To want to abuse my husband

[Athenatina]

I wrote a long thread but lost it when my phone died, so I'll just make it quick.

My husband is fixated on the benefits of breastmilk and wants to raise intelligent child, so I went through a living hell to make it happen. I had not slept for longer than 5 minutes in the first 3 months and I lived like a cow for the first year.

We're questioning the decision now as baby is not developing as he should be, suspecting to be malnourished as his weight is still 25% below birth and 65% below current height percentile. he's not babbling and not walking at over 1, etc. We were blamed by HV for giving him pouches for too long, but at that time I could not cook, I needed to either sleep or feed baby or play with him. When he was cooking I asked him to set unsalted portion for baby and he used to refuse and told me to give him pouches. I had to really fight with him and praise him so much to get him to cook for baby.

So when I mentioned this to him that he could have done a better job he blamed me for not cooking for him myself, he compares me to other mums as they were able to cook for their babies. It was very hard to hear him saying that as he should know best what I have been through. I don't think he realised that I have done something extraordinary for being able to breastfeed in our situation, HV told me when baby's 4 months old and weight gone up that most people would have given up at that point. No sleep is not a joke!

Yet he never sympathise with me on this or even praise me for having done a good job, and whenever I asked for his acknowledgement he always say it's not good enough he has high standard as our child is not doing what his friend's kid is doing at the same age! I guess I have not made him proud for not able to do a lot of things that other mums could do, but they had a lot of milk for baby!

As a result I just want to abuse him so that he can experience a little bit of what I have gone through! I have high standard for him too but he still plays computer games in the evenings when I didn't even have time to be on my phone to check for baby's development.

What's worse is that he told me he had to bear a lot of criticism from his family and friends that what I was doing was wrong-i kept feeding baby and not letting him play... It makes me wonder why he didn't try to do something to help? For example try to find out baby actually needed topping up formula milk, so that he would have time to play... In the past I was feeding him once per hour and he used to feed for one hour at a time...

It really pains me that he blames me when his family and friends have any negative comment-or maybe they're not really negative comments just kind reminders?! The way he dealt with being a new dad was not commentable. Instead of trying to support me, he pointed fingers at me and getting depressed when things get difficult. He even tried to leave me with baby so that I could toughen up- only later realised it doesn't work when I ended up in tears and wanted to divorce him.

When he decides it was too much he could stay away and go to sleep, go to shower, and dump baby on me because I love baby so much and won't hear a cry. I don't have a break. I was not happy for a long time. Now we decided to let it go, it was hard for both of us and we've done our best. But am I being unreasonable to want a little bit of sympathy from my cold blooded husband?

He told me he is not the type of person who have sympathy to people- bloody hell. For example he feels when he couldn't take care of himself he should be euthanized. If this is in his gene, it's so hard for me. When I asked for it he said I should talk to my female friends! End up I just want to throw at him when he's behaving like this!

Am I being unreasonable? What should I do?

I don't really understand your babys weight. They are a year old but still 25% below their birthweight?

My DS is 8 month old and is 10kg, well more than double his birth weight.

But no, you shouldn't abuse your partner, no matter what he did to you. Just leave him, get your life back and move on, try to heal the damage he's done to you

How is your one year old still 25% below birth weight? The midwife or health visitor would have giving you feeding plans/ top up plans and not discharged you until baby was above birth weight.

However, in terms of your H, no don't abuse him leave him. Focus on your dc's health and getting yourself the support you need.

You sound like you have an odd relationship and DH has too much say in how you raise your child. You both don't sound very happy together.

I don't understand what you mean by birth weight etc. I assume when you say pouches you mean bought baby food? There is no reason for a breast fed baby on baby food to be malnourished and not reaching normal milestones. HV should be referring your baby so that this can be investigated

You sound knackered and anxious. At over one your baby should have some sort of sleep routine in place.

Your DH doesn't sound supportive at all so would suggest counselling or a hard think about whether you want to be with him

Your husband sounds horrid and you sound exhausted and unsupported. I hope you find a way forward. Would you consider doing this alone?

