Peak stress

[hobbes]

Peak stress

Hobbes, surviving any newborn is a massive achievement but it does sound like you might have had what is euphemistically termed 'an easy baby'

Yes, guilty as charged. He was a very easy baby. I'd like to take some credit for that but I really can't. he just likes a kip.

[My Name Is Ian]

Peak stress

Thank you, all. You're good people, you really are.

I'll reply in more detail later, if that's okay.

[hobbes]

Peak stress

Oh presumably for reflux everybody uses Infacol?

I don't know if it works or not, but we hardly had to burp the boy and he hardly ever barfed up either. So with one datapoint it was great.

[laverte]

Peak stress

Dear Balderdasha,

Signs that you're justified in feeling stressed:

– you're able to make a long list out of what's stressing you out
– looking after toddler is not top of the list
– being 7 months pregnant is not top of the list
– your and your family's illnesses are near the bottom of the list
– several of the entries are a nasty combination of proximate deadline and reliance on some kind of Third Party/bureaucracy being as organised as you are
– this cluster of stresses even manages to dredge up the upsetting incident of your parents' separation; my parents separated 35 years ago and it still pops up as a Matter I Need To Think Through when I'm stressed and I've chewed my fingernails as far as I can chew them.

Signs that you're well-placed to get on top of the stress:

– you've made a list!!
– THERE ARE NO ENTRIES IN UPPER CASE
– the list doesn't contain the words 'whelp' or 'I surrender'
– the third parties/bureaucracies tend to leave everything until the last minute, but they do tend to come through in the end (if the Italian consulate is anything like the French one, they want you to earn your passport)
– seriously, you are seven-and-a-bit months pregnant!!!! The Good Lord didn't get around to creating people with uteruses during his six days of productivity, he put it off and put it off, and frankly, miraculous etc as it may seem, human pregnancy sounds like a bit of a botch job. My hat is raised to anyone who endures it.

I have every confidence that you'll get through this rush of deadlines, that mini-dasha #2 will be another gem, and that when the stress subsides completely some time in 2017 you'll sit down with that book you've been wanting to read for ages and fall asleep after three paragraphs.

Best wishes from someone who gets stressed when I have two loads of washing to do on the same day!

[caja-dglh]

Peak stress

For serious reflux (which Mister has) we went through colic relief, gripe water, medication and a final determination that he simply just seems to enjoy barfing stuff up. Still does, but solids have helped.

[Balderdasha]

Peak stress

Maybe I mean colic, not reflux. Our daughter was basically never sick, apart from the one day she had gastro-enteritis, threw up on me 11 times during the day and had to go to A&E to be rehydrated. Generally she just drank loads and loads of breastmilk and then seemed to have a lot of intestinal discomfort, screamed whenever she was laid flat.

I once woke up in the middle of the night and staggered through to the lounge to see how my husband was doing on his shift of holding our daughter under her armpits, bouncing her gently and singing songs to her (the only thing that stopped the screams sometimes). He was so brain-dead that he couldn't remember or make up any songs any more and was just reciting random numbers in an off-tune singsong voice "one, three, five, two, nine, six", etc. I took our daughter off him gently and sent him to bed. We can laugh at these memories now but it wasn't very funny at the time.

[WOM]

Peak stress

I remember one particularly 'dark' night when I was just staggering from room to room by the light of a dollar store nightlight in the hallway, holding my daughter near-horizontal in my arms. I bumped her head on a doorframe and remember thinking I was easily the worst parent ever. I don't even think she noticed.

[Crusoe]

Peak stress

When you know by heart the symptoms to check for when they bang their head (fall off the bed/sofa, etc) rather than calling NHS Direct, that's when you've arrived.

[Incandenza]

Peak stress

I honestly can't really remember much of the first few months after our twins were born. Just that my wife and I were sleeping sitting up on the couch and a chair in our living room because they wouldn't sleep unless being held, and it was too painful for her to lay down anyway because of the C-section surgery. There were a lot of thoughts of having no idea how I would ever get through those months. My wife is strong, I knew she could, I just didn't think that I could cope, and I felt hopeless. But it slowly got better.

[Dink]

Peak stress

I'm posting this while sitting in a darkened room next to my 8 month old daughter as she snuffles away in her cot. We're into week 3 of massive night time vomiting and we've come to the conclusion that the only way to deal with it is to be on hand so that when she begins to cough (which triggers the vomiting) we can pick her up and hold her face down so that she gets as much of the vomit out as possible.

Going from a baby who slept through the night to one who is wakened up every couple of hours by a coughing fit has been tough, although I realise that we've actually got it pretty easy compared to many.

We've been reassured by the consultant at the sick kids that it's nothing to worry about but it's still pretty stressful, and in some ways the worry is worse than when she had to wear a harness for her hip, or with the dreadful constipation she suffered with (and is still taking laxatives for) At least with the constipation the time when she finally did a shit after two weeks without a movement provided us with an amusing, if somewhat gross anecdote, for those rare occasions when we manage to see our mates.

