to set a boundary with DH about yelling at our toddler?

[lapaverde]

My daughter is 1.5 years old, teething, and in a sleep regression - she is quite a handful to deal with at the moment, especially during lockdown as we both attempt to work full time and provide round the clock childcare. However, I am trying my best not to let her see my frustration or stress. My DH, on the other hand, has quite a temper. This has already caused conflict because he accuses me of being over-sensitive, but the issue I'm asking about concerns DD. The other day she was whining and DH wheeled on her and said, with fists clenched and in a sharp tone, 'Shut up!' She immediately started crying hysterically because we have never used that tone with her, ever.

I defused the situation but later, at a calm time, approached DH and said, "I know we are under a lot of stress and she can be frustrating, but you mustn't ever speak to her that way. It caused her a great deal of upset." He responded by: 1) accusing me of being unreasonable - 'all parents lose their temper,' and 2) holding him to a higher standard than I do myself. When I pointed out -accurately! - that I have never once raised my voice at her, he said, 'Well, you've made a long list of mistakes as a parent - shall I start elaborating them?'

I'm concerned because his reaction is so defensive. Surely he can see that it's not okay to frighten a toddler, no matter how difficult she's being! He claims he doesn't remember her crying, 'or if she was, who knows what it was about.' But I can't stop seeing her shocked little face right before she started to cry. DH is constantly harping about how I am conflict averse and can't deal with normal interaction - so AIBU here?

The boundary should be the front door with him on the outside of it permanently.

No she’s only really a baby still. Frightening her is pretty awful. He needs to get a grip of himself.

You’re husband sounds like an absolute dick, surely you don’t need anyone to point out to you that being aggressive towards a baby and telling her to shut up is wrong? Under pressure from working from home? There are no excuses here, plenty of us are doing that and don’t frighten a baby.

What he did was not acceptable. Talk to him again.
However I think both of you trying to work full time and care for a toddler is not sustainable for long.

Wow that's awful, I think you need to stop him in his tracks when he does this rather than tell him later. We would never tell our children to shut up, they will only think its acceptable to say it to you back when they can. You really need to curb his behaviour now, it's sad to read the adult is having behaviour issues and not the child.

YANBU, we can all get frustrated at times but shouting shut up at a toddler is not on. If my toddler is doing sth I don't want him to do I tell him to stop, with a sterner voice if he's ignoring me, but not yelling. It also won't achieve anything. He needs to work on keeping a lid on his temper around her if he's very stressed, did his own parents lose their tempers with him when he was little, does he think this is normal?
I assume he means you are conflict averse around adults, thinks you're not assertive enough or shy? This is completely different to interacting with toddlers, YANBU to.challenge him on this. And his reaction to highlight your parenting mistakes? Did he just say this in the heat of the.moment or mean it? Think you need to have discussion about expectations when he is calm.

I’d remove the D from DH

He needs to get help for his anger or you need to kick him out. Who clenches there fists at a toddler and then rather than feeling guilt starts listing out your faults.

You say he had a temper like that’s an excuse... he’s an adult he needs to control it. Unless he is amazing at literally everything else bar this one off occurrence I’d be questioning what if I wanted to stay with someone like that

It's probably worth having a calm conversation about parenting style and agreeing some boundaries. I agree shooting "shut up" at a toddler is distressing for her.

Speaking to a baby like that - a big no no. BUT we all lose our shit with our kids sometimes and it sounds like life is pretty stressful at the moment. You come off as quite the angel which I suspect isn't totally right, so perhaps a bit of meeting in the middle might go down well. You were right to say he can't speak to your DD like that but you need to speak to him about 1. How he's feeling and 2. How better to support him and work together as a team. This also works the other way around too when you lose your shit (and I'm sure you will eventually).

I think there are two separate questions here OP.

1. Are you justified in your criticism of your H?

None of us can say whether his outburst was overly aggressive or whether you’re too sensitive because we weren’t there. Clenching fists is aggressive imo but I tense up when I’m angry as well so it could just be that.

1. Should you set a boundary with the way you H shouts at your toddler?

If you think you should set a boundary then that is what you must do. It is up to you what you will accept and what you won’t. The real question on which all this rests however, is what will you do if you set a boundary and your H crosses it? Boundaries are only boundaries if there is a consequence for crossing them, because if there’s no consequence then it’s a preference, not a boundary.

I think you way you said 'you must not speak to her like that' was really patronising. Like you were telling him off. Then you you tried to point score by pointing out how you never raised your voice.

Much less confrontational way would have been to talk about how to deal with dd whining. Do you ignore and walk into another room? Do you distract? Etc

Thank you all for your responses; it's helpful to get an outside perspective. I grew up in an abusive home so I often doubt my own boundaries, but I can't be a doormat if it causes DD to suffer. @MaMaD1990 you are right - there are always two sides to the story, and I'm sure DH has a point when he says that I am too conflict-averse, and that it's frustrating for him. I am certainly not an angel! But in this situation my gut intuition is that I am right - there is no excuse to yell at a toddler.

