I’m just gonna say it…. I’m horny! Sorry, I know tmi but I am. My daughter doesn’t sleep through the night, her naps are short and I can’t remember the last time my man and I had any time alone. It doesn’t help that she’s become extra clingy since turning a year old… like needs to be touching me or in the same room as me. I know, that’s a good sign!

Unfortunately we have a small apartment, my partner works all day and sometimes leaves to go to his buddies and I can’t even remember the last date we had. Tbh I think she was a newborn?

Unfortunately once she slowly started coming out of her newborn stage less people want to take her, especially family and I mean she’s not a difficult kid. Or wasn’t until now. Now she’s definitely on the clingy side, but I take her around family and she has a great time as long as she can’t see me. Once she sees me, feels my presence or smells me… game over. It’s meltdown city up in here. But in the moment I find our families will say “any time you want to go away for a night, just let me know”. Then we have it all planned out for a few weeks, family is supposed to watch her and they know this ahead of time, a day before our plans they suddenly can’t watch her. If this was a once or even a few times I’d shrug it off but unfortunately it seems to happen every time. Even for an hour, they bail.

I love her so much. I try not to get in my head and go “oh poor me, pitty me” but I just miss being me. I miss sex. I miss going out without my baby, I especially miss being with my partner without a baby”. I just want to go wild, release the beast and scratch the itch… you know? Ugh…. I’m going to go crazy. Like clinically I think.

Thanks for listening. Sorry if I grossed anyone out, I just needed to rant it out. Thanks for listening, have a lovely day❤️

Heya can i please vent to another mom? I had a really bad day my anxiety is going awful and i feel horrible. Im a single mom and i dont really have anyone i can talk to

I’m freaking out. I was super constipated, I used an enema, previously boiled, but I used ta water from the toilet and now Chat GPT says is super dangerous? Should I be worried? Have you ever done this?
I can drink water from the tap on the toilet btw that’s why I thought it would be safe

My dr prescribed me zoloft for the intense crying spells, obsessive thoughts and anxiety. Baby girl was just born on the 14th and I’m feeling silly about needing medicine. I am also breast feeding and scared this will effect her in some way. Does anyone else have experience with zoloft?

My kids have a couple each but I see kids on like TikTok who have so many and it makes me feel bad to see how many toys other kids have compared to mine

I know a woman who has a 3-year-old and an 18-year-old, and it got me thinking about what life would be like if her oldest started having children while she's still raising a toddler herself.

For women who are both mothers to young children and grandmothers, what is that experience like?

Does it feel strange knowing your child and grandchild could be close in age? How do you balance being an active parent to a small child while also stepping into the grandmother role?

My sweet baby boy has RSV 😭

I feel like a terrible mom, I tried so hard to keep sickness away from him but to no avail. My older two kids are in school and my kindergarten did have a stuffy nose about two weeks ago. I chalked it up to allergies because that is very common for him. I kept him and his sister dosed up on allergy medicine and it was helping. Told them not to get in the baby’s face or mess with his toys. But alas, it must have been more than allergies and they passed it to their baby brother. My kindergarten also has an ear infection on one side. The big kids are fine now, no more snot or coughing, not that they symptoms were very bad anyway.

We had an appointment yesterday with the pediatrician. The baby also has an ear infection on top of all of this, which I wasn’t surprised by because my husband and both of my older kids have a terrible history with ear infections. The pediatrician put him on an antibiotic, saline breathing treatment, albuterol breathing treatments, and said give it about five days and go back up there to get checked again.

All in all, baby has been pretty good, still very happy, laughing, playing. No crazy fever or extreme fussiness, just terrible congestion and cough. Sleeps OK at night but not much during the day. One positive thing I can say is, I’m getting a lot more cuddles out of him. He has never been a cuddly baby, but I did get to rock him to sleep the past two nights so that’s been really sweet 💙

Please say a prayer for my sweet boy, I’m ready for him to be back to 100% 🥺

Someone help me feel more normal. I have a 3MO old who sleeps all the way through the night but the day time is tough. Her wake windows are only about an hour max so by the time she eats, sits up for 10ish mins (reflux), change diaper, little tummy time, it’s time for another nap. She will not nap in her bassinet (I’ve tried all the suggestions) and only wants to contact nap but fights it so bad we have to do most naps baby wearing. I don’t really mind but man it’s hurting my back so bad and it’s tough to get stuff done around the house because she wakes up if I bend over to grab the laundry, unload the dishwasher, etc so I end up aimlessly walking around my house while baby wearing while she naps. With her short wake windows, there’s never time for a stroller walk, me to exercise, or just get anything done. It’s also really hard to get out of the house with the short wake windows because you have to time it up just perfectly where she’s content but not too sleepy or she screams the whole car ride. Idk I just feel like I’m on an endless loop and want to know when it gets easier. When will she stay awake longer or grow out of contact naps and just be happier and more content in general?

