Mom Confessions - How to Survive those Rough Mom Days

A big thanks to Pfizer Consumer Healthcare for sponsoring today’s post.

Teething is a rough stage for babies but it’s even harder for mom sometimes. Caring for a teething baby requires every bit of patience you have and often requires taking some shortcuts in other areas of your life to get through it.

As a mom of 6, I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent trying to comfort a teething baby or toddler. Teething really is the worst!

Have a teething baby? Here are our favorite Mom Survival tips

How do you, as a mom, deal with teething?

Teething days have sparked all kinds of things in our house, from pajama days and breakfast to dinner to marathon cartoon-watching.

I’ve done things I swore I would never do as a parent while caring for a teething baby, and a few things that I’m (almost) too embarrassed to share:

Video Transcript:

“When I’m tired, I tell my kids it is Daylight Savings and put them to bed an hour early.”

I’ve been known to claim it is Daylight Savings Time and put all my kids to bed an hour early when a younger sibling is teething.
When I’m too tired to read a bedtime story at the end of the night I make up a crazy story to go along with the pictures. Sometimes I even skip pages.
I have told grandparents that a teething baby misses them to get a second set of hands. They always enjoy the snuggles, and I get a break.

Do you have a “mom confession” you want to share? Visit the Children’s Advil® Facebook page to share your own confession and see what other moms are saying.

The best lesson I’ve learned as a mom is that sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.

Have you done the same? No judgements, I promise.

Be gentle with yourself

Taking care of a teething baby requires you to be endlessly patient and that takes a toll on you. I wish we would say that more often to new moms when we are sharing teething tips.

In order to be that patient, loving mother that your baby needs, you also have to take care of yourself. That means letting go of a lot of your perfectionism. The dishes can wait. Dinner may come from the freezer. You may have been in your pajamas all day.

What matters is your baby got what he needed from you.

Give yourself something to look forward to

I have a trick that I learned as a new mom running a home daycare and dealing with lots of very long days. I realized that I could get through just about anything if I knew I had something to look forward to at the end of the day.

Some days that meant having a secret stash of my favorite ice cream in the freezer. Others, it meant having a favorite TV show or a new book ready for me to enjoy as soon as the kids went to bed. Find something that really helps you relax after a hard day and when things get tough, remind yourself that you’ll get a break soon.

Enlist help

It is so hard to be patient when you haven’t had a chance to recharge. You have to have something to give. There’s no shame in asking for help.

My sister, who is braving the teething stage with her little one-year-old, pointed out that grumpy babies are always less grumpy for someone else. Pass your teething baby off to a friend or grandparent for a bit. They’ll enjoy the snuggles and you’ll be a much more patient mom once you’ve had a few minutes to yourself.

Get out of the house

Okay, hear me out on this one. I know how hard it is to get out of the house with kids on a good day. Getting out of the house with a teething baby may feel next to impossible. A little distraction goes a long way for both of you though.

Get out and go for a walk, head to the park, or go visit some friends. Your baby will probably forget about her teething pain for a while (and you can forget about your frustration as a mom of a baby with teething pain).

Watch sappy videos

I’m not going to tell you how fast kids grow up and to just live in the moment, because I know that in the moment that feels impossible. I know from experience, though, that it is possible to fake it a bit.

When I’m really struggling to have patience with a teething baby or toddler, I search for super sappy, tug-at-your-heart-strings online videos or movies that make me grateful that I have a teething baby to cuddle.

These are not usually the first videos I gravitate towards on a good day but when I’m struggling, sometimes they can really help you look at the positive side of things.

Mom Confessions – How to Survive those Rough Mom Days