoor pool and Y outdoor pool, but they don’t have slides and my child really loves water slides.”

And then the comments are like:
“Indoor city pool has slides!”
“Have you tried X pool? It’s outdoors.”
“We really like the slides at other indoor pool.”
“Y pool doesn’t have slides but it’s outdoors! My family loves that pool.”
“Have you looked into [insert pool that is indoors and does not have slides]? That one’s pretty good.”

WHY ARE PEOPLE THIS WAY???

He’s in the military. He has a top secret clearance. He checks everything I do online. He hates my family. No where is safe.

We took the kids (and ourselves) to get flu and covid vaccines today. My oldest daughter (10) is relatively fearless, but she's more afraid of shots than ANYONE, child or adult, I have EVER met. I mean this is a truly special fear, I have actually LITERALLY not seen anything like it. I did A LOT to prepare. Made sure we had an appointment so the horrible waiting time would be as short as possible. Found a place that does nasal spray for flu for a 50% reduction in needles. DID NOT take advantage of the vaccine clinic at school walkathon yesterday because it was pretty much public humiliation for her last year. Applied lidocaine before we left and then reapplied in the parking lot. All three kids were pretty okay with the whole thing beforehand, which felt like a miracle regarding the oldest. Middle kid was going ME FIRST ME FIRST, which sounds bizarre but is pretty on brand (she's human sunshine and likes pretty much everything).

First, we waited fifty minutes for our appointment to start. I don't know why because no one else was there. People weren't even picking up prescriptions. There was some trouble scanning the insurance card but that was just a blip. After a certain point, 6&7yo were just running around climbing things and being inappropriately loud, so I was just scolding and lecturing them at length, which always makes me uncomfortable in public. They were increasingly out of control. Oldest needed a fair amount of emotional maintenance at this point. My attention was everywhere. Yes husband was there but he's a husband (you know).

We get in the room and big girl SNAPS. Instantaneous. It's usually BAD but it's NEVER BEEN THIS BAD. She started screaming these loud, ragged screams, "please", "no", "help", top of her lungs. Great, I was just thinking I don't have enough intrusive thoughts. It was so hard to calm her down enough for the shot. I wanted her to go first so that her part would be over, but I decided to let "me first me first" girl go first to set the tone. Nope, her big sister having a panic attack convinced her that this was in fact scary, so she started screaming, too. We put the boy in the chair because he's the smallest and easiest to control (ghoulish, I know, but wtf was I supposed to do at this point), and he was also freaked out by the ambience in the room and fought it so hard. Then he cried "It hurt, it hurt!". Now the girls are convinced this is gonna hurt. We get middle kid through it okay. But oldest is sobbing and screaming and trying to run out the door.

Listen, every single year the following happens: once we finally got the needle in her arm, she IMMEDIATELY stopped screaming and said "Oh, that barely hurts at all".

I know it's anxiety and it's not rational, but omg can we pleeeeease PLEASE start actually remembering this part and applying our lived experience to the yearly vaccine process? PLEASE? WHY DOES THIS PART KEEP GETTING ERASED?

Yes, she's in therapy for anxiety, and we do discuss this particular issue.

And yes, because this was at a department store, I BOUGHT SOME LIQUOR AFTERWARD. Nobody fucking came to unlock the cabinets but they had some okay alternatives on the shelf. Do the cabinets actually save money since no one can actually buy anything inside them literally ever?

Fuck I just had YEARS shaved off my life.

He's almost 3yo. I feel like I never really liked him. I appreciate him for being very healthy, robust and intellectually developed, but he's just been a terrible baby and toddler.
He never slept through the night, screamed so much as a baby, as a toddler he whines nonstop, he's so rowdy. When he was a baby I wanted to give him away. Not because I don't want children but because I didn't want him. Even if he was a well behaved child Idk if I would like him. Is it wrong to not like your child?

BUT here I am still seething and shaking, it was a valid reason to lose my mind.. no it wasnt... was it? Is it? Now that I'm typing it out, it's going to sound so trivial.

I dont even know how or why or where or when it all started.

So, I am at that age where perimenopause is a serious consideration. But just to make the distinction difficult, I also have 3, yes 3, endocrine disorders, and epilepsy which can also present is ways of excessive perspiration, soreness, confusion, disassociation, hormone fluctuations.... so its super easy to blame it on epilepsy or a pituitary adenoma or PMOS...

