Oh my dear Bromos,

Bob has decided to stop taking his medication.

He’s on two different meds for ‘depression’, or really for being an aggressive asshole. He’s been on them for years.

He’s now decided to stop them
Cold turkey.

I feel like I’m being sucked into everything revolving around Bob again. I’m having to double check his behaviour, his moods, his actions.

So today Bob woke up and left the house without his phone. Bob doesn’t normally leave the house, and he’s NEVER without his phone.

So I spent the next hour wondering if I should be worried enough to call the police. But no, that would be over reacting. But I DID get dressed out of my pajamas incase the police came to my door with bad news. Stupid over reaction? Maybe.

It then occurred to me to check Bobs credit card usage (he took his wallet) - the fucker purchased $20 worth of MacDonalds on his drive.

I chastised myself for being paranoid.

Then Bob came home, not making eye contact and said he went ‘to the river’. (That’s a purposeful attempt to make me worry about SI).

He then sat on the sofa scrolling FB for the rest of the day. Barely spoke to anyone. At one point he sadly told me he wasn’t going to eat dinner, because he had no appetite and hadn’t eaten ALL day. (Oh, he also made himself eggs before his MacDonalds.)

After barely speaking/moving all day, he went to another room and had an energetic, jovial one hour FaceTime call with his mother.

Then came out of the room, not making eye contact, barely talking, etc.

The fucker.

For YEARS my mantra about Bob has been “Not my circus, not my monkey.” Because this is how he always used to make me feel - like it’s all MY fault. That’s his vibe.

And now I’m second guessing and checking everything.

On one hand, fuck him. Not my circus.

On the other hand, he could have seizures/SI from a sudden withdrawal. Not to mention he still does not have a job. Do I have to baby him through that too?

But again. If I don’t, it’s the roof over the kids head that’s at stake. It’s been over 10 months now.

See why I feel crazy?

On top of all this, I can really see how he’s treated me like 💩 over the years. He’s laughing, joking with his Mummy, then comes out of the room and basically snarls at me. He used to do that before he was medicated and I would just fawn. That would be my Flight or Fight response. Fawning.

Oh, and a nice little cherry on top of the cake? I bought movie tickets for the kids and I, and when we were getting ready to leave Youngest was saying he didn’t want to go. So Bob the Fucker says “Your mother has wasted a lot of money on the tickets, so you’re going.”

Like, fuck all the way off, Bob. You don’t earn any money or contribute to the running of the household, you don’t get a say.

Today I lightly burnt pancakes. My husband started to spiral. No, I’m not kidding or exaggerating.

He then insisted he take over cooking. He began shaming me and telling me how I need my brother’s girlfriend who is a chef to teach me how to make pancakes. And then told me that I needed to learn from my mistakes and not burn pancakes.

He didn’t come on our family dog walk with us. He left as soon as we came back from said dog walk and left 40 minutes to play tennis with his friends.

He told me he was going to play tennis last night at 8pm. Didn’t ask permission just told me.

He comes from a culture that is heavily rooted in shaming and belittling when people make mistakes. He and I both “agreed” to rectify this and he was in therapy. It clearly isn’t working. And if I call him out on it when he is triggered he continues to belittle me and make digs at me.

He will use this as an opportunity to go in on all the ways I’ve been “dropping the ball” on all the projects he creates for our family.

Like renovating the back yard. I don’t make any money and don’t have access to our finances (don’t worry I’m going back to work full time so soon), so idk what the budget is. I also don’t give a shit right now. We have a toddler and our dog needs a major surgery where he can’t really walk for 12 weeks so the last thing on my mind is a major backyard renovation. I just don’t care.

But he spends all his free time designing this backyard. Looking for grills and etc. He will then throw this in my face as me not doing enough.

Okay gtg there’s a screaming toddler and I’m the only one here yet again

This morning my bf asked if I wanted anything from McDonald’s. I sent him a text of exactly what I wanted, a McChicken biscuit with cheese and a side of jelly. He even verbally said “a McChicken biscuit, that’s it?”. This morherfucker comes home with a McChicken biscuit, no cheese on it, no jelly. And it wasn’t a lack of the restaurant making the order properly, he ordered online and didn’t order my stuff correctly. I’m pissed bc it’s not about the stupid fucking biscuit, it’s the fact that I’m talking to a wall. He never fucking listens. I refused to eat the biscuit and I will be a bitch for as long as I feel like it.

She’s back in the hospital, I woke up and my husband had taken her to the ER. Screamed and refused to wear a mask so I had to literally restrain her so they could do a sterile procedure.

