What It Means When You Dislike Being a Parent (And Small Changes That Help)
I’m standing at the kitchen sink, half-washed whole-wheat pasta sticking to the colander, when my 7-year-old knocks over his third glass of apple juice this week. The sticky amber liquid pools across the counter, seeps into the gap by the stove, and before I can even move, my 4-year-old drops to the floor screaming because I cut her sandwich into squares instead of triangles. The clock above the microwave blinks 6:17 p.m. I still have to pack tomorrow’s lunches, sign a field trip permission slip, and respond to a work email that’s been staring at me from my phone for an hour. I say it out loud, quiet enough only the dish soap can hear me: I dislike being a parent right now.
I freeze for a second, because no one says this out loud. Last month, my next-door neighbor brought over chocolate chip cookies after we helped her move a couch, and she sighed and said “These little years are the best years, aren’t they?” and I smiled and nodded and agreed, even though all I could think about that day was that I’d changed three poopy diapers and mediated seven fights before 10 a.m. I’ve left casual mom group conversations when someone gushed about loving every minute and no one pushed back, so I assumed I was the only one who felt this.
Back in March, I was at my 7-year-old’s well-child check, and the doctor asked how I was holding up. I opened my mouth to say “fine, great” like I always do, and my throat got tight instead. She waited, didn’t push, and I mumbled that some days I just don’t like being a parent. She leaned against the exam table and said she hears that at least once a week from parents, and most just don’t say it out loud because they’re scared of being judged. It doesn’t mean you don’t love your kids, she said. It just means you’re human, and you’ve probably given away too much of your own time to be anything else right now.
After that juice spill Tuesday, I didn’t have a big breakdown, didn’t call my mom crying. I just grabbed a paper towel, knelt down to wipe the juice, and texted my husband who was working late: I need 45 minutes to myself tomorrow. He texted back: I’ll leave early. Got it. The next day, I didn’t book a massage or get a fancy manicure like I see people do on Instagram. I drove to the public library down the street, wandered the fiction section for 20 minutes, pulled an old mystery novel off the shelf, sat in a scuffed hard chair by the window, and read half a chapter while drinking a $2 black coffee from the lobby vending machine. No one asked me for anything, no one needed me to cut anything or find anything or mediate anything. For 45 minutes, I was just me, not “mom.”
That worked so well I started making small, low-friction changes instead of trying to overhaul my whole life. Big changes are impossible when you have two little kids, anyway. I started waking up 15 minutes before the kids every morning. Before that, I was hitting snooze until they climbed into my bed and started begging for breakfast. Now, I get up, brush my teeth slow, drink my coffee while it’s still hot, and I don’t check any school newsletters or parent group texts. Some days I just stare out the kitchen window at the squirrels fighting over birdseed. That’s it. On weekends, my husband takes the kids to the park for 20 minutes after breakfast, and I stay home. Last week I didn’t do anything productive at all— I just rearranged my bookshelf by color and ate a full granola bar without cutting it into four pieces for the kids to share.
I also started saying no to one non-mandatory thing every week. I used to say yes to every playdate, every birthday party, every PTA bake sale sign-up because I thought that’s what good parents do. Now, if I look at the invite and my shoulders tense up, I just decline. We don’t have to go. Last week I said no to a Sunday afternoon birthday party an hour across town, and we all stayed in our pajamas and watched a silly cartoon about space dogs and ordered pizza for lunch. No one had a bad time, no one missed anything.
The other thing that helped was naming the feeling instead of hiding it. Before, I’d push the “I dislike this” feeling down, feel guilty about it, and then snap at the kids over something small. Now, if I’m mid-mess and I feel that irritation bubbling up, I say it out loud, soft but clear. Last week, my 7-year-old dropped his half-built Lego spaceship right as we were getting ready for bed, and I felt that familiar twist. I said, “Buddy, I’m really frustrated right now because I was looking forward to sitting down after you go to sleep. Let’s take two deep breaths together, then I’ll help you fix it.” He didn’t cry or get more upset. He just nodded, breathed with me, and we fixed it in five minutes.
It’s not that the feeling goes away completely. I still have days where I count down the minutes until bedtime, where I think I dislike this whole thing more than anything. I still feel a flicker of guilt sometimes, like I’m doing something wrong by admitting it. But I’ve stopped acting like that feeling means I’m a bad mom. Most of the time, that dislike is just a signal I need a little bit of me back, not a sign that I don’t love my kids. I love them more than anything in the world. That doesn’t mean I have to love every single messy, sticky, loud minute of being their mom.
Last night, I sat on the porch after they went to bed, drinking a leftover sip of cold coffee, and watched the fireflies blink across the yard. Some days are still hard, some days the feeling is still there. It’s not fixed, I didn’t have some big epiphany that made me love every second. But now I know what to do when the feeling comes: carve out 10 minutes for myself, say no to one extra thing, name the feeling instead of hiding it. It’s enough. It’s more than I had a few months ago, and that’s all I need right now.
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