This has been bugging me on and off, so I thought this was a good place to ask AIBU...
At 39 weeks pregnant, I had a complication (transverse lie) and ended up one day at 4pm, booking a planned c-section for 8am the following morning.
It was to be our first child and my first time in hospital. I was worried, nervous, happy, excited, the lot.
If my husband had asked me what I wanted and needed to do that night, I would have said spend one last quiet night together before the shit hit the fan! Eat an easily-digested meal reasonably early. Talk together. Get excited together. Get an early night.
But he didn’t ask me.
The second the surgeon left the room, my husband (36yrs old) was on the phone to his mum, asking her to come over and help him clean.
And she did. Between the pair of them, they cleaned the house from top to bottom.
Yes, the house had got somewhat messy (He works a lot and I worked until 8 months pregnant, and by then was exhausted the whole time.)
But it was by no means squalor, and nothing DH and MIL did was necessary for our son to be safe and healthy. I could have gone into labour any time, and brought my new baby home to a safe environment.
Just as an example of how OTT it was, MIL took home bags of laundered and organised baby clothes to re-wash (all bundled together into a bin bag, annoyingly) and bags of toys to steam clean - most of which were for 6 months plus. They cleaned in the toilet and spare bedroom that DS was unlikely to be in for days, weeks, even months. At one point, I had to dive in and prevent her from taking away my (washed and folded) pyjamas and maternity pants that I wanted to wear in hospital!
If DH had said “I feel a weird need to clean with my mum until 11pm, so if you want food and company, maybe you should call someone else” I might have felt hurt, but at least I would have been prepared.
As it was, he kept nipping in every hour or so and saying “Won’t be too much longer.”
His mum’s lovely, and I didn’t want to hurt her feelings or make a scene, but I don’t feel completely at ease around her and didn’t want her there at that moment. I just wanted to relax and speak freely in the company of my husband.
Toward 9 pm I took DH to one side and said “You have to stop now. The house is fine. This is too much. Your mum has to go home. This isn’t what I want.” I was crying and he took my shoulders and said “We’ll be finished soon, don’t get upset.”
At 11pm, DH’s mum finally went home. I then got angry with DH for leaving me hanging on for 6 hours at such an important time, and he threw a bag of “washing” (the one containing my clean maternity pants that I’d saved) down on the floor and shouted “Who do you think I’m doing this for?” Then I quietened down (couldn’t face a fight the night before an operation, so just swallowed it and breathed deeply) and we went for takeaway pizza as nowhere else was open.
I finished eating about 20 mins before the midnight deadline. We went home and up to bed. I was stressed and couldn’t sleep. He was tired and started snoring almost immediately!
Weeks afterwards, no matter how carefully I brought it up, he still wouldn’t have it that he did anything wrong, and I made him angry when I mentioned it, so it was easier just to stop mentioning it.
But it’s stayed with me. It was such a vulnerable time for me, and such an important moment for us both, and frankly I felt like my feelings were inconsequential to him.
How would you feel in my place? I mean, he wasn’t out gambling away our house or banging his secretary or anything. But still, I don’t feel like what he did was ok.