Parents involving children in row

[Rebecca1971]

I was angry this morning with DH. To fully explain I have to give a little background (sorry this may actually get quite long).

I normally get up at 6, walk the dog, sort out some washing, school snacks and get myself ready before I wake up DS at about 7.15 and then DH at 7.30 - because he refuses to have his own alarm and will not get up until and unless I wake him. DS has to leave the house by just after 8 to make it to school on time.

This morning I was running late as we'd only just got back from holiday and I was tired after the long journey (when I had done the vast majority of a 13 hour car drive as DH doesn't like to drive). So I got up at 7.10 and as a result struggled to get all sorted in time. DS was asleep and hiding under the covers and when I checked on DH at 8 he was in bed reading. I asked him to get up and help me. I reminded him of the time and said DS had to be out of the house in 5 minutes and needed to get ready and could he help make some kind of breakfast (sandwich) that DS could eat on the way to school. Not great but there clearly was no time for proper breakfast at home. When DS finally struggled out of bed the set of school uniform that I had laid out for him to wear didn't have pants. I asked DH if he could please find a pair of pants (no pants left in usual drawers as just returned from holiday). DH response was that school clothes are my responsibility. He also would not make sandwich but said DS should eat cereal at home. I said no time (which there wasn't, clearly!) and grabbed a cereal bar and a few raspberries in a Tupperware box to eat on the way. We were a few minutes late for school but not too bad, teacher was fine when I apologised.

I was highly unimpressed about the whole situation and rather than letting this pass I decided to send DH an email (talking would just have resulted in a shouting match). I kept the tone of the mail calm and said that he needed to reflect on not being selfish and that reading in bed at 8 o'clock when we had a joint responsibility to get our son to school was not on.

So that's the background. Now what I'm really upset about is that when I came home from work DS told me 'daddy is upset with you about this morning'. I said, oh so what did daddy say. DS at that point didn't want to elaborate, probably feeling caught between his two parents. I thought about what best to do for a few minutes, then decided (rightly or wrongly) that it was better to have it all out in the open and asked DH in DS presence what he had said to DS about this morning and that really this was between us. He said (again in front of DS) that he told DS after school that I had been totally unreasonable in the morning, had stormed out of the house in a self righteous manner and that I had an anger problem.

At that point I had to bite my lips not to cry. Not out of anger but out of sheer sadness that he cannot be a father first. My overriding ambition is always always not to let children know of parents' rows and certainly not making them take sides. It's a terrible position to put a child in and no child should have to feel they have to take sides when their parents have an argument.

This is not the first time DH has behaved this way. He doesn't get these parenting principles and seems to think it acceptable to involve children in our differences of opinion. (And that's leaving aside the issue of not getting out of bed in the morning and helping me get the household organised).

What do other MNers think? AIBU?

I'm stuck on the fact that he 'doesn't like' things and therefore doesn't have to do them. I wish someone had told me that simply opting out was an option. I do all sorts of things I don't like as a parent and partner. As does DH. Who knew one could just decide not to do perfectly normal adult things?

Your H seems to want everything on his terms, doesn't he? You can get up at 6am and see to all the family responsibilities and I'll just sleep in until you wake me up. Then I'll read and leave you to carry on doing more family stuff.... it all sounds very unbalanced and one-sided.

I think it is very easy to slide into these kinds of patterns of behaviour - but now you've articulated some of these patterns in your own relationship, I think you need to have some hard conversations with yuor H.

I would start by telling him that you won't be waking him at an hour convenient to him, ... or maybe say you will wake him an hour earlier so he can get up and start to contribute to the needs of his family!!!!

For the majority of our marriage (30 years this month) I have been a SAHM/house wife. That has meant that I do most of the housework and 'wifework'. It's old fashioned but has worked for us.

What I don't do and never would do is act like my DH's Mum - I don't get him up in the morning or encourage him to eat or make his medical appointments. He is a grown man, he is responsible for his own professional life and health. I did all that for my children not my equal life partner. Your DH is acting like an irresponsible child lying in bed until Mummy gets him up. He is also acting like a child encouraging his son to take sides with him against bad Mummy.

I am not suggesting that DH and I have the perfect balance (afar from it) and your dynamic is shit, but you do seem to have shouldered a great deal of responsibility whilst receiving very little in return. How did this happen? Is it ok with you? Was this what you expected when you
got married? If you had a daughter is this what you would want for her?

