to feel resentful I’ve used my AL for childcare while DH saves his for child-free time?

well, she didn't and here she is. So if she wants change, she clearly needs to articulate that.

Well now you know he isn't the type of husband and father that willingly wants to spend time with his wife and children so you can now have a discussion about fairness and sort out next year's leave between you now so there's no fucking about on his end.

OP - this reads like one of those first time parents mistakes and the assumption you have both made that childcare is your job. You were on mat leave so DC was your job, then you sorted nursery and you automatically booked off the time nursery wasn’t available because you assumed “my job”.

so a chat needs to be had - “darling I covered the week nursery was shut this year, next Christmas we need to split it between us.”

don’t default to it being your job. He has to be involved in discussing solutions eg “DS isn’t going to be well enough for nursery tomorrow, what shall we do?” Don’t make it always your job to think through the issues and think of the solutions.

So going forward it needs to be a discussion. You ask him what he's planning on covering this coming year, because you need complete days off and then you figure out your plans for all three of you, to do together. It's very common after ML, that Dads have to be reminded about doing their share.

Its jan 1st... sit down and do what hundreds of thousands of UK parents do and plan your AL for the year together against nursery closure.

Qs part of that tell him you need days off - or take yourself off at the weekend and just tell him its happening.

Start prempting child sickness now and be clear you insist he covers at least 50% as if you lose your job everyone is fucked. And tell him it like that verbatim.

He is being a twat but you are being a wet lettuce.
Read him the riot act.

I also recommend you talk to your employer about buying annual leave (its normally a week) if you can buy it and say sweet FA to your husband.

Also be less honest about taking time off.
I cant take time off in April (or whatever). You have to cover today i have a big meeting.
He isnt going to know the difference

The problem is the OP. If a grown man needs to be told to take time off to care for his kids then he is a pathetic excuse of a father.

Well, you have been on a bit of a learning curve and now you know.
Don't assume: discuss. And don't just go with "well i have the big paying job" bollocks.

The child was created by both of you, and therefore it falls on both of you to do the things that need to be done.

Use a joint calendar and make sure that you are both picking up the slack. Sometimes you will need to do a bit more, sometimes your DH can do a bit more. You both presumably know when your work needs to be prioritised?

Also while you talk about this: your child will grow, you may possibly add a second etc. Their needs change. Now is the time to start thinking about how that will affect you both in terms of things that need to be done. Make loose plans now.

You need to be proactive. Mine are older now so it’s not an issue but back when they were small I’d work out a rota in December and give it to DH to request the time off for the following year. No ifs, no buts, they’re your kids too, this is when you need to be off.

I sympathise @CrazyCatMom and I really don’t like all the passive aggressive ‘so when you discussed it with him, what did he say?’ type posts.

I am a teacher so most definitely have this issue. Every holiday I end up wrung out and exhausted and DH is just fine because he can actually take leave and get a proper break from hen he wants, safe in the knowledge school holidays are covered. It’s one of many things I didn’t think of before having children, or if I did assumed that I’d be delighted to spend more time with my children, or something stupid like that.

I think it is interesting that so many people think the OP should have communicated with her DH more clearly. I am pretty sure he is aware of the situation and is pretty happy with the set-up.

OP - get a calendar set-up and marked with days where childcare is required. Then divvy it up between the two of you. Make sure you also have equal child free AL. Do the same with household tasks.

Leave him an enormous list of household jobs that he needs to do on the grounds that you have been "too busy with childcare" to do them yourself. No reason why he can't get ahead on the chores on his day off.

I hope dh is doing both nursery runs tomorrow

While you sit and produce a fairer schedule..
Remind him if you split he will be organising 50/50 care then so why not do it now? .

It’s obviously unfair but if you never had a discussion about it, you are unreasonable to be so resentful. Obviously you need to sit him down and explain that he can’t keep his annual leave for personal holidays while you use yours for childcare, it has to be shared fairly.

I mean surely this is something you talk about. DH and I sit down at the beginning of the year and work out what needs covering and who will do it (we did it 2 days ago).

I can understand you assuming he was going to book time off if that's what happened in the past.

Could you look ahead and work out which days are going to need covering in the near future, and get him to do those? Does the nursery close at all on bank holidays or anything like that?

If not then I think you need to say you found this Christmas quite lonely and next year it needs to be shared.

YANBU to feel frustrated at this but YABU not to have discussed it beforehand. Surely once you knew the nursery was closing over Christmas you should have discussed with your husband splitting the days off.

You can only be annoyed about this if you discussed it and he refused to take time off to help. If you just did it yourself without a conversation then it’s not really his fault, although it is rubbish that both of you consider you to be the default parent

you need to have the conversation now about how he will need to use his annual leave this year covering any child illnesses etc to make it fair.

I had one of these husbands. Unless we were going on holiday as a family, he expected me to cover the school holidays. He said it was a waste of his annual leave to use it for childcare! He also expected me to do all the school runs and ferrying around as his job was too important. He was a middle manager ffs.

The resentment gradually chipped away at our relationship and I left him when DS was 17. To this day he still doesn’t understand why I divorced him.

You should’ve discussed this when the time came to book Christmas leave, ideally. Lesson learnt about martyrdom and resentment.

You can turn this around, it’s only LTB time if he refuses to play ball in future.

Yes. It is grossly unfair. Sit down this week and work out when you will both take leave all through 2026. And make sure you get an extra dose of time to yourself this weekend.

Is it just 1 toddler?

Hardly a big deal, you're complaining about looking after your own child for 4 days, broken up with a weekend and a grandparents day?! Did you actually want children.

Seems like your own fault for booking the days off instead of sitting down and saying Dc has 4 days to cover, shall we do 2 together and 1 each separately? Easy.

You say it wasn’t a discussion because you didn’t have to think about it last Christmas. But as soon as you started thinking about this Christmas, why didn’t you have a discussion? Where is the communication?

Re second post. Ok. So he doesn’t want to spend time with either of you. What are your options?

I’d suggest you sit down this week and work out together how you are going to use for leave this year. Particularly important once school starts and one of you will need to take days off to cover sickness as well as school holidays.

Just tell the lazy spoilt man child to step the fuvk up and DO NOT get pregnant again