Does it get easier.

I'm a young stay at home mother . Finding it very hard with my three kids . I love them with all my heart but when I was a child I wasn't exactly showed the best parenting . My father wasn't around never was and my mam struggled with her mental health . Just wondering does it get easier the older they get . I find myself getting very frustrated at them and I hate myself for it and I gets upset at night when everyone's in bed. I feel like a let down . I'm trying my best but I would love to have more patience and less of the grumpy mam. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2Qi1qEy

Tips for our smart, independent, strong-willed toddler?

Our daughter is two and a half. Ever since her personality started to show she's been fiercely independent. She's very smart but has to do everything on her terms. She refuses to be helped with anything (eating, how to use a toy, etc, etc) which can be tough to watch as a parent.My wife and I have been wondering if there are helpful strategies for fostering learning while still letting her be who she is to a certain extent. I know this trait isn't a bad thing, but as someone that is independent myself I look back and wish someone would have known the right times to help and how to help. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2OjHAf1

Weekly - Stories from the week/end - October 01, 2018

This weekly thread is meant as a place to share stories that happened to us as parents over the weekend. Share good, bad, fun, not fun, etc. Also, if you ever wonder who we are, click here to meet the mod team! via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2y6Ij8Y

Bad News at Ultrasound

I'm not sure how to begin, so please bear with me. At my 20 week anatomy scan on Friday I learned that my daughter's cerebellum is not forming properly, her head is much too small, and her bladder is barely visible. The doctors were confused because the typical presentation of those issues usually go along with other problems - but those problems weren't seen. I had tested negative for chromosomal abnormalities at the nuchal scan, her spine looks good and properly fused, the fluid around her all looks good, and her kidneys are normal. In short, the doctors were stumped, but certain: this baby is either not viable and I am looking at losing her shortly or she will be born with severe issues. They recommended an MRI and amnio for more answers - but of course, those won't be for another few days. I'm absolutely devastated and grieving for the family I thought I was about to have. Is it strange to miss the healthy child that I never actually had? One of the hardest parts of all of this is I couldn't even properly express myself all weekend, because of course my toddler wouldn't understand and I needed to remain Mommy for her. She also recently learned that I was carrying her sister and so all weekend she would point to my belly and remind me that there is a baby in there. I don't know how I am going to survive this.I'm not honestly sure why I am submitting this post. Catharsis mostly. Maybe hoping someone will say that they had a bad anatomy scan and learned at the fetal MRI that the scan was wrong???? Maybe? I know, probably not. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2xMF3QQ

It’s getting hard

I’m a single mom. And today was just one of those days where I felt sad, and overwhelmed for no apparent reason. I thought at first maybe i was just tired but I got to talking with a friend and the conversation got pretty deep.I should probably start from the beginning... I met my daughters dad at work. We knew of each other and would occasionally exchange words but it wasn’t until a year or so that we actually started getting involved with each other. We moved pretty quickly, which now....I wish I would’ve made better choices. But that’s neither here nor there. I got pregnant fairly quick, I had a high risk pregnancy due to the fact that I didn’t really wait long enough between my first section with my son. I got pregnant with my daughter like 5 months after I had him. I was constantly in pain, i was sad and miserable the entire time. I hated being pregnant with her, I often thought I might not bond with her because I felt so disconnected at the time with just about everything. I wasnt working as much I was home more and taking care of his other kids from previous relationships and my son from a previous relationship as well by myself, we weren’t getting along as well anymore and that should have been the first sign that things were just not going to work out. But I stayed for 2 years,Fast forward to having my daughter, I had a c section and he was already planning to return to work the following week. How the hell was I gonna do this alone with 4 kids? He went back anyway. He started helping less, changed jobs, started working more, drinking more, doing drugs (pills) being home less, we started arguing more, yelling turned into pushes, pushes turned into slaps, slaps turned into hospital trips due to broken bones. I never said anything, I was scared...It wasn’t until the last time he put his hands on me that i left, I quit my job packed up what i could and my kids and left. He seen my daughter for about a month or 2 after then completely disappeared for almost a year. During that time of healing and starting over I was terrified, I was safe but terrified. I never wanted to go anywhere let alone with my daughter Incase i ran into him. The thought of living in the same town with the possibility of seeing him anywhere i might go gave me the worst anxiety. In that time my daughter showed signs of development delay. I was worried because at a year old she just wasn’t doing anything, absolutely anything. No crawling. No walking. No talking. Nothing, she had doctors appointments , they agreed she wasn’t progressing at the rate she should be. So she started therapy, which now she does 3 times a week, which I have to be present for. So I work full time and between work, my daughter and trying to balance giving my son enough attention as well it’s overwhelming to say the least. I constantly feel anxious and angry and sad and I’m not sure why. I still have such a hard time going anywhere, I want to but I can’t bring myself to. I cant take my kids to the park without feeling like something bad is going to happen and that we should just go home because it’s safe there.Her dad is currently present and he legally has rights to see her but every time she leaves with him I think the absolute worst. Its just been her and I on this journey and she’s obviously attached to me and i to her that it physically hurts when she goes, as dramatic as it may sound I always wonder like is this going to be the last time I see her. I dont trust him but what can I do?There is not a moment where i don’t feel guilty, anxious, overwhelmed, stressed, alone and scared. I think how much easier it would be to have help but the thought of allowing anyone to get close to my kids and I is fuckin terrifying.I just want to feel normal again. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2zHJZYK