I'm guessing English isn't the op's first language.

I took that to mean centile below birth weight. So baby was born on 50th centile but is now on 25th centile

My DD was born on 90th centile and was 2nd centile by 6 months old. That caused upset in the health visitor world.

I think the 25% comment Is that he has dropped one “25%” line on the weight charts so on the 50% line at birth, now just under the 25% line.

I think your main problem OP is that you are being run ragged trying to please everyone- even if they have conflicting ideas. My guess that is why your husky hose you, because you were happy enough to go along with his ideas.

What would happen if you turned round and said- forget about when he starts walking- what about the example he’s not being set of being a decent human being. Your husband is using your child’s development as a weapon to berate you.

unfortunately he and his family will grind you to nothing if you let them continue to abuse you. Your action is to let them know you don’t giving a flying fuck what they think regardless of whether you agree or disagree with them.

He has so much to say and yet has so little to contribute to actually making life easier. That’s your starting point.

My guess that is why your husky hose you, because you were happy enough to go along with his ideas.

should be My guess that is why your husband chose you, because you were happy enough to go along with his ideas.

'Husky hose' 😂

It’s very normal not to stay on the same percentile that you were born on. My daughter was 90th when born and moved down to 50th and stayed there.

Not walking or babbling at 1 is also normal.

There are lots of options for food that don’t involve cooking a meal. Bread? Fresh fruit and vegetables? And cooking a pot of pasta surely can’t be impossible?

Your relationship sounds seriously unhealthy though.

It's a troubling dynamic in your relationship. If you've been pressured into breastfeeding when you didn't want to, then that isn't right.

I wouldn't have any more children with him until you're confident you can make decisions about your own body without him bullying you.

And if you resent him that much you want to abuse him, you'd be better off splitting up with him.

Op you both sound like you hate each other. He makes you feel like the worst mother and you are so resentful of him that you want to abuse him to pay him back. That is so far from a loving, healthy relationships. You both need to part ways.

He doesn't sound like a good person OP, I hope you are taking precautions to not have more children with him. Focus on the child you have, the 1 year check up should be coming up soon.

I asked for his acknowledgement he always say it's not good enough he has high standard as our child is not doing what his friend's kid is doing at the same age!

Why is he blaming you? It's his baby too. He seems to have plenty of advice and expectations but isn't doing his half of the work. Refuse to listen to any more of his criticisms and comparisons until he does his share. He won't, though, if he knows you will do it for him.

RE refusing to cook for the baby: is he just lazy, or is he in some way using the baby to hurt/get at you? Is there any point to him at all?

I just want to add to my previous post cos it sounds a bit wrong to me reading back -

• it's totally understandable to resent the hell out of him,
• and him bullying you would be the reason to split up, not your natural resentment of it.

Sounds like a very weird and controlling dynamic.

Also sounds like he thought that breastfeeding was a miracle solution that would guarantee that your baby would be exceptional - this is complete rubbish.

You need your DH to step up, do more to help you, do more of the childcare. I do hope you have stopped BF now if you want to

There is more to this. I am still breastfeeding my toddler and he has a sleep condition so I wake with him every hour at night. I still have time to look at my phone and I never had to top him up with formula so he could play? Why would breastfeeding stop him from playing?

Abuse isn’t the answer here though. You need to leave him. I’d also go and see a GP if you have concerns about your son and sack off your HV who also sounds utterly useless. Remember that children all develop at different rates. If your son is significantly missing developmental milestones see a doctor who will refer you to the right specialists. But breastfeeding isn’t to blame for your issues with your son, your husband forcing to you do so though when you didn’t want to is disgusting.

