DH banging on ceiling

[anxiousatnight]

I'm a SAHM to children aged 6 and 4. I do the vast majority with the kids. DH works fairly hard in a professional role, but office hours. He doesn't get up until 8 on a weekday and has a lie in until 8:30/9:00 every weekend.

I have done all of the night wakings and can probably count the number of times DH has got up with them in the mornings on my fingers. Kids are early risers.

None of this bothers me, I'm an early bird too and don't mind too much.

However, this morning they've woken up especially early (4:20!) and have been ratty and naughty for the past two hours. It's been a bit noisy downstairs and I've raised my voice a few times.

DH has banged on the floor of the our bedroom (ceiling of sitting room where we are), obviously telling us to keep the noise down.

AIBU to feel really irritated by this? It just feels like he has no sympathy for the fact that I've had to deal with this shit since the early hours and all that's important is his precious sleep. Most mornings are fairly smooth, this one is an exception.

Great idea, take them outside so they can piss off the neighbours as well as their dad 🙄

Wow I’d be up those stairs before he’d even closed his eyes again.

My partner works but does the weekday mornings with ours until he needs to get ready for work, as he knows how exhausting it is to parent all day (and our child is easy!)

Send the kids up every single morning. He's a prick.

So a 6yr old can open a stairgate but can't be told to stay in their bed. Right.

She needs to do something to keep them in their bedrooms when they wake, some gates are fiddly to open.

The problem here is both of them tbh. Sorry op, I had a terribly sleeper but we didn't get up at 4.20 it was more a case of getting into bed with them not making a noise playing and watching TV.

That's almost what I was going to say!!

'oh Daddy's awake, let's go & surprise him!'

'right mummy's turn for a nap, Daddy's turn to go downstairs with you two & make breakfast'

stop putting up with this shit. Honestly.

Why does OP need to do something to make sure the DC stay in bed, don’t both of them need to do that as they are both parents?

I would have dumped the kids in your bedroom with him and gone downstairs or into spare room (if you have one) and tried to have a nap.

@spitefulandbadgrammar

"She didn’t get them up. They were up. Presumably after battling them she got them downstairs on the basis that that would spare her useless husband the noise. Otherwise he’d have been banging on the wall rather than the floor."

So you do some good old fashioned parenting and you tell them to go back to bed, a 4 and 6 year old don't decide when they get up for the day ...

If her children won't listen to her and do as they are told them she has bigger issues that her husband. God forbid people actually parent their children these days!

I would tell my dh to do one if he tried that and vice versa.

I work10 hours a week so practically a sahp. When dh is at work I do everything and when he's home it's 50/50. I get lay in Saturday he gets lay in Sunday. Your parenting job shouldn't be 24/7

You rewarded them for not doing as they were told - I suspect this is your issue with being unable to deal with your children appropriately.

How did you work that out?

I'm not saying your husband is in the right with the way he has acted, but neither are you.

If he treated a maid or a nanny like this, it would be deeply disrespectful. For him to treat you like this is disgraceful.

I can't imagine this is the only way in which he makes it clear you are beneath him.

I'd be returning to work if I was you.

What a prick.

Going back to work isn’t a solution to your current problems.

It will just make everything ten times worse for YOU as you’ll still be expected to do everything ant home and be the one taking time off work when they’re sick/on school holidays etc.

Learning to communicate with your DH better will drastically change your life.

At the moment, it’s all passive agressive nonsense between you. Yes, he definitely needs to step up and share the parenting burden more fairly but first you need to stop playing the martyr. He’s not magically going to change his ways because you have the odd strop. Men need clear instructions, not hints.

Spend today working out what he could do to make things better for all of you. Then when the children are in bed, set out your position calmly. Explain why the current system of parenting is no longer working for you and what needs to change. (Lie-ins 50/50 for a start!) Admit you thought you could do it all but you’ve realised that it’s just not working.

Good luck!

