AIBU to think my DP isn't being understanding

[mama2be91]

Hello

Would like some honest opinions please as not sure if I'm BU or he is...

I'm 20 weeks pregnant with my first, not really showing yet but super tired, headachey, back pains etc. and was throwing up all weekend.

My DP and I haven't lived together that long, and I feel like all he does it moan at me about the housework, but I feel I pick up my fair share especially given that I'm 20wks gone.

We both work full time, but he always moans about things around the house and says I don't do anything even though I do most of the washing, I hoover, I clean up after dinner. I am working from home today and he has left the sink full of washing up for me to do even though I didn't eat all weekend due to throwing up! He implies that I can't be a parent because I can't look after myself!!! He does do housework too but I never moan at him even when I feel he's expecting alot of a sick pregnant lady. Just to add he also moans that I do nothing on days where I've ran around after his DD, doing the school run, food shopping, cooking her dinner etc.

AIBU to think that I do plenty???

Please don’t let your child grow up in a house with a man who thinks that little of women, and most of all their mother. He is a horrendous, disrespectful excuse for a man. Get the money from your house sale and get out. You and your child can do so so much better than this.

Please go home to your mum as soon as possible.

Everything else can be sorted out in time.

Please believe me. Doing it alone is so much easier than doing it with a cunt like yours. I've done it both ways.

OP, I have been a single mother twice. My then partner left me when DD was 9 months old. I absolutely managed. I even went back to work in my London job when she was a year old. Childminder was my saviour. I later married. We had a baby 11 years later when I was 42, that baby turned out to have autism and DH decided it wasn't for him, had an affair and left. I am now a single parent again. Quite frankly, doing it on my own was much much easier than dealing with a control freak/manbaby who expected me to skivvy, mother, do everything but with no input from them.

You can do this. Millions of women do. If you stay with this gaslighting, controlling, abusive cunt, you're going to regret it for the rest of your life.

Take control. Get out. As soon as baby is born, go to CMS. There are many organisations out there, including Women's Aid, who will help you. You deserve better, your child deserves better. Single parenting is hard, but not as hard as being trapped in a relationship with an abuser. I PROMISE you.

mama you’ve had some great advice. I know it must be hard to take it in , but do listen.

Your DP will only get worse not better and you will be trapped. Ensure that you keep your house sale money safe, don’t let him near it or divulge passwords otherwise he will make your decisions and “look after it for you”.

He’s never going to be an equal partner, he’s always going to treat you like dirt.

Are you able to approach his ex and see how he treated her?

Wishing you the strength you need to get through this.

Good grief. He's grim.

I really hope you are going to free yourself and your child from a life of hell with this complete and utter arsehole.

Why is there such a fuss from him about how much housework is getting done? Your pregnant! Your sickness could get worse too. The last thing you need to be doing, after working full time and being pregnant, is to have to deal with him.

He’s left those dishes for you to do on purpose, I hope you left them for him to do. His DD is HIS responsibility not yours.

He thinks once baby arrives as I'll be on maternity and therefore should do everything

You’re on maternity as you’ll have a baby to look after, not a lazy boyfriend and a house on top. Having a baby isn’t a walk in the park, it’s a time for you to recover from child birth, to bond with your baby and to take care of him/her. He isn’t going to help out with night feeds or when he gets in from work, which I’d find very difficult. You’d be better off on your own.

He said he might not even take the 2 weeks paternity

What dad evens says this? Why is he not wanting to help you out and see his baby for two weeks. Does he even want this baby? Doesn’t sound like he does from where I’m sitting. I’m quite shocked at his lack of support for you.

we have her 2x overnight a week so the current rate of me running around is 75% of the time we have her!

He does realise that once the baby is born that you can’t be running round after his daughter? What is he like with her btw?

He sounds abusive the way he talks to you.

If you intend to stay with him, look after the baby but don’t do any of the housework as he needs to actually do something.

He has also made it clear that he doesn't think that in that time I am contributing to the family as I am not working, and expects me to 'want to contribute by going back to work' ASAP,

How lovely of him! This should be a joint decision based on the financial situation not on what he believes should happen. All I’ve read so far is what HE wants, not what will be in the best interests of US or YOU. You go back to work when you’re good and ready. He wants you to go back so that you can start paying all of your hard-earned money into HIS ‘savings account.

His argument is that as he pays more towards house (he earns over 3x as much as we are in a bigger house to accommodate his DD, so I think we do contribute financially proportionately/fairly) I should do more around house, be on his DD beck and call etc

I’ve never heard anything so stupid in my life! He earns more than you so you have to do more. Like that makes sense. Also, its ok for him to have a run and be too tired but not ok for you to be tired while pregnant!

he said the baby does nothing in the first few months so having those two weeks of is pointless.

Exactly! It’s you doing all the work, while you’ve just given birth, while you’re exhausted and not knowing what you are doing. That’s without any complications or having a traumatic birth. The first 3 months are the most exhausting as you are up through the night with them while recovering yourself. You need your partner there to support you.

