DH ignoring our son

Don’t be daft, nothing in my response is about being a doormat.

The OP stopped a discussion with her son (one he had started with her as he had concerns) to criticise her husband and then allowed it to effectively turn into an argument, thereby not focusing on her son (which is what she was criticising him for in the first place) and creating an unpleasant dynamic for her son.

As I say, no phones at table. The husband was clearly in the wrong first. But that doesn’t make the OP’s actions correct in the moment: The correct response was to raise it later when the son wasn’t around.

Not necessarily. It might have just meant that your child wanted to tell you as well as his dad.

NC4this222 · Yesterday 22:35

So I should have ignored DH scrolling and brought it up later?

Yes, of course. If you wanted input on it from your dh, who had already heard it, why did that require your dh to hear it again? Honestly, parents in sole charge of a child shouldn't be ignoring them to go on their phone, but that doesn't mean that two present parents both need to collectively hang on the words of their child at every moment. Children repeat things a lot!

DH is rude and shouldn’t be using his phone at the table.

Doesn’t he know what children are like ? Stuff like this would be discussed with me, discussed with dad when he got home and probably discussed at bedtime, when he woke up and on the way to school. It seems small to an adult but how can he not fake some concern and pretend to listen to a story that he’s heard ? It really shows how little he knows children, cares about his children and how little time he listens to his thoughts and worries.

we are really desperate to excuse men and criticise women aren’t we

dh has apparently listened really well for hours. He didn’t ease the small child’s worries and made it clear in front of the child he was sick of hearing about his worries. but we’re apparently assuming he listened really well before that and offered help and advice and made the child feel supported. Or we don’t expect that of dh, I’m not sure which.

op on the other hand has not listened at all, she only interrupted, she brought her child’s attention to dh not paying attention, she needs to learn to resolve the issue alone or she is an idiot or controlling, she was looking for an argument and handled it wrong because she is combative and bossy, she needs to be fair and take her turn at - the awful task of - listening to their child and to teach her child (like dh is apparently already doing so well) that the world doesn’t revolve around them and their problems.

its really odd. We expect perfection from women and seek out any minor little thing men do well. I’m so sad for all the dc who apparently can expect this treatment at home too.

Your husband listened , at least once (whether he dealt with it properly I don’t know) , to your child’s worry. Yes he was a prick later , however…

When it was your “turn” , you interrupted your child , told his dad off and drew attention to the fact that he wasn’t paying attention properly. Your feelings right then and there were more important than your child’s feelings/worries.

Pot meet kettle.

@NC4this222

Yes you should have brought it up later.

You sound really combative.

Agree with crazzynut, you do seem snappy, and that's putting it very politely. Also controlling (and no, I'm not a man either).

I think your partner had great patience for how he dealt with you trying to boss him around.

Noone should be looking on their phone during dinnertime. But you didn't handle this one well @NC4this222 . Your son is talking about something important to him that you haven't heard about. Instead of listening to him and validate his feelings you are focussing on what your dh is doing and calling him out on it. By doing this you have

1. Showed your son that you think that what his dad is doing is more important than listening to him when he's upset about something.
2. Made your son aware about his father not paying attention which he wouldn't have cared about if you had been listening. You should have talked to your dh afterwards when ds wasn't listening.

👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

Exactly

Your husband's reaction gave the impression that he finds your son's problems trivial and boring. I probably wouldn't have pulled him up on it in front of your son because in doing so you drew attention to it. But children need to feel that their parents care about their problems. If your son learns at the age of five that your husband doesn't care about his little kid problems, by the time he's 15 he won't want to share his big kid problems.

It's very easy to scroll your phone at the dinner table. Smart phones are like a drug for most people. But I am trying really hard to put mine down and be more present for my children.

Shouldn’t have phones at the table.
Rule number ONE.

Your DH is apparently unaware of how important it is for children(especially very young children) to feel they are being heard.
It’s also really important as they reach school age for them to know that they can tell you anything and everything and you will listen. It’s great when they need to repeat stories too, as each version usually throws up different information.
Your DH may genuinely just not understand this, in which case have a chat with him about it. If he DOES understand it, but was just being an arse, then that’s a different problem.

But, as I said, first rule - no phones at the table!

I think the most obvious aspect to be taken from this is that the OP states that her son was worried about something specifically which is what everyone is so keen to overlook for some reason. I’m sure if he was just repeating random facts or talking about his interests for example then the OP wouldn’t have been so annoyed.

OP what your DH has effectively done here is show your son that instead of using the opportunity to team together with you and reassure DS of his anxieties over his friendship instead that his phone is more important and interesting to him than comforting him. Totally undermining your poor DS feelings when he’s upset.

I don’t think it does matter how many times he’s heard it or not. He’s a young child who feels like he needs emotional support from the two main/ constant people in his life. Five year olds don’t have a very complex understanding of emotions and can’t articulate their feelings well which is why when they’re worried they will seek reassurance by repeating themselves. A small problem can often become a huge anxiety for a young child and surely the best thing to do would be to give them the time and reassurance to help them feel better and make him feel heard and secure about things? Friendships can be such an enormous task to navigate for children as well. He’s tiny in the grand scheme of things and it wouldn’t have hurt your DH to sit down with you and help him work through his feelings and understand how to sort the problem he was worried about. Not difficult is it? In fact that’s pretty basic in my books.

Did your DH offer up the advice that he had already given to your son about the problem prior to you coming home OP?

This, i would have listened first then if I needed to spoke to dh later i don't see the need to make it more complicated

And separately he is a grown up if he wants a phone at the dinner table he can

I'm with your DH. He already knew about it and this was DS telling you.

They like to repeat themselves at that age.

It's not a horrible dynamic - sitting back and saying nothing while DS is ignored is a horrible dynamic for DS. Don't be such a doormat and speak up.

Neither one of you should be undermining each other in front of the child. If you spoke to him the way you laid it out here, it does sound nasty and almost authoritative.

I wish a man would tell me to put my phone down and pay attention as if I was a damn child myself. TBF I don’t think he should’ve been on his phone but a simple conversation about it later would’ve sufficed.

I don’t agree she was upset her dh was ignoring her son which was disrespectful to both his wife and child imo

I think if he had heard it before it was your turn. Then reassure DS that you will talk about it and speak to him later. Mine like to unload on whoever is collecting them, be reassured and then tell which of us hasn’t heard when they get in. Then (more often me) will suggest how to resolve issue or email school or whatever. We sometimes disagree but try to do that when DC is not in hearing distance.

Phones shouldn't be at the table.

DH has heard it repeatedly and has nothing more to add.

Why can't you offer your son advice based on your own gut or, if you truly need genuine support, ask your husband for his view on something specific?

I love my kids but god love them they can be like a broken record sometimes. If your husband says he has paid attention and dealt with it at the time, that's his answer. As I said, I'm love my kids but adults cannot be reasonably expected to respond enthusiastically like it's the first they've heard of it when it's the tenth time. You were there. You were giving it importance.

The problem was the phone at the table.

🤔

What’s so hilarious?

It’s not a double standard. His dad had listened to him, we assume, earlier in the day about the same thing several times. It would have been different if the child was directly addressing the dad.

And cutting across the child to chastise the dad is not great either!

Banning phones at the dinner table and not criticising each other openly in front of the kids (while the kids are talking!) is surely the way to resolve this.

😂😂

It’s also good for children to learn that it’s rude to start scrolling through a phone when someone’s talking to you, especially at the dinner table.