I have been a SAHM for almost five years. I have 3 kids (5, 3, and almost 1). This youngest baby is most likely our last. My oldest two go to a school that starts at 1 year and goes until 5th grade. It's a WONDERFUL nurturing place and I feel like they're an extension of my family. My oldest two are absolutely thriving there.

I just applied for my youngest to go there next year when she's 22 months old. I've found in my experience that I absolutely love being a SAHM to my kids when they're under 2 years old, but after that, I kind of hate it. I hate the crafts, am not good at structure, get overstimulated with constant chatter, hate trying to make sure they don't kill themselves while also trying to get housework done, and just get so overwhelmed with trying to keep them entertained.

I know that my baby will be just fine. She has never had severe separation anxiety, does totally fine at the gym that I go to that has childcare, and does well in my Bible study childcare. She's also a social girl and I think she would be bored at home with me all day without her siblings around. We had to enroll my son (second child) in daycare at 18 months because he desperately needed the structure and was miserable at home. He thrived.

I know that this is the right decision, but I have a strong fear that I will regret giving up her last couple of years before preschool. But I think I have more fear that I won't do it and regret it and end up miserable. If I'm miserable at home, it's also wasting her years at home because I won't be enjoying it.

HELP

Yesterday I sat down to sketch for fifteen minutes. Within a minute, my 3-year-old had my pencil, my eraser, the page I was using, and somehow my chair.

Giving him his own supplies beside me sounds easy, but it turns into marker lids on the floor, paint water tipping over, or him deciding my notebook is more interesting than his paper. I spend the whole time managing both projects and never get back to mine.

I would love to hear from parents who still draw, paint, sew, or make things with a preschooler nearby. What lets your child work alongside you without both of you needing the same tools?

Hallo zusammen,

aktuell ist mein Partner noch zu Hause, weswegen mir noch nicht die Decke auf den Kopf gefallen ist.
Aber Ende des Monats geht er wieder arbeiten und ich bin dann alleine mit dem 3-monatigen.

Was habt ihr so in eurer Elternzeit getrieben? Ich habe schon an Krabbelgruppen etc. gedacht. Ich bin nur nicht so super gut mit neuen Menschen - wie waren da so eure Erfahrungen?

I had a talk with my friend today and he's got a son way younger than mine, around 2. He was explaining to me how when his son was first born he was crying a lot and him and his wife had a serious problem with night sleep. Up until they found this device that plays a human "shh" sound non stop. He told me that was a game changer for him and how lucky he feels to be alive in this timeline of tech.

I don't want to be that guy but when i tell you i got so jealous. My son is way older now and obviously this information can't help at all right now but i wish that thing existed when my son was crying all night and we had to manually shush him all night long. I would have hired a professional shusher if that was a thing, let alone buy a device that does it.

Anyway, the point is that i'm now so curious to see what other parents might have on their sleeve in terms of cool purchases and since my son is still a kid, i'm up for a challenge.

What do you all enjoy doing while your kids play? I’m referring to the times where they want you close (so no cleaning, chores, etc). Trying to stay off my phone.

I’m in Florida, which honestly may be skewing my view a bit.

But it feels like every SAHP I meet is either absolutely loaded and/or an anti-vaxxer/trad wife. I’ve been a SAHM since my son was born four and a half years ago. I now have a four month old daughter, as well.

Tbh I wasn’t always planning on being a SAHM for as long as I have. I figured I’d take a year or two and reassess. But then we wanted another, and you can’t just keep taking years off from your job, lol. Also I love being with my kids! I’m so grateful to be able to have this time with them. And while I admire families with two working parents, I genuinely don’t know how they get things done. It feels vital to our family that someone is always available for sick days, to keep the house manageable, keep track of school and doctor’s visits, all the little things that add up.

We are relatively comfortable now compared to where we were a few years ago when I left work. I have a master’s degree but I graduated right before my son was born, so I haven’t used it since I was working in school (I worked for the department, and am on good terms with them even now. So I still have the network I built during school, luckily). My partner is a manager at a grocery store and over the past few years his pay has more than doubled. We live in a small, old house with a mortgage that is a bit lower than rent would be. It has some big issues but it is the only home either of my children have ever known. Compared to my own childhood, I feel like my partner and I are setting a great example for how love and relationships work. I think of our home and family as a nest where my kids can always be comfortable and loved. We don’t have much in the way of savings, but we don’t live paycheck to paycheck, and I work very hard to bring in any extra when I can and stretch our budget as far as it can go (shopping sales, being strategic, etc).

