Husband let child get sunburnt

[ReddyHell]

Name changed.

My DH took my DD (14 and a red head) out all day doing an archery course, locally to us (we are rural but almost next door to the adventure center) . I insisted on taking hats and quizzed about sunblock but they rushed off before i could watch them apply it. They returned after 8 hours and DD has bright red burn over her face and arms. I had cross words with them both, but aimed it at DH who just said "she wouldn't keep her hat on" to which replied "you're the parent, either make her keep the hat on or come home".
DD is notoriously laid back and lacking in any common sense which is why I checked about the hat before they left because I half knew my DH wouldn't even cross his mind. I just can't trust DH to parent properly and support my totally normal safety advice and take affirmative action.
AIBU to be utterly fed up with DH?

I can't get over the fact you were up at 3 am checking on a 14 yo and giving her paracetamol and cold compresses.

You seem to think she's incapable of common sense and rational thought over many things. She is, she just doesn't want to do certain things. Of course she's upset when it backfires, but it's a "sorry I got caught" issue .

YABVU. She’s not a small child, she’s a teenager. She’s 14.

How is she ever going to learn any life skills if you just do everything for her?

@stardustandroses - the British association of dermatologists do not recommend once a day products ( more accurately called 8 hour protection) because most people do not apply properly. They work in clinical trials as the sunscreen is properly applied by people trained to do it and participants agreeing to take part / being paid to do what they are told. These products are now banned in Australia.

OP’s DD is high risk due to her colouring not just in sunny days. Skin care should have been drummed into her as soon as she could walk and talk. She should be asking for sunscreen and refusing to go out without it. You and DP have failed her here.

Lightheartedly, I told my DS a couple of years ago,to make sure he used plenty of sunscreen on a trip to Arizona. He looked At me witheringly, and quite right too - he was 33, with a wife and a professional, responsible,job (still has the latter). !!!

@Pleasebeaflesbite

I think this is one of those MN versus real life threads. No parent I know would let the child get sunburnt. I still chase my 25-year-old DD around with the sun spray on days out

JFC. No wonder we have a generation of feckless snowflakes on our hands.

Yes in this instance it was a serious question. If she doesnt follow the rules on protecting herself in the sun and doesnt do as she is told in wearing a hat then i very much doubt she would comply and get in the car and go home. She isn't going to care if she has privileges taken away because she thinks she is in the right, it would most likely have just resulted in her being even more stubborn about the situation. Sometimes no amount of behavior management is going to resolve a situation.

Assumptions and projection.

Most parents can still manage their 14 year olds with age appropriate boundaries.

"DD is notoriously laid back and lacking in any common sense"

And there is no incentive for her to develop any 'common sense' when you do it for her!

There's a saying that struck home with me a long time ago. If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you always got. What you've done up to now isn't working, is it? So either you keep doing her thinking for her and she keeps not doing it for herself, or - you step back. Tell her ONCE what you think she should do, and the potential consequences if she doesn't do it. Then leave it. Step back, sit on your hands and bite your tongue. She either listens or she doesn't, she either suffers the consequences or she doesn't.

She's 14. An adolescent, or as I prefer to think of it, a TRAINEE ADULT. Do you want her to enter adulthood still abdicating responsibility for herself onto you, or do you want her to enter adulthood able (or at least, trying) to handle it?

It's not easy, doing the right thing by adolescents. After all, we've been treating them as children for over ten years now, it can be a really hard habit to break. But break it we must. Because at fourteen, she's too old to be having her nose wiped and you have to stop doing it if she's going to have any chance of being a functional adult. Yes, she will fuck up. Yes ,there will be consequences to that that she will have to suffer. Yes, you have to let it happen.

Good luck.

Sorry OP but I'm with the rest here. She's 14 for Christ's sake! Now, 14 with SN I could sympathise but she's just a massively babied 14 year old. I moved out to my own place at 16! I paid for it myself too by working hard (and thankfully a relatively cheap rent!)

Oh goodness, my eldest (she was then 8) went on holiday with her dad on her own last year. Despite me nagging at them, they both got badly sunburnt on day 3. Annoying but hey ho.

The rest of the holiday they wore t shirts in the pool and applied sun cream. So they both learned their lesson from it.

The damage is done, an uncomfortable night will teach your daughter you aren't going on about it for fun, but for her own good. At 14 it's her risk to take now- it is hard as a redhead (I am one) seeing everyone else tan and feeling your skin is a bit shit in comparison to be honest. But that's life.

Staying up with her is dramatic and over the top and all about making your husband feel bad to be honest. They've had a day out together doing something fun- don't make this a big drama. If she'd have come into my house like that I'd have just shook my head and shrugged my shoulders if she started moaning. You have to learn from mistakes sometimes yourself.

I really don’t get the whole your daughter is only 14 so she can’t be expected to protect her skin! In infant school in reception we were expected to teach our fair skinned children about topping up their sun cream before lunch because quite rightly teachers can not be expected to do it. There are so many options these days - even a dry brush that puts powered suncream on.

Oh my god! My very blonde easily burnt 14 and 15 year olds have been taking care of their own suncream needs since primary school! They were probably at about the same level as your daughter around age 7 or 8! How have you failed in parenting so completely that your daughter is so far behind?