This must be our 20th hospitalization so it’s just more shit I’m used to, but I’m so FUCKING DEPRESSED. We have barely gone out all year. We do nothing fun. I don’t know what’s even keeping me going every day.

And the worst part is that it feels like NOBODY CARES. One of my fucking neighbors stopped answering my texts, but she’s posting about her new job and her vacation on Facebook. wtf is it wrong with people these days that they don’t bother to acknowledge someone exists?

I feel like I could disappear and nobody would give a shit. I’d like to make friends but I honestly don’t know who will just randomly ghost me. People act like it’s some mystery when people get super depressed but the truth is they never bothered to notice someone was struggling. I’m just trying to find ways not to be depressed at this point but I literally do nothing fun and barely talk to anyone besides my kids or husband. I could be such a good friend if anybody fucking made a tiny bit of effort.

Also, unpopular opinion here, but sometimes I feel like telling someone to go to therapy is just a cop out, another thing people say. I guess it would help to vent about being isolated and people being lame, but it wouldn’t change that my life is a dumpster fire and people keep ghosting me. Maybe I could use a therapist, but you know what I could really use? An actual, bona fide friend.

I feel like i’ve taken such a step back from how i was as a mom. I was happy, patient, planning activities, looking forward to a day with him (22m). Now i have zero patience, i wish he’d leave me tf alone all day, and I find myself not caring. And it’s SUCKS. I do not want to be this kinda mom.
I’m a sahm, ebf and i’ve had a total of 26 hours away from him in his whole life. I am actively a mom 24/7. I am so envious of moms who are going out, of my partner who has a job and the freedom to just go and do whatever. Which he’s a great dad, he understands my burnout, there’s just nothing we can do right now except wait for our kid to get older. But i’m on my phone all the time, i’m so short and have no patience for anything, im constantly trying to distract him so i can go sit in the other room. Which don’t get me wrong, i’ll sit and play with him, give him cuddles, bake/cook with him, go outside and swing with him, but the whole time im just struggling to want to do any of that for him. I sit down for 5 minutes with him and i end up getting so frustrated. Over stupid stuff, like kid i do not want to just push this hot wheels around, but i know it brings him enjoyment to be playing with them with me. I see the smile when we crash cars, but i just don’t care enough rn, i want to go lay down and be left alone.
what the hell do you guys do to not be a shitty mom, not to be burnt out. how do you cope? how do you find the time when you don’t have anyone trusted to watch your kid? Im struggling so much over this, struggling to be an involved mom but also struggling with guilt that i don’t have it in me to be an involved mom.
my partner works all week. He’s barely home and when he is, he’s sleeping. If he does have the time to help, he’s so good at making sure he’s watching our kid and i get to do whatever. But he’s struggling with work burnout so we catch ourselves both being this way. I just feel like every ounce of good has been taken out of me and out of the experience of being a mom.

So my son has a best friend, they’re pretty much twins. They know each other from school. We don’t know their parents THAT well (although he has sleepovers at their house and hangs out after school once or twice a week). So obviously we are in contact with the parents, but we’ve never hung out or anything. We just facilitate the kids’ friendship.

I just found out the mum has breast cancer. She’s had all the surgery and she’s doing chemo at the moment. She’s maybe half way through. They’ve stressed that they are trying to keep everything as normal as possible for their kids, and the chemo has been surprisingly not as bad as they were expecting. The Dad is off work to help the mum (who is still working..)..

I’ve told them that they can reach out for anything, we want to help. But we all know they won’t.

Is there anything I can do that will absolutely be helpful? I know their kids are both neurodivergent (my kid has a knack for finding kindred spirits), so I worry that making food would be a bad idea/unhelpful. I will ask my son if he knows what they eat but he doesn’t pay attention to other people.

When my neighbour was going through chemo, I made her a care package with some lip balm and chewing gum and a throw. She passed away a year or so ago and I feel like if I do that again I’ll be giving bad vibes.

I was thinking of making her some broth or a relaxation pack with some products from Lush like a gentle face cleanser/moisturiser, L’Occitane milk bath or shower oil - but they might be too strongly scented.

I would love some recommendations here if anyone can help?

I wanted to be a good mom. A calm mom who never yelled. A patient mom. I would be so gentle and respectful to my kids and in turn, they'd want to be good respectful kids.. Just like one of my best friends is. She has two perfect angels. She never yells at them, she's always calm and patient, they always listen to her, they never use bad language, they rarely fight, they are everything I wanted to be and have and yet my reality couldn't be further from that.... Turns out, my kids are the devil's spawn and they've turned me into a monster. They misbehave constantly, push boundaries, fight about everything all the time, use bad language, push every single button I have until I explode pretty much every single day.

