I think a lot of this is caused by having a FT job AND having young kids. While women working in previous generations, they did not spend 40 hours in front of a computer and send their kids to expensive institutionalized daycare.

Covid interrupted life and showed us how much the grind stinks. My own mother was socializing with neighbors during the day and playing tennis. Now I’m on Teams calls and that’s my only source of fun.

Anonymous wrote:Mine were 9 months, 3.5, 5, and 8 when Covid hit. I am not the same person I was before Covid. I think it was seeing just how little anyone cared to support mothers and kids and families (both politically and within my own family- there were no reinforcements to arrive and no helpful grandparents with country homes in upstate NY) which really caused me to lose my youthful hope,trust and optimism about life.

I am smarter and stronger now, but more reserved and world weary.

What type of political support would you want? I’m not sure taxpayer funded daycare and whatever else you’re looking for would fully alleviate you from the stress of having four kids.

This thread is so validating to me. I did okay early in Covid (had a pre-mobile infant and an understanding job) but the last year or so had been really hard for me. I managed to change jobs which worked wonders for my mental health but I’m now making less money and am constantly anxious about it. And just everything adds up — last night I started up too late finishing a book and this morning my cat woke me up with a hairball at 5am and my kidsk’ daycare is closed this week so I’m on PTO and I’m going to need so much caffeine to power through today. I always feel like I’m juggling 1-2 more balls than is perfectly manageable. When everything goes smoothly is okay but as soon as even something small goes unexpectedly it’s like I don’t have any spare energy or time or brain space to sort it out.

I had a 2 yo when Covid hit and I had my second in 2021. Caring for our toddler during the shutdown and all the quarantines that ensued, followed by pregnancy and adding another kid amid more shutdowns, all while maintaining a high demand job, left me incredibly burned out in a way I have NOT recovered from. It sucks. It was a profoundly exhausting and stressful period. You are not alone.

I focus on sleep, getting light exercise (walking) and trying to plan for social/fun time as ways of restoring myself mentally. It’s getting better. But it is hard!

When I talk to other moms of young kids at work, most are in the exact same place mentally.

I was similar. Single mom with a 3 and a half year old when Covid started. First month or so was great and then reality set in. I didn't realize how depressed I was until I look back on it now. Things have gotten a bit better but I haven't fully recovered. I quiet quitted my job but still feel like I don't have enough time for everything.

Ah yes. It’s a collective trauma.

It is sad but also comforting to me to find that others are in the same boat with regards to really unsupportive families. The PP talking about how the low self-esteem from a really dysfunctional family pushes back having kids and depresses wages is so spot on. And by the time you understand this and might do something to fix it, you're just so old. And you have to do it mostly on your own, maybe with a supportive spouse if you're lucky. But no family support. Friends help but it's not the same.

And then when, on top of that, schools shut down, daycares limited enrollment and hours, community centers were closed, parent groups scaled back or disappeared... the sense of isolation, like okay I guess I am really and truly just doing this on my own -- it's a bitter pill. I know not everyone feels this way but I do.

I think this part of things really prevents me from getting organized as I am spending wayyyy more time than I use to shopping for deals, looking for side hustles and doing things like packing lunches and washing my car and other small things I use to be able to throw 5-12 bucks at. It’s just really something I don’t see much on this board but it’s rocking our entire world!

We have older kids, but we are also facing this. Costs have absolutely skyrocketed, plus one of my teens eats everything in sight.

And we also have not gotten our groove back, for many of the same issues including family of origin. It is daunting to realize you have no one who could raise your kids if something happened.

Anonymous wrote:The family stuff is an open wound that will never fully heal. Sometimes it scabs over and you barely notice, and then something comes along and rips off the scab and it hurts all over again.

It makes the decision to have just one kid harder. you want more kids so you can finally experience a large, warm, loving family that you never had yourself. But at the same time, it is almost impossibly hard to build that 2+ kid family if your own family was crappy and your salary is too low to afford paid help.

The crappy family of origin has such a domino effect on life. You never felt you had a solid footing because your parents didn't give you emotional support (not even talking $$, just talking someone who was like, "i believe in you, you can achieve your goals"). You have a kid during covid and you realize that not a single person in your family has your back not even in an emergency (i'm not even talking babysitting! just like, if you and your spouse were simultaneously hospitalized, they would somehow step up and watch your kid temporarily).

Low self esteem from crappy family leads to later childbearing and lower wages. Before you know it, you're in your 40s and you're like WTF happened.

that said, if you really want another kid I think you should go for it. really. it is not too late, and there are a lot of 5 year gaps in siblings precisely because of free public kindergarten. Your kids can take out loans for college but they will always have each other.

Thank you for putting this into words.

