A mother has been left feeling ashamed after revealing she often thinks about how “amazing” her life would have been if she hadn’t had children.
The woman has a two-year-old and a seven-month-old and is primarily a homemaker, “struggling to restart her business after moves, pregnancies, sleep deprivation and stress.”
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In the message on RedditShe explained: “I always read ‘you never regret having children, but you might regret not having more’ and ‘I can’t imagine my life without my children’, but I do and it looks amazing.
“I wonder if I’m the only one and if that means I’m a bad mother.
“I’m just exhausted. I miss my life and what my life could have been.
“I would also have a much better relationship with my partner.”
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She added that her youngest child “has just learned to crawl” and is therefore “constantly attached to her.”
While she also has difficulty toilet training her daughter.
“When I had my first child, I didn’t have this feeling. I also had a lot of trouble breastfeeding and sleeping,” she noted.
It gets worse when you consider that her partner works Monday through Friday and she works as a wedding and boudoir photographer on the weekends.
“I couldn’t really discuss this with my family (who are very close and full of women) because two of them – one of whom is my sister-in-law – just announced they were pregnant and the other found out she was expecting twins (babies 4 and 5!),” she continued.
But people in the comments reassured her. One wrote: “I remember being in your phase and not seeing any light at the end of the tunnel.
“Just accept that you’ve lost 10 years.
“But then your life comes back. (And it actually goes by very quickly).”
“This is a great memory. I only have one toddler but I’m looking forward to getting some of my life back,” said another.
“When you speak from the future it can be amazing,” wrote a third.
“I have a teenager and an older child in primary school.
“Teenager can make us coffee and cook dinner. Primary school kid is funny and nice, can make his own lunch and shower himself.
Benefits of being a young mother
Tracy Kiss, who fell pregnant at the age of 19, has revealed what she believes are the perks of being a young mother.
The Buckinghamshire personal trainer and blogger believes women who give birth in their teens make BETTER mothers than those who give birth in their 30s.
She claims that new mothers get back into shape faster, have more energy and are better with their children, which means they behave better and are happier.
Tracy told Fabulous: “Women who become mothers for the first time in their teens are better parents than women who are in their 30s or 40s.
“I think if I had been 10 years old or older before I became a mother, I wouldn’t have the relationship I have with my children now.
“To start with, as I got older I had less energy and therefore less patience.
“After months of sleepless nights, I wouldn’t be as excited to talk to people as I was when I was a teenager.
“My body got back to its pre-pregnancy size after giving birth through exercise, which gave me the confidence to date and find love again. I’ve never been happier than I am now, at 30 with two kids.
“If I had been alone with a newborn at 40, I would be more tired, less happy with my body, less energetic, and much more stressed by the shock of living for myself instead of putting others first. Sometimes age and the innocence of ignorance is a good thing.
“As a teenage mother, I just rolled with it, found my groove and became responsible and capable, because at that point I didn’t know any better.”
“We can go shopping with or without them.
“It’s actually quite awesome.
“From where you are it feels like an eternity, but from here it feels like those days were an eternity ago and yesterday.”
As someone else said, “Parents really should do more to warn expectant parents of the harsh reality.
“I felt like everyone I talked to was in some kind of rose-colored glasses, la la land parenting cult.”