He sounds like a horror and you sound shattered and overwhelmed. I wouldn't be worrying about centiles at this point - one of my DDs was EBF and born on the 50th, went up to the 90th and is now on the 12th - it caused a lot of health visitor hand flapping at one point but then covid struck and lo and behold they weren't actually that bothered by it after all. Shes always been a healthy weight, some kids do fluctuate. Nothing wrong with baby pouches, only reason I've never used them is they're so bloody expensive. Lots of people do and their babies are fine so tell your husband to wind his neck in on that one. In terms of abuse, I'm sure you dont mean that, better to just make a plan to leave ASAP, sounds like you'll be better off without him

This post is confusing

But your relationship sounds toxic

Why should be praise you for breast feeding

Why does breast feeding mean you can't do anything other than feed, does he stay at home and make all meals? If not why use pouches for the other times of the day

You seem to be placing 100% of the blame at his feet and I'm not sure that's fair

And your baby is the one that's suffering from this

Leave him and try to get control of your life back

You know that abusing someone is never okay even in retaliation.
you do need to speak to someone about your relationship though and probably make plans to leave, it isn’t working for you.
you can’t have a good life with someone who is too arrogant to communicate and tells you to speak to your female friends about your feelings about the things that HE is pressuring you to continue with.
I’d sack off the health visitor too, I had to take everything my HV said with a large pinch of salt. Eating pouches exclusively isn’t ideal because weaning is about getting used to food so that food can begin to take over from milk as main source of nutrition, food is not so uniform in flavour and texture and requires more work from the eater. Eating pouches will not cause a developmental delay though.

I hope you still want to divorce this twat. He sounds as though he has a heart of stone and not an ounce of empathy in him.

He should never have been the one making the decisions about breast feeding or not as he would never be the one actually having to do it. Stop listening to him on that. If you feel that your child isn't getting enough breast milk and insufficient nourishment then offer formula. It isn't your husband's choice to make whatever bullshit he spouts about intelligence. If you want to breastfeed then fine as long as it is actually working for you and for the baby (doesn't sound like it is to me). If you want to formula feed, which your baby might benefit from more, then do so and tell husband to bugger off.

Plenty of very intelligent people were raised on formula as babies.

Is there extended family involved that is criticising you? If you want to stop breastfeeding, stop breastfeeding. You have done more than enough. At over a year you would want to see your child moving or attempting to move in some form but not always walking yet. You would want some babbling but at this stage you are looking for him to be smiling at you, keeping eye contact, trying to communicate in some form.

You wouldn't need to move on to formula now, neither of mine took much milk once weaned from breastfeeding but you could give a bedtime bottle of whole milk. You want to see a progression with eating, so at 6 months smooth pouches are great but by a year I would want him to start trying more textured foods and trying to self feed. He can get most foods that you are eating now, just add your salt later.

Your DH is a bully and if he wants to raise his son in a certain way then he does the hard work. Tell him to induce lactation and feed him himself if it's such a necessity. I'm hoping you are just venting about your relationship and this is not your day to day because if so there are some toxic attributes from both sides. You have to decide whether you want DS growing up seeing that.

Your "D"H is the abusive one here. You are so firmly under his control that you aren't capable of putting your child's needs first. Breast milk may have some advantages but none of those advantages are worth reaching at a cost ofvan exhausted and miserable mother on the edge of losing it completely. In a school class of 5-6 year olds there is no significant difference between the ones who were breastfed and the ones who weren't, as any advantages are long since outweighed by other factors.

Sleep deprivation is torture and its no wonder you can't think straight. You need to ask for help to get away from this man's abusive control and help to plan a way to provide your child with age-appropriate nutrition without this breastmilk obsession.

This whole thing sounds awful. Your husband sounds hideous towards you, but I also can’t get my head around why feeding the baby meant you couldn’t play, or cook or do anything even look at a phone for a year? Did your baby really not sleep more than 5 mins at once for three months? That’s very unusual.

Everything around feeding the baby seems like a red herring. The nub of the issue is that your husband is a nasty unsupportive arsehole and you two absolutely despise each other.

Agree with this! He sounds really unsupportive!

When it comes to breastfeeding, some women just don't produce enough. I certainly didn't with mine, and after a month of struggling, we swapped to formula. Nothing wrong with doing that if you want to!

Baby food is fine but there are lots of good weaning books out there.

'Wean in 15' by Joe Wicks was my fav weaning book because you get recipes that are designed for you and baby to eat, so you eat the same thing.

And most people could follow a recipe, even if you say you 'can't' cook.