Moms of highly active children...anyone interested in a tribe?

[Norasmomma]

Hi I'm not sure if anyone else is out there who feels like I do, but geez, I have 2 of the busiest, most active children I have seen. They both have incredible amounts of energy.

My DD is a spirited 4 year old girl, I have read RYSC and she is an extrovert spirited. Everything is just more with her, she is busy, active and very extroverted. She needs huge amounts of mind zapping energy She is a bit better now that she's 4, but as a toddler I was in crazy-ville

Now my son was a very mellow baby, but he required being held in arms(carriers peeved him). He started crawling, climbing, cruising at 7 months, and was walking well by 10 months. He now is one and running, and is very busy.

Dh and I both cannot believe how much more energy they require than friend's kids. We know a quite a few parents who have children our ages and not one has kids who are nearly as active. They both are always running, jumping, climbing and spazzing out. We limit sugar due to DD's energy level. I've had more comments from random people, people I know, family about how "busy" or "active" they are(or from annoying people how I shouldn't give them sugar).

I know there have to be more of us out there, no one I know IRL has children who are nearly as crazy as mine. Mine both do.not.stop. DD just gets more ramped the more tired she gets, DS is becoming the same way. I just need to not feel so alone in this, I'm hoping there are other moms out there who understand my pure and utter exhaustion from the craziness of my kids, because very few people I know "get it".

[konayossie]

I feel you and your tiredness! DS is 18 mos, and he's been go-go-go from two weeks when he "woke up." As an infant, he had GERD/colic and was awake literally 12-16 hours straight during the day and up and down during the night. When people told me I should "nap when he naps," I wanted to cry (if ONLY he would nap!!). He also would only sleep while being held/worn.

Thankfully, he's no longer in pain and crying all day, now he's just busy, busy, busy (and still a terrible sleeper--he's had about 6 nights total of 5-hr stretches). He's the only baby I've been around for extended amounts of time, but other seasoned parents are a bit shocked at his energy levels, so I'm guessing they are on the high end. He sure wears me out! He isn't contented to play much by himself. I am amazed when I hear stories of toddlers entertaining themselves for a half-hour with a toy. DS is only entertained that long if he's figuring out some new way to subvert the babyproofing. The only surface he hasn't scaled yet is the kitchen cabinet, and that's b/c there are no drawers on the bottom. We can't have chairs out in the kitchen because he pushes them around uses them as ladders. He can climb INTO his crib (he doesn't sleep in there, so I don't know whether he can get out...), and he can beat any "childproof" medicine cap. Right now he's running back and forth from the living room to his bedroom pulling his ABCs cart.

It's hard when I come home from work, and he wants 100% attention and I'm trying to get supper ready, finish up stuff from work, etc. I'm sure if I were home all day with him it would be just as frustrating for different reasons.

So I've got lots of sympathy and would be interested in a HE tribe. I'll take any tips I can get for maintaining sanity.

[Natalie12]

Hi!
I'm the mom of one very active 4 year old girl, and pretty average activity level 6 year old boy. I find it absolutely amazing when I see kids their ages sitting quietly through a 45 minute adult church service, with nothing to do.

I'm a lot more zen about it than when she was a toddler. I think that I mentally fought against it, but now I just go with it, and have learned to enjoy the spunky kid that she is. This has been a hard lesson to learn because I'm mellow by nature.

It is easier as she gets older. She's been looking at toy catalog for about the last seven minutes, for example. One toy that we forked over big bucks for that I love is called the rainy day kit, from onestepahead. It's an indoor swing and bar that you put in a doorway.