Despite all of the above we are remarkably lucky, she is an extraordinarily happy and smiley baby. We may have been stressed by the various hospital appointments but she has taken it all in her stride. Indeed my wife gets somewhat exasperated by the way in which Eilidh inevitably turns on the smiles and charms whenever she meets a new doctor, leaving my wife and me insisting that she has been poorly and we're not just making it up.

[Snake Plissken]

Peak stress

Different kind of stress, but Mrs P is doing the Festive Gift Fair at the NEC next week, and seeing as all her stuff is handmade, the last few weeks have been non-stop. I'm doing the day job, then coming home and packaging up magnets (1,331 of them) cards (500+) and going through 7' singles (553, since you ask - we turn them into clocks).

She did about 100 hours last week, similar this, then I take six days off to do the show - which is a rollercoaster because sometimes you just want to reach over the counter and strangle people with their comments.

Though thinking about it, my longest time off - actual, doing nothing time off - since last May has totalled one week. That... is not good.

[Crusoe]

Peak stress

Good luck to you and your wife too, Dink. That sounds pretty awful to experience.

Our first was a screaming demon who didn't nap and didn't sleep more than 2 or 3 hours in a row until she was about 2 and a half, and then suddenly turned into a (mostly) gentle, charming comedian who sleeps from 7.30 to 6.30 most nights. Our 1 and a bit year old was a quiet baby who's rapidly turning into a noisy despot. Never mind "they fuck you up, your mum and dad", kids have always won, it's "they confound your expectations, your kids".

[Dink]

Peak stress

Cheers Crusoe, but it actually isn't anywhere near as bad as it could be. Approximately two minutes after she's finished vomiting she'll either just turn her head to the side and go back to sleep or be giving us massive smiles, delighted to see us. Mind you when she decides at 3 in the morning that she's done with sleeping and just wants to play now, then her smiles seem a little less delightful.

The impact of lack of sleep does just creep up on you, however. I can think I'm doing OK until I'm sitting in a meeting and realise how much I'm struggling to follow a very simple concept. And I don't think it's entirely coincidental that my wife and I have both scraped the car in the last few weeks. Mine was scraping along a wall whilst going into a (pretty huge) car parking space at work, that I've done hundreds of time before.

[Crusoe]

Peak stress

Yeah, once we'd got through the first few weeks with both kids we could handle almost anything except lack of sleep. Every now and then my wife has to remind me not to nod off and fall off the station platform waiting for the morning train.

[My Name Is Ian]

Peak stress

Okay, so it's, what, 11.30 at night and I've finally possibly got half an hour to myself. Perhaps. We'll see. Thanks all for your replies. They mean a lot to me. I've been posting on here more regularly recently, and I've started ascribing that to loneliness. I went to a friend's house last Sunday, and it was the first time that I'd spoken to anybody socially out of work in a month.

And I think that - apart from the exhaustion, not eating or looking after myself properly, etc, etc, etc - is what has come to feel as though hurts the most at the moment. We moved to Worthing in the summer because it was cheaper than Brighton and closer to my work, but I don't know anybody here apart from people that I work with. My friends all live in Brighton & Hove, and I can't get over there, while asking them to trek all the way out here anything like regularly to sit in a quiet, darkened room feels unfair. But I do feel isolated, here. I love my wife very much, but I haven't barely seen her for what feels like about a month.

I feel as though my life has become a treadmill, a bit. I get up at seven, work from eight until half six, mind the baby until half one, got to bed. Lather, rinse, repeat. The extra work hours aren't incredibly tough and I don't have any choice but to do them, but the feeling that all of this is happening just to keep the wolves from the door is dispiriting.

The lack of sleep is pretty awful. In that way that you do when you're just exhausted, I feel drunk most of the time and I can barely concentrate on anything. But I have to keep fighting through it. Two people are absolutely dependent on me. What I feel about anything doesn't count for a great deal at the moment. Anyway, to roll back to a couple of things that were mentioned earlier:

WOM: Thanks so much for the offer, I really do appreciate it.

Flynnie: Many congratulations on the visa. I know how stressful that is.

Hobbes: We're bottle feeding. That side of things seems to have calmed down a bit. It feels like he's settling into a routine, of sorts. We've got a thing called a perfect prep machine, which goes from zero milk to some milk in abut two minutes. I was reading about the prepping that needs to be done for bottle feeding and am incredibly relieved that I invested £90 in it a couple of months ago. I give it a big kiss every morning, before I go out to work.

Everybody else (esp Balders, to whom I apologise to most profusely for taking this thread directly to Cuba), thanks for reading and indulging me. I needed to let off steam. I actually think we're doing really well. He's healthy, apart from pretty terrible colic (he's on that Infacol stuff) and I'll cope with this. I mean, I have to. It's been really quite therapeutic to vent on here.

[ad hoc]

Peak stress

I'm massively stressed at the moment (and coincidentally or not, quite severely depressed). However, looking at this thread I really have no reason to be that way, so it feels churlish to even say it. But I find myself grinding my teeth all day long without knowing it.

[My Name Is Ian]

Peak stress

Andy, there's no rights and wrongs over this sort of thing, there's no league table, and no-one is more or less justified in feeling how they feel at times of stress. Nowt churlish about it at all.

