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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To let DD play!?

51 replies

over2021 · 30/10/2021 08:22

DH and I have had a blazing row this morning when he came downstairs to find the front room floor covered in toys and promptly started trying to tidy them up whilst DD (5 YO) was still playing with them Angry

DD loves Barbies so we had various Barbies, clothes, shoes, cars, vets surgery etc set up and she'd been playing independently for a good 45 minutes before he got up whilst I lazed on the sofa drinking tea, no dramas...

He gets up, comes in and just starts picking stuff up and putting back in random boxes. DD starts crying because she's in the middle of some form of vet surgery/shoe shopping/Fashion show and he just carries on. I ask him to stop and he tells me he's fed up with her 'trashing the house'Envy I tell him I'm fed up with him stopping her from playing; in his ideal world she would sit still on the sofa watching telly in a tidy room. We have two reception rooms and a kitchen table so it's easy to sit somewhere else if it really bothers him. When DD had finished playing it would have taken 10 mins max to tidy up properly and put everything away.

We're now not talking which has set the tone for another fan-fucking-tastic weekend Hmm

AIBU to ask him to F off for the weekend so we can relax in our own home and DD can play like a normal kid!?

OP posts:
PinkMoon22 · 30/10/2021 08:24

Yeah that's not normal tbh.

RitaTheBeater · 30/10/2021 08:29

He IBU. There is nothing wrong with a five year old having toys that she is playing with on the floor in her own home.

BlueSuffragette · 30/10/2021 08:32

He's an idiot. Your DD needs time and space to play independently and use her imagination.

SlugRose · 30/10/2021 08:35

Is he trying to stunt her development? What a weird thing to do. She's a child she needs to play.

Wagglerock · 30/10/2021 08:39

What's she meant to do instead? Housework? Homework? Sitting quietly not doing anything? He's being very unreasonable.

Peanutmnm · 30/10/2021 08:42

Is he always like this? He's being totally unreasonable. But I know there's been times where I've been utterly overwhelmed at how my 4 pull the house down around me and I also just desperately want them to sit still and quiet. It was worse when I was suffering from anxiety and depression. But yes he's unreasonable.

ThinWomansBrain · 30/10/2021 08:43

interesting that he stays in bed & sleeps in rather than get up to take care of her.

rainbowstardrops · 30/10/2021 08:49

Oh your poor DD! If she'd got up and walked away and left the mess then I could understand it a bit more but she was bloody playing ffs!
Yes, tell him to fuck off and enjoy your weekend surrounded by mess 😉

Harlequin1088 · 30/10/2021 08:49

I could understand if your daughter had got all her toys out then wandered off to go and do something else, leaving them all in the middle of the floor. But if she's actively sat playing nicely with them, what's his issue? As long as she tidies them away when she's finished playing and she's not cut a hole in the curtains to make a dress for her Barbie, it's hardly "trashing the house" is it? He sounds like a right nob!

Fanackapansy · 30/10/2021 08:56

He’s setting her up to become afraid of him and of expressing herself.

If she’s taught to tidy up her toys after she’s finished playing, then what is the problem?

HoldingTheDoor · 30/10/2021 09:11

Poor kid. She was doing nothing wrong. He's a real dick. Is he usually like this?

ApolloandDaphne · 30/10/2021 09:13

Thats a very odd way to react to child playing normally. That sounds like bullying behaviour.

ImInStealthMode · 30/10/2021 09:15

What an absolute dickhead. I'd be telling him to spend the weekend (and possibly every other weekend forever) elsewhere.

RandomMess · 30/10/2021 09:16

That's really horrible my DH is a very tidy and minimalist person but never was it an issue that the DC played and out tiny downstairs was chaos. Once they finished/went to bed it was soon tidied away!

Original poster
over2021 · 30/10/2021 09:16

@ThinWomansBrain

interesting that he stays in bed & sleeps in rather than get up to take care of her.
To be fair me and DD got up at 6.30 and he got up at 8.
OP posts:
GremlinDolphin4 · 30/10/2021 09:17

He’s a dick. My exh used to do this and it continued re home work, art etc - all too messy. Now he’s an ex. Xx

IWentAwayIStayedAway · 30/10/2021 09:18

Fast forward 5 years. Is this the life you want?

Original poster
over2021 · 30/10/2021 09:18

@HoldingTheDoor

Poor kid. She was doing nothing wrong. He's a real dick. Is he usually like this?
Yes, he is. Not just with toys.

I had friends over for coffee the other day and he came home from work toward the end of coffee/cake and started clearing our plates away, putting the dishwasher on etc.

Yet, if there's jobs to be done like cleaning the bathroom, doing the food shopping, changing the beds- he's nowhere to be seen!

OP posts:
Bingbong21 · 30/10/2021 09:19

He sounds awful.

Its also why SS often say over immaculate homes with kids in can also be a red flag.

ParmigianoReggiano · 30/10/2021 09:20

I went to the park in the summer and overheard a woman say to her child "will you just stop running around for one second and sit down and eat this pack of crisps" - wtf?! Some people have NO IDEA about child development Angry

Fountainsoftea · 30/10/2021 09:20

Dh used to be like this. I think often it depends on what kind of kid they were.

I was like your dd- huge, sprawling epic games. But confined to my room. I think so many of us have kid stuff in the living room now, so it encroaches on adult space. I resigned myself to the chaos when kids were little, as long as we tidied it all up at the end of the day. But dh would get twitchy and I'd have to block him. I don't know anther he was actually the kind of kid to do one toy at a time, or whether he's forgotten what he was like.

nimbuscloud · 30/10/2021 09:21

He doesn’t sound particularly nice
Is your 5 year old afraid of him? Is she aware of the blazing row?

HoldingTheDoor · 30/10/2021 09:22

This would be a deal breaker for me. You and especially your DD shouldn't have to live like this. It sounds as though he's contributing nothing to your relationship except stress and unpleasantness. I'd have a very serious talk because your DD should not be made to feel like an inconvenience, anywhere, but especially in her own home.

SpookyPumpkinPants · 30/10/2021 09:25

Do I think you should tell him to him to F off for the weekend? NO

Do I think you should tell him to F off until he stops being a twat, yes, if that happens to be forever. No problem.

She was playing with her toys, not throwing things & tipping paint over deliberately.

Would he go if you asked him to?
What does he bring to the relationship other than stress?

ParmigianoReggiano · 30/10/2021 09:25

This probably comes from his own childhood. Did he live in quite a repressed household?

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