DH has been an arse but I may have overreacted...AIBU or not?

[everybodysang]

I have been away with DD (5) for the weekend. Nowhere terribly exciting, just staying near some friends whose DD was having a birthday party and then we did a few nice things around the place. We had a lovely time.

DH wasn't with us as DSD and DSS were at ours for the weekend. All fine there.

Got home, after DD's bedtime but she really wanted to play a short game with both DH and I before bed, we agreed, he went off to "check on something" and came back 10 minutes later off his face. He'd obviously gone out to smoke a
joint, and he was really, really out of it. I told him it was obvious what was going on and he said he'd better go and lie down. I did shout at him - said he was pathetic.

Put DD to bed and then an hour later he came down, said I was overreacting and that I knew when we got together that he smoked cannabis sometimes.

To put it all into context he does smoke very rarely these days. But a while ago he got into the habit of smoking cannabis substitute he buys online - and I absolutely detest that. It seems so stupid and dangerous to just smoke whatever crap you've bought online.

He says it was cannabis tonight and that it was a bit stronger than he expected. I said I didn't really believe him, but it COULD be true.

I am not really bothered if he has the odd joint, really. I AM bothered that he hadn't seen DD all weekend and then went straight off for a smoke and was then too wasted to play her little game. I don't want her to see him like that. I don't want her to think that's ok. And if it IS synthetic crap he's bought online then I am very bothered about that as he could do himself real harm for such a stupid reason.

The AIBU bit is that I really yelled at him once she was in bed and he came back down. I said I hated him and he'd ruined the weekend for me and I wished I had never met him. Now I am in bed alone and he is in the spare room.

The thing is - I do hate him right now. I am so angry and upset. Is it an overreaction?

Sounds like hes got a problem that needs sorting, this is more than recreational.

If it was me he would not be smoking it in our home especially when kids are home.

You sound so laid back about it!

Im not going to lie both myself (ocassionally) and Dh used to smoke it and he also used to do other recreational drugs aswell. I gave him an ultimatum when we decided to move in together that I Wasnt going to put up with the other stuff and as soon as I fell pregnant I had him stopping the weed. To my knowledge hes never touched anything in around 9 years. And that is why I think there is a bigger issue here

Agree with SGB, a lot of hyterical reactions on this thread.

I don't think you're unreasonable to be pissed off, it was thoughtless and selfish of him.
I do think you went completely over the top with yelling, "I hate you, I wish I'd never met you" etcetera. IMO it was more that he made an error of judgement about a) when to do it and b) the effect it would have on him, rather than him being a really bad person.

He probably did have a smoke last night if he has some; but DSCs are older teenagers and very likely would have been in their rooms or just watching a movie with him so I can't get terribly worked up about that.

So the odds are, being teenagers, that they just might have realised what he was doing? Would their mother have been thrilled about that when they were supposedly in his care and spending time with him?

And why do people compare with drinking wine? Isn't it still illegal?

If he genuinely came back 'off his face' I doubt one joint would do that. I suspect your gut feeling it was the substitute is right. That stuff is evil, I have seen it do horrific things to people.

Classic bad parenting from both dad and mum here. Dad for getting stoned off his tits and mum for condoning it.

This. You are very careful to say that you have no problem with the drugs, and that you wouldn't leave him. So why did you shout at him? You have a huge problem if you are shouting at him over doing something that you are insisting you don't have a problem with.

You didn't set any boundaries over the drugs when you met him, did you? Did you say 'not around the dc'? If not, why are you shouting at him? The two of you are in this together.

I once dated a pothead because I was so liberal and didn't have a problem with people smoking cannabis at all. I soon discovered I had a problem with dating a pothead. It puts you in a difficult position if you say you are fine with the drugs, and then shout at him for smoking a joint. Now I would never tell anyone I'm ok with illegal drugs, because in practice it turns out that I'm bloody well not. Be honest with yourself. Otherwise you are sending mixed messages.

Horrible behaviour around a 5-year-old. Fgs, you need to pull yourselves together.

And no, being a middle-class professional who worked on Saturday doesn't mitigate anything.

He's using synthetic cannabis around his children, it's vile and pathetic. He's not a 'very very good dad', he's being a self-indulgent wanker.

And he is a very, very good father and husband in almost all other respects and he has had a really rather stressful week.

You say this twice. 'In almost all other respects.

So actually, there are other things about him that are not good enough, aren't there?

Look, I have quite the recreational past, but it's just that - a past.

Ducking out to get totally wasted after being asked to play a game with a 5 year old is really pathetic.

But I can see exactly how this will go - you will disappear from the thread in the face of people overwhelmingly pointing out how sub-standard your partner is.

At what point will you mind him taking drugs? When your DD goes into school and tells her teacher her dad can't play with her because he's off his face on drugs? when she tells her friends and their parents won't allow them to visit? When your DD is a pothead like her father?

His behaviour was appalling. Your attitude about not minding him doing drugs and thinking you are overreacting would be your own business if it was only adults in the house, but you have a very young child living there.

Nothing's going to change in your household, I'm wasting my time here. Pray none of your family ever end up in one of Feedmyface's photos.

Normalising drug use by exposing small children to it is not OK. You know it's illegal right?
It's not something a very very good father would do.