[caja-dglh]

Peak stress

The sleep is a weird one. I recently got a fitbit and through that have begun to learn that (probably due to the kids) I typically do fine on five hours sleep. I do, however, feel like a legend after 7-8 hours.

The treadmill feeling with a newborn is a very accurate description. You will get out of that pretty soon - simply on the basis that their stomach's get larger, they eat more and can sleep for a few more hours at a time. I find the interruption more disruptive, though that is because my wife is not as skilled at falling asleep in less than 5 minutes as I, so it makes the house a lot more tense.

ad hoc - as Ian says, there is nothing that requires what makes you stressed to seem as big a deal as anyone else who is stressed. Hell, look at delicatemoth. With what she is living through virtually none of us really have anything to complain about. That doesn't stop you feeling sick to your stomach and wondering how you will get through the next week / month / six months or whatever.

[Crusoe]

Peak stress

After being woken at 12, 1, 2 and 5 last night I'm thinking the buggers read this thread.

[Sam]

Peak stress

hobbes wrote:

She already mimics the 'oof' straining noises / grunts I make when trying to stand up off the sofa, and doesn't need more material to copy!

Hah. The cub does that too. Very deliberately says "oof!"
Not that I'm pregnant of course. Just old and knackered.

Crusoe wrote: Our three year old has started saying "bloody thing!" at anything a bit tricky. My wife swears she has no idea where she picked that up.

The first full sentence ever uttered by one of my dad's cousins was at a family gathering with various grandparents and a couple of friends of the family invited, and was (according to my grandad), 'dammit, broke the bugger!' when one of the wheels fell off the toy car he was playing with in the corner.

Hope things get sorted out, Balders - not much I can say apart from hold it together and good luck!

[Sam]

Peak stress

And having now read through - Ian, I don't live near you but am pretty nocturnal and in a timezone three hours behind you; if you're ever online and feeling lonely and see me signed into Facebook, feel free to say hello for a chat about any old shit, if it would help.

Not right now as I actually am about to go to bed, but any other time, like.

[Balderdasha]

Peak stress

So, apparently that wasn't peak stress. Got woken up in the middle of the night to the sound of the rat traps under the sink triggering. No sign of them this morning, but things have been ominously gnawed. They haven't been back since last time I was 7 months pregnant and we went for the full nuclear option (traced the entry point to under the sink, caught and killed two, cleared everything, filled everything with wire wool and expanding foam, laid enough traps to kill a small rat army).

We will be going nuclear immediately this time, I may be vegetarian but London rats get zero sympathy from me especially when they seem to smell out pregnancy and think that means it's a good time to invade.

Ian, ask your friends to come up from Brighton. I'm sure they miss you too and would love to see you under any circumstances. My friends have definitely done the bulk of travelling to see me over the last couple of years, and rarely got anything more than mumbled sentences, me in a dressing gown and the risk of standing on plastic toys for their efforts. They make tea for me in my flat and take my bins out. That is what good friends are for. People get that dealing with a newborn is hard and they like helping.

[delicatemoth]

Peak stress

ad hoc wrote: I'm massively stressed at the moment (and coincidentally or not, quite severely depressed). However, looking at this thread I really have no reason to be that way, so it feels churlish to even say it. But I find myself grinding my teeth all day long without knowing it.

It's the depression dog telling you you're being churlish. Do not succumb to the dog's insidious lies. As a kind person said of me on another thread, I want to give you a hug now.

And Balderdasha, you have all my sympathy. Any moving stuff is hellishly stressful even without complications. Rats?! Oh god. I will keep my fingers crossed for you.

[Balderdasha]

Peak stress

Also, Andy, yes there are lots of things going on which are making me stressed, but I am not currently depressed really. Being depressed is far worse. I was at my most depressed when our daughter was about a year old and it was horrific. There was nothing particularly bad happening externally at the time, so it felt ridiculous to be in that mental state, but that is the way of mental states, sometimes they catch up with you months or years after the stressful events happen, or sometimes they're not triggered by events at all.

If you're feeling depressed, that is the important factor, and what other people are or are not going through is irrelevant. Knowing that children are starving in Africa never makes anyone feel any better, it just adds guilt to the equation and makes you feel worse. Is there any help available where you are? Depression shouldn't be left to fester if possible.

[blameless]

Peak stress

Ian, ask your friends to come up from Brighton. I'm sure they miss you too and would love to see you under any circumstances. My friends have definitely done the bulk of travelling to see me over the last couple of years, and rarely got anything more than mumbled sentences, me in a dressing gown and the risk of standing on plastic toys for their efforts. They make tea for me in my flat and take my bins out. That is what good friends are for. People get that dealing with a newborn is hard and they like helping.

This. A thousand times this. If your friends don't have kids of their own, they should realise it's far easier for them to travel than for folks looking after an infant. And if your friends do have kids, they'll know what you're going through and sympathise.

Even if all you've got time / energy for when they arrive is a quick bit of lunch in a pub or cafe, it'll still have been worth it for everyone concerned.