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Original poster

To be annoyed my husband stole skin to skin time

552 replies

Hamiltondoesnthesitate · 16/08/2023 09:15

I’m probably being unreasonable, and happy to be told I am. I just can’t seem to shake this feeling of resentment that when our first daughter was born 5 years ago (yes, I have been known to bear a grudge!) my husband had most of the first 1hr of skin to skin time. I was a bit out of it on gas and air, but essentially I delivered our daughter and she was given to me by the midwife, I think I held her for about 5mins and then the midwives weighed/examined her. The midwife went to pass my daughter back to me but my husband intercepted and asked to hold her, he then sat away from me, unbuttoned his shirt and did skin to skin for about an hour.

I was still quite groggy from the gas and air, so didn’t really ask for her back until an hour or so, but I feel he should have at least offered to bring her to me or sat next to me, rather than sit far away in a corner with her?! I didn’t attempt to breastfeed until an hour after she was born, I struggled a bit and couldn’t get her to latch on until a few days after she was born.

These feelings were stirred up again when I had our second daughter. Before she was born, I explained to my husband that I wanted to have skin to skin immediately after the birth for 30mins and also attempt to get her to latch on in that time. I said I was happy for him to hold her in that time, but not to take her to the other side of the room for an hour like last time! Anyway I ended up having an emergency c-section. The doctor took the baby to be checked over immediately after delivery. As they were removing the placenta, I noticed my husband start to unbutton his shirt. The midwife picked up the baby and started walking towards me, my husband, shirt unbuttoned, stood in her way with outstretched arms as if to take the baby! The midwife ignored him and placed the baby on my chest, and she stayed there until they had sewn me up etc, she was even able to latch on. But I have a niggling resentment that my husband intended to disregard my wishes, and just do what he wanted!

I know I should be/am grateful for 2 healthy daughters. I just feel that my husband intentionally wants to cut me out/not include me in many ways - but it started at day 1 from each of their births.

Sorry that was long, thank you if you reached the end!

OP posts:
Carpediemmakeitcount · 16/08/2023 15:10

Iwasafool · 16/08/2023 14:21

Maybe read my other post before you start preaching. I said, and still believe, that the skin to skin isn't the big issue, how he is behaviour with the children now is the issue.

Just to let you know I did read all the OPs posts, that's why I was concerned about his behaviour now so maybe get your facts sorted before you leap to judgement.

Show quote history

Vaginal delivery
Vaginal delivery without pain relief
Breast feeding

All things we feel judged about and now we can add skin to skin. I'm sure there are more that could be added to the list.

Are you normally this sensitive do you get a lot of judgement from people?

I was once told that I should breast feed rather than express feed my baby. Who gives a shit I wanted to express feed my child. The op wanted to hold her baby and that's all that matters and it is important that he tried to take the baby from the midwife because it shows that he has no respect for his wife and she is an incubator to him. That's when the fuckery started and carried on from there. It's important to her husband and now he can't bond with his second child because he didn't have skin to skin with her. The creepy behaviour started from day dot. That's why your post has no relevance.

LondonLass91 · 16/08/2023 15:18

Hi OP, some good responses on here. I agree with previous posters who say the first can be forgiven but the second would upset me. I think he should give you a heartfelt apology, perhaps you could move on then. I do understand though, because when I had my first child, the baby was put on me and then after a while the midwife asked my husband if he wanted skin to skin, which he did, but I have not forgotten how that made me feel. The midwife asking him, not me, so quickly. We are at our most vulnerable after birth, so we need people to really show us consideration. Your second midwife sounds a dream.

Misty84 · 16/08/2023 15:21

The updates are awful OP. There is something very wrong here.

AuntieJune · 16/08/2023 15:22

It's actually amazing how many people don't read further than the OP.

radiantorange · 16/08/2023 15:22

When my boy was born, 5 years ago, they laid him on my tummy on the birth sheet thing and the midwife said to me ‘look at your beautiful baby’ and I looked but only saw an arm and leg. They immediately whisked him away, cleaned him up, dressed him and handed him to my husband while I was being stitched. My husband was more upset about this than me. He also had a pink hat on and the midwife kept apologising to me saying they didn’t have any blue knitted hats. I said it was perfectly ok. When I got to hold him about 20 minutes after the birth he had a blue hat on already and I couldn’t do skin on skin as he was fully dressed and I also had reynauds of the nipples so I had to stuff a heat pack down the gown.

with all that said it hasn’t affected me that it happened like that and I don’t ponder it either. It is what it is and I can’t change that.

