Wow heavy stuff in our little group tonight.
DiD - big hugs from me too. I think Amy & Kavita said some very sensible things. As another parent of just one rather manageable child, I don't have a lot to offer except the idea that because you feel beleaguered at the moment, you're looking at the kids in a sort of adversarial position and that might not be the best way of getting some form of family harmony back? Your older ones are old enough, give them the straight dope (mom feels like crap, this will continue for X weeks then mom will feel better) and ask them what THEY think they could do to help the situation out. They might surprise you. Also I VERY much concur with Kavita's suggestion to NOT talk to Jim about stuff during the day. It's not giving him any confidence (or you!) in your abilities. Vent here, vent to friends, but don't vent to him. From the other side of the fence, I feel like absolute crap if DH tells me he had a wretched day at work. I want to fix it, I want to tell him how to deal with his stupid "management" team, I want to write e-mails to them and tell them to hire 10 more people NOW - but I can't. Jim CAN however step in and do "his" share of the work and then some, and does. I think it's a very natural reaction on his part to what he sees as inability, however transient, on your part to deal with stuff at the moment, but you guys are obviously not on the same page at all with the whole parenting philosophy and that's much more of a problem than who does what chores when.
Uh, ok further to that idea - if you have to talk to him, make it a "the kids were doing X and I totally dealt with it by doing Y" kind of thing. I'm not saying hide the fact that it's hard or there are challenges or whatever, I'm just saying pitch it like you're dealing with it. I may have a warped perception of this, but in my mind DH is not far from being my employer in the position of mom, head chef and household organizer. And from my many, many years in the corporate world, I have learned that the best way to look good to employers is to always, always detail what you're doing to overcome problems, when you present problems to them. And even if you don't agree with it, listen to criticism and really compare it to your own core values objectively before you respond. FWIW, I completely agree with you on the unconditional parenting tack, but I can understand your desire to not have to tackle ALL the housework yourself. There must be a happy medium though... are there other chores that the kids would *prefer* to do? The dishwasher is a particularly crappy one, IIRC - I always prefered cleaning the bathroom and folding laundry myself. Ok now I'm just rambling...
If that doesn't make sense, please forgive me, I've got 2 pints of beer in me and that's more booze than I've drunk in one sitting in a long, long time. DH and I went out for a friend's birthday (actually friends', it's a couple we've been friends with for a looooong time and they share a birthday, which is cool). MIL babysat, so Rowan went to bed with considerably less fuss than normal.
:. "Oh, she's so perfect, she's so wonderful, she doesn't make any fuss, she just hopped into bed and lay down..." I'm all, can you come over *every* night, you put her to bed and we'll just pop down to the pub???? The other upside to MIL babysitting is we pay her in chocolates... but she doesn't know how many we bought to start with 
In other fun news, Rowan and I did something interesting this morning - I found some old herring in the freezer (bait) and decided that DH wasn't fishing nearly enough to justify the freezer space so we phoned one of her little friends (well, his mom, he doesn't talk much yet) and we went down to the wharf and fed the seals. Good times!!! What else on the planet would be so appreciative of 4-year-old frozen herring? And cute to boot?
Wheeee my head is loopy right now. I think I'm going to take some preemptive ibuprofen and hit the sack. 'night all.
Oh, Teresa - how awful about Woody's collar bone. You sound so calm and collected about it all, you are such an awesome mama. I would be a ball of freak-out by now. Yay you.
One last thing - I've been volunteering for our community newspaper and one of my stories for last month made the front page. Woot! I'm all famous! hee hee. (Paper has a circulation of AT LEAST 50 people...)
DiD - big hugs from me too. I think Amy & Kavita said some very sensible things. As another parent of just one rather manageable child, I don't have a lot to offer except the idea that because you feel beleaguered at the moment, you're looking at the kids in a sort of adversarial position and that might not be the best way of getting some form of family harmony back? Your older ones are old enough, give them the straight dope (mom feels like crap, this will continue for X weeks then mom will feel better) and ask them what THEY think they could do to help the situation out. They might surprise you. Also I VERY much concur with Kavita's suggestion to NOT talk to Jim about stuff during the day. It's not giving him any confidence (or you!) in your abilities. Vent here, vent to friends, but don't vent to him. From the other side of the fence, I feel like absolute crap if DH tells me he had a wretched day at work. I want to fix it, I want to tell him how to deal with his stupid "management" team, I want to write e-mails to them and tell them to hire 10 more people NOW - but I can't. Jim CAN however step in and do "his" share of the work and then some, and does. I think it's a very natural reaction on his part to what he sees as inability, however transient, on your part to deal with stuff at the moment, but you guys are obviously not on the same page at all with the whole parenting philosophy and that's much more of a problem than who does what chores when.
Uh, ok further to that idea - if you have to talk to him, make it a "the kids were doing X and I totally dealt with it by doing Y" kind of thing. I'm not saying hide the fact that it's hard or there are challenges or whatever, I'm just saying pitch it like you're dealing with it. I may have a warped perception of this, but in my mind DH is not far from being my employer in the position of mom, head chef and household organizer. And from my many, many years in the corporate world, I have learned that the best way to look good to employers is to always, always detail what you're doing to overcome problems, when you present problems to them. And even if you don't agree with it, listen to criticism and really compare it to your own core values objectively before you respond. FWIW, I completely agree with you on the unconditional parenting tack, but I can understand your desire to not have to tackle ALL the housework yourself. There must be a happy medium though... are there other chores that the kids would *prefer* to do? The dishwasher is a particularly crappy one, IIRC - I always prefered cleaning the bathroom and folding laundry myself. Ok now I'm just rambling...
If that doesn't make sense, please forgive me, I've got 2 pints of beer in me and that's more booze than I've drunk in one sitting in a long, long time. DH and I went out for a friend's birthday (actually friends', it's a couple we've been friends with for a looooong time and they share a birthday, which is cool). MIL babysat, so Rowan went to bed with considerably less fuss than normal.
:. "Oh, she's so perfect, she's so wonderful, she doesn't make any fuss, she just hopped into bed and lay down..." I'm all, can you come over *every* night, you put her to bed and we'll just pop down to the pub???? The other upside to MIL babysitting is we pay her in chocolates... but she doesn't know how many we bought to start with In other fun news, Rowan and I did something interesting this morning - I found some old herring in the freezer (bait) and decided that DH wasn't fishing nearly enough to justify the freezer space so we phoned one of her little friends (well, his mom, he doesn't talk much yet) and we went down to the wharf and fed the seals. Good times!!! What else on the planet would be so appreciative of 4-year-old frozen herring? And cute to boot?
Wheeee my head is loopy right now. I think I'm going to take some preemptive ibuprofen and hit the sack. 'night all.
Oh, Teresa - how awful about Woody's collar bone. You sound so calm and collected about it all, you are such an awesome mama. I would be a ball of freak-out by now. Yay you.
One last thing - I've been volunteering for our community newspaper and one of my stories for last month made the front page. Woot! I'm all famous! hee hee. (Paper has a circulation of AT LEAST 50 people...)
to Woody. Great writing though...
) Also at 9 going on 10, Gabriel at least is probably getting too big for this approach. I have the Michael Gurian books on order from Amazon at the moment trying to find a more appropriate solution for nine-ness, if I find one I'll let you know.
)
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