AIBU to think husband should be home with me and the kids in the evenings?

[Supermummy88]

Good evening everyone.

I just need some advice please. I am a SAHM and have two young children, a 2 year old and a 6 year old. I feel that I really struggle with my 2 year old when it comes to bedtime as he resists sleeping at times and is still up quite a few times at night which is really starting to exhaust me physically and mentally. My 6 year old still wants me to read him a story before bedtime and he also reads a book to me, so I feel like I’m doing 2 bedtime routines at times. My husband works full time and he started going to the gym with my friends husband after work 4 times a week Monday-Thursday from 7pm-9pm. I spoke to him about this and said that I’m starting to struggle in the evenings and would appreciate his help and if he could perhaps go to the gym at 6pm-7pm. He reacted badly and said no, if he can’t go with my friends husband then he’s not going at all, so now he’s stopped going ( apparently friends husband is the only person he enjoys training with so he needs to go when he goes) He’s now saying that if he gets unfit and unwell it’s my fault because I’ve stopped him going to the gym. He’s also started to eat a lot of junk food because he’s saying if he can’t train then he might aswel eat what he wants. Any suggestions on what to do??

Thank you xx

Well he knows it's really busy with little children that time of the evening and so is avoiding the hard work by making himself unavailable. Next thing he'll wonder why you don't give him enough attention, aren't up for regular sex and seem a bit tired and grumpy. He's now trying to make you feel guilty by over eating and moping around. Surely he can go for a run or a bike ride after kids are in bed? I assume you would be OK with say one or two evenings at the gym, so he's being really selfish,

He sounds like a complete knob to be honest. Being very childish

sulky little tantrummy twat.

so many lazy men who want to do the bare minimum when it comes to parenting.

let him get fat.

4 nights a week! Ludicrous

He sounds like a child

His gym time is obviously not primarily about wanting to stay fit. If it were, he'd find ways to do it and not threaten to eat junk as some strange type of 'revenge' against you.

I, too, wonder what your friend's husband makes of this. I assume he's still going to the gym when it suits him and isn't crying in a corner because his gym buddy can't go with him.

That's a lot of time at the gym, regardless of his responsibilities at home. Is he honestly working out for two hours a night, four nights in a row?

Toddler in a grown ups body

He's deliberately avoiding being home.

Does his workplace have a gym he can go to at lunch?

When do you get your free time?

Being a parent is a responsibility, he accepted that responsibility and needs to step up. He cannot expect you to carry all of his slack. There is 0% chance I would put up with that. YANBU, he is a parent and needs to act like one.

Sounds like a stroppy teenager rather than a man with a partner and children. Personally I'd ignore him when he's eating junk food. If he gets unfit it'll be on his head. Coercive control is never a good look.

Why can’t he go 8-10pm instead? That way he can put the children to bed and go when they’re asleep.

I'd tell him to go marry the friends husband!
Why can't he go later after the bedtime routine though? Or cut down a day or two?

Why/How on earth is he training 4 days in a row - a 2 hour sesh each time?

Blimey. That's two toddlers and a six year old you are dealing with.

He needs to understand what bedtime is like day in, day out.

I would say "look DH, I don't want you to miss out on the gym. Please go but let's say three nights a week? And I respect that you want to get fit, I do too. I would like to take three nights to X, Y or Z. Then I think we both get fit, both get some nights off bedtime and both appreciate the other person's perspective more."

Has he offered to stay in and look after the children (his children) for a few nights every week so that you can go out?
I bet he hasn't!
He really needs to grow up and do his fair share of parenting!
As to eating all kinds of junk food to spite you because you've said "no" to him, that really does sound like a toddler tantrum, doesn't it?

Good luck, OP - don't let him get away with it!

Wow! You have three babies, not two - well, I expect the 6 yo is more grown up than your husband.

What a horrible, childish way to react.

I’d compromise on him having two days a week to go to the gym, leaving you free to go out the other two, whilst he does “double bedtime” , or you relax at home whilst he does it.

It’s either easy, so he’ll be happy to do it, or it’s hard so you’ll need a break from it too

Or one night each at the gym (or wherever) and you get two nights to do the routines together.

Is he always like this?

He’s now saying that if he gets unfit and unwell it’s my fault because I’ve stopped him going to the gym. He’s also started to eat a lot of junk food because he’s saying if he can’t train then he might aswel eat what he wants.

