I don't like to think i regret any of our choices, but the thought that we should have gone for a 3 year age gap instead of 2 years is something that i think about every single day... i almost fantacise about how much easier a 3 year age gap would be and wish we'd had the foresight to see all the challenges we've faced in having the boys 2 years apart.

I know the problem isn't entirely the age gap, but i surely think it would have been easier if my older boy (now 2 years 4 months) had been closer to 3 when the baby was born. This being the case because - i should have weaned him from BF - the tandem feeding has been so so so hard. This in itself is a huge let down as i envisaged myself having great earth mother moments feeding them both. Instead its been months of having two of them all over me constantly, drenched in milk and the constant whine for "boo boos" from my toddler who stopped eating food almost completely. We are slowly getting there with getting him to eat and drink other things, but the upset associated with it hasn't been good for anyone. I keep saying every day, why did i not gently wean him sooner, perhaps over the pregnancy.

Well the pregnancy was another issue, i had terrible morning sickness for the first half of it, my poor toddler spent his days watching tv while i lay on the couch. I'd promised myself we'd bond while i was pregnant to savour those last days alone just the two of us.... instead i was miserable because i was sick and hated being pregnant. In the second half of the pregnancy i had SPD so could hardly walk let alone play with my toddler. We were relegated to games on the floor, when all he wanted was me to run outside with him. So i feel bad that he wasn't entertained to the best standard while i was pregnant, i wanted to take him to swimming lessons, to playgroup, but i just couldn't because i felt too crappy. It was a lonely time because we'd just moved away from family and friends.

Thats another issue... why didn't we wait to try for a baby when we had the support down here? well we didn't know that family would one day plan to move down, which they are now. We didn't know how hard it would be on my own. And it has been so very hard. The past few months i have been utterly consumed with my baby's "health issues", after trying a myriad of things and seeing a million specialists, i've concluded he is simply hard to settle... thats just him. Period. Why did it take me so long to figure it out? i dunno, its been hard to think straight with the lack of sleep or time to really reflect. Of course i'm grateful there is nothing medically wrong with him. But some kind of diagnosis would have seemed to make easier the fact that i had to wear him for 20 hours a day in the carrier, that i'd be walking for hours around the house trying to get him to sleep while my toddler wandered around aimlessly and simply gave up on expecting me to play with him..... I'm sick of saying i'll be with him in a minute. I know he's learnt patience and independance, but i didn't want him to have to yet - another reason i think we should have left a larger gap.

I also am still struggling with dividing my attention between the boys. How do you not feel guilty when you're paying attention to one and not the other? and because they are at such different levels i find it hard to entertain them both at the same time. My toddler wants to play whereas my baby wants to be held.... I'm trying so hard to make them both happy but come off feeling like i've done a half assed job of both. The only time i feel good about it is when my hubby has one of them and i give one on one time to the other. When does this get better? When it was just me and my toddler, i felt like the perfect mum because i could give and be there 100% for him, now i can't and i think he isn't as happy? I wonder if he'd be better off an only child. He had warmed to his brother heaps, and i can see a bond there... i only hope it becomes really special to him so as to make up for the division of attention he's had to suffer.

Then my own health issues, i've had mastitis twice, a sinus infection, and now the flu. I have never been so sick in my life. More times where i've been miserable and not "there" for my kids. My mil having to use her saved up days off work to care for me/us and my hubby having to take annual leave as well - because we have no one else to help. I feel like i can't even do my only job properly, that people have to come an help.

People keep telling me it will get better, and how great this age gap will be later on, but i just can't see it now as having been as ideal as we thought. I cant see much good in the past year, and i don't like to reflect so negatively on life when i'm lucky to actually have a really privileged one. I'm trying to be more positive. I have managed to get to a playgroup which has been really great, and hopefully from there build up some friends in the area. I just wish i felt like we'd done the best thing for the boys by having them 2 years apart in this context. We do have PIL moving to us in a couple of weeks so things will be heaps easier... but that doesn't take away the pain of how crappy the past few months have been.