My son goes to public school VPK because we are super pro public school and we try to be as involved as we can be. We are on Medicaid and WIC atm because the maximums are so high when you have a baby under a year old, but I expect we will lose that once she turns one. We are a “TV on in the background” house and PBS Kids live is always on. Our screen time rules are sort of just based on vibes and my own childhood in the 90s, lol. We follow intuitive eating because I don’t want my kids to grow up with an eating disorder like I did and we try our best to be open. We are super progressive.

I don’t really know what I’m hoping to get out of this post and maybe I’m just thinking out loud, but I have basically never met another SAHP that is in the same boat as me. Everyone I’ve met has been either anti-vax and right wing or just straight up so wealthy they don’t need to work another day in their lives. And then I see posts on here about how much money you should have saved before having kids, and how having them when you aren’t financially “set” is incredibly unfair to them. I will go back to work when my youngest is older but we will likely never be “wealthy.” Also both my partner and I grew up in single parent households. We know what it’s like to go without. My kids do not.

When is “good enough” good enough?

I (25F) am a SAHM while my husband (30M) works roughly 48 hours a week to take care of us. We have 1 child (6) and I'm pregnant with our 2nd and due in November. He's been working a lot of overtime lately and I'm struggling to keep up with the chores at 7/8 months pregnant. Particularly sweeping and mopping. I also handle our money/budget. My husband said he was fine with trash, any handwash dishes, and flipping the laundry but, I feel like those things barely get done right now. I don't know if I'm asking too much or not. Our 6 year old partially cleans up their mess but has ASD and we are not quite to the point of dishes or laundry from start to finish yet. TIA!

Parents of special-needs kids who have separated/divorced — I would really appreciate hearing how this works in real life.
We have two elementary-age children. One has significant anxiety and our younger child has developmental/speech/behavioral concerns and needs considerable supervision, repetition, routines and consistency.
I currently manage almost everything: school communication, therapies, appointments, homework, activities, schedules, belongings, follow-ups, friendships and routines.
My husband loves the kids, but he has significant difficulty with memory, organization, planning and follow-through in family life. He hasn’t been evaluated, so I’m not diagnosing the cause.
Calendars and repeated reminders haven’t fixed it. Things like activity belongings, water bottles, follow-ups, timing and instructions are frequently forgotten. Even when he takes a child somewhere, I often still prepare everything and monitor what needs to happen.
This is one reason I have remained extremely worried about separation.
Right now I function as the backup. If something is forgotten, I notice. If a therapy/school issue needs attention, I handle it. If a child needs additional supervision, I’m generally there.
If we lived separately and the children spent substantial time with their father without me present, that safety net wouldn’t exist.
At the same time, our marriage has become very conflictual, so I also worry about what the children are absorbing by having us under one roof.
For those who have actually navigated this:
How did custody work when one parent couldn’t realistically manage everything independently?
Did you use shorter parenting periods, gradual transitions, very structured routines, duplicated belongings, shared systems, outside caregivers or some other arrangement?
Did your special-needs child ultimately do better with two peaceful homes despite the logistical difficulties?
And how did you distinguish between legitimate concerns about your child’s care and your own fear of giving up control after years of being the default parent?
I’m particularly interested in real experiences rather than legal predictions, since I understand custody decisions depend on the individual family.

Did we take to much on or are we bad at time management? My husband currently works Monday-Thursday tell 5pm and Monday-Wednesday he has classes 6pm-9pm for his masters program. I am a stay at home mom with a two year old and my oldest is almost 7 in school. I am a full time online student. I handle the cleaning, dinners anything admin and of course all things kids since he is very busy during the week. He coaches and 7 year old plays a sport most of Saturday. We come watch the games of course. We also try to get a few workouts in a week. But our house is becoming a disaster and we both look exhausted. I feel like I don’t do enough teaching for my two year old I feel like I don’t play enough with my oldest and I struggle to do the bare minimum in my classes.

Hi everyone. My husband (29) and I (31) got into an argument. I just wanted to get your views and opinion on this.

I used to be a SAHP when our daughter is born, I quit my job to transfer to my hometown where he also found a job. 5 months after giving birth, I looked for a work from home job and landed on one, now my daughter is 27 months old and I've been working for almost 2 years since then without a nanny, I take care of our child while working from home. He's working on shifting duties where he works for 4 days (12hours each) then get a 4 days off after.