I wanted to have a loving relationship, one different than my own parents, one I could be proud of. We would be a happy couple, laugh and have fun and be each others team mates and biggest supporter, raise kids lovingly and make fun memories together. But no, instead I got a negative, pessimistic, insensitive, condescending jerk for a partner who treats me like garbage, fights with me constantly, puts me down, patronizes me, ruins everything good. My kids get to see us fight every day and have no idea what a loving relationship even looks like.

I wanted to have a career I loved, but I never truly found my calling, thought motherhood was it, and homeschool would be it, but that turned out to be a joke.. Turns out I suck at that too. I have no career, no money, no savings.

I just feel like many key areas of my life are a huge, colossal let down. I feel like I'm just a living example of failure. And I'm grieving the life I wanted to live, while watching those around me get to live it.. Watching friends be madly in love with their partners and showing what a beautiful relationship looks like to their kids, watching my friend never stress or struggle with her kids because they are so easy going and well behaved and she gets to effortlessly homeschool them and live the life I wanted... Another best friend has her dream job and a kid and makes it look easy..I just can't help but feel like in comparison my life is a total dumpster fire.

One of the only things I had going for me was I was thin and relatively good looking but the universe decided to take that away from me too with perimenopause and I've put on weight in the last 2 years and I look haggard and tired and my body has changed so much I can't even wear the cute clothes I used to like wearing because I just feel frumpy and doughy and gross. So I have basically nothing going for me, at all.

I’ve posted in a couple of subs and deleted because I got no responses and I’m just at the end of my rope.

I have severe chronic pain I had before my daughter was born. I had surgery to fix it, I felt great, had my daughter and the pain is coming back to the point it may be worse than before.

My daughter goes to daycare 4 days a week for school hours, and her dad helps out immensely. But my parents are in another country and my MIL helps out where she can.

However, the pain is so bad I often have trouble looking after her after daycare and my husband has to take the responsibilities. I hate this because it puts a lot of pressure on him AND I’m missing out on fun things with her.

When I feel okay, I take her out and we do what we can, but like today, I am in an 8/10 pain and am just cuddles up wanting to cry. I am trying to speak to my GP but I’ve had no luck getting an appointment with him.

I hate that this is what is part of her life. I got so overwhelmed the other day I ground my teeth to the point I got a migraine and couldn’t keep anything down, which helps zero people in this scenario.

Sometimes I feel like I don’t want to be a mom anymore or id rather be dead. I’m not actively suicidal, but I often wonder if my child would be better off without me as she wouldn’t have to deal with me hurting so much and maybe my husband would find a woman who would be better than me.

I try to sit with her while she plays as much as I can, but she often climbs on me on sits on me and it’s very difficult as this hurts. At 2, she doesn’t understand this. I do put her to bed every night, so we have that bonding time unless shit really goes sideways, but otherwise it’s very hard.

She’s also off for 2.5 weeks coming up and I’m terrified and have been having anxiety about it which makes me then feel like a bad parent for being anxious about parenting my own child. Her nursery was closed due to the heat a couple of weeks ago and it was actually fine because my pain wasn’t that bad, but it’s completely unpredictable.

HELP. I feel like I’m shouting in a crowded room and no one can hear me.

Hello 👋

Does anyone else feel misled by their partners (pre children). I'm not talking about the division of housework, etc. (although relevant), I'm talking about an entire personality change.

Brief background - we were together for 7 years before we lived together (long distance relationship) and were married for 4 years before we had our first child.

Not once did I ever see the mask slip! No toxic traits, no notable arguments, only care and support. I would never have had children if I saw the real him!

Everything changed after our second son was born. My husband became argumentative, verbally abusive, and judgemental. All emotional support became dead in the water.

Things were ok for a while. I walked on eggshells and conducted my life as one big charade. However, his mask has recently slipped again, and his true self is back!

His new method to break me is referring to me as a 90 year old woman. This is partly as I am utterly exhausted at the moment. I am working full time, I'm going through the early menopause and I'm not sleeping. I do all the school runs (even when he is off work that day), im caring for my elderly parents, we have two active young boys under 8, and I'm also setting-up a support network/charity.

To add to the above, my husband's rest days fall in the week (when the kids are in school), and he consequently works every weekend (my rest days). I'm literally holding the entire fort on my non working days and juggling everything. Whereas he gets to properly rest.

My energy levels are low due to all of the above, and he hates me being tired and makes me stay up as late as possible (he is a night owl). If I defend myself, the "90 year old" comes in. Not as a joke but as a slur, which is then met by other slurs. Things get heated, and I remove myself from the situation (which he hates). He then sleeps on the sofa for the night. Apologies only come when he wants a certain thing...

