Locking the back door at night

[stickydoughnuts]

How angry would you be if you were in bed with the baby and asked DH to go downstairs and lock up (reminding him windows are also open). He does this. You have to go down 30 mins later to get calpol and see the windows are unlocked, so check the back door. It’s unlocked.

is it just me that finds this outrageous? I was in a burglary as a child so not sure if I’m overreacting but it’s DH job to lock up nightly and now I’m concerned that I can’t even trust him to do it - I don’t want us to be murdered in our beds but also what did he even do downstairs whilst locking up?! Just stand there?

Really? Being "bothered" about doors being locked at night is a bit like making sure you're wearing a seatbelt in the car.

Anyway, I wouldn't trust a "smart" lock more than a human.

They haven't had a baby and don't understand that sleep deprivation can make you forget why you entered a room I could have done this in the early days

You know burglars/intruders will target open windows and unlocked doors over locked ones? If you can’t be bothered to worry about that stuff because you can’t stop it why bother locking up at all then, may as well keep all doors unlocked at all times and just hope for the best 🤷‍♀️

OP, just do the lock up your self, seriously. It just takes a few moments and in that time your husband can look after the kids. This way you know that everything is locked up and you have a piece of mind and you are not stressing about it.

We were a bit lax about locking up - until we were burgled. During the night, when we were asleep upstairs.
It’s much more of a Thing now.

He went downstairs specifically to lock up. He then didn't lock the back door or close the windows.

Sorry but he did not "just forget like we all have done". I'm with the first poster, he's telling you "don't tell me what to do - and now I'll make sure you have to do it yourself as you don't know whether I will do it or not"

You'll get used to it OP, after a while you'll accept you can't ask him to do anything without wounding his alpha male pride so you'll just do everything yourself.

That's not a solution, though, when you have a breastfed baby who is going to wake and scream and be really difficult to resettle - waking your other small children in the process - just so you can go downstairs and check the doors are locked. Unavoidable if you're a lone parent, but getting the (presumably unable to take over breastfeeding duties on account of being male) other adult in the property to lock the doors makes a lot more sense otherwise. It shouldn't be that hard to him to take on this responsibility, and if he's neurodiverse (like myself) and prone to getting distracted and forgetting what he originally went downstairs to do then the answer is to come up with a workaround. For example, I'll repeat what I'm going to do out loud as I head downstairs and then force myself to do it repeatedly, or I'll announce to myself that I am locking the door while I lock it so I can be more sure that I've actually done it, or I'll go back and check at least once each time just to be sure, or all of the above! Not simply give up and expect someone else to take on the adulting responsibility and make sure that I haven't screwed up.

That should be 'force myself to do it IMMEDIATELY', not repeatedly - I am able to restrict myself to one actual locking and one checking. 🤣

I’m not exaggerating it’s not just a moment - it means putting down a baby it’s taken hours of my life to settle who will almost certainly start screaming again and needing resettling. I’m not being precious in a few months it will be fine but at the moment putting the baby down/leaving the dark room will make me want to cry because it will be hours of rocking and ssshhing again.

You understand!!!!! Thank you!!!!

Sorry to hear this. Hopefully none of you were hurt but still very violating

@stickydoughnuts I certainly do understand, I only have one (so no other kids to wake) and she's 12 now but I still remember the years and years of sleep difficulties and how utterly enraged I would become when DH did anything to accidentally wake her. Like, I could have cheerfully ripped his fucking head off just for coming into the bedroom too loudly. Months of spending my evenings in bed just because if I moved and my boob wasn't right there to resettle her then she would be awake again - and miserable - well into the night. Years of sleep problems and sleep deprivation and building our lives around all trying to get enough sleep. Thought we finally had it nailed in recent years, despite her still needing to cosleep most nights, but now we're in bonkers territory again as she is trying to avoid sleeping at all, staying up all night, collapsing randomly in the day, there's just no predictability anymore. (Autistic, in burnout, can't attend school due to educational trauma so there is a reason but fuck me it's hard to cope with at this point.)

We didn't have the technology when she was a baby, but in 2022 I would be sending DH downstairs to lock everything up and keeping him on FaceTime, making him film himself locking every single door and window. And he would be happy to comply, understanding how important that peace of mind was for me and how impossible it would be to just nip downstairs myself and do it.

So you've never gone upstairs to get something, and totally forgotten what you went up for? You've never gone to the shop to buy bread and come home with everything but a loaf?

Nobody has a perfect memory and in the middle of the night it's very easy to go round on autopilot and not actually do it properly.

I'm also wondering - if OP's partner was having a go at her for forgetting to lock up, would everyone would be calling her controlling too? Somehow I doubt it.

I would be sending DH downstairs to lock everything up and keeping him on FaceTime, making him film himself locking every single door and window. And he would be happy to comply, understanding how important that peace of mind was for me and how impossible it would be to just nip downstairs myself and do it.

As you typed that, did it seem normal and acceptable to you?

@stickydoughnuts , thanks, but we were fine - didn’t hear a thing, didn’t even realise until we’d been downstairs for a bit!

There was no break in as such - we must have left the French windows to the garden unlocked. Besides the purse out of my bag (hardly any cash in it anyway 👍) they took only tech - phones and 2 laptops.
We are much more careful now.

@freckles20 I understand how you read the strike out, I didn't mean it like that. I meant hopefully they only * *rob you.
Locking doors may not stop those prepared to break in, but it stop opportunists

I was going to say the same 😳

Bloody hell, if my partner didn't trust me to the point that they forced me to video myself locking the house, our relationship would be history.

Yes, it would be normal and acceptable IN OUR FAMILY where all three of us are neurodiverse, all three of us have executive functioning difficulties and all three of us tend towards anxiety (or in DH's case have a full-blown anxiety disorder due to complex PTSD - and no, not caused by his horribly controlling wife, caused by things that happened in childhood and early adulthood). We share our feelings and concerns, we try our best to help and support each other, and we recognise our own weaknesses. We'd all be prone to going downstairs to lock up but forget to actually do it because we got distracted. We all feel it's important to secure the house at night. We are all open to whatever system might help!

That said, I'd also be comfortable asking him if he was sure things were locked, and he'd probably offer to go downstairs and check again. I'd also, if he assured me he was absolutely sure, be happy with that and not feel the need to check again myself because I can trust him not to bullshit or gaslight me.

Obviously my suggestion would not work if the DH in question was not comfortable with it, or felt his wife was being unreasonable. But that's not the case in our particular family.

Like, I could have cheerfully ripped his fucking head off just for coming into the bedroom too loudly

Now read this back and explain to me why it is totally ok in your family.

Yanbu. It's not difficult to lock all the doors each evening. It's a basic part of adulting.

Erm that was supposed to come across as humour, I didn't say/do anything to him! I was just trying to empathise with the OP, to show that I understand the bone-crushing tiredness of having a really high need baby and the desperation to keep them asleep once you've finally achieved that. I guess I did not get the tone right!!

I’m amazed that people don’t keep their doors locked at all times other than when they are going in and out of them. Whilst I am in the house during the day the key is in the back door and it literally takes two seconds to turn it.
@Fairyliz Absolutely agree with this, sometimes I can’t lock the back/ front door if I carry something and then forget to come back but as a general principle I go in and lock the door.
If I need to put washing out I unlock the back door and then lock it again. It only stays opened if we do something outside.

Do any of you doors are always locked people ever go camping?

I don't imagine they take all their worldly possesions with them if they do?

I've seen some people on camping and I believe they actually might!😳