To think DH should not teach our daughter that she can come to him if shes not happy with my parenting.

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DD is 3.7 years old. We just have the one child.

DD has got into a habit of telling dh tales on me when she thinks im in the wrong and he will come and bollock me in front of dd.

Simple things like if dd is not doing as she is told and i send her to the naughty step and she then refuses to go i will take her there myself. In order to do this i need to take her by the hand or arm and lead her there.

She will scream etc that i have hurt her even when i have barely touched her. After coming off the naughty step she will go straight to dh and tell him i hurt her arm.

Dh comes to me in front of dd and wants an explanation of the situation. If he feels im wrong he will tell me this infront of dd.

I do not like this as i feel dd is starting to understand that daddy will tell mummy off if i go to him.

I ve asked dh not to do this but he says he cant ignore and not act on something she tells him.

Another incident today is that i was trying to get dds attention and she wasnt responding to me as she was engrossed in something so i tapped her on the arm as you would to get someones attention and she then went straight to dh telling him i had pinched her.

I ve asked dh to back me up when she goes to him but he says he cant do that.

I feel that dd thinks im on the same level as her like her pre school friends.

It is worth mentioning that dh was badly physically and emotionally abused by his father (he has now no contact) who always told him to not tell tales on him etc. So he feels that he has to listen and act on things dd tells him as he knows what its like to not be able to tell people if your parent does something to you that you dont like.

Aibu to think dh should back me up in front of dd but then speak to me afterwards if hes not happy with the situation?

The reason dh doesnt back me up is because he doesnt agree with my side of the story and he feels i teach dd the wrong things sometimes and he doesnt want dd thinking the wrong things i do is right and if he backs me up he says hes teaching her the wrong things i do is right and thats not the message he wants to give her.

Sound like he is being very deliberate in undermining you then - he is right and your place is in the wrong and your DD has to be taught that.

No idea how you get round that .

Our conflicts are decided between us then we do a united front though there are not that many conflicts - we have more discussions on the way forward and we don't have the view the other is just wrong - more they have different concerns from the other.

Happy

He has put her on the naughty sept before now and yes she does complain about him!!

I dont really want to go into the nature of dhs job but work calls happen very frequently. He juggles the work load with an employee of ours but dh does the bulk of the work.

Its the way the household works unfortunatly and to compromise on it where dh helps more would mean a massive drop in household income.

I am going to speak to dh about therapy this evening.

Oh god . This sounds like my mum (badly parented) who undermines my parenting, am a lp. You have my sympathy.

We need to sort this out.

Im going to research the way forward to this

HappyNevertheless is right though.

My DH is very involved and has an appreciation that of how hard things can be not a theoretical knowledge. Some of that was building up his confidence to do things with our children because he had less time with them than I did to build that - and sometime that did mean getting out the way so he had to learn - being physically somewhere else so he couldn't mange to gradually hand them back.

"So he feels that he has to listen and act on things dd tells him as he knows what its like to not be able to tell people if your parent does something to you that you dont like."

But that's the thing-it's fine to listen, but he needs to know that he can't just always take her side.

It's awful that he is more willing to believe that you pinch her than that she is lying/exaggerating.

He really needs help & he's not doing your daughter any good at all especially if it will mean that she won't trust you & only him.

But he isn't working 7 days a week is he?
So he CAN do bedtime at the weekend. He can look after his dd during that time too. ON his own.

What did you say when she complained about him?

Oh so he's a back seat parent, happy to point out where you are supposedly going wrong but never takes the wheel himself. How long are you prepared to standby and watch him and your interactions with him, damage your relationship with your daughter.

This is serious OP, you have one fucked up family dynamic which will only get worse over time. He needs professional help to work through his past and to stop making excuses for checking out of parenting his daughter.

He does work 7 days yes.

Anyway..

I cant remember what i said when she complained about him as it was so long ago.

We had a long chat about this the other night but when she came to him today he said to me as she was crying on her knee "i dont know what to say to her now without her thinking its right what you did"

I think he needs some counselling, and then you both need to do a parenting course together so that you are on the same page.

If a child thinks they can play one parent off against the other, they will. That's bad for them. And teaching them that parents can't be trusted to set good boundaries and act in their interests is corrosive.

It's normal for parents to disagree on parenting style, but your DH is making that your daughter's problem, and he's also undermining her respect for you in behaving as though he is the final arbiter and you are under his authority, and DD is not under yours. That's really not doing her any favours.

I sympathise with his motives - that his own childhood was toxic, and he wants to form a new model. But his child is not him, and he can't use her to heal all the anger and hurt he feels over his own past. That, too, is a form of abuse. He has to work on his issues so he doesn't harm her by reacting against his own past.

I say that as someone who had a tough childhood, and worked hard on dealing with it before I had my own kids. It isn't easy, but it is essential.

