To insist DH steps up to the plate with kid emotional labour?

[GreenGoffee]

DS last night had an emotional meltdown about his homework. The task was to write about your role model. It set him into a tailspin about how he has no role models and basically feels like an alien in his own skin and is hating the whole prospect of growing up.

I told him he was overthinking it and should write about his Dad - who is a very role-model worthy individual, as well as being basically a scaled up carbon copy on DS physically and emotionally. DS said that that would not be true, and anyway he couldn't write about his Dad because he doesn't actually know enough about him.

I hustled quite hard that his Dad was a very natural choice, and also a good person to connect to if he is feeling wobbly. Printed out a sheet of questions even that I'd googled up to make it easy for him to start.

I took him upstairs where DH was bathing DD (but actually gaming while keeping an ear out on the splashing) - dropped off DS with him, saying that DS needs to chat to him for homework, and making faces behind DS head to flag that DS was in a delicate emotional state. It might be a good point to say that DS is autistic - and probably DH too. Because I twice got "Goffee, your face looks funny, why are you gesturing" - so ended up leaving them to it & taking over DD - since I couldn't say anything more direct without embarrassing DS.

When I closed the door, DH was giving very short answers to all the questions. (Who was the most important person in your life? Dunno. What's been the happiest moment in your life? Dunno). DS reappeared ten minutes later still looking downbeat, saying that he had asked all the questions and still had no essay material. (And seriously - DH is an impressive individual - albeit kind of self-deprecating - and a constant presence in the kids lives).

Apparently I wasn't very kind in telling DH it was a lame effort.

I do know he's been a bit struggly - and we had 'plans' last night, which got derailed by the kids taking more time than usual to settle, but AIBU to have called it out as a weak effort?

For context, our older teen daughter has had a hard time last few years - and DH has been the biggest flag waver for "What she needs is a strong parental bond - just take her out more & talk to her more". I'm the SAHP - so a lot of the emotional about naturally falls to me - which I accept - and I run myself ragged trying to keep an ear to the ground with the kids emotional well-being (esp DD1 - who reserves 100% of the shit and drama for me).

I appreciate DH was bounced into the convo with DS without any warning - but that's how kids emotional collapses go IME - and he was both available and the right parent to take the conversation forward with DS. I wouldn't normally flare up as much as I did - but I'm pissed at the idea that I do the kid emotional labour as a default - regardless of how available or suitable I am for the particular task.

DS got up early this morning and wrote an essay on Nelson Fucking Mandela. Who is an upstanding historical figure - but DS literally knew zero about him before he opened the Wikipedia article. I'm worried for my son if that is genuinely the best fit for the description of someone he feels he can model on as he grows up. It feels like a missed opportunity and I'm still pissed and unrepentant about calling it out sharply.

It wouldn't even have occurred to me to try to persuade a child to write about one of their parents for this. I would have gone down the Google route immediately. It's obviously sweet if a child thinks of it themselves but I adored my parents and would still just have taken the assignment as "find a public figure you admire and write about why". If you wanted your DH to get involved you could have asked him to help think of people that your son could write about.

I actually think this could have happened to an NT father and son, and that it would have been just as unfair to put them in this position if ASD was not in the picture for either of them.

I understand where you were coming from.

I just think there were other ways to approach this.

You are sounding a little inflexible yourself on this point.

Thinking about it - DH would have handed in a blank piece of paper if he was given this assignment.

Maybe they should have spoken about how it was a stupid homework .

DH is very much of the 'this is me' persuasion - and would say that role models are for sheep lacking a sufficiently developed sense of their own identity.

@NoSquirrels - I'm chippy, because I feel that a lot of people (not just DH ) seem to expect me to have a matrix-like power to slow down time and to set up every scenario optimally.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing for everything from laundry scheduling to time allocation to pre-chatting with people to social networking- but there is a limit to how much can be done - there's an opportunity cost to being always prepared that falls predominantly on me.

Sometimes things come up and really are best surfed in the moment, rather than creating a backlog for 'later' (by which point something else will have happened). And sometimes things are just a bit shit. It really strokes my feminist fur the wrong way if the inherent frustrations and challenges of raising kids somehow get spun as my 'fault' - because if only I'd scheduled a bit differently, or had a chat with someone a bit earlier, or had the house a bit straighter ... if only .... nope.