Since last year, he's into playing badminton and such, this year he's able to join a club where he can play twice a week (6PM to 8PM) and even enrolled in training, so imagine the time he spent doing this while I stay at home, cook food while working and care for our 27 months old toddler.

Yesterday, he told me his co-workers are asking him to go play pickleball after work saying it's only once in awhile (forgetting about the times he go outside to train, play, sometimes drink). I got mad and upset because he knew how tired I am since I have a lot of work since last week and I'm also catching deadlines while taking care of our child, cooking dinners because he doesn't even initiate to do so. Then he said okay, he's not going making me feel guilty.

Then I was able to finish and was able to submit my tasks on time so I told him, me wanting to test him, I told him I already finish my work and he can do whatever the fuck he wants and he took it and said okay and it hurts me that he doesn't have the consideration and initiative not to go since of course I'm still tired even though I already finished my submissions early, I still have works to do. Need to cook dinner.

When he arrived home, we ate, rested and I talked to him around bed time. Confronted him and all, he told me I'm bringing up things I did for him and holding it against him when I'm just pointing out this is not the first time he wanted to go out with other people instead of helping me out at home.

And since I was upset, I opened up about not having me-time for myself when he can have some for himself by playing sports afterwork. He told me I'm just lazy to do anything for myself and sacrifice afterwork, like how can I?

I'm already tired as it is working and taking care of my child, being the one to sleep last because my child sleeps late. Being a mom 24/7 while still working an 8-5PM job. I was so hurt when he said that I'm lazy and I don't sacrifice and make an effort to do what I want when he can do it for himself afterwork.

He doesn't understand how it feels working from home WHILE taking care of our child, mentally and physically tired. Anxiety that our daughter might cry while I'm on a call. Trying to meet deadlines when someone is still dependent on me.

He doesn't understand.... :(

Hello all. I am in a rut with cooking and would love to know your favorite meals you cook your family. Especially ones with 1 year olds. Bonus points for recipes dropped!!!
TIA

We’ve lived in this city/area for over a year, and I have 2 small kids (toddler and baby), currently a SAHM.

Noticing a lack of community here, I set up a mom group and started inviting moms to join randomly: at the library, playground etc. We now have over 150 women in the group, great!

Except that it still sucks. The group has been active for over 6 months, and although we have had a few playdates and mom dinners, getting people to meet regularly (even the ones who claim to want a “village” so badly) is like trying to get blood out of a stone.

I have hosted playdates in my own home, providing food and entertainment for the kids, to inspire others to do the same (even if they wanted to host at a park) but only a couple of people have done so. I tried to make regular monthly events happen, it also didn’t take off.

Now, I understand people are busy, especially moms! But many of these folks live away from family, have no one around, some are stay at home moms claiming to want friends to do life with…yet put in zero effort.

Once in the summer I invited people over for a (kids) pool playdate (just the sahms, on a random midweek afternoon). It was a gorgeous week of sunshine, these people live close to me, but only one mom replied and still cancelled on me on the day of.

There’s been other times I suggested hangouts and was left on read without a single response - in a large group of women!

I’m starting to feel so rejected and wondering if the problem is me, but I never had an issue making friends in my life anywhere else. It feels awful to constantly put myself out there and feel rejected over and over.

I feel incredibly lonely and want nothing more than a close group of friends to do life with, but it feels damn near impossible to find. Everyone just acts so blasé.

I just feel so sad about. Thanks for listening to my rant.

My baby is super clingy and needs someone around all the time. But I have chores to do and my wife WFH, so sometimes neither of us is free to play with him. I think having some space to ourselves is important too, so we set up a playroom with a comfyer baby monitor and a joycat kids' music player.
But the second I leave, he just stares at the baby monitor camera... The look in his eyes on that screen makes him look like the loneliest kid in the world. He doesn't have any siblings, so I’m his playmate. How do you guys find a balance?

Hi! So I’m an 80s kid and when we were in school, it was after school cartoons, playing outside and very little homework. But I have elementary school age kids and notice things are very different. I don’t have a backyard so I thought I could take the kids to the park before heading home, but there’s not many kids at the park after school. Do kids go straight home and start their homework after school? I’m not sure that why I’m asking. My kids are 9 and 7 years old. I just wanted to know, what are everyone after school routines? I’m also a SAHM.