Jealous of DH

[Bhagira]

DH has gone to a work exhibition and won’t be back till Sunday. In a couple of months he’s going to a conference abroad for a full week. I’m insanely jealous and resentful and I hate him.

We used to work in the same field. Then I got pregnant. I had terrible health problems and birth injuries that resulted in me being off work for over a year. In the end my employer had to let me go because I was off work for too long. Just as I was recovering, the pandemic happened. So as the unemployed parent I had to stay at home with DC while nurseries were closed, and I continued to stay at home until I was double vaccinated because I’m CEV. Then I couldn’t get childcare because due to the pandemic I wasn’t on any local waiting lists for a space, so I had to wait even longer.

I’m trying to reapply for jobs now but between pregnancy and pandemic I’ve been out of the workforce for years. The gap on my CV is being treated very negatively and nobody will hire me. Plus while I’ve been stuck at home, DH has been promoted, so he’s now saying he can’t be flexible for childcare and I’ll have to work around it. Which is going to pretty much ruin my employment prospects, I doubt I’ll be able to retain a job when they find out I have to cover 100% of pickups, dropoffs and sick days.

I’m incredibly unhappy. We agreed that we’d work around having a baby and it wouldn’t impact my career, I’d pop out the baby and go straight back to work, and we’d share the burden equally. But fate had other ideas.

DH left last night and I’ve cried ever since. I’m just so jealous every single day when he goes to work, and I want to go to the exhibition too but I can’t. It’s ruining my marriage - it’s not the same relationship it was when we met as equals. I hate him and I’d rather divorce him than sit here watching him have the career that I wanted.

His rise through the ranks does not make him immune to doing child care or absolve him of balancing travel needs. The only way your career can advance is if he does his job as a father. I understand hating him right now because his attitude is awful.

if he has ever expressed the importance of making sure women are represented in the field, point out this is one of the reasons they struggle, selfish husbands.

he needs to do his half of child care. Travel needs to be taken in turn or child care hired. If he won’t listen to you, you should try explaining this in marriage counseling, because it’s a big enough issue that the end result will likely be divorce. Of course, at that point with 50:50 custody, your child care problem gets taken care of by default.

OP, your posts are alarming. You don't need your husbands permission to get support for your mental health. I don't know anyone who "popped out a baby and snapped back into their old lives and work after a couple of months". No one. If you thought that, you were incredibly naive. Did you take any action against your employer for letting you go following injuries pist birth (which would be discrimination). You need to get back in the driving seat here and stop the "my baby took my life". You need to sort your mental health out and get back to work (if that is what you want). NO ONE is going to help you do it or "step up" as you call it. Its all on you. Fix it

This is the best post on this entire thread.

Unbelievable that posters will defend a man that coercively prevented his wife from getting medical care that she desperately needs.

Unbelievable and utterly shameful.

OP, you poor woman, failed by everyone around you.

What an utter piece of shit you married.

Please go to your GP and tell the truth.
Please ring Women's aid and tell them your story.

You have been through so much, you desperately need support.

I feel so sorry for you

If denying your wife desperately needed medical support after having a baby that nearly killed you, isn't abusive, I really don't know what is.

OP, please call your GP asap for an appointment.

I think social pressure is endemic in Society to have DC .Perhaps this lady is of a different culture so feels it more .But almost everyone, even well known celebrities seem to get asked when they will have a family or a 2nd/3rd child.It seems to be directed especially at women though.No one knows if they will have a difficult birth until it happens! Clearly the situation here is very difficult .Plenty of women are lucky enough to have an easy birth,be back at work and so on .This lady had no reason to think she would be any different! I dont think she hates her baby ,she just resents quite literally "being left holding the baby!"

@wellhelloitsme I don’t know why but feel free to. The OP has a child that she didn’t want before conception, doesn’t want now, feels like the child has fucked her over.

He hasn't "benefitted massively from it", he's had to get on with his life and having to support his new family.

Of course he has benefited. He's been able to progress his career because he has the OP at home doing all the childcare. She's is facilitating his career while he is actively preventing her from progressing hers.

Quite, @brookstar

He also benefits massively by having the child he insisted he wanted, & would care for 50/50 ... without doing ANY of that care!