Even if I was perfect - there would still be shitty times raising kids - and I'm kind of done with the 'heads you lose, tails I win' narrative that I feel is put on mothering.

OP looking back from an adult perspective I would agree that my parents and probably one of my grandmothers were great role models. As a child I would never have considered them role models because as much as I loved them they were in a childs eyes doing their job and I didn't want to be them I wanted to be Debbie Harry or someone like that. I very much doubt if a parent would be the natural choice for any child . It would almost always be someone who has excelled in àn area the child loves be that Harry Kane, JK Rowling or in this case an inspired choice of Nelson Mandela. Also I would find it hard to come up with an instant list of answers to questions the likes of which you have given your son and I am not on the spectrum.

Do ppl actually talk like this?
has the ringfenced 1-1 emotional wellbeing MOT conversations.
emotional palette emotional due to over scheduling
I’ve become stressed reading OPs posts, you sound very over invested in a piece of homework, why corral your DS into writing about his dad? encourage him to make choices, stop overfilling his day, let him have chill time with his dad. You come across as very rigid in your expectations, relax a bit.
My DS has hf Aspergers and I’ve learned to go with the flow and he’s very easy going and relaxed.

DH is very much of the 'this is me' persuasion - and would say that role models are for sheep lacking a sufficiently developed sense of their own identity.
Delightful

He sounds pretty shit, I'll be honest.

@JKScot4 - no, people talk with shorter words, but more of them. In writing, I use longer words to summarise the sense of what was said. HTH.

Is a morning at the park 'over scheduling'? Really? And I'm to believe that if we'd all hung around the house all weekend, then everyone would have been more receptive to an impromptu conversation on Sunday night? Or would it then have been my fault because I hadn't given the bloke a chance to decompress from the week?

You're getting a weird sort of negativity on this thread OP, I'm not sure where it's coming from.

I agree entirely with what you're saying. You put a lot of thought into engineering a situation that you hoped would build a connection between your DS and DH. It was really thoughtful and kind of you to try to fix a situation that you know is real issue in such a naturalistic way. FWIW my DH would be absolutely made up if I did the same thing - he would be beyond chuffed that I suggested our DS see him as a role model and would make a huge effort to ensure our DS did a great essay. It would be such a lovely bonding experience. I ask people questions about themselves for a living and I can tell you it's very unusual for people not to respond positively to someone wanting to know things about them. The fact that your DH reacted so negatively to his own son wanting to know things about him shows just how bad the situation is IMO.

I don't know why people are making out that you foisted something huge on your DH - he was playing a game FFS! Most people would just go 'oh lovely yes I'll answer your questions' and turn it into a lovely discussion of childhood memories and ambitions.

When people make out you didn't handle the situation perfectly it just makes me think that they must have had bad experiences of their own or that they expect men to basically show no interest in their children, such that asking this very minor task of a dad is just asking too much. Most mums wouldn't even consider doing a task like this work at all - in fact they'd probably think it was a lovely way to pass an hour with their child.

I think you need to have a very serious chat with your husband.

To add - I wonder how much of the negativity on the thread comes from the belief that I've come across a lot that for men, parenting, especially difficult parenting, is essentially optional. If a man is too tired to do the hard emotional work, they can just opt out and it's up to the woman to fill in the gaps, no matter how tired or fed up she is. Women have to do it, men get to choose to do it when it suits them.

@TheDailyCarbuncle - thank you.

Although a serious chat would need us to start talking again first - huh...?

I think this thread has been helpful for me to process other perspectives, but I'm still super upset I had to carry this one alone.

So he's not talking to you?

Poor kid, he should have chose you as his role model you seem to be trying so hard

This thread has given me a headache, your answers are really strange.

How old is your ds? You say he is going through puberty yet you are scheduling him trips to the park?

I’m referring to giving your son some space, you sound very uptight and rigid in what you expect of everyone. Why try and engineer this talk if you know your DH isn’t best at it? Pretty simple to say to him ‘ds is needing a wee chat/help with an essay’ instead of the wink nod malarkey that he clearly had no idea about 🙄
I'm still super upset I had to carry this one alone very ott, honestly 🙄
stop overthinking, over analysing everything, you sound like a bloody psychology book.

