@YahooBrahoo Firstly, congratulations on the baby. I remember the first 4 months as a sleep deprived haze.
It seems to me that your husband has gotten used to enjoying the living room for his own time in the early evening.
The thing is he doesn’t live alone, he shares a home with you and baby. Everyone has needs. Alongside considering his own needs, as a dad he needs to consider baby’s needs, as a husband he needs to consider his wife’s needs too.
His enjoyment of having the living room to himself does not take precedence over your freedom to have your needs met or to be able to use and enjoy the living room too.
You need to have downtime and adult interaction in the evening when baby is asleep.
“It now gets to about 8:30/9 and he's basically telling me I need to go up now and getting the things ready to take up (bottles, dummies etc) because it's the only 'time' he gets...”
What you have written here is not ok. He doesn’t get to dismiss you to your evening chores, bedtime routine and make you feel uncomfortable remaining in the living room.
This is your home too. You are an adult that makes your own decisions. If he thinks it’s a good time to get bottles and dummies ready to put baby to bed he can either get up and do it himself or wait until you decide you are ready to get up and do that and then offer to help. Even if you say no thanks, and prefer to do it yourself, the offer to help is a partner being supportive. And he really should be supportive. (It goes both ways).
As for the only time he gets, what about the only time you get? As parents it gets really hard to carve out time for yourself. This is where good communication and compromise comes in. Because, as a couple with a baby you both need to communicate and find compromises to make sure you both get “me time” that doesn’t unfairly impact on each other and the baby. A single person living on their own can decide when and where they have time to themselves and shut other people out. But your husband isn’t single so he doesn’t get to do that anymore.
As a mum I have to say for me personally going to bed when baby goes to bed and getting up with baby leads to burn out. Being able to enjoy other areas of the home while baby is asleep is somehow restorative. I hope as baby gets older you feel you can share bedtime routine with your husband. I’d recommend now is the right time to do bedtime routine together and work towards eventually taking turns. However, that is up to you and dh to decide.
And one last thing, if your husbands argument is that he has to get up early in the morning well then he needs to make sure he gets sleep without booting you out of the living room.
I wish you luck in resolving this issue with your husband. I hope you find a way to clearly communicate with him about your needs, his needs, baby’s needs and work out some compromises that work for each of you.