A mother of two has confessed to regretting having children, describing school holidays and weekends as 'an endless burden' and admitting she feels relieved when Monday comes and she can return to work. Writing to advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith, the woman, who has children aged eight and four, said she and her partner had their children in their early 30s 'without really thinking about it or talking it through'.
She said she increasingly envies her single friends and struggles to find peace with her role as a parent, despite loving her children. 'I hate role playing, hide and seek, etc, and I leave all of that to my partner,' she wrote. 'I dread being left alone with the kids as I feel I can't meet their constant demands and expectations of me. I find myself giving them more junk food and screen time than I know is healthy, just so that I can be alone in my room.'
In her response, Gordon-Smith said it is a common misconception that parenthood automatically transforms people into enjoying parenting. 'Some people see their child and feel a bolt from the heavens but some people just don't,' she wrote. 'It's quite possible that many, many people feel the way you do and we just don't have the resources to talk about it.'
She advised viewing parenthood as a 'rapidly changing condition', noting that as children grow, they become more interesting companions. However, she also cautioned against letting feelings of regret affect children, warning that kids can pick up on unspoken emotions. 'It is very scary for a kid to have indications that their existence made things worse,' she said.
Gordon-Smith urged the mother to seek support from friends or others, rather than struggling alone. 'I can handle it alone is not a great option,' she wrote. 'We tend to overestimate how successfully we can conceal dark emotional truths from kids by just not saying them out loud.'
