Can I ask you if you think I'm lazy?

[dhisaknob]

I have 3 kids oldest is 5 middle one is 3 and youngest is 12 weeks.

I do all the night feeds and then I will do the last feed at 6 and then I will get up. Feed kids get them ready for school & nursery. DH will drop them off and I will stay at home with the baby and clean and tidy. Then around 10:00am I will get back into bed with baby with a cuppa try and nap or just relax. DH will drop DD back from nursery at 12 then he goes back to his office. I will do lunch for me and DD and then we will get back into bed we will then usually all fall asleep.

Then about 1:30 I will get up shower and get babies next feed ready. Then I will stay downstairs for the rest of the day and do dinner etc.

DH will pop in and see me napping or whatever and will accuse me of being lazy and will say"why don't you just up get dressed and take the kids out instead of getting back into bed"

It works for me because if I don't catch up on some sleep I will feel groggy all day. No I don't do much with the kids during the week but we are out every weekend without fail.

Aibu?

As she doesn’t your point is irrelevant and says more about your reading comprehension than the OP’s sensible decisions.

And everything is just a phase anyway. This too shall pass. 3yo will stop napping baby will get bigger you'll probably change it up. Seriously rest while you can. We are extraordinarily hard on mothers in this country 😡😰

She asked for opinions and I gave her one

Please can you tell him to do one? I swear if I was doing this routine and my DH even implied I was being lazy he’d feel my full wrath. What is it with these useless men laying into women just trying to get through the day with themselves and the kids in one piece? Makes my blood boil. Perhaps suggest swapping routines for a week and intersperse it with calling him lazy and see how he likes it!

I'm torn on this one. Yes it's tiring having a 12 week old but actually by 12 weeks lots of babies are starting to do a longer stretch of 3-4 hours at some point during the night. I can understand the needing to go back to bed in the morning with baby to catch up on a couple of hours but the second nap in the afternoon feels a bit much while your husband is both working outside the home + doing all the preschool and school drop offs and pickups. OP can you get the children settled to bed by 7 30pm to enable you to get an early night (say 9pm) to maximize sleep overnight and enable you to skip that additional pm nap to engage with your preschooler more actively?

Some people think you’re being lazy for being asleep past 7am no matter what.

sounds like your husband is one of those people. Shame the selfish git can’t bring himself to do any night time wakings, if he did he’d understand the benefit of napping.

I don't actually think it's fair to slate OP's partner when he is doing all the preschool drop offs and pickups in and around work, presumably to give the OP more time to rest. Lots of parents working outside the home wouldn't actually be able to do that, when mine were this age I had no choice but to get dressed and get my older kids where they needed to be with baby in tow.

I think the best time to discuss this with dh is whilst you are doing those night-time feeds. Make sure the conversation continues for the length of the feed then continue it at the next feed. I doubt it will take many nights before dh decides its best if you catch up on your sleep during the day.

I never went to bed during the day BUT I never had 3 kids under 5. So no, I don't think you're lazy. If you feel exhausted when you get up then you need that extra sleep.

Perhaps it would be good to swap roles on his day off and see if he calls you lazy then

Would he think you were lazy if you were doing night and afternoon shifts as a paid care worker?

A lot of people are relying on you for care and nourishment & you need to be sufficiently resourced to meet their needs.

A sleeping infant and a napping toddler don’t need schlepping out to a park FGS.

Your doing amazing tell him to sod off! I had a newborn and my 6 year old (husband worked away ) , as soon as I'd dropped dd off at school I'd be straight back and sleeping with the baby most of the day! It's exhausting when you get broken sleep each night, now my baby's 8 month and still doesn't sleep through, enjoy your naps op! Don't worry about the kids not being out and about each and every single day your all in a nice routine that works, their well looked after .

So, your children are clean, fed & watered and your home is 1/2 step away from chaos?
You are a hero!
💐

Tell him when he starts doing the night feeds he can start judging.

he’s got a good deal not doing any of the night wakings.

Sounds great and not lazy at all. You're doing loads and getting some rest when you can.

I don't think you sound lazy at all. I do think that regularly spending a lot of the day in bed can be both a sign of and a cause of mental health concerns and in your shoes I would want to be up and out of the house a bit more. That's not meant as a criticism, more an attempt to see what your partner may be concerned about.

Why isnt he parenting? It his job to share night feeds

Why doesnt he know 12 week olds and 3 year old need naps? taking a 3 year old out at nap time lol leave him to deal with the overtired toddler.

Also ask him how long it took him to recouperate from pushing a fully formed human out of his genitals - it takes 9 months to make a baby and at 9 months for your body to recover.

Take it while you can tbh. At some point the 3 yr old will refuse a nap. Just crack on and tell him when he's up during the nights doing feeds, he can have an opinion.

I bet he’s still getting more sleep than you are. 🙄

The only thing I’d say is to make sure you’re at least getting some fresh air by sitting in the garden if you have one, good for mental health and much needed vitamin d if you’re not really going out on weekdays.

Hopefully your nights will be less disturbed soon and you can have a more normal day and night. Until then I would be continuing to grab sleep and rest when possible and tell him to concentrate on his own day.

As for comparing yourself to his mother, stop that right now! 😜

We had a talk and he said he would do two night feeds a week but he slept through it both times. So we've just left it as it is. In all honestly if I was getting as much sleep as he is I wouldn't be getting back into bed. DS is a very difficult baby my other two were a breeze. I even take DS downstairs in the night to stop him waking DH up.

Argh, only a man who is NOT doing endless night feeds with a baby would take this attitude. I think the fact that the house is clean, food is prepared etc means you're doing fine. And of course, this routine won't last- the baby will get bigger and you will need to be out and about more and the toddler will refuse this level of napping. But while you're up and down all night doing feeds, it seems imminently sensible to me. Especially as the toddler is getting time out the house every day at nursery.

Yes because people who do night shifts etc... are lazy.

Or maybe people have different scheduals to the one society blindly and stupidly insists we should follow, not everyone goes to bed at 9pm and gets up at 6am and works 9-5.

Many cultures nap in the middle of the day, and have kids that stay up late at night... its very British to be offended by and condemn something different to your own experiance.

I would be tempted to tell him you are going to wake him through the night every time you have to be awake for the baby and make him help you for four nights on the trot. And after that if he thinks he can wake for the baby and keep up with work without napping you’ll happily swap night duty for taking the kids into school and out to the park. But if he’s so “lazy” he can’t wake for his screaming child you don’t want to hear another word about your lack of excursions while you’re so sleep deprived.

He has no fucking idea how exhausted you feel and he’s being a bit of a cunt about it. (I remember that fugue like state, lack of compassion from people who aren’t waking for their own children makes me so angry!)

Having said that - if you can find some of the time you aren’t napping to go outside, that would probably be good for you. Even if it’s just sitting in the garden/park/cafe pavement seating to feed the baby.

Not lazy at all, you just gave birth 12 weeks ago and are up numerous times in the night feeding baby and up very early every morning, you sound like you are doing a great job. Remind your dh that you can nit our from an empty cup, you being well rested is essential to being able to look after everyone else x