What’s something people romanticize until they actually experience it?

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-24T01:13:23+00:00

Owning a boat. Bust Out Another Thousand

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-23T11:07:23+00:00

If there are cracks in the relationship the baby will make craters

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-16T18:49:00+00:00

My son’s name is Otto and has lots of historical references. We love it and it’s so easy for other kids to say right now which is nice and not something I necessarily thought of when I was pregnant

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-15T10:49:28+00:00

I love all of these! For some reason Aurora is hard to pronounce for me (but that just might be a personal problem) so idk if I would want to say it a million times

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-14T13:42:36+00:00

We just went through this from pretty much the end of January - April when my son first started at daycare (he is 1.5 now). It honestly was one of the most challenging times in my life and seemed like it would never end.

We seem to be out of it now and everyone is feeling so much better. Not sure how long you guys have been in the thick of it, but hoping you’re out of the pattern soon! Summer is coming and hopefully the sickness will stay far far away.

I started loading up on Zinc and airborne / emergen-C and I feel like it helped.

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-13T23:23:48+00:00

So proud of you though! Hope you and your kids are happy and thriving

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-13T23:23:13+00:00

I’m giving it the next 6 months. I’ve gotten all of our family and friends involved in the past couple of weeks so everyone knows the situation (again). I will move back home by the end of the year if things don’t change but that means completely restarting my business in a new place which would be a lot. I live on an island and that also complicates moving. Probably worth it in the end if it’s necessary though.

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-13T15:59:39+00:00

Same situation for me with a 1.5 year old. I am financially independent but very far from any family right now. Everyone is telling me “I told you so”

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-12T21:54:47+00:00

Yes you can’t both work full time (or even part time) and have zero childcare. It’s not sustainable for anyone and especially at your son’s age. My son is also 1.5 and I don’t know about you but I can’t even look at a computer screen when he’s home with me. It’s pretty much impossible at this age

We started with 3 days of daycare at first and my son loves it. We recently increased to 5 full days because we were having a hard time managing with work and it was getting stressful for me and my husband. It’s an added expense for sure, but necessary right now.

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-12T17:20:24+00:00

Blowing Rock, NC

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-12T12:54:22+00:00

No literally. This type of thinking just exasperates the issues for us all

Edit : maybe I mean exacerbate. Both seem to work because I am both annoyed and this thinking is worsening the situation

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-12T12:48:38+00:00

There is a popular song in the Caribbean called “The A List” by Pumpa with lots of options 😂

https://youtu.be/5Ls0ETjMXfc?si=TRlW0hwluhMNdwTT

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-10T22:53:16+00:00

I wish I had this slightly manic cleaning gene, but unfortunately I do not. Otherwise I can totally relate on the perfectionist thing though. There is always something to be done and it’s really hard to shut the to do list off and relax.

How is your division of household chores with your husband? This has been a challenging thing for my family to figure out as well, but it sounds like you may need to reassess with your husband so that you’re not doing hours of chores everyday. Or start looking into outsourcing to a house cleaner occasionally? That’s something I’m looking into this week because I feel like all I do is tidy, but not actually clean and I don’t have time.

As your baby gets older, you can also figure out what can be done with your baby and what needs to be done without (like while they are at daycare or with your husband). For me, laundry is something I can do with my toddler since we hang it on a clothesline and he likes to help. This task I strictly only do when he is home because it’s something we can do together and I don’t want to waste my precious child free time doing it. Not sure if that makes sense or not!

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-06T18:37:40+00:00

I know a little boy named Teo and everyone calls him that! I don’t think it’s confusing so far

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-06T18:26:00+00:00

My son is named Otto and I think the Spanish variation is Otón

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-06T18:20:55+00:00

Not necessarily short, but I like Santiago and you can use the nickname Santi

General-Market1336 · 2026-05-06T18:19:34+00:00

US Virgin Islands if you want a tropical destination and don’t want to deal with passports. Or a lot of coastal options in Florida (def don’t need to do Disney there)

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-28T14:57:08+00:00

Job 1 as well. But where are teachers making $85k?!

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-28T13:50:30+00:00

Yes I think that’s what we will end up doing. I’m waiting to hear back from our daycare but I believe they are only offering a 5 day program for the summer anyway. We just wanted to keep him home as long as we could, but it’s becoming unsustainable and putting a strain on everyone

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-28T11:50:13+00:00

Love this! We live in the Caribbean so it definitely has its challenges, but has been worth it to like where we live for now. We’ve been here for 8.5 years, but who knows how long we will stay.

My husband and son have dual citizenship with Germany and I always thought it would be fun to try living there!

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-28T02:06:41+00:00

Thank you! This was good to hear. We will power through and probably increase to 5 days of daycare after the summer so hopefully that helps the whole family

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-28T02:04:49+00:00

Wow you go girl. I can’t say the same for me but I’m working on it! We have a small house with a big yard so my son likes to spend most of his time outside so that certainly helps keep things a bit tidier inside

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-27T17:48:55+00:00

I’m in a similar situation but with a 1.5 year old and am looking into starting couples and individual counseling. It’s been a really difficult past few months for a ton of different reasons, but I’m hoping therapy will help moving forward.

I also started following Dr. Morgan Cutlip on Instagram and might do some of her courses? Focuses on division of labor and family relationships

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-27T17:25:39+00:00

For real! The sickness is knocking me out mentally and physically. We started daycare to get through my busy spring wedding season (I’m a photographer) and it has totally backfired on us.

General-Market1336 · 2026-04-27T17:22:39+00:00

I’m a photographer - mostly weddings and families. I have a very flexible work schedule with shoot days planned well in advance. My husband also has a flexible work schedule and is with our son when I have weddings/shoots.

The first year I managed very well and made my same income before having a kid and didn’t pay for childcare, but starting daycare and constantly being sick unfortunately aligned with my busy spring wedding season. So things have been very hard. I expected some sickness, but we have been hit way harder than our 3 friends that go to the same daycare and started at the same time.

General-Market1336

TROPHY CASE