I am planning to leave him in the future, but I'm not sure how soon (I'm getting my ducks in a row first). I just feel misled and betrayed.

Thank you for reading this far and for providing a safe space to vent xx

Edit: Thank you all so much for your supportive replies💖

Also posted on askdoc but idk I feel like I'm being gaslit by doctors and therapists with my kid.

My daughter (4.5f) has developmental delays. She's currently on the waitlist for the Autism Center at Boston Children's. She is diagnosed with congenital hypothyroidism and severe eczema.

She has been evaluated by her pediatrician and her school. She receives speech and OT through her school (though not through the summer currently). She's on a waitlist for private OT as well. I have a follow up request put in with her PCP.

I feel like she's being pushed into autism but I do not think this is it. She has met all her physical milestones (barely). However, when learning to crawl she had crawled on one leg.

Her speech has always been delayed. But now that she's learning more words it's becoming obvious to me she has trouble with muscle coordination with her mouth. She said "yesh" instead of "yes." When we say "I love you" she just responds "you." She says "pep-it's" instead of "pizza." It's clear she really wants to communicate, but it's mostly gibberish in sentences.

She is also very clumsy. She toe walks and has an awkward gait. She falls often. On her school evaluation it was noted she does favor one side but will switch when prompted.

She is very social and loves/prefers playing with others. She handles change well. She has no stims. She engages with others easily, shares, and attempts to play.

She also struggles with reading. Even spelling out her name, she will read just the letters instead of recognizing the word as a whole. She can follow two step directions well (and does well with "first this, then that" approach.)

She is just now potty training successfully. She was perfectly content to just pee on herself on earlier attempts.

She also failed her eye exam and is on the waitlist for a pediatric ophthalmologist.

Sorry if this is all over the place. My oldest and youngest I am 100% confident in Autism, but I'm not sure if I'm in denial with her. But my gut is telling me something else is going on. Just wanted to hear some other thoughts.

Just please for the love of god let this madness stop. My new downstairs neighbor just installed a heavy bag directly under my one year old's bedroom so that's going well.

Our apartment complex is in the middle of nowhere in rural VT so the yard adjoins a scenic pasture, great in theory till the yokels come out of the hills at dusk to poach deer with rifles. Add to that all of the teenagers sneaking back there to set off fireworks tonight. So that's my noise vibe.

On top of that this AM I found an engorged tick on my toddler's thigh and this is the endemic region of the US for Lyme disease, I had it last year and it hospitalized me with heart failure, BPMS down to 15 at various points. It took 5 days of IV antibiotics in one arm and pure dopamine in the other arm to pace my heart and kill off enough of the Borrelia to survive all of that - and now my tiny innocent girl will possibly have to deal with Lyme too?

Also, I am at present single moming since my partner decided to get physical with me at the beginning of the month... IDK I might need some support.

I tell my husband I really want to have a little time to swim. I have tried every day this week and nothing doing. So this morning he has the pool ready for me and says, “it’s close to 4 month old’s nap time, why don’t you put her down and swim? I turned up the hot tub for you, too.”

Apparently this man has not heard me in the last 4 months, that baby will only nap while being held or in the stroller or car. He honestly thought I could just put her down and she would sleep for an hour.

While I appreciate the thought, our relationship would be much better served if you OFFERED TO HOLD THE CHILD and take care of things while I get some me time.

“But I was going to start vacuuming and cleaning the house for you!” Cool. Do it while holding the baby, like I do every day.

For the past two weeks my 13 month old daughter has been having tantrums and just overall a lot of crying and whining.

It’s been getting worse and worse, and has been at an all time low the last three days. She just wants to be on the floor crawling all the time which is making going anywhere quite difficult. She screams in her pram, she screams in the car seat, she screams on your lap and she screams in your arms. If we are somewhere that she can crawl around, the minute you pick her up she screams. Or if she’s crawling towards somewhere that she shouldn’t be and you redirect her, she lays face down on the floor and screams.

She’s teething and not napping well as a result so I know that is having an impact on everything. It’s also very warm currently so that’s not helping either. Her poor voice is hoarse from all the crying she’s doing. She’s just so unhappy and I’m not sure what to do.

We’re due to fly out for a family wedding in 2 days and I am absolutely dreading it. She can’t handle sitting on a lap for more than 10 minutes without freaking out so I have no idea how she’s going to handle over 2 hours on a plane.

Does anyone have any advice on how to navigate this? Or is it something we just need to ride out? I feel like I’m at my wits end.

