Husband golfing- 3 week old baby

[HuckleberryBlackcurrant]

I had a C-section 3 weeks ago. We have 2 other kids, 4&6. Husband heading off on a golf trip tomorrow, will be gone for 2 days.

Am I right in being upset that he's going? It's an annual thing with some friends, but I missed my annual trip with my friends this year due to just having given birth.

He's been on paternity leave and has been keeping up on the laundry and dishes mostly, and taking on the care of the older 2, letting me nap with baby etc.

I've only just been cleared to start doing any type of housework. I hate to nag, but the bathroom hasn't been cleaned in a month, the carpet hasn't been vacuumed in weeks, kids toys and dirty clothes everywhere, etc. I'm able to do more now, but bending and squatting is still painful, and it's stressing me out thinking of trying to play catch up. It's upsetting because I worked so hard to have everything spotless and up to date before I had the baby and it's all going to rack and ruin now.

He's arranged for my MIL to have the older 2 boys overnight, and she's available in the daytime if I need her. I can't lift my 4yo if he throws a tantrum. That's my main concern about being alone with him. My 6yo will be in school all day Friday.

I just feel like leaving your newly postpartum wife after she has just had a major surgery, to play golf is a bit selfish.

The house wouldn't bother me so much if I knew I could slowly get back on top of it. But we have company coming in a week, who are staying for a week and it's really stressing me out.

I had to grit my teeth watching him pack his golf things tonight. I'm so exhausted and sore, and he's swanning off to play golf. He says not to worry about the housework and he will help when he gets back, which I know he will. But I just feel a bit cheesed off. I think with him being on paternity leave, he really could have been doing more. The house is a state.

The reason I'm not sure if I'm being unreasonable is that I know we are fortunate he has leave. I know many people have to do all this alone.

I would show him these responses. Book your brother into an Airbnb. Don't have more children as you don't have appropriate support. Stop being a doormat.

It's annoying and I'd have asked him not to go. Sounds like it's too late for that now.

Having your brother there for a week is going to be exhausting though, even if you get on well and are close. Make sure you have parts of every day where you get to go to your room and chill with the baby on your own. Maybe ask your husband to take the visitors out for tea and you stay home and have a bath.

Op have you said to him how much it stresses you out to be sitting in a messy house all weekend?
how you felt discovering he would not be home until after the DC bedtime?

has he offered to do something to make it up to you? Has he already started on the housework? If he hasn’t done either of these things then he doesn’t really mean it and someone has expressed surprise that he left you alone.

I agree that you need to find your voice and really let him know the stress he put you under.
and I’d expect the golf clubs to be put away for the next few months while you adjust to being a family of 5 and while he puts in the time to give you a break similar to the breaks (both the weekend golf trip and the days of golfing) that he has had over the past few weeks.

Who are you to call someone else’s husband a dick head, you must be in a seriously unhappy marriage 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Oh OP I am so furious on your behalf. To be totally honest, him leaving you like that, at that time, in a messy house, 3weeks pp etc etc - would give me such a huge ick that divorce would seriously be around the corner. Maybe not now, but in time, sooner or later. I cant see any way back from that, it says everything about how he sees you and the kids. Also, absolutely no way could i ever have sex again with a man who treated me like that 🤮

@MrsBecs40

He is a dick head.
He's been on paternity leave for weeks, doesn't even cook dinner because there is a meal train, don't get me fucking started on that! He's more useless than a chocolate teapot.

I'm not a doormat for my husband not he one for me. If he wanted to go on a trip like this it wouldn't matter, because 3 weeks post partum after a C-section he would know, without having to be told, that it was a non runner.

He wouldn't need to have a meal train, because he is capable of putting a dinner on the table for his family.

He isn't a useless self serving piece of shit in a nut shell.

@MrsBecs40

Well he is a dickhead, so...
It is unrelated to anyone else's relationship. He is objectively a fucking dickhead 👍

He got up with the boys today and I slept in with baby. He's now doing housework.

He asked me again what's on my mind, I said I'm still upset about you being on the golf trip. He immediately proceeded to the sink and started doing dishes lol. I think it's his way of saying sorry.

We will talk about it later I'm sure

OP i would directly ask him the question ‘why did you think it was ok to go on that trip?’

I would think it’s actually the opposite lol.

We are in better marriages where our husbands aren’t dickheads because they don’t leave us a few weeks after having major surgery with a baby to look after.

There’s no ‘we’ to do it though is there because he’s not there. Yes it should be done but by him, not between you. You’ve just done a 9 month marathon culminating in major surgery. I’d be absolutely raging if it was me. Paternity leave is to be a parent and do all the things that need doing to support the mother, not play bloody golf!
To not even do all the cleaning before he goes so you have to sit in it all then says he’ll do it when he gets back. Why when he gets back? Why not before? Why is his home and family a second to his leisure activities. Honestly you need to tell him exactly how it is. His mother should have done on your behalf, from one mother to another!