To all suggesting I talk to him at a calmer time - that's exactly what I did; in the moment I just took DD to the park to let DH cool down, and later approached him in a conciliatory way ('I know toddlers can be frustrating, but...') And he still blew up at me. So I'm left wondering what else I can do, other than threaten to leave (which maybe seems like an overreaction to a one-time event? And which could also be construed as manipulative.)

This will not be a one time event. Your husband is horrible.

I know this sounds OTT but that would be a serious concern for me around the long term well being of my child.
Therefore I would install a secret camera, record it next time it happened, then LTB and make sure his contact was under supervision.

Bit harsh but I grew up with an abusive father and would move heaven and earth to make damn sure no child of mine is ever subjected to that fear in their own home.

Doing it is bad but not even admitting (or worse still, not believing) he was in the wrong = massive red flag. Then to turn it all back to you. He is a narcissistic arsehole.

I think most of us have shouted but then felt awful about it and resolved to be calmer next time. However I also think if DH told me I must not do something then I’d get defensive so I wonder if there’s a better way of talking to him about it.
Also do you know much about how he was parented? My DH grew up in a very shouty household whereas I didn’t and we’ve had quite a few conversations about how we want to bring up our DC and what we learnt from our parents which has helped

I disagree about waiting for a calmer time. If DP had shouted at my 1yr old he'd have been out of the building and finding somewhere else to sleep that night.
It's completely pointless and horrid to shout at and scare such a small toddler. Not acceptable at all.

OP, re my post and your last post: you have already talked to him and he has minimised and dismissed your concern. I can see that you need to set some sort of boundary with him, because you are sensibly following your gut, but what boundary are you going to set and how will you enforce it? He has already indicated that he doesn’t respect your opinion on this, which suggests that any boundaries you set will be crossed, so you need to be very resolute in deciding what the consequences of transgressing your boundaries will be, and sticking to it if he does. It’s not easy, especially when you already struggle to cope with conflict, but it’s very important, because as I said in my last post, a boundary is only a preference if there’s no consequences for crossing it.

It’s his response that is worrying to me. Yes, we all lose our temper from time to time - I have spoken to my kids in ways I have regretted, as has my husband. But if either of us were to then raise it as an issue, the other normally agrees, and then we talk about ways to reduce the stress. He seems to think that his outburst was unavoidable, and doesn’t seem to want to try and come up with ways to avoid getting that wound up again. Which is concerning.

Threatening to leave would definitely be OTT, unless he is continually aggressive which is a whole other issue. Have you tried to approach the situation in a way that doesn't criticise him? Such as "DD behaviour is quite hard to deal with at the moment. How do you think we should deal with it?". This was you are deciding together how to parent and he isn't feeling like he's backed into a corner. I do this often with my partner (no issues with yelling but he can be pretty soft) and I do some research on different techniques we can use to sort whatever the behavioural issue is out. I just say "oh I've read up on X and apparently this is a good way to deal with it. How do you feel about trying it out for a while and see if it works?"

Agree with those of you who have said it's his response to the situation, not the yelling itself, which is most concerning. We all lose our cool sometimes, but express it in different ways - I cry, DH shouts.

It's a good suggestion to approach it collaboratively rather than give a lecture. I'll try that moving forward.

This is the first time he's yelled at DD. However, over lockdown, he's shouted at me extremely frequently. His temper wasn't an issue for the first decade of our relationship, it only grew in frequency over the past year or so. But my main fear is that his behavior toward DD will continue. I don't want her to experience that, even one more time. I guess I have to see what his response is to a conversation rather than a lecture.

My main issue: on one hand I worry that I'm massively overreacting here. OTOH I worry I'm like the frog in boiling water, and I'll end up letting DH yell at DD and rationalize it away. I never want her to experience that pain.

Try and have a collaborative conversation about parenting and see how it goes. If he does yell at DD again take her out of the situation like you did before and broach it with him later. You know your own limits so go with that and put you leaving on the table if it does get too much. As for him shouting at you, I'd be telling him how it makes you feel and that he needs to cut it out. Assuming he knows your past experience with abuse, I would remind him of this and ask that he treats you with more respect. COVID has put a strain on so many relationships and it can personify emotions when you're all stuck in the house with nowhere else to go - not that this is an excuse, but a consideration.

I don’t agree with a lot of the posts here. I think most of us have lost our temper at a toddler who is pushing boundaries. I have. BUT I also apologised for shouting and upsetting them ‘mummy is sorry for shouting I worried you weren’t safe’.

I wouldn’t ever raise my hand / clench my fists or deliberately frighten anyone but especially not my child.

Only you know what the reaction was like as you were there.

I think the problem here is more that he can’t reflect and apologise and try to deal with it better next time than the fact he shouted in frustration.

Life is stressful rn, parents are human and not perfect but we should treat children respectfully and apologise when we get it wrong.

He was in the wrong: but most parents would be lying if they said they’d never felt rage and shouted at their toddler for whining. He shouted at her in a sharp angry tone, it was a one-off.

There may be times in the future when you feel overwhelmed with anger and stress at something she’s doing and yell at her unfairly.

I think parents need to be understanding of each other, especially at such a stressful and uncertain time.

He sounds stressed, but he is also defending himself. I could forgive him if he was genuinely remorseful for what he’s done. But he’s not is he?

I wouldn’t feel happy leaving him alone with her after that.