@xnalaks if OP is so bad at parenting then maybe her DH should take over. She took them downstairs so they wouldn’t disturb his lord and master. If I had been trying to get DS back to bed on the odd occasion he refused to go back quietly (normally a ‘no it’s not breakfast time’ would suffice 😀) then DH would have to lump it if it woke him up too. He could always come and see if he could sort it out and I go back to bed

Agreed, the sheer number of pathetic excuses wheeled out for useless, self centred men at times is depressing.

As for all the perfect parents who would never have allowed a child to get up early and stay up - well I think people have short memories if they really never had this happen whilst raising children. The OP has said clearly that this was not a normal morning, sometimes it all goes wrong and parents need to pull together rather than "working" man treating the mother like a house slave.

I’d have been straight up there to tell him he can go down and deal with them whilst you’re going back to bed. Why let him get away with so little parenting in the mornings?

@Flakey99 men should not need to be told. I didn’t have to tell DH how to parent, we muddled through together. I hope as parents we are not bringing up sons who can only be good parents if their partner shows them how to do it.

The fact we don’t have a penis doesn’t make it any easier to put a determined wide awake child back to bed at 4am

Stairgate? For a 6yo and 4yo??

'Why does OP need to do something to make sure the DC stay in bed, don’t both of them need to do that as they are both parents?'

The time to have discussed night waking arrangements was pre pregnancy not when you already had a 6 and 4 yrd old.

Again, I have sympathy our youngest was a terrible sleeper but the whole house wasn't woken up at 4.20 with noise and TV on just because they were.

I used to do early, late and night shifts - it's like being permanently jet lagged. You NEED your sleep and anything that disturbs it can have really bad effects. It's not good for you and I'm glad I stopped. My dad also did shifts and I remember as a kid 'shhh, Daddy's sleeping' happened a lot.

So he needs peace and quiet to function as a reasonable person - it's important to understand that being disturbed can put you at the end of your tether.

And being woken up suddenly can make anyone behave in basic ways that are out of character.

If your children don't have neurodiversity needs, it's also important to train them to understand that and to know when to be quiet.

And it's also important for him to understand that behaving in ways that feel agressive and frightening to his family, is unacceptable.

Time for you all to adjust and meet in the middle.

I sympathise, I was a SAHM and then returned to full time work in a demanding role. It does give you a different perspective. If he’s shattered at work doing a professional role it’s probably more important that he gets his sleep, sorry! But he does need to appreciate that your job is difficult and tiring too. Hopefully you can have a chat about it when you’re not so frazzled and find a better balance.

@JFDIYOLO but doesn’t the same apply to the OP, she is getting disturbed sleep and maybe at the end of her tether, so he can take turns or be the parent who sorts out early wakings so they don’t happen again

OP,
Firstly he absolutely doesn't value what you do and is very selfish to never share lie ins.

That is at the upper level of selfishness.
The plate thing?
Dreadful.
My teens will hear about it if they do that, very poor.

The children do need to do what they're told and today there needs to be consequences for mum being exhausted.

Do not be your super energetic self.

Tell them No a lot with the explanation mum is exhausted because you got up so early, so we will have a quiet day.

They are not babies, though small.

It is ok to say mum is exhausted because you wouldn't stay in bed, and show them that mum is exhausted.

It is ok to teach them consideration of others.

Today should not be a normal day as otherwise they won't learn.

Time to look at returning to work.
You are rightfully resentful of him and that will get worse.

He's not a great father/husband if he thinks earning is his only responsibility to his family.

Men like that are not to be trusted.
They are not invested in the family unit.

He works and doesn't do another thing?

Not good at all.

The banging on the floor per se wasn't the worst of it, and might be what someone might do, but combined with NEVER sharing lie ins, it would definitely grate.

Sit the children down, have a chat with them, tell them to entertain themselves, make coffee, and start job hunting.

This will likely only get worse.
Protect yourself.

Agree with this. I've worked in a high pressured job with chronic sleep deprivation and also been a sahm with sleep deprivation and it is much easier managing the shopping, kids activities etc whilst feeling crap than it is trying to function and be competent at work on 3hrs sleep. Not a competition just a fact.