DD 22 months watches far too much TV every day. I just don't know what to do with her. If she isn't watching TV, she wants me involved in whatever she's doing...
DS3 wants constant input/participation from me as well, and as an introvert I often find his neediness exhausting. He's going through a phase where he wants me to talk to him non-stop all day long. He loves language and soaks it up, but sometimes I just crave some silence. And especially when he was younger, I also found myself bored, as much as I love(d) to be with him.
I wanted him to go to preschool this year but it didn't work out, so I started to look online for activities to do with him to add some variety to our day. He loves sensory bins, costumes, plastic animals, play doh, water play, simple science demos, spooky crafts, and anything hands-on. I found that introducing new things helped break up the monotony for me and made me feel less guilty about the time he does spend watching TV so I can get a break.
My husband commented recently, "You don't like to cook or clean or stay at home, so why did you want another baby?" I do wonder what I've gotten myself into, but I also think it's okay to look forward to life beyond the baby years.
YES. THIS.
Particularly when that
child also isn't particularly "into" age-typical activities or those low-cost camps, classes, and activities which are open to toddlers and preschoolers.
As I just posted in another thread (preschool learning materials and software), my daughter and I
both just wound up tearful, angry, and resentful if I pushed her to do all of those great things that FamilyFun magazine (and Mothering, and Waldorf... and, and, and) encourage. She HATED that stuff.
I finally realized that so did I, and we were better off doing what we didn't actively loathe. Life's too short to spend it on "should do, even though I hate it" and I'm not sure what she got out of pottery class, but I'm pretty sure that the instructor and the rest of the class got out of it that I was the meanest mom in the world and that my daughter was probably autistic because of her sensory issues and meltdowns (she isn't, but BOY does she not like having her hands or any other part of her either wet or dirty...)
I finally enforced "quiet time." This was in self-defense, honestly. I insisted that DD play in her room independently for some portions of the day. I also used media to babysit her for short periods of time, since we could not leave her with a sitter (medical reasons).
I listed some of my other tricks in that other post. Just knowing that you aren't as alone in this as you feel probably helps.
