Collecting DS from XDH in middle of night

[clpsmum]

Not sure if I've been unreasonable or not.

8yoDS went for an unplanned sleepover at his dads tonight. I get a phone call from him at 12:40 saying he wants to come home. I tell him to go cuddle his dad and I'll get him in the morning.

1:30 another phone call DS obviously anxious or scared, crying saying his dad is asleep and he is scared and wants to come home. I try to reassure him and tell him I'll get him first thing in the morning but this makes him more upset. Try to call XDH but he doesn't answer. DS calls back I tell him to try and wake his dad which he eventually does. Instead of reassuring him and cuddling him he starts telling him off. Anyway to cut a long story short I went to collect him. XDH absolutely furious with me and with DS. Have i been unreasonable? Should I have just left him to sleepover and collected him tomorrow? DS usually has sleepovers at his dads with his brothers not on his own so not sure if this is what spooked him

No you absolutely should have collected him and NOT left it until the morning. Out of interest, why didn’t you collect him when he first called, just before 1?

His reaction to a distressed 8 yo ws to tell him off, not comfort him. Of course you couldn't leave him there all night on his own

No you did the right thing.
Its hardly as if you just barged round to his either you tried to calm it and assure your son but something must of really bothered him,he's only 8.Is he ok x

Yanbu, he needed you or his brothers. Trying to be charitable maybe your dxh was not thinking when woken up. Or he's an arse.

Ruby - I didn't collect him the first time he called because a) I knew it would cause big problems with XDH and b) I've got two other sons and it meant leaving them alone in the middle of the night to go and get him.

Thankfully he is home now and fast asleep. He'd worked himself up into such a state by the time I got there and XDH is furious but I'll deal with that tomorrow.

I'd like to think XDH was not thinking straight because he's just woke up but that's giving a lot of credit he has a lot of precious for being a complete arse!

Glad I wasn't being unreasonable. I didn't think I was but suffer from anxiety and was starting to question myself. Thank you all for the reassurance

Why was he so upset distressed ? Does he not usually have sleepovers at his Dads ? Or has something happened tonight that was different ?

He was furious because it was clear he was a rather crap parent. I wonder how much your DS's brothers do for him since he misses them so keenly.

Sorry, but if your 8 yo wakes you up because he's scared, normal reaction is to say 'come here for a cuddle', not tell him off! Hell, my mum called me (she's abroad) as she heard a bang and it scared her and she wanted someone to talk to- I didn't bloody complain she disturbed me.

Ultimately, my attitude would depend on whether he is a decent parent that had a shitty reaction, in which case I'd just let it slide.

Or if he generally can't be arsed and this was just normal wankiness, in which case I'd explode!

Bumble - I think he was upset because his dad was fast asleep and he was there alone without his brothers. Was hard to get much sense out of him when I collected him he was clearly over tired and upset. Said he herd noises and was thinking about scary things.

heard*

How old are his brothers and why weren't they at the sleep over too?

So what was the issue? I wouldn’t be rushing out to collect a child in the middle of the night from their other parent tbh unless it was a genuine emergency, and neither would I be impressed if my child’s other parent turned up at my house because the child had called them.

You are undermining his position as parent, and potentially creating a situation which enables your child to play you off against one another. I think your ex is right to be annoyed.

Yep you've made a difficult situation potentially worse in the future. I didn't react particularly well when my 11 year old DSD woke me at 1.25am the other week as I was quite asleep. You've undermined the other parent and set it up for issues in the future. Next time let him parent his child.

He wasn't parenting his child though was he, didn't the op say that her son couldn't wake his father up.

We can't accuse OP of undermining the other parent when we don't even know what happened to cause DS's distress.

I think she did the right thing. She couldn't be sure what was causing the problem and her ex was uncontactable, so she collected her DS. It was what a responsible parent would do, surely.

What if she had left him there and it had turned out to be a potentially dangerous or abusive situation?

it might have ended differently if his dad came in and calmed in,nurtured and looked after him.his son could have then felt self.
you did the right thing and his dad needs a talking to.
also talk to you son to find out what upset him so much ,so the fear doesn't build in his head.often whatever it is be it nightmares or an event is only scary until you've talked to mum or dad about it.
im sure he will be fine op.you did good.

but he wasn't parenting his child he was telling him off.if he was at home and dp was having a go at an upset child in the middle of the ngiht the othe rparent would have stepped in and told him to stop being an ass!

So how far do we take that one? If a poster posted here that their child woke them up, that they wanted to go to daddy’s and then he turned up and took them would posters be blaming the op and saying good on the ex? I don’t think so.

Of course it’s hard, and of course you want to rush in as a parent, been there, done that; but this child has two parents, and there is no better way to teach a child to become manipulative than to always be their rescuer.

Father collapsed? Absolutely. Child ill and wants their mum? Understandable, but child scared? “It’s ok, go to sleep and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

YADNBU. Your ex is VVVVU.

I would have collected him earlier myself, based on this. Yes, Dad should have been there for him and dealt with it - but he wasn’t and didn’t.

I know it sucks and would have been a pain because of your other kids though - and you definitely have not been UR.

'Of course it’s hard, and of course you want to rush in as a parent, been there, done that; but this child has two parents, and there is no better way to teach a child to become manipulative than to always be their rescuer. '
erm and how will the child turn out when his mother.yes his rescuer leaves him to cry when hes literally beside himself with fear.and left him to cry all night.one parent angry one parent left him.

Oh don’t be so dramatic. Interesting how op didn’t say what the actual issue was and said herself that he’d worked himself into a state.

I’m assuming then that the op shouldn’t have been allowed to do anything for herself on nights when her dc are with their other parent? And that it will be perfectly ok for the father to turn up and do the same in future?

I'm sorry but all those posters saying OP should have gone immediately to get him are full of crap.

The child was with his Dad ffs! it's not like he'd been sent to the bogeyman for the night!

summergem ?

We are to take it that you are supporting the F's reaction in this scenario?

Sprite I think the Father's reaction is not ideal but not that unusual. If we're honest, I;d say that most parents have woken up and been grumpy when older children have woken us up for inane reasons.

An 8 year old crying to go home isn't really normal in the middle of the night. it's very needy behaviour and I wouldn't really put up with it as a parent.

Unless OP has failed to mention that the Father is an awful person for some reason of course.

The only time this happened with dd was when she went to a sleepover at a friends house. She was about 8. The girls couldn’t sleep and the girl left dd alone in the bedroom and went to sleep with her parents. Dd did eventually sleep but not well and called me upset at 6.30 as she’d been told by the parents to go back to sleep. I didn’t pick dd up. But she won’t be going on a sleepover to that house again for a long time... not the only issue there

I talked to dd, she was crying and calmed her down. Gave her virtual hugs etc. Were she hysterical after that I would have gone round. I assume you tried to calm your ds first. I know this is different as your ds is with his father but he didn’t handle the situation and I wouldn’t have wanted to leave my child distressed.

Well, assuming there are no safeguarding issues which given the child was staying there with the op’s agreement there clearly aren’t, rushing out in the night to collect a child from their other parent sends a very clear message that the child need only cry and he’ll get his own way. It also puts the op in a situation where she will be unable to plan anything for herself in future if child is at his dad’s as the expectation has been created now.

And all the talk of a child being beside themselves etc is projection.

And again, if your child came in in the dead of night crying that they wanted to go to daddy’s, that they’d called him and he was on his way over would you think this was fine? And if not, why not?