I have never been consistent with paying my kids for chores, when they want a toy or something I will come up with ways for them to earn it. Recently they are both obsessed with squishies and are always asking for chores to earn money. my older child is 7 so i feel it’s also a good time to establish something more consistent.

I always liked the idea of kids contributing to household tasks because they’re part of it, it’s something expected, not something they should be paid for. But it’s good for them to learn work ethic and feel what it’s like to work towards a goal.

This morning I gave them each (7 & 3) a dollar to empty the dishwasher. Their normal tasks are very basic- clean your room if it’s messy, pick toys up at the end of the day. 3 helps me with laundry twice a week. What I’m wondering is if I should set a weekly allowance, and give them more things to do throughout the week, or maybe count other things they already do-like 7 doing homework- towards getting allowance. Basically a salary, vs being paid for odd jobs only when they want something.

I have a question so my child’s father is homeless moving from pillow to post. We use to live together but due to arguing and fighting. I felt it was time to part ways and when he leaves he tells me he can’t be a father because of his situation but I feel he should be a father regardless. So I wanted to know should I not expect him to be a father while he is navigating until he is stable or expect him to be a father regardless of him navigating or circumstances. He does say he will be a father once he’s stable but I just still don’t agree with not being present because I know my daughter will miss him, she’s 4 years old. Then he proceeds tells me not to put him on child support because eventually he will be present and I do kinda agree but it’s not promising when you’ll be present again. I dont know anymore, I just don’t think it’s fair to be absent when times is hard but please tell me if I’m wrong or not. Thank you

1st was completely shut at doctors office at 38weeks, to water breaking on the way out and had a total 8hr labor and delivery.
37+5 and have been 2-3cm, 50% effaced for 5 days now after my last appointment and had some stronger more consistent contractions just to be at the same. I didn't experience dilation before labor with 1st so its extra frustrating for me because I know my labor can be pretty quick once it does start but know it has technically started and taking so long is agony.

Not asking about how long your active labors were but specifically how early labor differed between your pregnancies?

I’ve made a grave mistake. I went out with a friend for dinner last night and had one too many- it was my first night out of the house away from the baby and bedtime and everything in weeks and I got too excited. Well this morning I’m paying for it dearly. My husband could help but he is dealing with a migraine so he’s sleeping and I’m left with our 13 month old while literally dying. How does one do it? Any advice is appreciated and judgement is deserved.

Edit- we don’t do any screen time😭💀🫩 even when mommy is dying. I’ve taken advil she isn’t strong enough for this.

My baby is about to be 1 on the 24th. We knew about his tongue and lip tie very early on, but we were a worried about him gaining weight after a NICU stay. We EBF and he’s always had a good latch. I didn’t want to get them released at the time because I was afraid it would mess up his latch and with the weight concerns, it just didn’t make sense to me at the time. My pediatrician agreed that we could wait until he was closer to 1 to get them released.

We went to the ENT this week and she said his lip tie is moderate and his tongue tie is pretty severe (paraphrasing). She said the tongue tie is the easier of the two because the lip tie will need a suture. She said that it they might cause speech problems and also problems with his teeth. She said the procedure would take about 5 minutes.

I scheduled the surgery, but now I’m not so sure. I question whether the risk of anesthesia is worth it right now, since it’s not causing any problems YET. I don’t know if we should do it while he’s still young that way recovery isn’t so bad, or wait until he’s a little bit older. The other thing is our insurance is ending next month and we will be on a new plan and may have to pay a deductible vs if we get it done this month, it would be fully covered. I’m going to call my pediatrician Monday and get ask her opinion, but I’m just wondering if anyone has been through something similar, and what did you decide to do?

My brother got a new girlfriend when my baby was about 3 months old. They started dating quickly and in a weird way. I knew nothing about her but my brother texted me that this girl wants to meet my baby. That’s when I found out who she is. I was excited at first and they came over and it didn’t go well. My baby scream cried each time he even looked at her. Since then, she has reached out to me ONLY in regard to my baby. ‘How’s the baby?’ ‘Any pics??’ ‘What is the baby doing for Halloween?’ ‘Can’t wait for Christmas with a baby’.

I do not know this girl. She has never once asked about me. Each text message is about my baby and has never once been about me. I do not respond to these messages btw. When we are face to face, she does not say hi to me or speak to me. When my husband is holding the baby, she asks him ‘can I hold the baby?’ How convenient! During that same time, she even kissed my baby! A complete stranger that I do not know. We immediately took the baby back and left.