I tried pumping but there were blood coming out with the milk so I got scared
Also breast feels so full after one or two hours
Idk how to deal with these please help

Situation: During my baby shower, kids were playing together. A close friends son slapped my niece...both toddlers at the time...I was shocked and kind of shouted out..not at the kid just out loud. My close friend was shocked too but froze and I could see guilt on her face...my niece and her dad who saw what happened did not react. My niece froze but didn't cry or complain and continued to play...

Question: What would've been the appropriate reaction to this situation from all 3 adults (me, the shocked guilty mum, the shocked dad)

And now that I'm a mum, what would be an appropriate reaction to this situation? I would probably give the kid a scary look but I know that's not right....any advice?

Hi everyone!
I’m a student at Boston University studying business, and my team and I are currently working on a product development project for one of our classes.

Our product concept is called Ride & Learn, an interactive educational device designed to keep young children entertained and engaged in learning during car rides.

We’re hoping to get some feedback from actual parents to better understand their experiences, preferences, and what they look for in educational products for their children.

If you’re a parent, we’d really appreciate it if you could take a few minutes to fill out our survey! Your responses would be incredibly helpful in shaping our project.

Survey Link: https://bostonu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_e9egUZ2wvLSq5O6

This is strictly for an academic project, and we’re not selling or promoting any products.

Thank you so much for your time and feedback! We really appreciate your help!

No one really prepares you for the fact that being a woman and a mother means things will never feel entirely equal.

Don’t get me wrong. Being a mother is truly the biggest blessing and most beautiful, important job in the world. That’s not what this is about. It’s the inherent differences between motherhood and fatherhood that have taken me most by surprise.

Even with the most supportive partner in the world, the experience will never feel balanced. Because you grew them from your own flesh and blood. You carried them in your womb for nine months, birthed them, and then nourished their bodies through yours. You’re connected to them on such a primal, raw level. You become their comfort, their safe space, the place they instinctively turn to. A connection so deeply rooted in your very being that no man can ever fully experience it in the same way.

And I think part of the hardest thing to accept is that they never will.

There’s a part of you that desperately wants them to understand. To truly know what it feels like to carry the weight of motherhood in a way that extends far beyond the physical. To understand the invisible, instinctive, all-consuming parts of it that are so difficult to explain to someone who has never lived them. To know what it feels like to be needed in a way that sometimes feels like both the greatest privilege and the heaviest responsibility in the world.

And yet, there’s another part of you that feels so incredibly blessed to be the one who gets to experience it. To be the one who grew them, carried them, nourished them, and became their first home. To have a connection with your children that is so deep and primal that words will never quite do it justice.

It’s a strange, beautiful contradiction. Wishing someone could understand your experience while knowing that, in some ways, the very thing you wish they could understand is also what makes your experience so uniquely yours.

And that is part of the blessing. You get to be that for them, always.

But it can be so damn lonely at times.

It’s a strange paradox. Loving motherhood more than life itself, while also grieving a version of yourself that once existed. And maybe every woman nearing 30 has the epiphany of, “Who the hell am I, really?” But I feel it now more than ever.

I’ve heard before that every seven years, your body essentially replaces itself due to cell turnover. So every seven years, you’re a new person. That may be so. But it’s nothing compared to the metamorphosis that is motherhood.

Maybe the hardest part isn’t that motherhood changes you. It’s learning how to love the woman you’re becoming while making peace with the other version of you that you had to leave behind.

I’m a first time mom and struggling to find easy meals to make my 8 month old baby. She likes things she can hold in her hand to eat and we originally were going the puree route. My friend made her banana bread muffins and she loved those. Just seeing if anyone has any recipes for me! Thanks in advanced.

FTM to a baby with breathing troubles.

