Confessions of a bad mum

I've been in a dark place this weekend. Felix has been doing my head in. He's cutting molars - the painful ones - three of them simultaneously. It makes him very grumpy. And either it's coincidental, or somehow related, he's incredibly impatient with everything right now. So if he's playing with a toy and can't achieve what he wants to with it, he starts screaming. Currently he screams about once every 2 minutes. For a minute. That's a lot of screaming.

Normally you get to leave him to get on with stuff quite independently, and a scream means he's in trouble so you go and check on him. Now he screams all the time you have to check on him ALL THE TIME. And he's clingy. And wriggly. And has developed a habit of lurching his head back and trying to writhe out of your arms if you pick him up, even if he asked to be picked up. And he mostly does it on the stairs because he instinctively knows that's the worst place to drop a baby.

And that hasn't stopped all the relentless danger hunting either. He likes to think he can get down stairs facing forward, like a grown up. And this is before he can walk, or really balance properly on two feet. You have to be on hand to catch him, just in case he falls forward. And his latest new thing is reaching up to the kitchen worksurface with his fingertips to see what he can bring crashing down. Like plates. And knives, if he got the chance.

So, in summary - he's loud, demanding, attention seeking, quasi-suicidal and difficult to control from very early in the day to very late.

I've totally lost my patience this weekend. I've snapped at him and uttered the F word a fair few times. When he headbutted me on the chin on the stairs, making my head smash into the wall I shouted at him and cried. And I've ignored Jambeans. And snapped at the boyfried. And I've not given a fuck.

So last night, after two days of full on Felix we were beat. And then Jambeans woke screaming at 9.30 because she had a bad dream, and went mental. Total hysteria. Mainly in my ear. For two and a half hours. I understand why the Victorians locked hysterical ladies up now and threw awat the key. Anything to make them shut up. At more than one point I wondered if a good smack would be allowable in exceptional circumstances.

Boyfried wisely elected to sleep on the futon in Felix' room - not that he got any sleep either - and Jambeans whimpered her way through the whole night waking every hour or so to shriek and moan and scrumble.

Then Felix woke at 5.15am. Fuck me that's early when you've had no sleep. Bf and I had a barney over who should get up and look after him - both of us insisting the other should go to bed. I won. I fed Felix a chocolate biscuit for breakfast, whilst I had the last 4 with a very hot cup of tea. Then I zombied on the sofa and watched 2 episodes of Countdown before 7am.

I think I'm *supposed* to feel guilty. But I don't really feel guilty at all. I do feel guilty for being nasty to the bf, but I don't think I'm a bad mum at all. I may be more Slummy than Yummy but I still think I'm a pretty good mummy. And bf absolutely puts me to shame with his parenting prowess. But being in the dark place makes you reflective. And I've been reflecting that if this is the sum total of my life I don't particularly want it.

It's a common complaint of motherhood that you feel like a ghost of your past self. I've been feeling that very keenly this weekend. I'm a shadow of the person I used to be. The only time I feel even remotely close to that person I used to be is when I'm working. I had managed to find some freelance work - only 5 days of me being brilliant for crap pay - but work nevertheless. And that came to a close on Friday and I just crashed. It doesn't help.