Bring home brochures and applications for life insurance. Tell him if he is determined to commit suicide by junk food they you want enough money to afford a nanny - and maybe attract a man who will be a real father to the kids.

When do you get to go out?
To go to the gym?

Exh leaving me to do “double bed time” (I have a 5 year gap and they were 6.5 and 1.5) was literally the final straw in my marriage.

We both worked full time, but I often got home a bit earlier (because I rushed to do so). I suspect he was stringing out time at work to avoid bedtime, but either way he’d come home, know I was in the middle of two separate bedtime routines and not pitch in and help. It was a night when the toddler was being especially tricky, I really needed to get the older one into bed ready for school, but couldn’t with the way the toddler was behaving.

I came downstairs to find him stood in the kitchen having had his dinner eating a yoghurt reeeeaaallly sloooowly. Like a man with all the time in the world.

It was just the fjnal straw after never helping out with bedtime / night times/ early mornings, going out with his friends with no notice - not even a phone call to tell me he wasn’t on his way, going off for naps on weekend days, all manner of not pitching in. And being EA to boot.

But that yogurt was the final straw

Tell him you've changed your mind.

You think 2 hours at the gym a few times a week is a great idea.

So he can do M,W and F and you'll do Tu,Th and Sat and Sundays you have family night in.

You don't need to go to the gym - walk to the nearest costa on your evenings for your 2 hours!

What to do? Go back to work and prepare to split. The kids will get over the early years sleep issues but your H will remain a selfish petulant arse for years.

DH is being a dick. He should be home at least 50% of evenings. You are entitled to as much ‘time off’ as him. He could at the very least put the older child to bed and then go.

(I’m currently hiding downstairs because DH and I usually put a DC each to bed and after an hour and a half of DD being a nightmare I made him come up so I could eat crumble and cry)

Why can’t he compromise and do a couple of nights and you also have time to do your thing too a couple of nights. Oh but no he is a man child that kicks his toys out of the pram when he can’t get what he wants. It’s like once the baby is created in the womb the men have done their work and don’t need to raise their own offspring.

I thought you were going to be unreasonable, wanting him at home every evening with no social life, but actually YANBU.

7-9pm, as every parent should know, is crazy time. Finishing supper, baths, bedtime etc. Maybe once a week would be ok when they're young, but this is completely unfair to you (and the DC who presumably barely see him in the week).

DH gets one week night a week for sport, and fits in other sport at the weekend or straight after school run in morning. Importantly, I also get time to do exercise alone.

4 times a week for 2 hours with a toddler and a 6 year old at home and at dcs bedtime?

Hell no!

He's behaving like a toddler having a tantrum! Is he really that insecure he can't go the gym alone? How pathetic!

You need to sign up for something that's 4 times a week for a while! Doesn't have to be exercise (although it could be) but give him a taste of his own medicine!

He's absenting himself from the hard work of parenting. Let me guess he's simply pouting at dcs bedtimes now and of no use at all?

He needs to grow the fuck up!

Guessing he also did sod all when they were babies?

My ex (not a shining beacon of fatherhood!) used to exercise at home of a morning (army expected to maintain a certain level of fitness)

When dd was a baby/toddler he used to "use" her like a free weight which she loved and found hilarious and was something of a bonding thing for them then. As she got older she used to "exercise" with him which consisted of either weakly copying him and showing him her "muscles" or running around like a Tasmanian devil

Tell him you both get to have equal down time as you both work - even though your work is unpaid and in the home.

3 evenings out a week each and the 7th date night?

Thinking it would be a very good thing for him to have to parent alone of an evening regularly! Good for him to bond with dc too

Was he definitely going to the gym?

I was wondering this too. Is friend an alibi or an affair partner?

But entirely possible he's just being a lazy arse dodging the witching hour

Can't he run or cycle to work, or use the stairs more, there are ways to keep fit without abandoning ones family

Exactly!

Bring home brochures and applications for life insurance. Tell him if he is determined to commit suicide by junk food they you want enough money to afford a nanny - and maybe attract a man who will be a real father to the kids.

I like your thinking

But that yogurt was the final straw

I totally understand that

The kids will get over the early years sleep issues but your H will remain a selfish petulant arse for years.

Prob true