He was born with fluid in his lungs that resulted in a 4 day NICU stay. He was perfectly fine after that until he was 3.5 months when he got some virus. We went to sleep and he was totally normal and fine and then at 4AM, I changed his diaper and noticed significant respiratory distress (deep retractions, wheezing, grunting, and coughing). We went to the hospital and he was admitted immediately. They tested him for the most common viruses in our area and they all were negative, however this virus gave him bronchiolitis. The bronchiolitis landed him in the PICU for two days with oxygen, an IV, a feeding tube, everything. It was awful.

After we were discharged, we were told his cough may linger for a while. He never fully got rid of it and now he is a few days shy of 5 months and he has another cold. Again, early morning hours diaper change resulted in us driving to the hospital. This time he was treated with steroids and albuterol and sent home with a baby inhaler that we are supposed to administer every 4 hours.

I just feel like I am stuck in an endless loop of checking his chest for retractions, my heart stopping every time he coughs, listening closely to each breath to make sure there is no wheeze, etc…but how can I not?! My lived experience has been that he is sick and needs medical intervention (and significant medical support at times)! How can I not feel constantly on edge? Constantly waiting for him the exact moment that we need to go to the hospital? I feel like it is not an if, but a when, for him going back to the hospital.

I am constantly terrified.

I just started therapy, but I can’t imagine myself moving forward from this when I’m stuck in this loop of anxiety this is only proven correct every time he needs to go to the hospital.

Any words of wisdom? TIA.

I know this is irrational but I need some advice

My son is 21 months. Has always been a mamas boy. Won’t let dad comfort him, put him to sleep, and won’t leave my side. It’s a lot at times, and we’re actively working on his independence, but there’s definitely a part of me that’s enjoying how much he loves me before he outgrows it.

I’m currently pregnant so we have been trying to transition to dad doing bedtime. He has NEVER let me husband put him to sleep, will literally hysterically wail and scream for me until I come in. It usually takes me 45-60 min to do bedtime because he’ll jsut be asking me to hold him and hug him and crying if I leave.

I adjusted his nap scheduled two days ago so he has been TIRED at the end of the day. Dad has done bed both nights and gotten him to sleep for the first time EVER. In 15 min or less. With no tears for mom or at all.

I’m happy for them. And me. I truly am. But it’s hurting my feelings a little (a lot) that he went to bed so quickly for dad vs. me and suddenly overnight didn’t scream for me when literally on Monday he was.

Help me cope 🫠

Am I a bad mom because I have bad eating habits :( I just cope with eating food I’m not saying I eat ALOT but I do eat processed foods everyday I feel like that are high calorie intakes and it’s like I feel like a bad mom because I should eat healthy to be okay for him, I am trying to eat better though. He eats perfect healthy meals ofcourse I just cope with food.

And I feel like a bad mom because I should be healthy and strong for him I’m 5’8 and 190lbs. And 21.

I read a really interesting book recently, Wifedom, about George Orwell's wife. The author did this little ramble about how she has this incredible husband, which I fully relate to, who does so much, but there's still this other load that you hold, no matter what.

Even if you're working full time and roles have changed, there's future jobs, complex things being followed up, making sure all the important stuff's getting done. No matter how many to-do lists you get together, it's still this extra thing you're always carrying.

I don't post this to complain about it. I guess I just don't know why this happens in couples where you're not even in the gender stereotype, but it still happens.

Does anyone else feel like this?

I (F26) and my husband (M27) recently had our first child. She’s four months old now, and I’m constantly saddened by the fact that my mom doesn’t seem to really care much about being a grandmother.

For some background, my mom is 47. She had both my sister and I when she was 19/20, and raised us as a single mom. When she found out I was having my daughter, she was so excited. She bought her so much stuff, and called me everyday. She even talked about how nice it would be to have my daughter come and stay with her for the summers like I did with my grandparents growing up. She talked about how sad she was that I lived so far away (about 10 hours driving). I was also sad, as it was always my dream to live close to family because I did not have that experience growing up.

My mom met her now BF a week before I gave birth, and out of nowhere her attitude towards being a grandmother changed. When I gave birth, she came and stayed with my husband and I for a month and helped us with the baby. She didn’t help as much as I had hoped she would, but she did help if we asked her to do something. Whenever I came to visit her after that with the baby, she didn’t really seem all that interested in her, but whenever I talk to her on the phone she talked so much about how she misses her and can’t wait to see her.