Your H is not just an entitled, selfish prick but a classic misogynist, and he is harming your DS. He is teaching your DS that women are silly, annoying servants who need to be put in their place regularly. It might not seem too bad to your DS now, to feel that he's on the 'right' side and that he can order you about and complain if you are 'disrespectful' just like Daddy does, but the H will also insist that DS defers to Daddy and that Daddy's wishes come first. Because the H considers himself the important person in the house and will never pull his weight or treat either you or DS with respect, courtesy or kindness.

My son just asked 'Mum, please can you promise me something? That you and daddy will never breakup'.

Son but we did have an argument this morning. I wanted daddy to help me and he refused. I was cross because I thought it was unfair and I said that to him. I am also a little cross that he told you about the argument. But adults will argue and need to talk to each other to sort things out. You don't need to worry about any of that.

Then go upstairs. Tell your dh you are no longer his alarm clock. Simply stop waking him in the morning.

No idea what to do about his crap parenting involving your child - not sure how you can change that kind of entitled stupidity.

No, this is not your fault. But I think you need to start setting some boundaries.

Tell your DH that if he thinks that DS's mornings are 'yours', then DS's evenings can be 'his'. He can sort the next day's school bag, pack the lunch, lay out the uniform, do the bed time routine. You will do the wakeup, breakfast, check the bag, out the door routine. AND that from now on, you will no longer be his personal alarm clock. Since he works from home it's not like he's going to be 'written up for being tardy'. From now on, he's on his own. Reading in bed, indeed!!!

As far as involving your DS in things, I don't think it's necessarily wrong for a child to see his parents disagree, as long as the parents are able to work things out with a minimum of 'heat'. But it IS wrong to involve the child, or to give the child their 'opinion' of the other parent. Him telling DS that you have an 'anger problem' was way, way out of line! In fact, him (apparently) sitting your child down and giving him a play by play with his colour commentary was dead wrong, and damaging to your child.

Do you think your DH would consider counseling? I think he's entitled, spoilt, and lazy, but these are issues that can be worked on, if he is willing to change. If not, well, I think you need to think long and hard if you want to spend the next 30,40,50 years of your life dealing with his shit. Because, trust me, it gets worse as they get older!!!

As far as your child saying "Promise me you'll never break up", promising that is something you should never do. It's akin to them saying "Promise me you'll never die". It's something that just cannot be promised.

"Is it my fault for not being good enough at smoothing it all over?"

You're not actually, seriously asking this, are you? You're just venting it out, right? Because NO. Absolutely not your bloody fault. NO!

Your "d"H is a nob and a half. He's a lazy selfish git who, as it happens, was the initial parent to involve your poor son in the row in the first place, pitting him against you and sending him off to be the little soldier. He's awful.

I won't throw out a casual LTB because for one thing it seems clear that's not what you want at this time, but I think that you need professional intervention to make your marriage stable. You simply cannot go on bearing the entire weight of parenting AND all of the blame, AND parenting your full grown husband, on top of being told every minor, completely reasonable request is a self-righteous strop. Unacceptable.

I don't think this is something you can handle on your own with a serious conversation. Which, need I clarify, is down to your "d"H, NOT YOU. HE does not sound the type to take a conversation seriously, much less actually take action. I just can't see a man who acts that way taking from you and only you that he's rotten to the core. From here, he seems like the type who's going to need to be told by some sort of authority that he's out of bounds by a mile. And if that wouldn't change his tune... Well...

And I would stop RIGHT NOW with waking him up for work! What a joke! If he can't get himself up to be at work on time, what on earth IS he capable of? If he can't help out one single time, then you certainly don't need to go out of your way every busy morning and help HIM, on top of every other thing you've got to do every single day without his help. Pull the other one mate!!

I also think it's interesting that your son said that he wanted you to promise you won't split up. Your H sounds manipulative in the extreme and I would imagine that he prompted your DS to say that tbh. Spiking your guns so that you will continue to accept what everyone here is telling you overwhelmingly is completely and utterly unacceptable behaviour from your H.

You and your ds are being mindfucked by this loser

Sadly, your son will model his behaviour on his father. He will see women as skivvys and will treat his future wife like you are being treated, setting him up for a failed marriage.