I understand your frustration but I think you are using this example as an illustration of a bigger issue.

I wouldn’t have written about my parent as a role model at that age and if you DH was happily gaming he wasn’t prepared to have a bonding session and probably had no idea of how important it was at the time.

Draw a line under this incident but tackle the bigger issue in a calm conversation with your DH.

It really strokes my feminist fur the wrong way if the inherent frustrations and challenges of raising kids somehow get spun as my 'fault' - because if only I'd scheduled a bit differently, or had a chat with someone a bit earlier, or had the house a bit straighter ... if only .... nope.

I think you are over-thinking what I (and others) meant by dealing with it differently/later/whatever.

I think if anything you were trying to over-engineer something, not that you had failed to prep it perfectly.

Perhaps it's just how you've framed it here.

It seems to me like you were placing too much emphasis on getting it right/doing it properly.

@NoSquirrels - is it your opinion that the OP was asking too much of her husband when she asked him to answer some simple questions about himself for his son?

I don't know why people are making out that you foisted something huge on your DH - he was playing a game FFS! Most people would just go 'oh lovely yes I'll answer your questions' and turn it into a lovely discussion of childhood memories and ambitions.

I think because the way OP frames it in the post, it seemed like a huge big deal - her DS was really upset, she hustled hard for him to see her DH as a role model, she printed off answers, she mimed behind the child's back that this was A Big Deal and now she is really cross about it?

If it was just a case of answering some questions, it wouldn't seem so fraught?

We can only go on what is written and my interpretation is clearly different to yours on the same words. No offence meant to OP, and certainly don't think dads shouldn't have to do their share of the heavy-lifting.

From what @GreenGoffee (though correct me if I'm wrong OP) she tried to sort things out with DS, he got upset, she had a brainwave, did a lot of her own heavy lifting around talking to DS about what a role model was (as that was something he was struggling with), helped him write some basic questions and then brought him up, questions in hand, to his dad, who was literally doing nothing. His dad then proceeded to act the arse and basically refused to answer the questions. On what planet is that not ridiculously shitty behaviour, particularly as the OP had done something really nice by trying to big her DH up in her son's mind so they could strengthen their connection? The task itself was piddling - it was answering fucking questions about himself! Who would rather see their son disappointed than just go along with it?

I think the situation itself is neither here not there anyway and people are getting too fixated on it. What the OP is trying to say is that she's tired of dealing with all the emotional stuff with her children and that she's had enough of her DH refusing to step up, which I think is a valid way for her to feel. Posters saying that she didn't engage with this situation correctly are totally missing the point IMO.

The OP could just as easily have said 'DH I'm tired of trying to sort this role model stuff with DS, you sort it,' which she would have been entirely within her rights to do but which may have been a bit more unacceptable. She didn't do that, she set the whole situation up so that the DH had to do practically nothing and he still didn't do that!

You're married to a socially and emotionally stunted arse tbh. Autism might be the reason but it isn't an excuse to be an emotionally absent parent. Also playing games while DD is in the bath? How old is she? If she's young then that again, is lazy fucking parenting.

I'm on a roll now - but I would love to see a situation in which a mother could spend years being emotionally detached from her children, refusing to deal with any difficult stuff and still get a free pass when she was just downright horrible to her upset son. It would never ever happen because mums are never allowed to just crap out on the hard stuff.

The emotional temperature in your house sounds febrile, OP, and it feels to me as if it would be exhausting to live there - everything seems so high-stakes all the time.

Postmanbear has it, I think: 'Draw a line under this incident but tackle the bigger issue in a calm conversation with your DH.'

As for parent as role model, I find it a bit odd that you were so invested in getting your ds to pick his father, tbh. It does seem as if you were trying to get something else out of this - some kind of emotional statement - there was a lot more in this somehow than the practicalities of getting an annoying piece of HW done on a Sunday night. I remember a very similar situation with my ds1. We chucked ideas around a bit - I had a favourite I agitated for briefly (not dh!) - he ended up picking someone else and fine, the task was done.

You may have a valid point about 'emotional labour' - I get the sense that there's a lot bubbling under the surface - but I'm not sure this is the incident to make into the defining one about all this.