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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think I have an equal right to sleep

67 replies

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:15

I know I’m not being unreasonable, but if actually I am I trust you all to tell me!

I work from home and once in a blue moon I have to work in the evening to finish things off (I’m the boss, so it falls to me). On Thursday night I was working to nearly 2am and had to be awake and ready for my two dds (3 and 7) at 6am.

Me and DH sleep in different rooms because he snores and doesn’t want to disturb me when he comes to bed later than me every night.

Friday night (last night) dd1 shouts the house down at 4am that dd2 is being sick everywhere, so I get up, clean the bed, put the sheets onto wash, clean floor and shower dd2. Send dd1 to DH because she says the room smells of sick, and then end up with both DDs and the cat in my bed. DD2 is sick again in my bed at 5am. So I send dd1 back to her own bed (the smell has nearly gone), shower dd2 again and post her off to sleep in DHs bed, clean my own bed, put those sheets onto wash and wrap myself in my duvet on the clean half of the bed. Then get up at 6am to receive them waking up.

DH heard me getting out of the shower, stands blocking the doorway and says he’s cornered me now and wiggles his fingers at me. I say “go away” and he’s now sulking that I was rude to him and claims he didn’t realise anything was going on in the night….

We've now had the biggest row because I’m exhausted. Most of Christmas he got up at 10am every day while I got up between 6 and 7am. Just as he has every weekend.

Am I being unreasonable to tell him he’s the one being useless?

He has apologised for making me feel bad but says he doesn’t feel he’s done anything wrong. I’ve retorted that when our dds marry men who do nothing rather than finding decent upstanding members of society to get together with it’s his fault.

OP posts:
LapinR0se · 14/01/2023 10:17

What on earth does this mean

DH heard me getting out of the shower, stands blocking the doorway and says he’s cornered me now and wiggles his fingers at me.

LydiaBennetsUglyBonnet · 14/01/2023 10:17

He’s an entitled selfish prick. Does he think by owning a penis it means he’s unable to get up at a suitable time? Ridiculous that he lays in til 10 while you get up 4 hours earlier!

LydiaBennetsUglyBonnet · 14/01/2023 10:18

Next time wake him up and say DD has vomited go and shower her please

donttellmehesalive · 14/01/2023 10:19

Do you think he knew all that you did overnight, and was lying?

Because if he slept through it, and you didn't wake him or ask him to help, and he genuinely had no idea, then I don't suppose he has done anything wrong really.

Obviously, if he's lying, then yes he is useless and needs to do better and certainly can't be surprised that you were grumpy with him.

atteatimeeverybodyagrees · 14/01/2023 10:19

Why is he wiggling his fingers at you?

Chamomileteaplease · 14/01/2023 10:20

That seems a very convoluted way of saying that you regularly get up at 6am while your husband gets up at 10am.

Talk to him, not in the middle of the night, and tell him this has to change. He doesn't have a leg to stand on surely? It's not rocket science.

donttellmehesalive · 14/01/2023 10:20

But YANBU about weekends and days off. Does he know you are all up at 6am while he sleeps until 10am? He must do. How has that come about and been allowed to continue?

MuchTooTired · 14/01/2023 10:21

Even if he didn’t know anything went on last night, surely after being told a normal response is I’m sorry, you get upstairs for some sleep, I’ve got the kids?

Does he work late/night shifts? Or pull his weight in other areas? Or is he just lazy?

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:23

LapinR0se · 14/01/2023 10:17

What on earth does this mean

DH heard me getting out of the shower, stands blocking the doorway and says he’s cornered me now and wiggles his fingers at me.

Just that he wants to cuddle me or touch me when I’ve just got out of the shower. He says that I don’t give him enough physical affection. I feel really backed into a corner when he does it (I have repeatedly explained how I feel)

OP posts:
DoNotGetADog · 14/01/2023 10:24

Next time just wake him up and ask him to deal with it or help you deal with it.

I would say I question the logic of having a child who is repeatedly vomiting and as soon as she vomits in one bed getting her to sleep in another bed (yours) which she then vomits in, and then sending her to sleep in a 3rd bed (DH’s)! I’m surprised your story didn’t continue that she vomited in that bed too.

I would clean it up, put an old towel on her bed and new sheets and just put her back in her own bed. No point having vomit on every bed in the house!

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:25

MuchTooTired · 14/01/2023 10:21

Even if he didn’t know anything went on last night, surely after being told a normal response is I’m sorry, you get upstairs for some sleep, I’ve got the kids?

Does he work late/night shifts? Or pull his weight in other areas? Or is he just lazy?

I work full time he’s a househusband (albeit that covers him doing the school run and me doing most of the housework).

