Did I ruin Christmas

[Helphelpx]

Have I ruined Christmas?
I have a 3.5 year old, a 2.5 year old and a 3.5month old. I'm exhausted. Im on maternity leave but I have zero help. Partner works 24/7 and gets called into work constantly. He is however an excellent father in everyway.

I have zero help from his mum who lives 2 hours away. She will call up every few weeks and we will visit.

My own mother does my childcare when I work but does zero while I'm on maternity.

By no help I mean absolutely zero.i love both very much but it is extremely hard.

Over the last few months since baby has been born we have had a lot of fights with me being very dramatic. This usually includes me getting annoyed about doing all washing, shopping, cooking, appointments, clothes shopping, ironing, organizing etc. ALL. As well as having a newborn that I exclusively breastfeed. Again partner is amazing and helpful dad and works very hard. But will not acknowledge how hard it is at times for me managing the 3 including bedtimes alone with zero help. Example, mum came to visit 3 days after baby was born. She and partner sat in room with kids while I made a home cooked meal, did washing and cleaned. Taking painkillers for pain and break to feed baby. I also was very huffing and clearly annoyed.

On boxing day we usually go to his mum's for dinner with entire extended family. In the time leading up to this day I repeatedly said it will be stressful as my newborn hate the car and I will have to organize everything.

We ended up having a huge fight as I had to give him step by steps instructions to get himself ready- go get ready, pack bag etc while in a panic to keep baby up so she would sleep in the car.

This led to a huge fight and I ended up not going. He left with two older kids alone and very annoyed. His entire family will be there and I'm sure it will be a bit awkward along with family annoyed I did not make the effort and they will not see youngest daughter.

Am I unreasonable? Have I ruined Christmas? I feel like I'm constantly with kids, working to keep house etc for everyone else and not one person would say you must be exhausted etc

You said he works 6 days a week and "on call". Many here will probably assume it means some sort of medical job, emergency response or something similar which doesn't sound like minimum wage work. But regardless of that, paying for help has nothing to do with privilege but very simple maths. As long as his hourly pay is higher than that of a cleaner or babysitter then he can afford to pay for one to alleviate your stress. He needs to see it as him working for free for a few hours in lieu of not being able to home in person. His wage goes to paying someone to do the work that he would need to do if he were home.

This is all in the context of one person taking care of two kids and a newborn with zero assistance. The vast majority of people will consider this a fairly extreme situation and having some help for a few hours is a necessity, not a luxury. At the end of the day, what is the price of your mental health and physical wellbeing? If he really cared about that then he needs to find a way to compensate for his absence.

Have you not worked for a while given you have 3 under 4 (god love you!)? I’m another who says get some paid help. You can’t come home when you’re working and then have to clean/cook with 3 that age. I’d be sending your Dh back to the doctor (did you do the deed less than the recommended 6 weeks post snip or has the operation not worked?).

You had two babies a year apart, which must have been enormously tough. It's a bit strange, imo, that knowing how tough raising kids is and how little support you get, you decided to have another. It was presumably your decision to have a third, so you can't expect others to help out, as nice as it would be. I think that you were a bit of a martyr to make a home cooked meal whilst your baby was 3 days old. That just seems like madness.

I think that it was somewhat 'unreasonable' for you not to show up at your in laws, but fatigue and hormones obviously played a part. It happens and is therefore understandable. The only thing that I would say is to check whether you could have pnd at all, given your recent anger etc.

Apologies, I missed your later post and have just seen that 3rd baby was a unexpected surprise and that your in laws was a 4 hour round trip. Yes, I think that it was fine to stay at home if things were going to shit. I don't know what the answer is. It's just extremely hard raising babies and small children.

They didn't "decide" to have a third- the husband had a vasectomy and she got pregnant accidentally. I guess they decided not to have a termination, but it's not like OP thought "oh yeah brilliant I'll get pregnant 3times in a row close together, there'll be no strain there".

You are nuts. Just let’s raise those kids.

You sound exhausted and at the end of your teather 💐

I also was very huffing and clearly annoyed

Kindly, you need to stop being passive aggressive and tell people what you want. "Sorry MIL, I'm in pain and I can't cook lunch today. Shall we get a takeaway?" Be clear, people are not mind readers however much you think they should know how you feel or read the situation.

I didn't ask for advice regarding whether he is a good father. I asked have I ruined my children's Christmas as I was feeling low about this.

People are mentioning this because, from what you have said here, it is simply not true. It is not helpful to have a belief in a narrative that doesn't exist.

If he works 6 days a week and is constantly on call, there should be some money for a cleaner. If not, some serious questions need to be discussed on whether another job might be better for your family so he can actually take up the slack, even if it is for a year or two.

Good luck to you 💐