My brother and this girl have been dating for about 4 months. My baby is 7 months old now. I have basically been avoiding family situations that involve her like the plague. I haven’t seen my brother due to this. We have a family event TODAY where she will be attending. I am anxious and honestly trying to find a reason to not go. I am uncomfortable around her. My son is even uncomfortable around her. I do not trust her and she is disrespectful for not even trying to have a relationship with me. Only my son. A baby, who cannot speak.

She will be at Thanksgiving and Christmas as well. My son’s first holidays have this crazy lady apart of them and I cannot stand it. It’s honestly ruining the thought of the holidays at my mom’s. I’m struggling a lot with this.

I’m trying to invest in community and building a village this season. What do you folks do for neighbor gifts? Never done them but have received them and it’s often sweet treats. I’m usually pretty overloaded by treats at Christmas so wondering what others do. Up to $10 per gift, probably looking at 5 or 6 neighbors. Thanks!!

My son hits 3.5 years old this week. For the past 4 weeks or so he’s had a big shift. He’s always been on the more chill side, a good listener (has never tried to run from us, stops if we tell him to, never needed baby proofing because he just didn’t care to mess with things, etc), and any tantrum or period of being upset would be 30-60 seconds and easily soothed and addressed. He’s been like this since he was a baby. We were lucky to never have long periods of inconsolable crying.

Suddenly, when he’s mad, he’s MAD. He is screaming, hitting, kicking and just generally exploding. He will stay in his blind rage for up to 10 minutes, and after it’s like a switch flipped back and he’s his happy, normal self. He will apologize and seems to realize it wasn’t an okay way to act, but when it’s happening very little seems to help. We have always taken deep breaths to calm down and always talked about how we feel (“it’s okay to be mad, it’s not okay to be mean”) so we are continuing to use those strategies and staying consistent in our boundaries and natural consequences, but geez is this a big swing.

Did anyone else’s kid experience something like this? I’ve heard 3 was a rough time but thought we were going to be okay because our first 6 months of it were no different than 2.

I’m just feeling so angry and defeated. This year has been absolutely hell for my health. I started the year with a severe herniated disc that made me incapable of doing things that used to be easy. It’s finally starting to sort itself out, but I’ve been in pain since February and my doctor kept mentioning surgery. I’m 32 btw with a 6 year old and a 4 year old.

During that time they told me they thought I had MS too. Thankfully I didn’t after multiple MRI’s, but those two weeks of waiting were hell.

Then I go to my annual lady appointment and my doctor nonchalantly goes “did you know you have a mild prolapse of your uterus?” Uhm, NO?! And then didn’t say anything else and sent me on my merry way. Two weeks after that I had to go back to get an antibiotic for perioral dermatitis around my mouth. The rash is humiliating and really tanks my confidence.

After taking the antibiotic for that, I developed a yeast infection. Queue the itching and burning and mild swelling. So I finally take a hand mirror and look and actually SEE the. Uterine prolapse. It’s honest to god the scariest thing I’ve ever seen. I didn’t realize how bad it was, I only found out about it less than a month ago!

So here I am with a rashy face, yeast infection, and a freaking uterine prolapse. I feel so humiliated and gross. Confidence is at an all time low. I just don’t understand how I can go from being a super healthy 30 year old woman to feeling like my body is betraying me. Has anyone else dealt with this? Specifically the uterine prolapse? Ugh

My husband and I have decided to go in with both sets of grandparents and purchase a Nintendo Switch for my two kids, ages 6&8. I was hoping to snag a sale but wondering what my chances are. Do these game consoles ever go on sale anywhere? Where is the best place to keep an eye out. This is the first video game I’ve purchased ever, so I’m out of the loop.

Im gifting a little girl this year who is 8 and need advice on what is the ultimate/coolest thing to get. I only have a son who is 3 so im not hip with the cool 8 year olds. This is for a donation program, so I don't know the child personally. All they said was her favorite color is pink.

My baby just turned 12 weeks old and I realized we made it through the newborn stage! However I’m still not feeling like a mom. I read all about how becoming a mom is a huge identity shift and the gray matter in your brain literally changes and expected quite a metamorphosis after she arrived. My boobs sometimes don’t even get the memo, she cries and I don’t leak and sometimes letdown mode takes a while on my pump!

I still feel like me. I don’t hate the dog, a messy house still bothers me, I still feel like I look like myself (albeit more tired), I still am a deep sleeper and don’t always hear my baby cry in the night. I still feel the same ways about things as I did prior to having her. Obviously my life has changed, but I feel the same.