He will cover costs whilst I am on maternity but expects me to cover childcare when I go back to work. And then top up what I earn with an 'allowance' if I am short

What allowance is he referring to? When you have a child and a house together it’s supposed to be working as a team. It sounds like it’s all very separate in your case. What was the point in moving in together. Especially when it looks like that he is the only one benefiting from it by wanting to save up.

he's already said he'd work abroad to not pay maintenance

Did he say this referring to you or about his DD? If he said this to you, how did this conversation come up to begin with? And does he pay anything for his DD. If so, why wouldn’t he pay to you under the same circumstances.

I just don't know where I'd go - to my mums perhaps.

Don’t you have a close relationship with your mum? You will need support around you with the birth of your child as sadly you won’t be getting it from your partner.

So, have you both got a house each which are under offer and he has rented a house separate that you have just moved into? I’d go to your mums if you can’t move into your original house again and keep the money and look for a new home. I wouldn’t buy a house with him.

Said if we bought a house he'd want a declaration of trust to say that the house had to be sold within X time (regardless of me or baby needing somewhere to live) if we split, I can't remember his proposal but it was pretty much immediately, even if I couldn't afford to rehouse myself and our son.

This is very worrying! If I were you I would be looking at all my financial options and leaving him for dust.

He has you right where he wants. The emotional and financial abuse is only going to get worse. You will be exhausted and extremely vulnerable, even more so than you are at present. Please please leave now. It will be so much harder when the baby is here and he can blame your hormones.

Wow. I know it's a way back, but i'm still stuck on:

...expects me to cover childcare when I go back to work... So for example, if me working after childcare gives me £600 per month, his exact words were 'well that's £600 I can put into my savings'. Totally blind to the fact that £600 per month would leave me in minus.

To which the sane reply is "no, we'll both cover half of the costs of childcare because we're both parents. Any money that I manage to save from my salary will be put into my savings, not yours".

He's very much a 'what's mine is mine, and what's yours is mine too' person, isn't he? Why on earth would your money go into his savings?!

Can you discuss this with any close friends or relatives? Mum or siblings? Best friend? Be as honest as you can with them, and see if they think he's being reasonable (hint, they won't!).

Fucking hell, OP, he's a real turkey.

I'm so sorry you are going through this now and it can't be easy seeing all these posts telling you to leave. I agree with them all and it's not often there's a unanimous thread on here.
Couple of things I wanted to add. I'm pretty sure this is what they call gaslighting? He's messing with your head. I bet if he had shown you this side of him when you first got together you wouldn't have got involved. Think what you would say to a friend in your situation? Would you tell them to stay?
The other thing is do you really want your son to grow up seeing this behaviour day in Day out? Do you want to look at him in twenty odd years time and watch him manipulate his partner the way he saw his dad do it to you? Children learn from their parents and he will always see it as normal if that's what he sees.
You can step away from him. It won't be easy but you don't want to be in the same boat in six months, 12 months...

Sending you strength. X

I’m going to condense this as much as I can:

You’ll be sat on the sofa feeding your tiny baby feeling guilty that you haven’t yet washed to pots or managed to put the washing on. You’ll be willing your baby to sleep so you can do housework so you avoid another rant/sulk/mood from him. Doing this will give you massive mum guilt, as you will feel you should be cuddling and loving your baby. You’ll be constantly torn between what you want/need to do with your baby and doing what you need to do to appease him. Whilst all this is going on trust me when I say you will literally be missing the most precious time with your baby and time is the one thing you can never get back. Even if you stay you’ll end up resenting him and hating him for this.

All the above is the reason why everyone here who is or has been a lone parent tells you it’s so much easier to do it alone than with a man like your partner.

Alone you’ll be able to freely give your baby all the love, cuddles, time and attention you want without feeling guilty, without feeling there is other things you should be doing to prove yourself useful and worthy. As much as this baby will need love and cuddles you will need them too, it’s such important bonding time that should never be sullied by such an impetuous man. A day spent doing nothing but cuddling/feeding your baby is far far from a wasted day, if nothing else remember that!

Be alone, be free, be free to love your baby, it honestly will be the best thing you ever do for both you and your son, I promise

I recently became a mum. Nothing, no parent, no neice or nephew, no NCT class could prepare me for actually looking after my child....and i realised..

EVERY BABY IS DIFFERENT.

Your DP wont understand this because hes never been 100% hands on for even his first child and i know this just by reading the crap hes spouted to to you.

