u/palatablypeachy

Money's been really tight, it felt like a good time to start my practice on the side of my agency job, only wanting 1-2 clients/week for now. I thought that would surely be doable. I got signed up with Headway, Sondermind, and Grow (still in progress). Got the Psychology Today profile. Been networking like crazy on the therapy groups in my area, putting my name out there for every referral needed that is up my alley. It's been about a month that I've been 'open for business', and crickets. I've had one (1) consult call that did not convert. Nothing else. I really didn't expect it to be this challenging to get a single client and I'm feeling a lot of self-doubt right now. Advice appreciated. I did create my website and published that a couple days ago, working on SEO and hoping that will help also. I feel like I'm the only therapist in the world who can't get a client in PP 🫠

Potty training has been such a struggle. My son is over three and a half, preschool starts back up in four weeks and he won't be able to return if he's not potty trained. He knows how, he can tell when he has to go, sometimes he goes of his own volition, sometimes he goes when prompted, but he just as often fights it and prefers to go in his pull up. The one day I tried to have him in underwear, I got so overwhelmed from all the accidents and cleaning up pee and poop while taking care of our infant it was just too much. And that's on me. I feel like it's all on me. It's my fault he's not trained yet and I feel like such a failure.

While I was thinking on this tonight, I came out of the bathroom to hear my husband yell at our son, "ARE YOU GOING TO BE POOPING IN DIAPERS FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE?!"

When I challenged him on this approach, he got angry that I am "usurping his authority." He left the house to go get alcohol which almost guarantees he will be emotionally and verbally abusive tonight, and when he doesn't get enough sleep and feels shitty at work tomorrow it'll be my fault, and then he'll be emotionally and verbally abusive tomorrow because he's tired.

I'm carrying the weight of working, parenting, homemaking, and trying to raise children with self-esteem while their father actively tears it down. He doesn't seem to understand that he can "build them up" all day, but it doesn't matter if he ends the day by berating them. He doesn't seem to understand the impact his words can have, despite being victimized by his father's throughout his own upbringing. Something that impacts his self esteem to this day. He disregards any opinions I have on child rearing that differ from his own, despite the fact that I have a master's degree in a field which required heavy study on child development.

I don't know where I went wrong. We had so many conversations about how we'd want to parent, about our values, etc. for the decade we were together before having kids. I thought we were aligned, I thought we'd have a family and be able to break generational patterns. Now I feel like we have no business having kids together. I don't regret it, because I love our children more than life, but dammit they deserve so much better than us.

I am going back to work soon after maternity leave for our second baby. We are privileged to be able to hire a nanny to watch our two kids, and one of the two who were interested is a young, pretty girl, who looks quite similar to some of the women he would watch. Also similar features to a past coworker he admitted to fantasizing about. He says he hasn't used porn since our second was born, and I haven't seen any proof to the contrary. But my insecurities still just don't feel ready to bring a pretty young woman into our home like that. I'm so frustrated that her looks are even a consideration. I'm angry that the Aftershock of him blowing up our marriage is continuing. Will it ever stop?

So my husband, three year old, (at the time) three-week-old, and I went to my in-laws' for a visit. My oldest was playing with FIL, tickling, getting tossed around, etc. We were sitting in the living room, and I had a beverage on the coffee table while I was nursing. Their crazy dogs got the zoomies and knocked over my beverage. FIL started going on about how I should not have put my beverage on their coffee table. My husband offered to clean the spill, as I was nursing, but my father in law started cleaning it instead, right by me, all the while muttering about how an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, etc etc. I felt incredibly awkward. After this incident, my MIL told me quietly that my FIL was probably just grumpy because he was sick.

Well that would have been nice to know before coming over! Sure enough, a few days later, our toddler started coughing (this was two weeks ago and he's still symptomatic). I caught it too, and despite all our best efforts, so did my newborn. It's nothing severe for her and she doesn't have a fever, thank God, but it has been so exhausting taking care of a sick newborn and sick toddler, and I feel so bad for my youngest especially because she feels crappy and gets so congested.

All this could have been avoided if they had simply said, FIL has a cold why don't you come over when he feels better. Or at least given us the option. WTF were they thinking? Something like pertussis could show up as a mild cold for an adult but put a newborn in the hospital. I'm grateful things aren't worse but damn, am I annoyed.

Not yet a month postpartum with baby #2. Our oldest is 3. My husband is in class for his electrician license and has to take a quiz to make up the class he missed while I was in the hospital. He originally said yesterday was the deadline, but didn't get it done despite having hours to himself with no responsibilities while the toddler was at preschool and I was napping with the baby. He said he found out he could do it today. So by myself, I made dinner, got the toddler fed, got the baby fed, took both outside so toddler could get some energy out, bathed both, and got both asleep almost two hours earlier than he got our toddler down last night. It was not easy. My toddler wanted my attention any time the baby cried, it was a lot to juggle, and I had to put aside other things I wanted to get done tonight (like straightening up my tornado of a house) in order to do this so my husband could do his quiz. Well when I finally came down, guess who hadn't even started his quiz? He decided to take advantage of that time to vape and argue with randos on twitter, like he did late into the night last night, and til 3 AM the night before. He then opened the quiz and said the link is closed. If he had done that when I originally took over with the kids, maybe he could have helped. He is refusing to acknowledge that this was shitty, and is refusing to offer a genuine apology. Now I'm going to be up later than everyone else getting things ready for mother's day tomorrow. FML. Also, he could get fired from his job for failing this class, which he will if he doesn't do the make-up quiz.

This comment was infuriating to me. Our second is a few days shy of three weeks old. When she was about five days old, she had lost 9.5% of her body weight so doctors suggested we supplement with formula after every breastfeed. She has more than gained back her birth weight by now but they want us to keep doing it. It is so exhausting, especially at night, nursing, changing diaper, getting bottle ready, feeding bottle, holding upright for 20-30 mins after because otherwise she spits up, etc. For every hour of broken sleep I get, I'm up for two. My husband offered to do some of the bottle feeds overnight to help, so last night I tried twice to take him up on that because I couldn't keep my eyes open, and he could not wake up to help because he had taken his sleeping medication.

Today, I was trying to express to him how hard this has all been on me and how exhausted I am, because he kept insisting that he understood and he just doesn't. I was trying to get him to understand that it's difficult having a tiny human attached to your body most of the day, and how helpful it would be to have support with making meals, coffee, getting water, etc. so that my own needs aren't constantly neglected when I'm taking care of hers. He told me that if I "can't handle it (breastfeeding)" then I should fully transition to formula. I don't know why, but that comment hurt so bad. I have been trying so hard to keep up breastfeeding, even though I feel like supplementing with formula has negatively impacted my supply and now she never seems satisfied unless she gets a bottle after nursing. I feel alone, unsupported, and like I'm failing in so many regards.