I'm sure there's two sides to every story but reading your OP makes me glad he's not my DH. Be kind to yourself.

Just fucking leave him in his pit so he is late for work and takes the responsibility for that, the useless, lazy prick. He's treating you like his mother.

How do you imagine your sons adult life is going to look like ?
He is learning that the woman does everything bar what is convenient for the man to do.
You need to step back and take a long look at what's happening.
We can't ignore the first part of your post because it is quite alarming how selfish and unhelpful your H is being.
The argument is just a reflection on how poor your relationship is.

The sentence 'he was sat up in bed reading a book' just breathtaking. How did hit not get said book and batter him with it op.

Jesus Christ what a total cock.

Tell him he's on borrowed time op and maybe try relate? See what the councillor makes of him and his ways

Be strong don't wake the twat this morning and see what happens! If he wfh he has no commute.

How did you get to this place where you do all the work and your husband does absolutely nothing?

Your husband is a lazy shit and is manipulating your son. This is a toxic environment for both of you. I'm not over-exaggerating. You really need to get out. Literally, the only thing your lazy arse husband does is stop your son needing to go to after school club a couple of days a week. That isn't co-parenting.

Just to say thanks for all your support.

I'm surprised that the waking up bit has incensed so many of you.

Also I'm not sure that it's right that i do everything and he does nothing. I work in town, I'm the main breadwinner - he works from home and fits work around DS. Often, because he takes a few hours out in the afternoon to collect DS he then works in the evening. With this division of roles we manage without a nanny/au pair and we've always taken the view that this is better for our son.

What upset me was the reading in bed borne out of an 'entitlement' to wake up in a leisurely manner. And the lack of help on a stressful morning when I was also tired.

What upset me more than anything was the involvement of our son. Which lead to the poor child asking me to promise that we would not split up

This morning I mentioned son's desperation to DH and telling him that he should not have spoken about his wife/mother of DS in that way. His reaction was that "You confronted me" so seeking to defend and justify.

I am distraught. I feel I've failed my son by creating this situation.

PS. Yes I think I will try to move this post to Relationships (if I can figure out how)

He is awful.

If you want the thread moved to relationships, report your opening post and you can ask for it to be moved.

Oh love, you haven't created this situation. Your husband has boiled you like a frog - slowly but surely so that you have accepted all this as normal.

It is not normal:

• for one parent to do a 13 drive because the other parent doesn't like driving
• for one parent to get up at 6am to do all the chores before school because the other parent doesn't like getting up
• for one parent to lie in bed reading while the other one rushes about
• for one parent to drip poison into the ear of their child about the other parent
• for one parent to work long hours and do all the cooking, cleaning, child and pet care.

None of this is okay. None of this is how a loving supportive partnership is supposed to work

You say your son has taken your husband's side in situations like this before. You are both teaching him this is how to behave and treat your partner. Things need to change.

Hang on, you're the main breadwinner and you do all the household stuff whilst you H collects son from school and supervises homework? No OP he does not pull his weight and he's not even sorry.

Stop with the waking him up for a start and I'd be doing a rota for chores and telling him to shape up or ship out. Honest to God why do you put up with this? Is this really how you want to model relationships for your son?

You need to stop overreacting to what your son said. Yes, it's upsetting but being distraught and feeling like you've failed as a mother is ridiculous and overly dramatic.

When you've stopped focusing on that, you can start asking yourself why the fuck you're allowing yourself to be treated so unbelievably badly by this waste of space of a man!

My jaw is on the floor. He doesn't get a gold fucking star by picking up his kid after school and doing fuck all else except "supervising homework".

He's a prick. He's a bad example to your son. And you're enabling him.

He works into the evening because he has had to take 'a few hours off to collect DS'. How far away do you live from school?

He is using that as an excuse to leave all the housework to you.

Does he even cook? Or do you have to cook for all three of you when you get home at 7pm?

He is lazy. I bet his income is negligible and he uses the working from home as an excuse to opt out of family life.

Why you are with him I have no idea.

I don't think children have to be shielded from every disagreement. It's healthy for them to see that adults who love each other (1) don't always agree (2) respect each other's views and (3) work together to find a solution

Someone offered me this advice in relation to household tasks "Do it because you want to, do it because you have to, or don't do it"