Those first two weeks are absolutely fundamentally the most important - motherhood will slap a new mum in the face so hard, that any tiny miniscule droplet of support will be the equivalent of a holiday in the bahamas. I cannot tell you how much i wept on day 2 from zero sleep, baby who would not latch onto my tit, constant baby crying, drugs still in my system, overload of hormones and deathly low iron levels. She would ONLY sleep in my arms. She would NOT stop crying. I would not have survived mentally if my husband hadnt been there to help me through those nights. BUT id have much rather done it alone if he was as much of an unhelpful old fashioned complete selfish tit bag like your DP is proving to be, because those comments would have tipped me over the edge and most likely triggered mum guilt and PND. Now shes 3 months i still have days where i dont wash the dishes, sometimes the vacuum doesnt get done for a week. And i NEVER feel guilty because i just love being mum and enjoying my baby. Hubby wont dare to protest to the state of the house even after hes done his 14 hour shift at work, because he knows this is what a newborn brings. Regardless of how tired he is he will still do bathtime and all the nappy changes between coming home and going to bed because its his child too and he understands that motherhood IS a job in itself.
He probably wouldnt have realised this had he not taken his 2 weeks of paternity and seen how hard it was. But it gets soooo much better so quick!

Think about what this will teach your son. This is not how you want your own son treating a future partner.

So you have a choice;

1. Raise your son ALONE under DP's house arrest, under HIS rules, doing as HE wants, him expecting you to still have the house immaculate and you walking around on eggshells.

OR

1. Raise your son alone under YOUR rules doing as YOU want, no pressure to be a housemaid and cracking those eggs to make a fantastic omlette for yourself when baby finally sleeps without needing to be held.

Either way you're in this alone. And you will be a wonderful mother. Dont let anyone spoil that enjoyment for you. You'll never get that time back where u can enjoy your baby and have cuddles and snuggles and be in a mummy bubble. Dont let him taint that.

I'm glad you are now considering what you should do next.

You need to look at the equity you'll have from the house co-owner with your friend and start looking at what you can afford with that deposit and your current salary.

You need to do this before the baby is born because you still have a salary now but won't when the baby is born so no one will offer you a mortgage, plus your child will be a dependent so they'll take that into account.

It doesn't matter whether what you can afford is a one bedroom flat, buy it because it is your abs gives you security.

Start saving hard. Try and borrow as much baby stuff from others as you can, get the rest second hand, look at freecycle. Try and get him to fork out for some if the biggest baby purchases now as you won't get anything from him once you leave.

Confide in your mum if she's 100 percent trustworthy that you're going to leave.

You can do this, but it's really important you start the process now before the baby is born as however tired etc you're feeling now it will so so much harder when the bsby is born.

Good luck

Lilly makes some excellent points. I agree wholeheartedly. It's so hard op but you can do it.

Morning everyone

Thank you so so much for the overwhelming response. Whilst it isn't exactly what I expected, it has opened my eyes to something I probably knew deep down already.

Few questions about maintenance for his DD. He does pay maintenance. He earns very good money so has 'cleverly' convinced his ex to go onto a family based arrangement rather than CMS so that she doesn't have access to 12% of earnings until DD turns 18, as he expects his earnings/career to only increase quite dramatically (he is very good at his job so very likely). He still pays a lot, but it is currently just under CMS guidelines, and will definitely end up way below if his earnings increase as expected. The reason he will go abroad is because he doesn't want to pay maintenance to two exes. I'm not entirely sure how it works if you have to pay two mothers maintenance?

What were you expecting people to say?

So what are you going to do OP?

Trojanpony - that either I need to clean up a bit more or he does - never expected people to all agree on that he is being awful...

Lyndsey - not too sure need to have a good look into finances as they are my primary concern. Whilst my money is good getting by on the very basic maternity package that my company offer will be difficult.

He’s not very invested in you is he? Pensions, life insurance etc not for you. Clear plan on how the house would be managed if you split - it wouldn’t be for you. No maintenance if you split, he’d move abroad rather than pay. He actually tells you these things. He’s actually planning for when you split up!

And when he talks like this he is telling you loud and clear who he is and where you and your baby lie in his priorities.

mama I understand it must be overwhelming for you to read all of the responses. Believe me, I rarely say LTB, I have said it only a couple of times on MN, but you would be setting yourself up for a lifetime of misery with this man, under his control financially.

He has already stated that you will need to do all of the housework , as having a baby is not work. Perhaps he thinks that all the nappy changes and feeds take care of themselves then?! Every baby is different. Mine would feed then sleep for 2 hours, I was lucky, not everyone has that baby. Even then I didn't spend that time doing housework, I needed to rest and maybe snooze myself! Some babies feed for hours or scream for hours. and you are supposed to keep a spick and span house while dealing with that?

He has said that you will need to pay for all of the childcare. Why?
this is his child too. This man does not see you as a family unit and that will never change.

I am so sorry that you have to go through this, but I honestly fear for your future if you stay with this man.

The phrase that I have taken on board the most from MN is”when someone tells you who they are, listen” this man sounds awful.

Wow, OP. I have read every word you've written and there is no doubt whatsoever that your "D"P is a total and utter twatbadger with no redeeming features. If you stay with him you will find your world shrinking until one day he and your DC are all you have left. Please don't subject your child to his abuse. Leave, as quickly as you can x