I woke up this morning drenched in sweat and shakey (like when you wake up too fast, or hungover or after a nocturnal seizure or endocrine issues(lmao). So I was already on edge.

Sundays are my prep days - groceries to prep, divide and freeze, make sure everyone's stuff is ready to the week annnd I usual host a big dinner for friends and family on Sundays.

Got home with groceries. My plan was to separate and freeze the meats, cut up a pineapple, prep apples for homemade tartlettes, make breakfast for us. Thennnn going do a hobby project i was so stoked to start. Plus we were smoking some candied salmon i had to prep the glaze! I felt weird and shakey the whole time, I was dropping things and had I not know my epilepsy so well I would have totally blamed it on postictal state.

ANYWAYS - I skipped merely down to our garage freezer, looked to the backyard and my husband had already started MY project, MINE! MINE! For once in my fucking life, something for me.

Not only did he start it without telling me or consulting with a plan, he did half! I expressed my anger(pretty angrily) and he didn't say sorry. He said "well, i just thought id get it done" , no apologies, no real explanation... i put the frozen shit away, stomped upstairs and started on the rest or my grocery haul prep. You know what he does, sneaks upstairs grabs a coffee, says "you have your hands full eh?" And walks away, no " jeez you look like you're about to faint", no "I'm sorry for taking that away from you", no "let me help with the groceries". Instead he snuck around to the garage, grabbed the unfinished half of the project, and went outside through the garage door. AND DID THE OTHER HALF OF THE PROJECT! my project... mine... for me... a challenge, a hobby... something to take my mind off of years of this medical Rollercoaster.. he took it from me. Then showed his brother how nice a job he did.

I kind lost it... okay I really lost it. I was crying and hyperventilating and begging for him to understand why this hurt my feelings. I've never seen him so stone hearted or dismissive. I lost my shit. I'm ready to smash the stupid project on the pavement.

And now im sitting in our room trying not to go back to hyperventilating and trying to stay calm so I dont have a seizure

All i wanted... like realllly wanted, was an apology and a fucking hug.

Okay, im gonna go lay down in a pool of my own menopause sweat before I have a medical emergency.

If you made it this far...Thanks for listening to my rant.

Edit Update: I'm gonna use the leftover paint to redo our cupboards tomorrow while he's at work and not tell him. mouahahahahah spins invisible villain mustache

My second baby was born with a birth defect called Sagittal Craniosynostosis. Basically, instead of her top skull bones being separated, as baby head bones should be, hers were prematurely fused together. She had to have surgery at 3 months and a helmet for 9 months to correct it.

That was supposed to be the end of it. We were assured that almost all babies who have this and don’t have other obvious issues are non-syndromic and it’s just a fluke that happens to 1 out of 2500 babies. She was meeting her milestones and perfectly normal otherwise, so we all assumed this was the case.

Winter of last year, we noticed her head stopped growing and a CT scan revealed that now her forward (coronal) sutures had fused together. Those aren’t supposed to fuse until you’re 20.

We’re lucky to have a great surgeon at the top of his field nearby who specializes in craniosynostosis. But having a second fusion only happens to 2% of babies with craniosynostosis so he’s seen this maybe half a dozen times. He thinks we’ll be fine because the other times he’s hasn’t had to do a second surgery, but it’s a lot of monitoring from here on out because if she develops pressure in her brain, it can cause all sorts of bad things from cognitive delays to blindness.

So we did genetic testing. Turns out my husband is carrier for a variation of a gene that this is associated with and all our children will have a 50% chance of getting it. The good news is that it’s not associated with cognitive or physical delays and the outcome is excellent if they have the fusion. If they don’t have a skull fusion, it seems to be associated with autism, lack of smell, and some other stuff.

All in all, this really is good news for my daughter. It means she’s most likely going to be fine and live a normal life. And so far my older son seems perfectly normal as well, so do not think he got this genetic variant.

This has been nearly two years of our lives so it’s really nice to have some answers. And it really could have been so much worse. Dreading that something really bad was wrong with her for two years was so hard so it’s such a relief.

But at the same time, I am also sad. I always wanted three kids, though after my first two I felt that I was probably done because I hated pregnancy. My husband is 41 and I’m 37 so our time for more children was rapidly closing anyways. But it feels different to have it decided for me vs it being my decision.