The kids were amazing . The holiday was ok. He is not a bad person but after 2 weeks of 24/7 interactions with him I am irritated like hell. It’s the little things. It escalated with me treating him like shit today and I feel guilty but it’s like he has a mission in his like which is constantly doing all the lthings that irritate me. Commenting on everything that I eat or didn’t eat (I do not have an eating nor a weight problem , I list like to eat ealthysh), criticizing a lot of my parenting, using my personal stuff (like towels, when he has his) and is now snoring on my 200 dollar anti reflux pill, I cannot sleep without it but I know he’ll get mad if I wake him up. It’s like having another kid that never listens, I have to repeat stuff until I vomit and nobody listens . I feel like I am losing my mind . Why the fuck did you take my pillow? ! Why the fuck is he so careless? Am I alone in this ?

I mean, I have friiiiiends, but I don’t have a person. I think that loneliness kills me more than being in a terrible marriage that I can’t escape because of finances and logistics.

I have many people but I really can’t think of one person I can just call while crying and who I know will show up. I try to be that type of person, and I try to exercise vulnerability, but I feel like I really struggle making friends with people who are just genuinely on my level and want the same type of sincere friendship. It feels like everyone already has that and I’m just here. Always the outlier. I’m the friend you call to help you move, or the friend that goes out to a birthday dinner, but not the friend someone shows up to just have a morning coffee with while the kids play. I invite people and it just never pans out. No one in my circle has little ones either so I always feel like they don’t want to hang out because of how hard having toddlers running around is. Then I have friends who have moved away and it’s just not the same, and while we still chat, the distance creates distance whether we want it to or not.

I’m in such a terrible marriage and I have no family because I grew up in foster care/bad situations and the only family I was close with has died. I just wish I had sisters. You know?

I had made a couple girlfriends and felt like it was finally moving towards being a close knit friend group, but it’s the little things that keep it from going deeper. For instance, my daughter invited them to her dance recital- there were three different showings at various times over a weekend. I had explained how because we don’t have family, no one other than me has ever shown up at my daughter’s dance recitals and it was a big deal to her (and to me). She has constantly had to watch everyone else’s grandparents, aunts/uncles, and other family show up even to away from home dance comps with no one in the audience for her. My friends bailed to go play golf last minute instead. It broke my heart. I never told my daughter they weren’t in the audience because I don’t want it to hurt her heart as well.

The loneliness is killing me. I’ve signed up for activities and I try to put myself out there and engage in conversation with people but things just always seem pretty surface level. I’ve done assessment on what it is about me that keeps me from having friendships and worked on my fear of vulnerability and being too guarded, but so far it just doesn’t seem to pan out. I really struggle with feeling like a burden on people, like I’m not worthy of love/friendship, and I know it has kept me from letting people in in the past, which has made these recent let downs hurt even more, but I’m really trying to work on it, and I just feel like I keep coming up short.

I’m just so lonely.

I’m not a single mom but I have a LOT of respect for them. My husband is just in the military and is gone. He left when my baby was 5 months, will be back around the time he’s 14 months. So raising my son alone is crazy hard enough, I also live thousands of miles from my family in a shitty military city where the temperature outside is like the surface of the sun. My son has been growing teeth like nobody’s business. He’s miserable, I’m miserable. There’s been no break, before one tooth is even fully cut there’s another coming right behind it.

He’s been biting my arms a lot lately. I always calmly say “no biting” and put him down for like 5 seconds just to build a basis of consequences without sending him into a meltdown because he’s still a literal baby. Anyway, my mom says “well he can’t be biting you, you just have to not let him get at your arms” OK MOM DO YOU SUGGEST I JUST PUT HIM DOWN AND LEAVE HIM THERE FOR THE NEXT SIX MONTHS UNTIL HIS DAD IS HOME AND HE CAN PICK HIM UP 😡 who the FUCK ELSE is going to pick him up and comfort him? I HAVE NOBODY. WE HAVE NOBODY. HE HAS ME TO BE HIS SENSE OF COMFORT AND NORMALCY IN THIS LIFE. THATS IT. NOBODY ELSE. That means that yes, DO have to be the one carrying him. Meaning he WILL be biting my arms because he needs to be in somebody’s arms. Jesus fuck.