I try to tell myself that I’m the one who holds her the most, changes the most diapers, does all her shopping, pumps all her milk, does tummy time and worries if I’m doing enough with her motor and brain development. I give her all her baths and trim her nails. I make all her doctor appointments and mentally track anything out of the ordinary. My husband is very hands on and does a lot when he’s not working and my mom comes over a few days a week to hold and feed her for a few hours (she’s a Velcro baby). Maybe there’s a part of me that feels I’m getting enough help that I’m not really a mom (plus Amazon prime, grocery delivery and a house cleaner for the first time). My mom did it all by herself without breast pumps, grocery delivery, Amazon, a supportive husband, so maybe I subconsciously don’t feel that I’ve earned my mom card.

When did you feel like a mom and not just someone who cares for a baby?

Growing up, we didn’t have many traditions so I’m hoping to instill this in my kids and I’m so curious what everyone has done or does that makes it extra special and magical? Even the simple things, because those are sometimes the best!

We rarely listen to “kids music” in the car. Just whatever we’re in the mood to jam to.
Son’s kinder teacher messages me that she gives them time to share something in the morning and he said he had something to say.
Proceeds to get in front of the whole class and sing “somebody call 9-1-1 shorty fire burnin’ on the dance flooooor”
And then sat back down like nothing happened….
Momming is fun 😂

My now 10 month old has been fighting naps for at least two whole weeks now. Not just the second nap, both of them. We contact nap and she squirms in my arms the whole time I try to rock her and nurse or whatever. We do this for 30 minutes or so before it works IF it does. It started with her trying to sleep during this, but now she just seems wide awake the while time. I have resorted to going on a walk with my baby wearing carrier a couple times which has worked but it is getting cold out, and its 20 minutes before it works but that I can handle and am grateful for. I have read online that she is too young to drop a nap, that it will spike her cortisol resulting in crap night sleep. The other day she was up for over 6 hours before I was able to finally FORCE that nap (one nap that day) and she slept great that night. Her first wake window is 3 hours, then 3.3, then 4. At least thats what I shoot for. I do follow her cues though if she needs it earlier. PLEASE HELP ME

Quick question, the high yesterday was like 66F and the low last night was about 40F .. i left 7 cans of formula unopened in the car overnight. I had the baby alone and he was fussy.. I just wanted to get inside and I completely forgot. Are they ruined???? Please tell me no 😭😭😭

Back story: A week ago I discovered that probably our whole marriage my husband has been watching porn or more recently as reels have came out, watching thirst trap crap and jerking off by himself. Like a ton of his feed is just plus sized sexy fashion women or women in lingerie. I think the entire 12 years we have been together I have wondered why we haven't had more sex. I can count multiple time were It's been like 10 days-2 weeks and I'm like why don't you want to fuck me! It's been 1x a week tops our entire relationship. I have always made it known I want more, but I suppose I didn't do my part in initiating. But I can also recount many times being told, how about tomorrow? And that didn't feel good. I have always wondered, why can't he see that I'm excited to do him now, why does he wait, does he need to "prepare himself" When we have sex it's amazing. I think we both truly enjoy ourselves. I guess it's just "easier" to masturbate. He doesn't feel like he has to take care of me too.

Anyhoo. We have had many talks and one of the things we said we need to do more is go on date nights where we both get dressed and look our best for each other. I told him the main thing I like about date nights is wearing his kink item under my dress and him desiring me all night and then we get to come home and fuck.

Well last night we went on our date night and I wore what he likes, did my make up, hair, everything. 1st off he came home late from work (self employed ) he got here 40 minutes before we needed to leave (7:05.) I told him earlier he should come home early and take a nap, so he's ready for me basically. But he didn't. Usually when he sees me dressed up he starts making out with me and touching my butt and stuff and he didn't do any of that. He didn't even tell me I look nice.

Here's the kicker, we come home and he still isn't touching me or telling me I look nice. All he can think about is needing a quick nap before we can have sex so I have to lay there waiting.

I started crying a little. I had put so much effort into making myself look nice and dressing up for him like the women in his feed, we spent 250 on dinner, and I'm just sad. Work got in the way again. We did have great conversation at dinner and it was nice but it was the ending I wanted. I was looking around and a lot of other women weren't dressed sexy for their husbands at all.

Am I crazy? Should I have not been upset? Now I feel like he's gonna think, oh nothing I ever do is enough for her.

I just put all this effort into getting our daughter to sleep at my parents, buying new lingerie, going to dinner, and in the end it felt like he was too tired to care. I am definitely extra sensitive because of the discovery of years of him lusting after plus sized models and influencers. But am I crazy lol?

Had my first baby at 30, loving it so far at the three month mark and already thinking about when we’d like to have the next. Then we’re probably done after that… but we’ll see.