He keeps asking what's wrong so that he can tell you after a while that you need to get over it.

You need to be proactive. You need to have a conversation where you set out that his willingness to put his wants over the needs of his family have really impacted how you view him.

It is no use to you, him or anyone, that he feels guilty after the fact.
Only long term change and demonstration of where his priorities lay will repair what has been done.

You guys really need to have more open and forthright communication. You are disappointed with him because his action was selfish, careless, and hurtful. The way he is apologizing now is childish and thoughtless too. You don’t feel strong enough—or the relationship doesn’t feel strong enough—to bluntly tell him how disappointed you are and he is just furtively trying to make it up to you without self reflecting, really acknowledging what he did wrong, and proposing to do better.

No, we shouldn't.
Men are a different species.
I would have gone ages ago if not for DS.

Sorry is easy after he has had his Funtime away , actions louder than words , doing a few pots is not enough
Reflection on what he wants and what you are prepared to except is crucial or this could be a repeating pattern

Women really are conditioned to expect the bare minimum. It’s actually quite sad. It’s a joke that he hasn’t cleaned the bathroom for a month. If he’s buggering off on this trip, the least he can do is clean the house properly before he goes or pay a cleaner. I assume you’re the house slave the rest of the time as he’s been incapable of doing something so basic for a whole month. You should expect better.

Yes we are conditioned to treat our husbands like our children
When I had my Dd 16 years ago my husband had a flu bug and his mother was ready to swoop down and take him home to look after him . I said no he would be fine in a few days and he wasn't ill enough to do nothing to help .

And if we start saying we aren't happy we are nags

Assertiveness from a women in a marriage is still not acceptable.

Husband went to NYC for 10 days, 2 days after I had a C Section with our 3rd child. We are divorced now.

He immediately proceeded to the sink and started doing dishes lol. I think it's his way of saying sorry

Man does a load of dishes. Woop-dee-fucking-doo. Stop the presses.
After he's gone on a GOLF HOLIDAY leaving his wife with an uncleaned house, and with a newborn baby and two older children 3 weeks after she's given birth, 3 weeks after she's had a c-section ie major surgery, WHILE he's on supposed to be on "paternity leave". Absolute fucking joke.

So you have to be upset for him to do stuff? Good lord! The fact that you have little kids and he hasn’t been doing the basic to keep the house clean is disgraceful. Stop minimising what a complete arse you’ve saddled yourself with by dating he’s got up with the kids and done some dishes. You sound very downtrodden tbh. My ex was a lazy twat, but after a difficult birth he cleaned and cooked while on paternity leave.

He immediately proceeded to the sink and started doing dishes lol. I think it's his way of saying sorry

He should be doing them anyway. This would piss me off even more tbh. Such a misogynistic way of saying sorry.

my dhs footy mates are dads from school, we probably have the closest to a baby age child. They all decided this is not the year they are finally going on a footy trip to the beach etc as there is too much going on at home with young children. Just for some context about dads who are active family men who take an equal role in their children’s lives. Have you said while you’re having a look at me I’m cleaning up pity party could you please scrub the bathroom floor? Thoroughly, as i usually do it weekly but haven’t been able to do every time I walk in I feel like I’m a toxic waste hazard zone. And since you’ve been off work to help me recover from a c section while looking after a baby, when you’re not heading off to play golf wihtout having done even the minor chores I asked you to, it’s your job.

Well that's made me change my response, and it's a hell of a drip feed.

He actually asked you if your rather he didn't go. And you know that he'd not have gone if you'd said how you felt, and he wouldn't have been resentful. But you didn't tell him.

I'm sorry but at least 50% of this situation is on you (which is absolutely not what I planned to say).

This is yet another post where a mumsnetter has expected someone to read her mind, and then been annoyed when they didn't.

Okay, it would have been better if he'd just decided that he shouldn't go. But he ASKED YOU IF HE SHOULDN'T. And you didn't answer him honestly. More to the point, you choose not to answer at all, as some kind of test.

You need to learn to communicate, frankly.

Do you ever wonder how toxic and stunted this relationship must be that he had no trouble asking and she had difficulty replying honestly? There is a lot more going on here than just poor communication on OPs part. I, personally, think the DH is passive aggressive and OP knows he would have made her pay for thwarting him by acting out sulkily. I think she should be more forthright but he is not excused from knowing what his priorities should be just because she was to polite to shriek “Fuck you NO.”

He's not going. That's it. Tell him he needs to pick up the slack. While you've been recovering from major abdominal surgery and taking care of a tiny being, he's not managed to hoover or clean the bathroom? Give me a break. If anything, you should go for a 2 day break and he stay at home with the kids. I can't believe his mum hasn't said anything either.