Husband on phone the whole fucking time he’s with the children

[Hormonalorjustified]

I’m heavily pregnant and extremely hormonal so want to check I’m not overreacting…

DH has been getting up early with our small children throughout my pregnancy. Amazing - what a great dad. So helpful for me to have an extra 1-2 hours in bed. Right?

except that I’ve just learnt that day in, day out, he is, from 5am-7am, just watching YouTube videos on his phone. And they are short videos, 2-3 mins long (eg about football or tv shows or films). So it’s not something he has on in the background (which tbh I also wouldn’t find ideal as 1 and 3 year old need supervision and attention and it isn’t setting the best example/they aren’t allowed screen time in the morning). He has just been actively doomscrolling and watching stuff for hours on end. For months.

I am a SAHM and I have to say this just isn’t parenting for me. I found out he was doing this for a window at the beginning of my pregnancy, explained I didn’t think this was alright and if he didn’t feel up to getting up I would rather do it myself/not do this. He said he understood/agreed. So I trusted him
not to do it. And I find out he has all along!

I totally get some people have different bars for what they do/let their children do and I am not judging for that but AIBU to think I should be able to trust my husband to do what we fucking agreed with our children?! I feel like an idiot I would have rather been up at 5am myself. It explains a lot of things too - DS having a bump etc and him not knowing how it happened, or me sometimes waking up to hear DS communicating but not able to hear my husband responding for several minutes.

Hear what you've said.

My rule.

He has different rules. He's their parent too. Why does your rule trump his?

And train your children to stay in their rooms. Children need to be parenting through early rising, not left to maybe grow out of it. You're taking the easy route too by doing nothing.

What time does he get in from work if he doesn’t see them in the evening?

I would be doing vey low contact with DC at 5am in the morning to dissuade them from waking up at that time

I thought the same. I brought mine up on ‘benign neglect’ and they were all high flyers, independent and have done well. We are all close now they’re young adults and they reminisce about their ‘idyllic childhood’.

I’m not saying parenting constantly stuck to a phone is desirable - it’s clearly not - but equally at 5am no small child needs the Mary Poppins boot camp - they need quiet self-directed play and minimal parent interactive because ideally they should still be asleep.

Do you also think he would rather be on his phone than with you, too?

Or does he already do that?

Is there any intimacy in this relationship?

Love it when parents try to parent the other parent because they are superior. At 5am you just survive. Stop being so highly strung.

Yabu based on the time tbh. 5-7am? If my kids were up at 5am they would be watching tv while I drunk coffee and doom scrolled and if my partner tried to tell me off for that I would be telling him to get up with them instead. Honestly stop trying to dictate how your partner parents at 5am. 😐

Some might say that getting a 1 year old out of their cot at 5am as oppose to settling them back to sleep is lazy parenting. One persons idea of lazy is another's survival approach.

You may see it as an opportunity for quality time with his children, but sounds like he sees it more like time they should be asleep. It's not family time he's ducking out of.

Furthermore, I don't believe that all posters who disagree with OPs view are raging screen addicts!

Why did you ask AIBU when you obviously dont think you are? Why put your name as hormonal or justified when you clearly feel justified? Wake up yourself at 5am and problem solved.

My son woke at 4.40 after 7/8 wakes a night until he was 6 years old. Sometimes i did scroll my phone at 4.50am with an eye on him to make sure he was ok, shock horror sometimes i even dozed off as i was juat surviving. If you can do so much better, then just do it.. and stop checking a grown mans phone, its weird and controlling.

As parents you need to communicate, I dont think this should be a "i'll just get up with them then" situation. You can't just pick up the pieces every time you feel your husband isn't doing it right- you will make it easy for him to 'be lazy' and parenting is a long road and you will exhaust yourself. This is a communication issue and you need to talk with him about how you feel. On the other hand just because you think you are right doesnt mean you are. When parents arent on the same page its stressful but equally he may think he is ok in what he is doing. If you gatekeep your husbands parenting then you are in a way undermining him. You may need to accept he is more relaxed about it. Parents arent always perfect, dont always do the right thing and parenting is hard. If this is really important to you, you need to communicate your viewpoint to your husband and tell him that this really matters to you and he needs to listen- but then you must also be willing to hear and take on board his viewpoint even if you dont agree. I dont believe any parent should gatekeep the other parents parenting style... that will always end in conflict eventually. Ultimately it should either be agreement or compromise....and that may mean you compromising too. If he can't follow through on what you BOTH agree then that is a whole other communication/marrriage issue.

I can honestly see both sides.

Yeah, it's pathetic basically

Very poor parenting and deeply unattractive really

Can he not be bothered to engage with them? Wtf

You can't train tiny children to stay in their rooms. They get up early, and you have to deal with it.

Come off it. Kids of this generation get more attention from their parents than ever before.

^

Really?? More than before phones? And I don't mean sychocpantic, certificate-for-wiping-your-arse attention, I mean basic, normal communication and attention. Conversation. Discussions. General chit chat.

You sound like really hard work. He's getting up so you can rest, what he does is up to him.

They know! They just normalise it.
OP YANBU. Also full respect to you for the screen stance. I was the same and it has paid off so much as they have got older.

My husband is similar, he just has the kids whilst I do dinner.
He has recently taken the toddler whilst I have baby.
Toddler keeps getting injuries because dad isn't watching him properly... he is too on his phone. I've had 1 hour and 40 minutes of disturbed sleep tonight whilst he has slept.

I messaged him before I went to bed at half 1-toddler wouldn't sleep! Saying that we've had one injury today, and a very nest miss of another... both injuries could have been terrible...that he needs to prioritise our children's overall safety if he can't that he will need to leave. I can't have people having responsibility ilith of my children who are not thinking of their safety, even if it is their father. Let's see if he changes.

I think YABU tbh.

At that time in the morning, for me, it’s all about survival. I need some kind of adult or interaction to wake myself up. If that means reading something, so be it.

My son went through an awful summer of getting up at 5 (sometimes earlier) and I treated myself to Disney +

If you’d rather get up for the sake of a couple of hours of non-entertainment, then you do you. I’m more grateful for sleep and let my DH do what he wants with the kids.

It's not ok.

He's not parenting.

It's bad for the children to have him there bit not responsive.

He's a lazy and dishonest man.

Also, just want to say, I think that really your problem should be more that he's so engrossed in what he's doing, the kids are getting injuries and he doesn't know how and hasn't been able to minimise the risk or them happening.

To all the people not seeing a problem here - if you found out a nanny you hired or a nursery worker who was supposed to be taking care of your children was instead glued to their phone for two solid hours, would you be happy?

You're a parent not a slave... I'll happily entertain my child with custom-made activities and role-playing during normal hours but it's all a bit much at 5am.

Could you try a later bedtime? The 5am problem I find is a ridiculous very British problen and almost always of a parent's own making.

In other words, accept whatever piss poor parenting your husband wants to do because God forbid you would end up without a man.

You're setting the bar very low, @Famfirst . No wonder men think they can get away with this sort of parenting performance when there are women telling other women a lazy, checked-out co parent is better than none at all.

Not the same thing at all.

Yes, God forbid you'd end up Without A Man, a figure of pity...

You're saying it's not ok for someone you pay to do this but it's OK for the children's own parent to sit like a lump on the couch and basically ignore them for two hours?

In both cases, the children are left to their own devices and are only given token supervision at most. In both cases, the children could hurt themselves, and will be aware that they are having to repeat calls for the caregiver's attention.

Are you saying it's OK for the children to be in this position?