Mysleepisbroken · 16/08/2023 15:23

My husband had the first cuddle (after ELCS) with my eldest because I felt he should, given I'd felt her constant presence for so many months. Then she came to me for skin to skin contact within a couple of minutes, then he did skin to skin contact in recovery.

My second (again ELCS) I had the first cuddle and skin to skin contact almost immediately after birth. He then had a skin to skin cuddle for a few minutes before giving her back.

There's nothing weird or creepy about dads having skin to skin contact, even if mum is well. But mum is the one that's just given birth and her say is the only one that matters.

We did what I wanted, and I treasure those memories (and photos) of their first cuddles with their day. But that's because I chose it. The OP didn't.

To take a baby away like that, to not return baby, to leave mum alone without baby is awful. Especially the second time when it seems so deliberate.

MrsPelligrinoPetrichor · 16/08/2023 15:25

TherapistInATabard · 16/08/2023 09:51

I just feel that my husband intentionally wants to cut me out/not include me in many ways - but it started at day 1 from each of their births.

Tell us about the other ways he tries to cut you out. When I started reading your OP I thought ‘there’ll be more to this’.

You and me both!

Booklover40 · 16/08/2023 15:28

The midwife went to pass my daughter back to me but my husband intercepted and asked to hold her, he then sat away from me, unbuttoned his shirt and did skin to skin for about an hour.

Yuck. That made my skin crawl.

ihadamarveloustime · 16/08/2023 15:29

WinterDeWinter · 16/08/2023 11:07

I think the big problem is what's going on NOW @Hamiltondoesnthesitate . It's very, very, very wrong for your husband to be creating an 'you and me versus mum' structure in your family.Have you ever challenged him on this, because it's extraordinarily manipulative and also very unusual to be so open about it. If you haven't, you must start doing so now. Right now.

At the very least this is emotional abuse towards both your DD and you.

At the very worst it's sexual grooming. Somewhere in the middle is emotional grooming, where the daughter becomes the 'wife' in the triad, with lasting psychological impact on her. He will make her complicit in this - he already is - and she will feel terrible conflict and self-repulsion because she has been groomed to crave what she on some level knows is wrong. She will seek similar triangles in the future - will not feel loved unless it is at the expense of another. At the same time, she's likely to be tortured by guilt.

Your second daughter will also be profoundly impacted - rejected as 'not enough to be my wife'. As well as the crushing blow to her self-esteem, she will also know that what she longs for is wrong - like your elder daughter, she will hate herself for wanting her father's perverse attention.

On the matter of the skin to skin - you can see that he thinks this time is exceptionally important, because he (wrongly) attributes his lack of closeness with DD2 to not having it with her. Yet twice he wanted to deprive you of that bond.

There is something deeply, deeply creepy about a man demanding that a tiny powerless baby touches him in this utterly intimate way - 'gives herself to him first'. Others have mentioned, there is something fetishistic about it. It's fucking repulsive actually.

These are serious and very unusual responses/behaviours OP. This is so very far beyond normal. I think he sounds dangerous, and I don't think I've ever said that on here.

Yes. To all of this.

Marwoodsbigbreak · 16/08/2023 15:30

Reading your updates, he sounds quite unhinged.

Pallisers · 16/08/2023 15:36

I'm so glad you are pondering what WinterdeWinter posted because she has really nailed it.

Whenever she misbehaves/doesn't listen, he will say she is doing X or Y to him because he was denied skin to skin when she was first born, so he's not as close to her now!

Yuck. "denied skin to skin" yuck yuck yuck. Does he realise how disfunctional/creepy this sounds? His relationship with his daughter depends on him being skin to skin with her when a baby? There is something very off about this man. Sorry OP. Not sure what to do because he'd be the last man I'd share custody with after a divorce - would rather I could be there supporting dd2 and making sure dd1 isn't made as weird as he is.