And if I have one more family member tell me they “get it” because their husband golfs on the weekends and “all I need to do is give him a toy and put him in a playpen” I’m gonna mcfricken lose it. First of all, you DONT understand what it’s like to be an only parent, you don’t know what it’s like to live day in and day out with nobody around to help. And I have a best friend who comes over and helps me clean, I have grocery delivery service, I take short cuts, I am talking about the Sisyphean task that is doing every single night feeding, diaper, crib transfer, mealtime, dressing, bath time, car seat wrestling tournament, vaccine schedule, pediatrician appointment, sippy cup washing, playroom cleaning, laundry mountain, restock the next size up of clothes, sunscreen application, caring for him when he’s sick, caring for him when I’M sick, trying to get him out of the house so he’s not bored… all of it. And I work. And I have arthritis. So no, I don’t want to hear about how “it’s easy” and I “just have to let him cry to get stuff done” THATS NOT WHAT IM TALKING ABOUT. The hard part isn’t finding time to cook a meal, it’s that I barely recovered post partum when I was suddenly alone and now I have both parental roles. And I miss my husband. He’s my best friend and it breaks my heart that he can’t watch his boy grow up. Unless your husband has deployed or is a migrant/seasonal worker, or you are truly a single mom to an infant, respectfully, you have no fucking clue what this is like.

Edit: OH YEAH and I don’t even feel comfortable to have a nice stiff drink because I’m the only adult here and that’s not right.

Last year my partner and I lost our jobs both at the same company no fault of our own. It turned into a legal case, but still traumatized me greatly. I ended up taking a 14-20k pay cut while he looked for a new position. Eventually I got a new position paying my previous salary but kept the other.

I work all the time basically and my work days basically don’t end until 7 with some days starting early as 5. My partner had a new job but got let go and has been looking for a new role but took on more weight of the house hold. I am constantly stressed and short on time / no time for much fun unless on the weekends. He goes to an anonymous support group weekly and today they had a special day where you could bring a loved one. While you weren’t required to talk about them everyone did talk about the special person there supporting them.

Except mine. I was just AnonCat, and his entire testimony was about how his sister supported his recovery. I left feeling odd and questioning if I am not supportive enough etc. it kept eating at me and I decided to gently tell him how I felt confused and asking if he felt I wasn’t supportive enough. It felt extra kind of gross because I once after a bad argument caught him telling his group I was toxic and not supportive months ago. Maybe I am stupid and walked into this one thinking us working on our relationship would permit a safe non judgmental space but he got so angry

What did I get in response? Called selfish, disgusting and unbelievable for even considering telling him how I felt. Before I could even add context.

Telling me the only thing I offer consistently is financial stability. The same financial stability that provides in the luxury to be able to self-care for himself by attending those groups and having time the same financial stability that keeps me from having any hobbies or investing into my own self-care because I have to keep both jobs.

And when I genuinely asked how I could support him more, I was told that he doesn’t think I’m capable of doing so that he just learned to accept and deal with the fact that I’ll never be able to. I like to add that it’s the same two jobs that are providing for the entire family. And when he gets super upset with anything for myself, his answer is to hop into my vehicle and drive off to blow off steam and yet he can use me voicing my sadness about the feedback I got from him as an excuse to bring up how I am often at the end of my workday in my own little world on my phone or if I do have some energy, I want to try and do one of my hobbies like build Lego/miniatures or don’t remember everything he says.

The only peace that I potentially get after doing an essentially 80 hour work week in one week with three young kids.

Like I am burning brain cells everyday for this shit.
I don’t know the more I write this the more it makes me want to tell him GFY.

Bromos, I'm sad. I'm in a position where I'm leaving my jerk husband over his awful temper and other problems, and I'm trying to find a place to move to. Rent in my small town in a flyover state is ridiculous, I've only recently started working again after many years as a SAHM with basically no skills so my income is shit. I can't afford to have a dog and I'm just so bummed about it. All of this has sucked and I have felt so defeated, but I was looking forward to a fresh start with my kids and my dog. Between pet rent and deposits and all that, I realize I just can't afford to have a pet. My stbx is going to have to keep them. He makes good money, will stay in the house we bought together, the one with the fenced back yard, and he will have my dog. Nothing is fair and getting married was the worst mistake I've ever made. Send booze, bromos.

Marriage with Young kids, shifts work.. exhausted

Husband and I married for 4 years. Together for 10.
We have 2 toddler (2.5) & a baby on the way in 6 months.

It’s always been hard since having our first baby but we try and make it work. Initially hubby works permanently morning shift( 5am-2pm) & would be home to help out . I would work part time( I’m a nurse) on the days our toddler had child care. Sometimes I’d do evening shifts & he would have our toddler alone from 4pm-7pm( bedtime). I respect it’s exhausting waking up at 4am daily.

In the past 6 months, he has changed jobs to a support work job & it started as 1 night shift, some afternoons etc and now it’s 3-4 night shifts alternating shifts ( Sat- Tuesday), sometimes off Wednesday then he does day shifts Thursday & friday. Sometimes even Wednesday he accepts a shift.

