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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to completely change the DCs routine against DPs wishes?

206 replies

LissaLoves · 15/04/2016 12:43

Our DC are 8, 4 and 15 months.

DP leaves at 6.15 am so he can go to the gym or do his hobby before work. He returns at 6.45 pm. Currently we all eat as a family at 6.45 but it then means that the kids are always in bed later than I'd like - usually 9/9.30. I take the older two up and he watches baby downstairs then I feed him to sleep too.

They are always happy in the evening but I have to wake them all at 7.30 ready to leave at 8.10 and they all struggle to get up and say they're tired. It's always rushed and hectic and sometimes we're late for school/nursery.

I want to start waking all DC at 7. Have tea around 5.15 because middle DC has SN and takes at least an hour to eat. I want to eat with them and have them in bed for 8. DP complains that he'll have to get home and sort his own food while I sort the DC and that he won't see them all week. However, he hardly does anything with them when they're up late anyway - just spectates while I play with them and I don't think it's fair on them to always be tired and rushed in the morning for the sake of having tea with him.

Aibu?

OP posts:
Artandco · 15/04/2016 13:25

Giles - I would assume by 4 and 8 a child can eat without getting mess everywhere. At most wipe face. So bathing first saves an hour later as everyone hair washed, dry and in pjs. 15 month old put long sleeve bib over pjs. It's dinner, not a chimps tea party

PoodlesOfFun · 15/04/2016 13:25

The kids don't like him and he doesn't seem to like the kids much.

Change it as you wish. Otherwise he can get up with them in the mornings and skip his fucking hobby

diddl · 15/04/2016 13:25

Bloody hell!

I remember being at 2ndry school & having a 9 O'clock bedtime-voluntarily!!

I've never really understood making kids wait for their meal until dad gets in.

purplevase · 15/04/2016 13:25

If you eat at 6.45 why do the kids go to bed at 9? Can't they be ready for bed, ie bathed and pyjama-ed, eat and then go to bed about an hour later so around 8? Does it really take nearly 3 hours to eat a meal? If so can I come to your house because you clearly cook a a magnificent repast!

Scooterloo · 15/04/2016 13:25

What is the point of him at all?

Ciggaretteandsmirnoff · 15/04/2016 13:27

I've never really understood making kids wait for their meal until dad gets in

Me either.

PoodlesOfFun · 15/04/2016 13:29

Also, don't have any more kids with this guy.

PeppermintPasty · 15/04/2016 13:29

Oh I just hate this! He is a lazy manchild, how do you stand it?

Actually, I get why you stand it, I suspect you are bloody ground down with it.

Good god, what if (God forbid) you dropped dead or broke a bone or whatever? What a ridiculous man.

It's not normal, and you are so far from BU that it's not funny.

It feels like the tip of the iceberg. How do you get on with him generally?

BadDoGooder · 15/04/2016 13:30

I have to say your DP sounds massively selfish. My DP is out of the house lots, but its work not hobbies or gym.
We have a 4yr old, DP leaves the house at 6am for work, gets back roughly 7pm. DS has dinner about 5 to 6 ish. When DP gets in he gets DS into PJs, does teeth etc and plays with him while I sort our dinner. DS will then sit with us at the table, and either share a bit of our food, or have some toast or something as a bedtime snack.
We both take it in turns to do bedtime, it was always me until I stopped BFing, as he still fed to sleep at 3yrs! But when we stopped DP got involved straight away!

Your DP needs to buck his ideas up, and stop being so pathetic.

JugglingBabies · 15/04/2016 13:31

YANBU. DH can work long hours, but appreciates that our young DC's need healthy routine with plenty of sleep. If he is home in time he reads them their nighttime story. Then he at least manages a little quality time.

Gileswithachainsaw · 15/04/2016 13:31

Doesn't save an hour those does it. cos she's still entertaining kids when she could be clearing up as they eat dinner earlier. so as soon as kids are bathed and in pyjamas she's pretty much free then as soon as they all in bed by 7-8

instead she's got to clear up at 8 and not sitting down til after 9.

what's the point.