By the way, you may find as your older daughter gets older and pushes back against her father (and mother- it is normal part of growing up), he may find her less wonderful and turn his attention to his younger, still more malleable daughter.

Hollyisalrightactuallysorry · 16/08/2023 15:36

OP I'm so pleased you started this thread and it's made you realise there is a wider issue here. You've had some great advice-I hope you have the courage to make some changes

And to the posters who aren't bothering to read the updates-this is a prime example when you really really should

To be annoyed my husband stole skin to skin time
Prelapsarianhag · 16/08/2023 15:43

My father groomed me to be his special person and scapegoated my sister to the extent that in her teens, he stopped speaking to her entirely. I later discovered this has a name: Covert Incest It seriously psychologically fucked up both me and my sister.

Covert incest - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_incest#:~:text=Covert%20incest%2C%20also%20known%20as,although%20to%20a%20lesser%20degree.

HowcanIhelp123 · 16/08/2023 15:50

Honestly, your post confused me as where I am you must wear scrubs in theatre, including birth parter, so there is zero way he could be unbuttoning a shirt in C-section for skin-to-skin. He'd be wearing a scrub top he would have to keep on or be chucked out.

Either way guy sounds total dickhead.

WisherWood · 16/08/2023 15:53

She will seek similar triangles in the future - will not feel loved unless it is at the expense of another.

This, OP, and the rest of that post. For a few years I was friends with someone like this, who came from a deeply fucked up family dynamic. If it was just me and her, we got on fine but she kept trying to recreate these triangles where she would then leave the third person out. There were also some other things she did that meant the friendship just couldn't last because she was secretive, lied, and liked to exclude people. I don't think it was her fault, I genuinely do blame her parents. But I think ultimately she had a miserable life and poor relationships and friendships because of her family dynamic when she was young.

Please get some professional help and advice.

OriginalUsername2 · 16/08/2023 15:56

You’re right to feel weird about it. What on Earth is wrong with him?!

Has he explained? Is he desperate to be the closest to the children or something?

ItsNotRocketSalad · 16/08/2023 16:02

The image of him standing there unbuttoning his shirt in the deliery room makes me feel queasy.

I do not have any concern that my husband is sexually abusing my daughters.

Out of interest, what signs do you think there would be?

ArabeIIaKarenScott · 16/08/2023 16:03

Hamiltondoesnthesitate · 16/08/2023 10:26

The second birth was a few years ago (don't want to be too specific as I know people on here IRL, and don't want to out myself). I did question him at the time, and he said that the reason he tried to have skin to skin the second time was because he thought I wouldn't be able to hold the baby after the emergency c-section. He has a very close relationship with our eldest daughter, to the point I feel he is purposefully trying to exclude me. He attributes this closeness to the initial skin to skin bonding they shared when she was first born. In reality he was much less busy with work at that time and was able to work part time and care for her 50/50 in her first 2 years. That's likely why they are close. He didnt have this opportunity with our secoond daughter, consequently he is not as close her. Whenever she misbehaves/doesn't listen, he will say she is doing X or Y to him because he was denied skin to skin when she was first born, so he's not as close to her now!

For those asking how he excludes me, it's hard to verbalise, and I sound unreasonable and silly with these complaints. But it can be tiny things like walking very far ahead of me with our eldest, and not stopping to wait for me/our youngest when we (very rarely) go out as a family, or stopping conversations/playing when I walk into a room and saying "we will wait for mummy to leave before we continue talking/playing". Put really simplistically, my husband's idea of family life is that either he or I spend time with the kids separately, but he does not want all 4 of us to be engaged in an activity at the same time - he finds it stressful and overwhelming. Ideally he would prefer all activities with just him and one of the children.

OP this is really strange behaviour.

I think others have suggested counselling. Can I suggest you speak to a professional yourself, without your husband present? Perhaps speak to Women's Aid?

The whole dynamic sounds controlling and odd.