This can't go on, because kids need to feel secure and that the boundaries are clear, and being able to run to Daddy every time Mummy doesn't do as DD likes won't help her feel safe or that what you say can be trusted or relied upon. Your DH had a father who could not be trusted, but he now has a wife who can. He needs to take that in.

But dressing her takes 5 minutes- he can never dress her in the morning without being interrupted by a work call?

Never lifts her into the toilet?

Your DH cannot criticise your handling of her if he has never attempted to do it himself. It is impossible to deal with a toddler without them making some kind of objection about the way you touch them. My DD is pretty robust, but she complains every single day no matter how gentle I am, and usually when she doesn't want to do something. It isn't manipulative, it's a normal toddler coping strategy.

The reason dh doesnt back me up is because he doesnt agree with my side of the story and he feels i teach dd the wrong things sometimes and he doesnt want dd thinking the wrong things i do is right and if he backs me up he says hes teaching her the wrong things i do is right and thats not the message he wants to give her.

He also needs to understand that children learn from adults, and one of the things they learn is compromise. If he can't, how can she learn?

In parenting, as in so much else, there are deal breakers, and then there's the rest. If what you do is appalling and deserving of an apology to the child - and both DH and I have, when very angry, said stuff to DS we have apologised for - then that has to be challenged, and a quiet request to have a word, before leaving for another room, will happen. Challenging is fine, just not in front of the kid. We also have a strict rule in this house that we apologise if mistaken, so we model what we want to see. But we also have a strict rule against what we call, "venue-shopping" - i.e. if a kid comes to us and asks for something, and we later find out they asked the other parent and they said no so they tried Plan B, there is a sanction. Because what one parent says is final. That's not because we aren't aware the other parent makes different choices, it's because we are aware of it, and we don't want to undermine them.

If he is thinking he is being a good parent in contradicting decisions you make, not because they are definitively wrong but because they are different to the choice he'd have made in the same situation... then he needs to wise up. And fast.

Again: I think a parenting course is every bit as important as counselling, because it will get you on the same page, and teach him the essential nature of a united front, positive discipline, and clear and easily understood boundaries. In muddying the waters he's undermining your child's security, which is actively bad for her.

Sorry scary

Yes he does lift her on the toilet (maybe 3 times a week)

I always dress her and do her hair etc. If on one occassion i ve asked him to dress her he will pick something not weather appropriate out of the wardrobe so i end up going in as he says well i dont know what to put on her then so you choose etc.

In the end i do it myself as its quicker and easier

"In the end i do it myself as its quicker and easier"

does he manage to dress himself in weather appropriate clothes

The good old, "if I do it badly/wrong I won't get asked again"-don't fall for it!

The prime rule of parenting for a couple is to agree with each others handling of the child in the child's presence and to settle any disagreements about it out of their earshot. Any other way is a recipe for chaos.

The good old, "if I do it badly/wrong I won't get asked again"-don't fall for it!

Yeah. I agree.

Honestly, he seems to put more energy into undermining than he does helping. Not sure how that constitutes anyone's notion of a good parent, tbh.

Mishaps

Your theory is exactly mine!

Im going to talk to him tonight

He is inadvertantly encouraging your dd to exaggerate and tell lies to get her own way. This sounds like a really unhealthy situation and she will have less respect for you because he is over ruling you like this - he is also showing her that he believes every word that comes out of her mouth instead if you, that is a recipe for disaster imo.

He obviously has huge issues as a result of his own childhood and he and you really need outside help or this will destroy your marriage.

Family therapy. Now.

Do you think there may be some instances where you are actually a bit rougher than your DH thinks you should be? (not just that she is hamming stuff up but that actually you have crossed the line, as your DH sees it?)

Maybe, maybe not, but you need someone else to pull all this out into the light, and then decide how you will all behave from now on.

I have this sort of thing with P (soon to be ex-P?) He will behave at times as if there are three naughty girls and he can dish out reprimands to any or all of us. He hasn't a clue about half the stuff I am saying and doing. I have read books, I have mainlined mumsnet, I have talked to my experienced parent-friends, I have so much practical and theoretical background that he hasn't a clue about. And then he storms in and starts undermining me. It's crap, and a lot of it comes from his own messed up childhood.

He tries to copy things I do and just ruins them. Like dd2 has a really special bond with my sister. Sometimes when she is being tricky because she is over tired I will say "When you're in bed and I've tucked you in and given you a kiss, shall I phone Aunty x and say how good you were? ok, so here's what we'll do... you get into bed and I'll read you a story, and then I can tell her - " blah blah, and then we end up talking about last time we saw her or next time we'll see her and she gets distracted from being difficult by happy memories and it all falls into place.

P totally mangles this technique into "get into bed or I'll tell Aunty x you were being naughty!" And he's so stupid he can't tell the difference. I don't even talk about Aunty any more because he has just messed this whole thing up and I don't want him using her as some bogey policeman.