DH was being an arse, then fell down stairs and I have no sympathy

This is the dressing gown of doom scenario. We all know when our DPs are genuinely ill and need serious TLC. We also recognise the dressing gown of doom.

If he’s been injured, I’m sure OP would have been encouraging him to stay still, catch his breath and calling the ambulance if needed. She actually got him an ice pack.

She just didn’t immediately forget the previous hour to fawn over him as he’d have preferred.

Sorry, OP, but this really made me laugh 😂

God, he sounds childish and pathetic - not just the inability to deal with minor pain like an adult, but the refusal to take responsibility for his own words and actions. He knows he fucked up with your DD and instead of just apologising like an actual grown up, has manufactured a little ‘poor me’ dramatic tableau in hopes of brushing it under the carpet.

I also have a drama llama DH. To be fair it’s only when he’s genuinely hurt himself, but his outbursts are mortifyingly over the top and a standing joke in the family.

But he’s never refused to apologise to the kids when he’s been out of order, because he’s not a dick when it comes to his responsibilities as an adult and a parent.

My partner did this once. I threw a T shirt at him, he pretended to be thrown off balance (for drama / injured party points), then actually did lose his balance, a look of surprised horror passed across his face, he fell down the stairs, and a step ladder fell on him.

He came up for air with a bleeding head expecting to be babied, but I was absolutely furious. I saw quite clearly that he had purposely ‘pretended’ to lose his balance. He could have broken his neck. He eventually admitted that I was right, he had been dramatic and it backfired. What a knobhead. It was a running joke/dig for a while. He felt very silly.

Soooo familiar with the dramatics when they do something wrong my ex weaponised it but I have seen it in people less abusive they basically feel like they are losing control or a situation or they can't stand being "the bad one" that they go all out for sympathy it's childish immature and definitely a holdover from when they were growing up

Ignoring it is fine check for a real injury tell them to dust themselves off and walk away

If you actually think there's a possibility that your DP fell down the stairs on purpose in order to gain sympathy after calling your daughter a bitch, that's pretty massive imo. It's extremely manipulative.

Ignore all the men on here minimising op. Your dh is harming your dd. If my dh ever called my dd such a name his bags would be packed and he would be gone.

I see the underlying patterns perfectly. I'm quoting her words to you and you are ignoring them because they don't fit in with your narrative. She calls him a "good man" and YOU say she calls him a "child abuser". Show me where she says this. Or are you going to ignore this request of mine to back up what you said again?

Doesn’t sound like a wonderful man or partner or parent at all. @Caplin if you think he could’ve faked it - that means you must think he’s pretty much morally bankrupt.

also not apologising to daughter …. WOW

I am afraid I disagree with the majority here.

First off, he didn’t call her a bitch, he said she was ‘being a bitch’. That is talking about her behaviour, not her. I am not saying it is OK, but it is very different.

So the reality is that a decent guy used a misogynistic word, immediately realised he was wrong, and tried to apologise but his daughter had (not unreasonably) left.

This could have been left between daughter and father, he probably would have (and will) apologise in the morning. No major drama.

Separately, the poor guy fell down six stairs (really quite a big fall) and was treated coldly by his wife when he lay there in shock.

OP, you sound like your husband’s (rather cold and unkind) mother the way you condescendingly speak about him. Rather than worrying why your 40 year old husband, whom you claim to care about, regularly falls, you say he should develop more core strength!

It is a very modern thing to try to judge someone’s entire character on one word. Everyone uses the wrong words from time to time. Tone and context matter a lot. I doubt most here would like to be judged that way.

😂 she's told him she's cancelling it. And if she doesn't thats.... worse? She's trying to control him through manipulation.

i'm sorry you are unable to see underlying context and wider patterns and implications, it must be why you haven't reached a higher level position where you manage generationz and know what I'm talking about 💐

So you don't know what happened, you're speculating. And then lying "Op has cancelled a family dinner and is on here calling him a child abuser."

OP ASKED if she should cancel lunch. "I think he felt my general disdain for his fall when he said he was Ok and whether I should cancel his family"
And OFFERED "I offered to cancel Easter Sunday lunch with his family tomorrow and he said yes (we are cooking).

And where does she say he is a child abuser? Do you always make things up? If so it's no wonder you find it hard to work with people.

Your ‘d’h is openly abusing your dd, then pretending to hurt himself to garner sympathy and attention. Why are you still living there? Wtaf op.

OP on the question of 'did he throw himself down the stairs or what?' Have a look at Freud's 'psychopathology of everyday life'.

He describes precisely this kind of accident/performance, and characterises the way they're suspended between intentional action and accidental clumsiness very well.

My mother once fell down stairs and broke her leg, rather than face up to the fact that by her own declared standards, she ought to confront her partner over how he was treating my sister. People do this kind of thing....

Hope your Easter meal turns out OK anyway.

True he should apologise, sounds like OP has been ignoring him and giving him the silent treatment which is definitely abuse so she should probably apologise first as that's a lot worse than saying a low level swear word.

apologies all round 👏

I offered to cancel Easter Sunday lunch with his family tomorrow and he said yes (we are cooking). I won’t as I know he was being a ham.

OP never threaten something you are not going to carry out - it's manipulative.

All these gymnastics to try and excuse a man for finding 'sorry' so impossible to say.

Someone who never admits when he's made a mistake will be horrible to live with. Nobody's saying he's an axe murderer ffs. But we teach children to apologise, even if they hurt someone by accident.

The bar for men IS on the floor, so true.

Sorry, I haven’t read it all but it’s making me laugh! 🤣

Her daughter handled it perfectly- by removing herself from the situation and not watching their shared programme together.

You're acting like there's some kind of statute of limitations on apologies. He can make one now, today. He's behaved wrongly in lots of ways: calling his daughter a bitch, trying to make her come to him for an apology (controlling bullshit), not going to her, the performative falling bollocks to try and make himself the victim (DARVO) and his continued refusal to apologise.

I'm speculating, but I imagine he was like: it was just a joke', the teen took it badly and stormed off (we've all been there' and istead if being like: this is a bit silly, Op has cancelled a family dinner and is on here calling him a child abuser

whispering something inaudible under your breath when your DC/DH/DM/DF is pissing you off is something entirely different and that is clearly not what happened here

my father never called me a bitch in my hearing & neither has my DH. I thought that was completely normal and how it should be and yet somehow that now renders me a Pearl clutcher

the bar is on the floor

And if he apologised immediately you may have a point, but he didn't.

It's not fine if he's screaming it at her for knocking over a cup, but sounds like they were messing about and being silly and it slipped out while they were having fun? And now everyone's treating him like an axe murderer?

I've whispered 'knobheads' when my kids are actung up, shoukd they throw away the key?

The ridiculous pearl clutching on this thread illustrates perfectly why generation Z and younger are an absolute nightmare to manage at work. A low level swear word slipping out in jest is a life altering trauma that the dad needs to throw himself down the stairs to atone for 😂

doesn't sound like a happy home for a child to be growing up in to be fair

Couldn't agree more. I feel sorry for the daughter.

What is interesting about this post is that OPs question is "AIBU to think he is a drama king and have literally no time for his shit….or am I being an uncaring wife?"
The "good man" calling his 13 year old daughter a bitch is not even what she's asking for advice about, it's just whether she should be fawning over her foul husband.

A good man doesn’t call his teen daughter a bitch
a good man doesn’t call any woman a bitch
a good mother doesn’t think a man is “good” if he calls her daughter a bitch