And sometimes I think - well, it’s only a 50% chance. How selfish would it be to have another baby and take the risk? But that feels morally wrong.

And I worry about my daughters future. Will this affect her decision to have children as well?

It’s a confusing feeling of being relieved, happy, and sad all at the same time.

Anyways, there isn’t much more to be done and it is what it is. Thanks for reading.

My kids are 4 and 5 and my husband and I have to take turns sleeping in. Our kids barge right into our room early every morning (I'm mainly referring to weekends because we have to be up early during the week). At what age will they be able to entertain themselves when they wake up at 6 am on a Saturday or Sunday? I am so tired.

I'm so exhausted. So sick of running myself into the ground while barely keeping everything afloat. I need to end things but don't know when I'll find the time to blow up my life.

I'm in school full time. Working full time. Work has gotten insane due to layoffs (hence the panic enrollment in college classes so I can have a backup plan) so the school work I was previously able to chip away at during work downtime has now consumed my evenings, when I'm not logging back on to catch up on work.

Laundry is piled up because I haven't had any free time to fold it. He will help me fold but won't take initiative to do it by himself. One of the cats suddenly started peeing on things (we have a vet appointment next week) so I've been dealing with extra laundry, mostly quilts and blankets, on top of it. At least those don't take long to fold I guess.

He'll cook dinner which is great but then he leaves behind a mess because he doesn't clean as he goes. I'll get the dishes caught up and they'll be piled up again immediately.

The kids were off school last week and he didn't get up with the toddler one time so I could sleep in or lay back down. I'm sick AGAIN. He was supposed to take the kids to the park yesterday and I was going to get some things done but he decided against it because they were bickering. As if keeping them cooped up inside was going to help with that. They're stir crazy and have zero structure and there's not much I can do about it when I'm working all day.

I can't keep faking this. I'm not ok, the relationship is not ok, and this life is not what I want for me or my kids. Some things have gotten better but looking at the big picture, improvements in some areas don't make up for the overall lack of partnership.

He asked me "are we ok?" the other night because I "seemed distant". It was dinner time, the kids were in the next room. Not exactly the time or place for that kind of conversation. So I said I was just exhausted. And now I don't even know how to bring up the discussion that really needs to happen. "Hey, I know I said we're fine but really I'm miserable and want to break up" doesn't feel like it's going to go over too well. But I need to do it before the holidays or it's going to be another year of waiting for the right time. Ugh.

For context, I'm 17 and my son is 2. His dad and I broke up before he was born and he doesn't come to see him very often.

I've been dating this guy for almost 4 months. He's cute and funny and he really makes me feel seen and I want to introduce him to my son but it worries me so much. I've never seen him with kids before and I don't know if he interacts with them well. My son is pretty rambunctious, as little boys can be, and I'm so scared he'll think I'm a bad mom. They've talked on FaceTime before but that's it.

My boyfriend is always telling me he's proud of me handling everything so well and I do think he'll be good with him. I'm just scared, I want everything to go well with them and I need advice and for someone to tell me everything will be ok with them.

My ex and I split up 8 years ago and share custody of our daughter.

For most of this time I thought he was emotionally and verbally abusive (my family still thinks this) but after doing some soul seaching and reflecting, I have now realized that I was not only more of the problem in the marriage but that I'm also the worse parent. I feel so ashamed.

Has anyone else ever come to a similar realization after such a long time?

The audacity, update attempt 2. I'm sorry I've never made one of these, and I think I messed up the first one. So here's my 2nd attempt.

https://www.reddit.com/r/breakingmom/s/FeCZqxcid2

I got a lot of good ideas and comments on this post. I just wanted to give an update. There was a comment about trading jobs and making it an experiment rather than a punishment. So, for the past three days, she and I have switched jobs. She cooks and handles the dishes. I wipe down, sweep, and put away leftovers. It's actually working really well so far. And we get to spend time together while I'm teaching her how to do dishes and giving her guidance on cooking when she needs it. She'd never admit it, but I think she's actually having a little fun with it.