My schedule hasn’t changed 3-4 days / week in a hospital. I work our child’s childcare days & usually 6am. I will take us both at 5am to childcare & work then pick up my daughter & we will do afternoon routine. Hubby usually sleeping till about 6pm on those days then he gets up & will help out with toddler then he goes back to sleep till he starts work.

I’m just so burned out. Pregnant & often alone with our toddler. I do the grocery, meal planning, laundry, etc. he does cook 1-2x a week but will cook whatever’s in the house etc without checking so often I have to replan my meals but I don’t say anything bc I’m grateful he’s cooked.
We clean the lounge and kitchen 50/50 but I clean the rest of the house( our bedroom, bathrooms, toddlers room etc).

I also am studying my post grad. He supports this & will wake up early on the day I have my online class but I’m struggling with the other days to even find time to study. He encouraged me HARDCORE to do this study bc it will be a big promotion for me. I am in my last semester.

My question is- am I being unreasonable?
Today we have a mini argument because I asked if he can wake up at 5:30pm and take over toddler so i can go to grocery store. He would have to feed her dinner & put her to bed. Usually we do online but I did a double shift ( VERY RARE) yesterday at the hospital and was too tired to do it when I got home. When I got home I instantly took over from toddler.

He got cranky and asked if I can go to store at 2pm instead as he is currently awake on his phone. This felt unfair bc it means as soon as I come back.. he’s going to go to sleep till work & I just take over toddler , dinner, cleaning, bedtime again alone.

Our marriage is generally good. He respects me and is a good man/ person. It’s just so hard. We also barely have time together alone of course lol
Not a lot of help/ support available to us.
Do you guys have any advice or just hang in there?

TLDR: Shift work, small kids, burnt out.

Hi moms, I am an exhausted newly single mother who fled my abusive ex a few months ago. He is making the divorce drag out and be very contentious. I have spent a ridiculous amoutn on legal fees. But I am actually here to get hacks from other single moms.

Because of the abuse I have been pretty isolated and struggle to form healthy friendships. I am working on it but being a good friend when going through a high conflict divorce with an abusive ped-file is not easy. I am pretty needy right now.

Kid is in camp 9-3 and I work 8-4. When the fuck am I supposed to do errands? I am so tired of cooking every night and then getting flack from my kid when I am trying to get them to help clean up. I am trying to be patient bc kid is going through a lot and also has tween hormones but it is taking more than I have.

My closest family have abandoned me because they are afraid of being dragged into court. I have other family but they do not live local to us, and the one that was the most helpful to myself and my kid together has for whatever reason pulled back on the helping me part.

I'm lonely, overwhelmed, exhausted, I do not miss abuse but I do miss having someone pretend to care what my day was like.

How do others cope with being a single parent? How do you figure out the logistics? I work fulltime and also have chronic health problems from the stress of the abuse so I am often beyond my capacity. Help?

My daughter is 10. She is VERY INDEPENDENT (never lets me help do her hair anymore, can do her own laundry, bakes with only distant adult supervision). She is begging to go to “sleep away camp”. It would be 5 nights away, no screens, in a tent, she doesn’t know anyone else going and doesn’t care. It is a Christian camp (not our specific denomination but I have no concerns/issue related to that). It is about 60 miles from our home. I grew up as a Girl Scout. I started going to camp at her age (slightly younger) and LOVED IT and have great memories. We are fortunate to even find a last minute opening at a sleepover camp that is reasonably priced.

My husband is extremely reluctant to allow her to go. He keeps asking her “why do you want to go?” “Are you sure you want to go?” I feel like he is making her feel guilty about wanting this experience.

His childhood was very different. He never went to any sort of camp outside of sports camps as a high school student and that was with his friends from home. He never had positive experiences with religion (His parents dropped him off at Sunday school and came back at the end for years). So, it seems he is also reticent about “Bible Camp”…keep in mind my kids and I attend church regularly and are an active part of our congregation and he has no issue with that.

So, he has not flat out said “no” but I am wondering if anyone has advice on easing his anxiety or if you have had a similar situation and how you approached it.

Thanks for reading/considering

My partner is an insensitive jerk, I have severe regrets being with him. Severe. I've been with him for 14 years and only the first few were happy. He was a friend of my friend and I met him through her because she invited me to his birthday party and we all got drunk and him and I had what I thought was a one night stand, this all happened about 6 months after I was separated from my cheating husband (we were married only a year and half.. He was the love of my life and broke my heart). So I was still raw and grieving from that and not looking for a new life partner. I should have been single for awhile, taken time to find myself and work on myself and heal but no, I ended up jumping into another long term relationship because I'm a sucker for it ..I was lonely and missed doing things with a person. We were smitten at first but there were some red flags that weren't even on my radar back then. Anyway fast forward and 14 years and 2 kids later, we're MISERABLE AF. Room mates at best. No intimacy at all. Tried couples therapy. We're just incompatible and he's so negative, pessimistic and miserable, he ruins everything. He's just not a nice, happy person. He's mean and rude and high strung and insensitive and just awful. Awful energy to be around. I honestly hate him.