If one of mine failed to use enough/any suncream and got burnt, they'd get a gentle bollocking and a lecture on skin cancer, not be mollycoddled and have a parent staying up all night to take care of them!

You are doing your DD no favours at all. Good parenting is all about equipping them with the skills to become fully functioning adults, not keeping them endlessly dependent on you.

OP I don’t understand all the negative responses you’ve had. I have a 12-year-old who lacks common sense and would never remember to put sunscreen on even after umpteen experiences of sunburn yet I have a 5-year-old who is more than capable of remembering. Some kids just don’t get it, no matter how many times you teach/tell. There are plenty of grown ups who also lack common sense! I remember seeing a family on a plane back from Italy and both parents and both kids had bright red blistering sunburnt skin. A week in Italy with no sunscreen on any of them in the middle of summer by the looks of it. While you and your DH are responsible for her and she doesn’t have the sense to look after herself then yes it is your job and your DH’s job to protect her and I would be equally cross with my ex P if one of my kids got sunburn whilst in his care.

I hope you're laying off the paracetamol and sympathy today, OP, provided of course there are no signs of sunstroke. If she feels bad, your approach needs to be to point out that she knows where the cold water tap and the painkillers are.

@TinySleepThief

If she wasn’t going to be safe then he should have brought her home. It’s not really rocket science.

How exactly do you propose bringing a 14 year old home who doesn't want to go home....

Eh? You’ve inferred that yourself. In any case, last time I checked 14 is still a child. I’m sure her father could have put techniques in place.

All these posts about how the British don't take sunburn seriously....missing the point by a country mile folks.

The point all the sensible posters are making here is that the person in question is 14 years of age and appears not to have learned any common sense or ability to self-care. At 14, NT people should have grasped the consequences of no sun cream, or no bike helmet, or no seat belt. If they haven't then the parents are doing something wrong.

This sounds like competitive parenting to me. DH has been labelled the bad parent who harmed the 14 year old and can’t be trusted to parent properly. Op is the good parent, the saviour who would never have let this happen and is now proving that by nobly staying up into the night tending the child whilst bad dad sleeps on.

This. Up at 3am keeping an eye on her because she has sunburn?! You're teaching her that her actions (or lack thereof) have no real consequences (because you'll always default to babying her) and that it's always someone else's fault (in this case her dad's). You're doing her no favours by not teaching her the importance of planning, accountability and consequences. She is not unable to do these things, she just hasn't had to because you do them for her.

Great minds think alike Poppinjay

Just seen that you’ve replied to the same post before me in almost the same way.

YABU op sorry. You say she doesn't have** additional needs but then say
"DD just isn't capable of making decisions for herself like this"
She really should, at 14, be able to do this, and if not the blame must be put firmly at her door.
What is she saying about it?

JFC. No wonder we have a generation of feckless snowflakes on our hands

Better to be deemed a snowflake by some internet random on the basis of one comment than dead of melanoma for the sake of a quick spray

Every sun burn incident is another step closer to skin cancer for type one skin types

Never understand AIBU like this.

Clearly OP you don't think you are, and no matter how many people tell you you're still thinking YANBU, so why bother asking?

Yabu

Asking a 14 yo to do anything like wear a hat, is just going to have the opposite. And you nagging for her to wear it, isn't going to help.

What sort of hat is it? Like was it one mum brought me when I was 10? If that's the case then why not let her pick what she wants to wear.

Also, hopefully this is one of those things where she learns from her mistakes. She's realised sunburn isn't the nicest and next time she will be more careful

She's 14 YEARS old!!!! I had to check your follow up posts to make sure you were talking about a 14 YEAR old child, not a 14 month old baby. And you're being serious?! Jesus Christ. In 2 years she could join the army, get married, have a job, ride a motorcycle, and generally be treated as if she's got a working brain! I hope you've got something fucking momentous planned for the next 2 years op, because staying awake all night babying her because she's been stupid enough to get sunburnt is not going to help her!
Also, if you're so fucking desperate to find fault with your husband that you're making this (a) a big deal, and (b) his fault, just divorce the poor bastard and let him go.

You’re martyishly sitting up with a 14 year old at 3am because she has a bit of sunburn and yet claim you don’t baby her?
This exactly!!
She’s 14 years old, it’s her responsibility to wear a hat and use sunscreen, you’ve said your husband reminded her but she refused. Would you really have brought her away from the activity if she had refused if you were there?? That’s what you’d do with a toddler, not a 14 year old, again another way in which you are babying her!

Also, my eldest son is a keen archer and I know for a fact it’s very difficult to shoot a bow with a hat on as you need the bow up to your face. She probably took it off to shoot and was fed up, or just forgot, to have to keep putting it in and off.

Stop blaming your husband and stop babying your child.

I am another confused about why you’re still up nursing her at 4am. It’s sunburn. If she’s that bad that you need to be waiting on her hand and foot in the middle of the night, she needs medical attention.

@Pleasebeaflesbite please stop. Your comments about your dd are just toe curling awful. Do you chase after her boyfriend with condoms so they dont give her HPV? "Better 1 moment of hopeless overprotectiveness than cervical cancer"?