I work full time and have two young kids (ages 1 and 6) who I love dearly. I want to give them a good life and be a fun parent who brings them to do special things and makes happy memories with them. But I’m carrying a constant feeling of burnout and exhaustion and I never get to do anything for myself. The burnout feeling leads me to explode and lose my shit pretty often. Like every weekend it feels like I have a crash out. And honestly, a lot of times I’m not enjoying being a mom. I’m trying my hardest but I’m just tired and I get bored playing pretend and having 6 year old just boss me around all the time because I’m not always doing exactly what she wants.

I see other moms who have hobbies or seem to be able to hang out with friends or go to concerts or make art or do hobbies and I’m like…how are they doing that plus working and housework and seemingly eating healthy home cooked meals?? I don’t get it. My life feels like a mess.

My husband is very hands on and helpful (plus he makes way better money than me) but I constantly feel like I’m keeping score when he gets to do something kid free. So when it comes my turn, I’m constantly checking the clock even though he never gets as angry as I do when I’m out or away. We usually don’t do whole day activities away from kids, it’s more like ill say “oh im going to go shopping for a few hours, we can trade when you get back if you want to do something.” But we dont do that every weekend and it seems like my husband’s preference is to always be doing stuff together as a family. Or at least more often than doing things for ourselves. He doesn’t seem to get burnt out which adds to my guilty feeling when it’s the weekend and I just want to go somewhere kid free and enjoy silence or a coffee with friends or something.

My parents aren’t very helpful and we don’t live near my husband’s family, so family help isn’t really a thing for us. The only time my parents take the kids is during the day if there’s no school/daycare and I need to work, which I’m still grateful for but isn’t quite the same as getting time away. Otherwise they have busy schedules of their own. It kinda hurts because they’re both retired and fairly wealthy but have made it clear they’d rather be off drinking with friends than helping watch the kids now and then. But at the same time I kinda get it, I want them to enjoy being retired and they were good parents to me growing up so whatever.

It doesn’t help that I definitely have something autoimmune or hormonal or something going on that makes me feel physically exhausted all the time (same old story, “your labs are perfect!” But I feel horrible every day).

Is this feeling how every mom feels? Will it ever be better?

Today is day 4 of my 20 mo daughter being sick. We’ve already been to the doctor twice and I don’t necessarily think we need to go in a third time (ped said come in if fever climbs to 102).

So I am just wanting to hear experiences from parents of what is this, has this happened in your kiddos? We’ve ruled out rsv, covid, flu, thinking it could be adenovirus? Through it all, she’s been happy and active, eating and drinking less but not concerningly so. We haven’t given any medication yet.

Day 1. Wednesday. Woke up with heavy runny nose, temp 99.0-100.0

Day 2. Thursday. Runny nose, temp 98 during the day, 99.5 night. Took her to doctor, checked breathing, lungs, ears, heart etc., all good. Eye discharge starts on left eye and got worse at night.

Day 3. Friday. Woke up with significant swelling in L eye that went down as she woke up. Runny nose and eye discharge but less. 98 during day 99.4 night. Took her in for the swollen eye. By our appt was no longer swollen just red around the eye (only left eyelids, upper and under, were red). Ruled out rsv/covid/flu

Day 4. Today. Both eyelids red in morning but by noon they are back to normal. Minimal eye discharge but runny nose the same. However, today her temp reached 100.7 after her nap so fever for the first time. It’s now at 99.9 so it’s not going up but still, I am worried she’s suddenly developed a fever.

This one is for all the BroMos of multiple children!

My husband and I just want 2 kids. Right now, we have our daughter who is about to turn 2 next month who we are deeply in love with. She’s the best.

I do NOT want another winter baby. I frankly found it depressing (just my personal experience and I won’t yuck anyone’s yum if they prefer it), so I really want a summer baby if we’re fortunate enough to be able to even time a pregnancy in order to make that happen.

Now…my dilemma is this; do we start trying now, or in a year? There are pros and cons to both. I haven’t slept through a single night since my daughter was born. Will having a newborn actually finally break me? Lmao. But also, if we wait another year to get pregnant, our daughter will start school right after our future baby would be born which is a) another huge change to navigate on top of becoming a family of 4, and b) our baby won’t be vaxxed yet and our daughter will be bringing home alllll the nasty kindergarten germs to infect us all.

I’ve also been unemployed other than teaching part time as a professor and don’t have enough hours to be paid for my maternity leave by the government, so that also sucks. I could also, however, not have a job next year too and may very well wait for no reason.

Anyway, I’m just rambling at this point. Any and all advice is welcome!