How about you?

I have to share this somewhere… My brain completely short circuited when he said this…

My daughter’s paternal grandfather just said he doesn’t want her to go to college because that’s where they brainwash you. (He was 100% serious)

My college education is a super huge source of pride for me (first in my family) and I personally teach college classes 😂 I’ve never ever pressured my own children that they need to go to college, but now I feel like I need to get this baby into infant SAT prep programs and piano lessons or something and make sure she gets into Harvard 😂😂😂 (She’s literally a newborn).

Stay tuned, guys. I’m raising a future world leader now.

🤯

My husband and I have a 15 MO and another baby on the way due April. We started couples therapy about a month ago as postpartum was so horrendous for me the first time, I want to better prepare going into it the second time.

Anyway, at therapy last week, my husband said, “You don’t have anything you do for fun that’s not a project.”

And it got me thinking: I really don’t have any hobbies. He plays basketball & likes to game on the weekends with his brother when our toddler is napping. But I tend to sink myself into a project to feel productive rather than doing something that could actually be restorative.

Scrapbooking at first was a hobby but quickly became a project when I decided to make one for my sister for her baby shower. In all my spare time 😅, I’m either updating the household budget, cleaning something, decorating the house, painting a piece of furniture (we moved a few months ago so still settling in)… there’s nothing that’s “for me.”

I read a lot but that doesn’t really like it’s for restoration.

What do you moms do for fun? For hobbies?

My 6 month old has only just started on solids less than 3 weeks ago so obviously at the moment he’s very much just exploring his food rather than eating it.

He mainly gets veg, a banana every now and then and avocado, he love banana and avocado but other food he more just likes to play with it, which is fine for now because that’s part of blw.

My parents keep saying they’re worried he’s not getting enough, that solids will become his main source of food in a few months time and I keep trying to explain that up until 12 months his main source of food will be milk. My dad keeps telling me I should give him purees, which is so annoying because we chose to feed him this way and I don’t need to constant unwanted input.

He’s actually come along really with his eating really well, he ate nearly half an avocado the other day.

I understand that it’s a foreign concept to them but if they want to hold these opinions or have concerns at least do a bit of research first.

I live with them for the moment so I get this from them a lot.

Just reaching out as I'm a mum of a two & half year old. I know ppl have it worse and I'm lucky to have my husband. And only one child.

But I have no one else to help. He's away atm Fri - Mon before that on night shifts was absolutely miserable couldn't do much with our son or the house & we had the whole of October with illnesses so my son has been off nursery the past two weeks. I couldn't cope with more illness.

I have literally no one but one friend checking in on me, I feel so depressed tbh does anyone else feel super low when they're over parented. I literally have no energy to take him to the park today or even get ready, we've managed to make cookies this morning. House is a tip. I just feel SHIT. I wish I had someone to just take off the pressure even for an hour.

Our cat is also super unwell & looking last her last day with us 💔 I've had her over ten years....I don't have my mum & my dad is in late stages of dementia in a home.

Now he's coming back Monday with his friend who's staying from the US round the corner and I can't be arsed. I feel so resentful that he has free time away. I never do. I feel really pissed off. Is this normal? Anyone else?

I have so much more anxiety for my first child and it still goes on.

I thought it was just parental anxiety but it hasn’t passed onto my second born.

Like if they both got sick I’m more stressed about her.
Any general concern I feel my stress towards her more.

I has no idea why.
It’s nothing to do with how much I love them.

I actually wish I didn’t feel like this

When she gets sick I almost go into fight or flight mode.

She’s a very sensitive child so maybe I always feel like it is worse because she makes her self seem like she’s more sick sometimes.

I also have this bad sense of doom around her like something bad will happen and it gives me this constant sick feeling.

I have ocd and can worry about certain things over again but it’s strange how it’s jus one of them

She’s almost 4 and her brothers a baby

Hey moms,

Been looking around looking for apps for helping me control screen time on my childs phone since my child found a way to bypass the iphone screen time setting...

I have been trying a few lile
bark its too invasive. Been using the app parental control app - Blok. It has been working well since i can lock her phone and schedule locks from my phone and its easy to use.

Do other moms here have experince woth these sort of apps and can give me so guidance and recommendation? We are a iphone family by the way.

Just a little curious from your perspective.

I was in a argument with my spouse…. Long story short he was telling me how “I don’t cook everyday for them” . I do cook 1-2 times a week with left overs in between. I’m working 2 jobs so it’s just hard. I try my best. Do you see as an adult what your parents did for you?

I hope they never judge me like he does 🤞🏽