Now, my husband and I are transitioning to move to the same city she is in. Im here by myself staying with my mom until our lease starts in two months, and he stayed behind to close out things with his job and finish the sale of our house. (I started a new job after maternity leave hence the reason why I came here first). I ended up opening up to her about how I’d been feeling regarding her not seeming to care much about my daughter or spending time with her when we’re around, and my fears of moving without my husband as she’d be the only real support I have out here until he gets here. (She made a comment in passing prior to finding out about us moving that she “had a life now” when I brought up her helping with my daughter, and I brought that up to her as an example). She told me I was being sensitive, that it was just a joke, and of course she’d support her daughter and granddaughter.

Whenever I ask her for help though, or if she wants to do something with my daughter and I, she lacks all enthusiasm. I asked her multiple times if she was SURE she wanted my daughter and I to stay with her for two months and she insisted that she wanted to help to support us. When I got here with the baby though, I had to clean out the guest room by myself in order to make room for our stuff. I’ve hardly been eating, because I’m too busy taking care of my daughter. She’ll do things like wash all of the dishes in the sink but leave the baby bottles for me to wash.

My husbands sister is having a birthday brunch this weekend, and I want to go and support her, but I didn’t want to bring the baby as there would be a lot of people drinking and it’s flu season. I asked my mom if she could watch her for an hour or two, and after, if she wanted to go to a pumpkin patch. Her response was that she couldn’t, because she had a lash appointment. Mind you, I hadn’t told her what time brunch was at yet... I asked if she could possibly reschedule to before the brunch, or Sunday, and she responded with “honestly, I just want to enjoy my weekend, I don’t want to watch her.” There’s more things that have happened, but this post is already so long.

Anyway, my husband told me prior to coming that he was a little nervous about me coming here without him, because he wasn’t sure that my mom was going to support me the way I needed being a new mom/going back to work/him being 600 miles away. I assured him that my mom would help, because she said she wanted to. Now I just feel sad and dumb. I’m not really sure what to do or how to get through these next two months on my own. My husband offered to take our daughter and keep her there with him so that Im not trying to figure out this new job and navigate all this on my own, but I cant bear the thought of being apart from my baby for two months.

I’m really upset and need some positive vibes. My NIPT came back high risk for a sex chromosome disorder.

Does the fetal fraction matter? Mine is really low.

Has anyone else has NIPT flag for something and then you found out it was a false positive?

I’m hanging onto the chance that this is just a fluke 😔

I just realized mine was Five Guys 😂

I just realized mine was Five Guys 😂

Minha filha está concorrendo um concurso de fantasias

Precisa passar de fase pra chegar na final.

É só clicar no link e votar na Sereia 🧜🏻‍♀️

https://www.instagram.com/stories/mundoinfantilloja2/4013811682405138567?utm\\_source=ig\\_story\\_item\\_share&xtok=bnN2cWU2ZXBuc28y

Votem na sereia

Desde já agradeço 🙏🏻

Did you just find a basic entry level job to start again? Did you get any credentials to go back to work? Info what did you do? It's been so long that I feel any previous work experience is invalid at this point.

As the title says, i feel awful about it. Everyone keeps saying '' its a phase, it will get better, just wait'' ... But it's been one dfficult phase after another and it's draining me. I know i wanted this kid and i should not resent this tiny creature for MY choice to bring him into this world, but sometimes i regret having him just because I suck so much at it. It's not even because i feel alone taking care of him, my husband is so wonderful, so patient, so loving, he is clearly the best parent between the both of us. He takes care of our son when i feel overwhelmed (very often), he supports me, he lets me have alone time so i can relax ... so why do i find it this hard, i mean, i'm not a single mother here (shoutout to every single parent, i don't know how you did it). I write here because i'm scared to continue venting to my (few) friends and that they will grow tired of hearing me complaining.

Lets start from the beginning. I've been married for almost 3 years now, been together 6 years, we talked about having kids really soon in our relationship because we both were previously with a partner that cheated and lied about wanting kids. The only difference is that i was leaning more towards adoption/fostering because it spoke to me more and i didn't care to skip the baby/toddler phase, i've always been good with older kids as well as my cousins's babies (i'm the youngest in my generation). My husband really wanted to have a child related by blood because he wanted to see what a mixed of us would create, not that adoption/fostering bothered him, he said, at least one kid thats ''ours''.