3 Year Old said he's scared to go back to his Mother's house.

Background: Ex and I had 2 kids (now 6 and 3) and we split up just after the youngest's 1st birthday, so he doesn't really remember me living with him full time.We both have new partners; Ex lives with her new boyfriend and Mother, I live with my fiance and my parents while we save. The kids are with her Sunday night to Friday night and we have them Friday night to Sunday night.Now my 3 year old's vocabulary has exploded over the past 3 months but he still has trouble enunciated some words.Story: So for the past few months, at least 90% of the time my youngest will say that he doesn't want to go back to "Nanna's House" and that he wants to stay at Daddy's.Tonight though, he said that he didn't want to go to Nanna's House because he's scared. My fiance and I kept asking why but he couldn't say what he was scared about clearly enough to understand, then he started getting shy because he had to repeat himself a few times.We're thinking next Friday night we're going to pull my 6 year old aside and ask her why she thinks her brother said he's scared, but she's also been caught out telling lies recently so we'll be careful with what she says.Any advice on what other steps to take? Should we leave it be for a bit or should we go speak to a GP about what to do next? via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2xNIqag

I feel like my daughter/I got screwed in a court ordered parenting plan and I don’t know how to proceed.

I have a 15.5 month old daughter with my soon to be ex husband, who is active duty in the military and stationed over 3,000 miles away. Unfortunately, my ex doesn’t have much of an established relationship with our child. Let’s keep it simple and say that our daughter has only ever been around her father about 4 months of her life. She wasn’t around him until she was 7 months old (100% his choice). Then my ex and I reconciled and she lived with him/us for 4 months. He ended up abandoning us while on vacation before reporting to his current duty station, so I filed for divorce shortly after her 1st birthday. Nearly 5 months went by before she saw him again, which brings us to present time. I’ve been a stay at home mom her entire life so she’s extremely bonded with me and I can’t say for sure if she remembers her dad.For a multitude of reasons, I felt like I had no choice but to hire a lawyer and take this to court. As much as it’s more ideal to come to an agreement on our own, this is borderline impossible because of how he is as a person and the fact that we don’t see eye to eye on anything related to our parenting plan and our child’s best interests. Throw in all of the harassment and threats and you have one giant mess. I really put my faith into the court and hoped they’d give us a good solution to our issues.Well, the judge ordered that we exchange our 15 month old child every 30 days. Every other month, our child is supposed to get on a 6 hour flight to her father’s duty station and spend an entire month there. I am honestly shocked a judge ordered a 50/50 custody plan for a young toddler with parents who live so far apart from each other, especially when one parent hasn’t been involved much at all. I guess my case is causing an uproar throughout a bunch of family law firms here and everyone is appalled by the ruling. Apparently nobody has ever seen anything like it. The order completely goes against the court’s parenting guidelines and sample parenting plans, and it’s like the extensive research that says this will be detrimental to our child’s well-being wasn’t considered whatsoever. There’s so many reasons why this parenting plan truly sucks for our child and why it isn’t reasonable or realistic for either me or my ex.My ex’s custody proposal was that he wanted to trade our daughter every six months, and it looks like the judge essentially gave him that but broke it up so she wasn’t away from either parent for too long. My ex doesn’t like the court order and wants to try hashing out our own agreement again. Except he is just so stuck on his six month idea and there’s no way to get him to consider anything else. He’s very manipulative and very much a “my way or the highway” type of person. I think he needs to exercise some parenting time in our home state, but he absolutely refuses to use his leave to spend time with his daughter. He wants to use his leave for his own personal time and he’s even already doing that next week. I mentioned to him that all of this back and forth nonsense is detrimental to our baby and there’s all sorts of research to back that up, and all he had to say was that he doesn’t agree. I feel like he’s only thinking about himself and has ulterior motives for wanting this sort of custody plan. Especially financially because he is responsible for all travel costs, including the person traveling with our child. This screws me over too because as a result, I only get enough support for a few days of daycare every month when I could easily get more and I don’t get to claim our child on taxes until several years down the line.But the sad thing is, I am having trouble thinking of what we could do that isn’t trading her every six months but not passing her back and forth every 30 days either. I feel like there’s no good solution in our situation. No matter what, our daughter is going to suffer in some way. I do want her to see her father and have a relationship, but what exactly does that look like and how much will it cost her her overall well-being? What type of custody plan will benefit her the most? Every one I can think of has a long list of cons and maybe a couple positives. It’s really hard to decide which plan is the least horrible. We’d be doing this until she’s school aged.I have to decide if I want to appeal this order or if I want to let it go and see if my ex will hang himself, so to speak, so I can get the order changed. I can see why I should and shouldn’t for both options. I firmly believe that since my ex really wants our daughter to stay with him where he’s stationed, he will take her sometimes but not every time it's ordered. He’s already said he’s not going to take her for his first ordered block of time. I’m nervous about what the consequences will be if we try to follow this order so I am leaning towards trying to appeal it.Please share with me your thoughts and opinions, especially if you have experience with long-distance parenting or know anything about child psychology. This court order has me feeling so messed up. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2DGjwid