He had both dds in and out of his bed so I don’t see how he didn’t know - it’s not usual for them to be out of their own beds in the night

OP posts:
OutFortheBirds · 14/01/2023 10:25

Of course YANBU.
You’re a human being not getting the sleep you need because he’s not pulling his weight He didn’t help you at all! If he didn’t know what was going on he ASKS or gets up and CHECKS. Let him sulk.

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:26

donttellmehesalive · 14/01/2023 10:20

But YANBU about weekends and days off. Does he know you are all up at 6am while he sleeps until 10am? He must do. How has that come about and been allowed to continue?

He thinks they should go back to bed and be quiet until a “reasonable time”. I think if they’re up then they need supervision

OP posts:
Xrays · 14/01/2023 10:27

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:23

Just that he wants to cuddle me or touch me when I’ve just got out of the shower. He says that I don’t give him enough physical affection. I feel really backed into a corner when he does it (I have repeatedly explained how I feel)

Well that sounds borderline creepy and abusive. 🤢😳

Yuck.

donttellmehesalive · 14/01/2023 10:29

This doesn't sound like a relationship that will last to me. You sleep in separate beds, he feels 'starved of affection' (yuk) and he's lazy and unsupportive. As a SAHD shouldn't he be doing most of the childcare and household chores? If all he does is the school run he needs to get a job.

ditzzy · 14/01/2023 10:30

DoNotGetADog · 14/01/2023 10:24

Next time just wake him up and ask him to deal with it or help you deal with it.

I would say I question the logic of having a child who is repeatedly vomiting and as soon as she vomits in one bed getting her to sleep in another bed (yours) which she then vomits in, and then sending her to sleep in a 3rd bed (DH’s)! I’m surprised your story didn’t continue that she vomited in that bed too.

I would clean it up, put an old towel on her bed and new sheets and just put her back in her own bed. No point having vomit on every bed in the house!

I agree about questioning the logic! Luckily she made it through the rest of the night. I was in no fit state to apply logic

OP posts:
Loics · 14/01/2023 10:30

I wouldn't call him a househusband, that implies he does something (I wouldn't count the school run as him pulling his weight)!
His behaviour when you get out the shower is creepy at best, but it's not okay that he does it knowing that it makes you uncomfortable, to me that's abusive.

donttellmehesalive · 14/01/2023 10:31

"He thinks they should go back to bed and be quiet until a “reasonable time”."

I kind of agree with this. But 7am IS reasonable for little children. A 3yo won't amuse themselves until 10am!

Dumpstertruck · 14/01/2023 10:32

I work full time he’s a househusband (albeit that covers him doing the school run and me doing most of the housework).

Lol imagine the scenario where the sexes are reversed.
Sick kids during the night. Working father up all night sorting them out. SAHM sleeps through, only getting up when she hears him getting out of the shower washing vomit of himself because she thinks there's a chance of a shag.
He rebuffs her, she sulks and goes back to bed.
He gets up at 6am to go to sort kids out before going to work. She's still in bed.
Lol.

He's taking the piss out of you OP. What is the actual point of him?

Happin · 14/01/2023 10:32

As a house husband most of these things should be on him.

Why dont you like affection?

DoNotGetADog · 14/01/2023 10:36

Well I’m going off him with every post. If you’re doing all the work in and out of the house and he’s home all the time, you need to change things really quickly.

He either needs to get a job and also do half of the housework/childcare stuff with you; or if he’s not going to get a job he needs to do more or less all of the housework and childcare, including at night. And you should be the one getting the lie in at the weekend if anyone, the vast majority of the time.

Why on earth are you putting up with this?

I’m not surprised you don’t want him to touch you when you come out of the shower (which sounds creepy too).

LadyGAgain · 14/01/2023 10:38

Thread after thread about man-children. I don't know how we break the cycle. How is it that women ( and men) do their best to bring up boys to not behave as we continually read about. Sorry OP. You have one. And the fact that another man (househusband like that warrants some applause) focuses on why you don't want affection sums it all up. FFS. We don't want to be pawed when we are exhausted and not feeling it. WHY DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND THIS? It isn't rocket science. I don't know what you do other than sit him down, explain it and make a decision about what happens next based on whether he gets what you're saying or not and is prepared to change.

LapinR0se · 14/01/2023 10:38

If my husband wiggled his fingers at me for sex after I’d been cleaning sick all night, I would chop them off. And possibly his penis also

America12 · 14/01/2023 10:39

Happin · 14/01/2023 10:32

As a house husband most of these things should be on him.

Why dont you like affection?

Would you want to be affectionate with this useless man child ?

Rainbowqueeen · 14/01/2023 10:43

I’d be really blunt with him. You aren’t interested in giving him physical affection because he behaves like a child not an equal partner. If he really really wants more physical affection then he’ll do all housework and cooking plus give you equal lie ins.
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He needs to lift his game and he needs to do it now

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