MyLocal · 15/04/2016 13:33

Eat early.

It is a fact of life that many fathers (and some mothers) don't see much of their DC during the week due to work, long commutes etc. As long as he makes up for it on a weekend, it won't affect them.

My DH has eaten a reheated evening meal almost every evening for years and years.

BoatyMcBoat · 15/04/2016 13:38

What exactly is you dh bringing to family life? To you? To the children?

Artandco · 15/04/2016 13:39

But after 6.45pm her Dh is home, so he should be helping with clearing up and bedtimes for 8pm bed. If op does everything early and in bed by 7pm then she has all dinner, tidying, baths, stories and bed by herself. Making bedtime earlier than 9.30pm is fine, but I wouldn't make everything so early the Dh gets out of doing even less

potap123 · 15/04/2016 13:40

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JellyBabiesSaveLives · 15/04/2016 13:40

And when do you fit in your 90 minutes a day of gym/hobby time?

Gileswithachainsaw · 15/04/2016 13:41

It's not just the practicalities either. there's the behaviours to consider.

Kids get tired and cranky my towards that time. it's not a time to be trying to feed them.

a bath helps relax them and wind them down befire bed. eating refuel and combined with the younger twos probable over tiredness at that time, is going to result in harder work. as they will be on their second wind and running rings round her.

it's also more uncomfortable to go to bed having just eaten. so could result tin them going to sleep significantly later than they need.

all so their dad can watch them for n hour and not even interact.

stuff that

Gileswithachainsaw · 15/04/2016 13:41

But he doesn't so it's all on her.

and she's having to do it all much later than she could be and getting no time fir herself.

Gileswithachainsaw · 15/04/2016 13:42

besides it's about the kids. what's best fir them.

keeping them up to eat with daddy isn't.

WizardOfToss · 15/04/2016 13:46

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

museumum · 15/04/2016 13:47

Personally I really like family evening meal where at all possible. For me 6:45 is just on the cusp of possible. But if everyone helped with bath and bed then all could be sleeping by 8:30. Still on the later side of usual but an hour earlier than at present.
It's daft that you're essentially doing two bedtime shifts one after the other when there's another parent available.

NoSquirrels · 15/04/2016 13:54

Eh, we sometimes all eat together at 6.45pm, having done an earlier bath & kids in PJs as Art suggests. Similar ages to OP, no great clean up of PJs or faces required unless someone's spilled something disastrous (can't remember this happening but guess it must sometimes). One parent then cleans up whilst the other supervises teeth, stories & bed by 8ish. So it's not a bad plan if you wanted to preserve the evening meal.

But the OP's problem is not really how late the DC eat or how to achieve a family meal but that her husband is generally unhelpful and perhaps more than a little selfish, and needs to step up and inconvenience himself a little for the greater good.

TreadSoftlyOnMyDreams · 15/04/2016 13:57

Er no. YANBU. He chooses to have no role as a parent in your home and in his children's lives and therefore he does not get a choice.

The difficulty is that he struggles to cope and gets stressed with one child, let alone three.
I'm not surprised. From your description it's not like he gets any practice.

StarUtopia · 15/04/2016 13:57

staggered at the shit some men get away with

Just this.

He 'hobbies' every day?? Bloody hell. When, incidentally, do you get to 'hobby'?

He sounds like a selfish twat. Sorry. But I wouldn't even dream of doing a routine to suit his needs. He doesn't get a say imo.

landrover · 15/04/2016 13:59

Well, I have a 13 year old. She is ravenous when she gets home. Even after a snack I would do well to hold off tea to the very latest 5.30. So it won't get easier when they are older. My husband and I work from home but she still gets fed earlier that us (we would rather eat 6.30 to 7). We wouldn't dream of making her eat later, plus going to bed with a full tummy? yeuch what a horrible and unhealthy idea. (her bedroom light go off at 9.30)