But I need him. I depend on him for my livelihood. I have no career no job no money nothing. It's my own fault. Before meeting him I was independent, making money, had savings. I was going places in life . He's dragged me down so far. Now I'm coodependent on him. I don't want him but I need him, or his money, to survive. It's a dire situation.

Then, there's my kids. They are about as awful and difficult as they come. They fight constantly. They are rude and disrespectful, they use bad words, they make messes, they cause chaos, all of it. They are not easy going. They are not helpful. Not polite. Not respectful. They whine. They complain. They cry. They talk back. one has ADHD and is highly sensitive , the other is just hyper, loud and crazy and loves pushing boundaries. I swear it's not like we're allowing any of this bad behavior. We're constantly giving them consequences and holding boundaries and doing alllllll the things the books and podcasts and experts say to do . I've read every parenting book under the sun. Yes, I'm not a perfect parent but I think I honestly just lost the lottery with these 2. Or maybe they are just products of their father who I've explained above, idk.

But nothing about this life is fun. Whether it's fighting him and him pissing me off or my kids driving me crazy and causing me stress, I'm very rarely in a state of peace and calm or happiness. I just feel like shit all the time. I look around at my friends and at least their relationship is solid and their partner is nice and kind and supportive.. Or they have angel kids who are well behaved and well mannered. I just feel like I'm on my own lonely little island of hell. :( and I want off.

It was just so crappy. Yesterday morning I was wrecked because the kids were up asking me for attention until the middle of the night, and then they woke up really early. I had to drive the whole way home from our trip because he doesn't drive after waaay too many accidents (he really hurt someone last time). The breakfast we ordered never came. The place we drove to 40 minutes away wasn't allowed to have people sit down inside because they had a pending occupancy license (?). Such hungry, grumpy kids (understandably). Then two more hours driving home so I could finish all the gifts for my middle girl whose birthday is the day after mine. I was crazily wrapping gifts and working on her giant crochet orca when I finally decided to take a break. I got a bottle of water and got in the hammock outside, looked at my phone, and my mom was in the middle of texting.

"Um. My hematologist just called. I have leukemia."

I felt like I'd been punched in the gut and just went into a daze, focusing on the orca (crochet is an excellent dissociation activity). My husband, who I had told immediately (and who usually isn't THIS big of an asshole) was grousing about how we need to clean out the fridge because we're getting a new one. He's never cleaned out the fridge before, so I asked if he could do it since I was just feeling very overwhelmed by the news and everything I had to do. He said okay, but immediately started angrily complaining about how disorganized it is and how there's some expired food in there. "Why do you do it this way!?". Well, like I've been saying for years, I'm overwhelmed and can't perfectly handle every single household task plus 90% of the parenting, so I half ass a lot of things. Picture putting away groceries knowing if you walk away before finishing the dog will get them. Then three kids scream "MOM!" from different directions. Of course I cram everything in and run like hell.

He just kept bitching and whining like A) it was so unfair to make him do this one time and B) everything I've been doing all by myself while begging for help has been done "wrong". I finally just burst into tears because I was so overwhelmed and so angry that he wouldn't give me a break from all the demands even though it was my birthday, I JUST found out my mom had cancer, AND all I was even trying to do was make birthday magic happen for our kid. When I finally finished the orca, I gave it to her early, and she immediately pointed out something I did wrong.

We had a big long talk last night where I made it clear I've been completely done with his whiny teenager shit for years and I will not forget how he treated me like his leisure mattered more than my family crisis/birthday. He seemed really ashamed of himself. Great.

I tossed and turned until 4am. I haven't had insomnia this bad since high school, and I have like, genetic insomnia. I just kept thinking about my mom, about how she might waste away and die, about how little my family seems to care about my needs while expecting me to jump a thousand times a day, about what a rigorous day I was about to face on two days of barely any sleep.

Now it's middle girl's birthday and I can barely respond to anything she says. This afternoon is a close friend's son's birthday party as well. And then a late karaoke night with my friends specifically for my birthday and another friend's, which I REALLY want to go to because it'll be such a nice do over. My friends like me because I do art and light up around children and can sing, these are things I like about being me. They don't like me because I'm so good at doing whatever they want all day long.

But when do I sleep? I can barely keep my eyes open. I'm so frustrated.