It's benefitted him so massively that when he saw OP's 'light at the end of the tunnel' moment with getting help for her PND - he prevented her from getting that help, because it would inconvenience him to be told he needed to do more himself.

I suspect he has also isolated OP from friedns & family support with the same coercively controlling stunt about not "admitting" PND.
If OP even still has PND ... she's yet to find out, because she needs a check-up.
Could well be a case of the exhaustion, suppressed rage, & buried resentments,
Could even be physical - she nearly DIED ffs & he is refusing her medical care.

Hi, apologies if I mess up abbreviations (new to MN) but you sound like you might have PTSD surrounding birth trauma which is probably having a significant impact on your current mood. I agree with other posters that you should try and speak to your HV asap or a medical professional. There are mental health services available with shorter NHS waiting lists for post partum issues. Re your husband - I understand how you feel and it is a difficult situation. My husband and I are both doctors and when I had my baby I was in the middle of my PhD. I went back into research at 6 months but would intermittently feel resentful as I felt I did most of the childcare as well as my normal job. I think if you are able to access mental health services for your mood then it will help you manage things with your husband. Good luck

OP Are you the research scientist that posted a few weeks ago?

I can relate to your post-at 30 weeks pregnancy I had a gallstone blocking a duct and needed my gallbladder removed then my pancreas inflamed and I went into ARDS and needed an emergency c-section and was on life support four days. Almost two weeks in hospital three months to recover. (I got MRSA,blood clot and kidney infection) Physical therapy to do normal daily tasks as I was so weak. Our son has severe cerebral palsy. I had hoped to earn an advanced nursing degree but sadly it never happened. My husband kept progressing and is doing well. I only was able to work full time for a few years recently (had been part time on nights and weekends prior). Covid hit I got long Covid and now I'm disabled so life has really thrown a wrench in our lives but you can get bitter or better. There's no shame talking to a therapist and reaching out for help-your post screams you need additional supports. Be brutally honest with your husband but I'd have been a single mom if my husband was a lazy sod like yours! Mine helps out with everything in our home.

Another option is that you could leave him and the baby. My sister in law did exactly that, she left my db with 3 dc.

I do think you need to see your gp about possible pnd, but also, plenty of men just up and leave, you could just grab a bag and leave them to it?

@MzHz - MzHz

To be clear. A woman is allowed to be utterly pissed off and livid about how her life has been ruined and shrunk by an unsupportive man and his ego, without it being labelled as PND.

To be clear, OP herself labelled it as PND.

Agree that she is quite right to be furious too, but it doesn't mean she hasn't got PND.

I think op R Evie g a bit harsh on the H. If hems the only earner currently and op can't get a job due to gaps on her cv (which are down to circumstance nothing more), then it's inherent on him to do well at work and if it's a new role (promotion) it might well be hard for him to say to his work that he has to cut hours to look after the baby. Ideally it would work like that, but the world of work isn't that yet and one of them has to earn (well?) so they can live until op can get work and even up the income a bit. It's then that the H will need to lean in at home more.

Can you retrain Op or do a course to enhance your cv during these baby's years then once the baby is older or you have childcare you can launch yourself back into work? That would add a bit of interest for you-because it seems to me your resentment stems from boredom and I don't blame you. It's hard when one of you is jetting off all over the place and the other stuck at home doing the drudge.
I learned that in my first marriage. In my second my Dh more often than not takes me with him when he goes away if my work/ our kids can be managed. He does his work bit and I get to hang out in a a new City and we just hook up when he's free.
Would that be possible for you at all? Any childcare that could help even for a few days?

He's completely in the wrong by refusing to share responsibility for his own child, especially when you'd agreed previously that it shouldn't affect your career. However, you were both stupidly naïve to think it wouldn't. You can't just 'pop' out a baby and have your life continue uninterrupted. It doesn't work like that. Think you both need a very honest conversation about this. Crying and hating him achieves nothing.

This.

So you became a mother due to societal expectation and family pressure.

Oh dear oh dear oh dear. When will women stop having kids due to the "mothers are better than non-mothers" narrative. Couldn't you have thought for yourself???

Anyway, stop fretting.