Agree with PP. Nothing will change OP so why post?
It's not 'cool' to be so tolerant of drug taking. That he is a 'middle class professional' means nothing. You are both allowing illegal drug use around your children. Well done.

He's a bad parent. Anyone is who puts drugs before their kids.

I say that as a person who used to take a lot of drugs. I wouldn’t consider it now I have ds.

Hello. I haven't disappeared from the thread - I went to sleep and now I am up for work!

Lots to think about... I think the main thing is that I was furious not because he'd had a joint but because he couldn't wait till she's gone to bed. Which I think most of you agree is utterly shit.

He insists it wasn't synthetic cannabis, I have made my feelings on that clear to him. I am not sure if I believe him purely because I don't think he would have seen anyone over the last few days to buy the real stuff. If it is synthetic then we definitely have a problem that goes deeper than this one thing.

I said he was great in 'almost' every other respect as he probably has some faults in his parenting like pretty much everyone else but I couldn't think of anything right at that moment. He is a very involved, caring, engaged dad. Except, you know, for that time when he couldn't play a bloody game with her because he was too stoned - which obviously makes me furious. I can't say that's happened before through - he does usually wait till she's in bed.

He wouldn't have smoked in front of the teenagers, just gone off to the garage then come back in. Their mum, ironically, wouldn't care, she likes a bit of coke and a LOT of cannabis at the weekend. Would they have noticed? I am not sure. I am
also not at all sure he would have actually done that, he's done it maybe once that I can think of (been stoned while they were still up, I mean) but of course I can't say he definitely wouldn't have.

We didn't lay down ground rules when we got together, no. He said he smoked a bit of pot and I didn't care and I still don't. What I do care about, very much, is that he couldn't wait till she had gone to bed.

I mentioned the working lots thing as he does not cope well with stress - he gets filled with self doubt and doesn't sleep well. So I am sure that's why he has done it. He hasn't for months (it's
very obvious when he does as he doesn't smoke otherwise so I can smell/taste it). In fact I think it might have been last summer when he last did.

For those of you think I am a shit parent; well, I hope not but you could be right. I am certainly very upset by those comments, really desperately upset so maybe you are right.

If it is the synthetic stuff, then the LTB'rs may have a point. Otherwise i am not about to leave my relationship over this, as I have said before. I need to figure out how to move on from it.

.. I think the main thing is that I was furious not because he'd had a joint but because he couldn't wait till she's gone to bed.
Sorry OP but that says it all to me. She's 5 and you're ok with him taking illegal drugs with her in the house?

The fact he couldn't even wait until his DD went to bed before he had a joint implies to me he has an addiction. If he's so in control and only does it 'every now and then' why couldn't he have waited half an hour?

You are making ridiculous excuses for him OP.

There's no way I would let anyone take drugs around my child - absolutely not.

I've been around people doing drugs before in my late teens and 20s (pre children). It becomes so "normal" you start to think it's okay - I never did anything myself but I began to think most people did and it was okay. Well it's not. And not everyone does it at all. He's normalising it to you and you're accepting his version of things because it's become your "normal".

I would never ever be with someone who took drugs around my children. Never. Totally irresponsible. Don't let him make you think this is okay and you're being unreasonable because you're really not and it really isn't okay.

The way to "move on" from this is to accept drug use around your children.

It will then escalate until other "middle class professionals" are involved with your family and all your choices about whether to move on, enable, appease a compulsive addict and stand by while he wrecks your family might well be taken away from you.

That'll do it.

So OP if he gets caught buying the shit and gets into trouble with the Police and ended up losing his job you'd be okay with that?

And what the fuck your DH uses and his ex wife uses coke?I hope to God SS catches up with your family I really do for the sake of all the children involved
because it honestly doesn't sound as if any of the adults closely involved with these childrens lifes have normal boundaries.

I say that as someone that had to deal with the fall out in situations like these when I worked with SS and as a Police Officer my DH has also seen lots of the problems it causes!

OP you're not a shit parent at all. Back in the real world and not MN hysteria land I would be if I knew someone had kicked their DH out for smoking a joint once every few months.

But I'm sure the perfect saints of mumsnet will be on soon to tell me how utterly WRONG I am!

I bet he's doing it a LOT more frequently then once every few months and OP is either downplaying it to us or she's got her head in the sand....

This is really grim, like Jeremy kyle grim, poor kids. OP you should really get this sorted. It has social services written all over it

OP I am going through a similar dilemma (completely different situation).

It's easy to look at a situation from the outside and make general comments and make judgements. This is the person you love and you have invested into your relationship. It's not that easy.

You know what's happened is wrong. This has shown you have different boundaries and priorities, trust has been destroyed.

You need to question whether you can put up with that, not the occasional drug use.

Writer if that's the case then maybe OP does have a problem on her hands, but I tend to go on what the OP says as otherwise you're just responding to what you think is going on and what's the point in that if OP's account is accurate?!

AnyFucker and others have went so far as to say that her DH is an addict and her kids are going to be taken away by SS as if that's set in stone! If he really does smoke occasionally and never in front of the kids then that is a completely ridiculous overreaction and so far removed from the real world that I don't even know how to respond to it

Does anyone here really believe that SS routinely remove kids from their parents' care because one parent smokes a joint once every three months?