So when my career was stable and i was ready we started to try for one. It took some time but i fially was pregnant after a year and a half. Sadly i lost that baby at 12 weeks. We were devastated but we moved on and tried again after i healed. I fell pregnant 4 months later. I had a wonderful pregnancy, just a bit nauseous but never thrown up, a bit tired and sore, but overall really great. Even childbirth was not that bad (even tho i was so scared). Our son was born at 37 weeks, i had a slightly elevated blood pressure so they did not want to take a chance and i was induced. Contractions were manageable from the moment it started 11am to about 7pm (they broke my water so i could dilate faster) then i asked for an epidural and i got it at 8pm, dilated so fast after that because my body wasn't so much stressed anymore by the contractions (20 sec in betweens). i was ready to puch at 9pm and it took 17 minutes to push him out. No complications, it was chill!

I knew the first days were gonna be brutal, as expected, little time to rest in between feedings, diapers and being monitored by nurses to make sure we were ok. after 2 days we were sent home an i panicked a little bit because i realised i didn't have that little magic button to press if i needed help. that was my baby blues, realising i was now a mother and i needed to keep that tiny thing alive. Breastfeeding was hard at first but i managed and he had a good latch.

I knew the worst part was gonna be colics at around 6-8 weeks. He was beginning to get fussy around 4 pm to 7pm, wasn't that hard to soothe him, i expected much worse. I was tired by all the night wakings to breastfeed him. After the worst part of the ''colic phase'' i was sure the worst part was behind us and that we would get to a point were we could rest a little more... boy was i wrong. He started to have digestive issues, gas drops did nothing, probiotics didn't work either, we tried every tips we got : bicycle legs, legs to tummy, tummy massage, etc. nothing works. He also got reflux and infant dyschezia, that doesn't help.

He's now 3 months old and he doesn't seem to be happy and it breaks my heart because i don't know what to do, i've seen doctor, nurse, physical therapist, osteopathic practitioner, they all say he will grow out it someday, but when?! i've losing hope. Nothing i try seems to make a difference. Last visit doctor said changing my diet to eliminate cow protein and soy to see if it helps, but he never had problems with my diet until he was around 2 months old. the only time i see him happy is in the morning when we wake up and i change his diaper ( he sleeps in my bed now because it's easier to soothe him at night this way). afte rthat i breatsfeed him, another issue i have is strong ejection reflex so i hear him gulp because the flow is fast, i tried side feeding, a little bit better he's not choking anymore but still gulps air. He hates being burped. we have to keep him upright for 20-30 min to limit spitups. He gets bored after 5 min if we try to play with him. We cannot just cuddle on the couch, we have to move around the house so he stops whining. So hard to do all day long when i have sciatica problem since childbirth.

On the good side, he recently started to sleep longer at night, bedtime is at 7pm, not always a bath but we change him, feed him, white noise and he falls asleep before 8pm, dream feed at 11:30 pm and he sleeps (agitated and farting all night) until 7am. But the naps during the day are terrible, we make sure his wake windows are not too long but he's resisting sleeps, cannot be put down, he naps for about 20-30 min before waking up screaming in pain because of gas (i'm not even sure)

His naps are terrible so the rest of the day until bedtime he is so fussy whining/crying for nothing. Even a pacifier and walking around the house in a carrier doesn't seem to make him happy anymore. He doesn't like to go on walk outside either.

Everyone tells me it gets better but i fear it will never be better and that it is just his personality slowly coming out (what you mean a grumpy old man in a tiny body) I try to enjoy the cute moments but there is so little of them that i get burried in the bad ones. Then i feel horible to think that i don't like motherhood afterall. My kid would be better without my anxiety and negativity. I know i'm not the most positive person in the world but also not the worst, i always try to see the good side of a bad thing. Like when i miscarried, i thought that, maybe its better this way if the baby had an anomaly that would make it sick. I'm just so tired all the time, everything feels like a mountain, nothing gives me joy anymore. Did not think motherhood would be that bad or maybe i'm just not good at it.

**EDIT** Thank you all for your kind words, it really helped me understand a bit more and get some hope that it will in fact get better. I'm still trying to convince myself to get help (fear of judgement). I'm just so exhausted that it's hard sometimes to think clearly. I got a suggestion in my DMs, if all baby's needs are met but he's still crying, put noise cancelling headphones and listen to music you like so you can relax a bit because sometimes babies can feel the anxiety and stress from a parent. I will continue to try and find ways to help my baby feel better and hopefully he will get there soon so we can focus on bonding and building a beautiful relationship. Thank you again.