It's ONLY 5 years in a life of let's say 80 years and then you'll be free again when your child starts school. That's a tiny fraction of your life.

Do motherhood, swallow your pride, love your child and then do a returners program and you'll jump back.

The problem is now you've become a mother and you can't turn back the clock. You will have to bide your time. As far as I can see the only sensible way to do that is to join a returners program and usually you have to have been a Mum for at least 2 years, some want more time. That's even the full 5! You're onto a winner here!

In the meantime, why don't you get ahead and start an MSc or masters or something to put you WELL ABOVE your husband once you restart.

You could use this time to great advantage, love your child, be a great Mum and win all round.

I'd stop seeing it as poor hand you've been dealt and start to make lemonade. Your poor child as well. You've bought the poor blighter into this world. Now - what about it and its well-being? how are you going to ensure you don't add to the very long list of fucked up people on this planet?

We agreed that we’d work around having a baby and it wouldn’t impact my career, I’d pop out the baby and go straight back to work, and we’d share the burden equally. But fate had other ideas.

It isn't fate - it's your DH being totally self-centred and oblivious of his advantage.

Does he know how strongly you feel; that this is making you consider divorce?

You poor thing though - I just want to give you a big hug.

You think OP is being 'a bit harsh' on a bloke she says this about?

DH said he’d leave me if I sought treatment. Because he didn’t want social services interfering in our lives and he wasn’t having his child taken away.

This is coercive control. She's not being harsh for starting to see how abusive he has been.

You think OP is being 'a bit harsh' on a bloke she says this about?

DH said he’d leave me if I sought treatment. Because he didn’t want social services interfering in our lives and he wasn’t having his child taken away.

This is coercive control. She's not being harsh for starting to see how abusive he has been.

I had only read the op. Now I've read the update I've changed my mind. He's a wanker.

😂😂😂
Apologies OP & @warofthemonstertrucks but this made me guffaw.

OP I hope you can at least get a wry, dark-humoured giggle out of it.
I hope you are doing OK today, & that you are finding good nuggets of advice & support in your thread.

None. DH said he’d leave me if I sought treatment. Because he didn’t want social services interfering in our lives and he wasn’t having his child taken away.

@Bhagira your husband is abusive. This is bordering on coercive control, and financial abuse.

I can't believe all the handmaidens on this thread, minimising the utter arseholery of your husband.

You sound on the edge: please seek help. And start to make a plan for your future, which does not include him. There is lots of really good advice on this thread, but please don't listen to those excusing your husband or blaming you. Try to pull out the advice here and ignore those who blame or admonish you.

But I think you may have to start to make your peace with the fact that your life has changed, and start to plan for your future in this new framework. Without your husband.

This is why we need a feminism that recognises the costs of children for women and instead of forcing them to make the choice of no children or children & no independent career - a choice men do not have to make.

Did you take any action against your employer for letting you go following injuries pist birth (which would be discrimination)
You can’t extend maternity leave beyond 52 weeks. If you’re still unable to return to work at that point you can be sacked. It’s not discrimination and the employer isn’t liable.

She does NOT have to preface the post with how much she loves her child and that it is well cared for. She doesn't have to establish that to justify her feelings. This isn't about her baby. It's about her impact of the baby on her life, which does NOT preclude loving the baby and being an excellent mother. All of those saying they feel so sorry for the baby are making me furious and people who have the limited literacy to read "I have been screwed over by this baby" and not get from context that she means the life changes, not the baby himself, are also infuriating. You have no evidence - none - for saying that the baby is not loved and excellently cared for. OP is seeking advice on a forum where she thought she could be honest.

This is why mothers can't talk about this stuff. Because if a woman is honest, people shit on her and call her a bad mother. Unless she begins with all the lovey dovey stuff about how much she loves her baby which, most of us know all about that anyway. You can love your child and still feel everything the OP is feeling here. How about we start from the perspective - not that all women love their kids, because we know sadly some don't or can't show it, but that expressing difficulties and frustrations does not automatically mean a poster does not care for her children as much as you do for yours.

As for those going on about the privilege of being able to stay home and make the most of it...no. OP is not you. She doesn't have to want what you want. And how you can say that to a woman who is being controlled by her unpleasant DH, I don't really know.

Well said 👏