Skin to skin is part of the process of birth, it's a mother-baby thing that helps establish breastfeeding, strengthens the necessary infant/maternal bond. It's wrong and odd of your DH to have taken that away, and I'm sorry. Of course males can be involved in helping out and holding the baby during or after birth, but the central process there is between the mother and the infant and he should be supporting you, not taking over.

Can I ask you to have a read and a think about coercive control, and see whether any of this is ringing bells? Perhaps it isn't, and your DH just needs to work on his interpersonal skills, but I think you need to consider your relationship, and that of his and the children's, before you raise it with him.

https://www.womensaid.org.uk/information-support/what-is-domestic-abuse/coercive-control/

Coercive control - Women’s Aid

https://www.womensaid.org.uk/information-support/what-is-domestic-abuse/coercive-control

ArabeIIaKarenScott · 16/08/2023 16:03

Sorry, I've said 'males' when I meant 'father'. I am so used to typing 'males' to avoid deletion on the feminism threads my brain now autocorrects ...

Towst · 16/08/2023 16:04

HowcanIhelp123 · 16/08/2023 15:50

Honestly, your post confused me as where I am you must wear scrubs in theatre, including birth parter, so there is zero way he could be unbuttoning a shirt in C-section for skin-to-skin. He'd be wearing a scrub top he would have to keep on or be chucked out.

Either way guy sounds total dickhead.

I was in theatre for an emergency during my birth so there was no time for my partner to wear scrubs (but they didn't mention it either so not sure if they would have asked him to anyway) but he was told if they were to leave the room for any reason he would not be allowed back in.

Whiskeypowers · 16/08/2023 16:09

When I read your first post I thought he was an entitled arsehole
the subsequent ones are very concerning indeed. There’s some sort of dystopian misogyny going on with the not being close to his second child because of the skin to skin thing. It’s like you are some sort of subjugate vessel. The comments about to to this children are emotionally abusive and controlling.

not surprised you have some difficult feelings sorry you are going through this

Whiskeypowers · 16/08/2023 16:09

*comments about YOU to his children

airey · 16/08/2023 16:10

JusthereforXmas · 16/08/2023 11:21

I was busy nearly dying when my first was born, they saved my life but I was unconscious for about 6 hours.

It took 4 hours to sew the many tears I suffered with my second as I blacked in and out from exhaustion all throughout. He was delivered to my chest for a minute but by the time I was fully alert again over 4 hours later he had been rushed to NICU and I couldn't hold him for days.

My third was hypothermic and had to be in a special heat chamber for her first day of life, no holding her at all either.

I carried them for 9 months alone, my Dh can have an hours cuddle while I'm physically recovering. Why on earth would I deny either of them that especially when Im hardly in the best state to do it.

When my second was born on my chest and I could feel myself drifting out of it I literally said to DH 'grab him' and he said 'You did the last 9 months, I'll take it from here' and frankly its a godsend to be able to relax knowing baby is safe with dad.

Gently, JusthereforXmas, while I'm glad your DH was able to do this for you after a terribly traumatic labour, I think this reply misses the deeper points at play. This is not just about the hours after birth, but the dynamic the OP's DH is engineering ever since, even now.

OP, there are some wise voices here. I urge you to consult a specialist therapist to talk more about it. You may not find the right therapist at first, it can be worth trying two or three. Well done for sharing this here x

TheoTheopolis23 · 16/08/2023 16:15

"I think he should give you a heartfelt apology, perhaps you could move on then.*

How's she going to do that while he's alienating her eldest DD from her?

While he's favouring their eldest DD?

While he's telling her DD to wait to continue playing til she's left the room and to keep secrets from her.

The skin to skin is the tip of the ice berg and only the start of it.

This man needs psychology help and I'll tell you what .... I don't believe it will work

OhwhyOY · 16/08/2023 16:23

Awful behaviour all round from him, very creepy. I'd be pushing for couples counselling to get a healthier dynamic in place ASAP and divorce if not. I'd you do divorce I'd also be exploring if there's some way to get a psychological assessment of him to ensure only supervised contact, at least initially until it was established he was a fit parent. Also re skin to skin why did hospital staff enable it the first time? Surely babies go straight to mum and then to dad when mum has a post-birth shower/other medical attention?