Yes OP, I totally feel this. I think it’s that life with young kids was already busy and required staying on top of things (I have 3 and work full time), but now we’re trying to do all the things we did before with depleted resources.

Like I burned through a bunch of leave thanks to various close contact quarantines (preschool kept up with that long after the rest of the world went back to normal). And we burned through a lot of savings having to hire a pod teacher when our oldest started K plus I cut back my hours for a whole, which cost us even more money. I have somewhat gotten back into exercising, but I’m nowhere near at the fitness level I was at before (I used to be the type of person who would get up early for a 5:30 am orange theory class and now just a jog through the neighborhood is tiring.

Also, a lot of things have changed. Some older people at my job left during COVID and because I was too busy surviving I missed the boat on some promotional opportunities that will likely not come open again for a while. Not to mention I feel like my ambition has been crushed seeing how little society gives a crap about working moms. And everything just costs more — restaurants and babysitters $$$ making date nights feel like an extravagance. We recently took a family vacation somewhere we had visited before and were shocked at the start of the hotel compared to our last trip pre-COVID. Plus the rooms cost more and no longer even have the same level of housekeeping. Not to mention the costs of things like groceries. So it just feels like we need to be more careful with our money.

I don’t even think I’m depressed or anything like that. But like a PP mentioned, I am a different person now than I was before.

I think we were all running along the life treadmill and suddenly got forced into a marathon in March 2020. Now we aren’t running full speed anymore, but we never really got a chance to restore ourselves so even a regular jog feels so much more exhausting. I don’t know how to get my pacing right again.

Anonymous wrote:Not to minimize but a lot of what you describe is also just having a 6 year old. It is hard to get to financial planning, thinking about changing jobs, moving, finding time to even find names of professionals to fix up a house much less call and schedule and take time off work to meet them when you have a 6 year old who needs breakfast and lunch and dinner and possibly homework and class snack for the party and a ball for the sports team or uniform for the whatever and so on and so on.

OP again and honestly, thank you for this. Yes, that is what my days look like and there's just nothing left. My big goal for the month of September is to fit in a 20 minute yoga session a few days a week, but it's going to mean getting out of bed 30 minutes earlier and it sucks that doing this one thing for myself requires me to take away from my sleep, which is one of my favorite things.

Anonymous wrote:The family stuff is an open wound that will never fully heal. Sometimes it scabs over and you barely notice, and then something comes along and rips off the scab and it hurts all over again.

It makes the decision to have just one kid harder. you want more kids so you can finally experience a large, warm, loving family that you never had yourself. But at the same time, it is almost impossibly hard to build that 2+ kid family if your own family was crappy and your salary is too low to afford paid help.

The crappy family of origin has such a domino effect on life. You never felt you had a solid footing because your parents didn't give you emotional support (not even talking $$, just talking someone who was like, "i believe in you, you can achieve your goals"). You have a kid during covid and you realize that not a single person in your family has your back not even in an emergency (i'm not even talking babysitting! just like, if you and your spouse were simultaneously hospitalized, they would somehow step up and watch your kid temporarily).

Low self esteem from crappy family leads to later childbearing and lower wages. Before you know it, you're in your 40s and you're like WTF happened.

that said, if you really want another kid I think you should go for it. really. it is not too late, and there are a lot of 5 year gaps in siblings precisely because of free public kindergarten. Your kids can take out loans for college but they will always have each other.

OP here and this is basically my life story. And it's frustrating that it's my family AND my DH's family -- we really learned the extent to which our families are just dysfunctional over the last few years. But no more kids. I'm 44 now. The window was closing right as Covid hit. I no longer feel comfortable with the idea of another pregnancy, and I don't want to be over 60 with a kid under 18.

Not to minimize but a lot of what you describe is also just having a 6 year old. It is hard to get to financial planning, thinking about changing jobs, moving, finding time to even find names of professionals to fix up a house much less call and schedule and take time off work to meet them when you have a 6 year old who needs breakfast and lunch and dinner and possibly homework and class snack for the party and a ball for the sports team or uniform for the whatever and so on and so on.

My kids are older, but here are a few things that helped me: continuing to exercise, cutting out about 95% of the alcohol I was drinking (it wasn’t a lot before but I would have a 1/2 glass to glass of wine 3-6 days per week. Now it is once every 7-10 days), going into the office more, paying more attention to how I dress, and aiming for 7-8 hours sleep, but no more.

Anonymous wrote:Mine were 9 months, 3.5, 5, and 8 when Covid hit. I am not the same person I was before Covid. I think it was seeing just how little anyone cared to support mothers and kids and families (both politically and within my own family- there were no reinforcements to arrive and no helpful grandparents with country homes in upstate NY) which really caused me to lose my youthful hope,trust and optimism about life.

I am smarter and stronger now, but more reserved and world weary.

well said. this is me.