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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Spoon feeding DH?

67 replies

Glasscabinet · 05/09/2024 20:10

I’m just ranting really. I can imagine the replies. I’ve spoke to my sister about this and she says I just have to spoon feed DH, that’s just the way he is.

DD is nearly a year old, exclusively breastfed which is 100% my decision but it has meant that a lot of DD care has fallen to me. She also refuses the bottle so until recently we’ve always been joined to the hip.

Tonight I said to DH I was going to go out to the shops for some ‘me time’. Like always he’s always happy to oblige but again, when I’ve got home he’s just watching tele with DD. We had a row last week because he had allowed her to fall asleep on him without dinner/getting her ready for bed so when she woke up she was furious and refused to go back down for hours.

Tonight I got back, no dinner, no bath, not ready for bed. Just both of them happy as Larry watching tele again. It was the same when he’d have her to give me a lie in until I had a meltdown. He now does give her breakfast and gets her dressed but I did have to spell it out to him.

He’s now cooking her dinner and says he’ll get her ready for bed. But it’s bedtime now. Maybe I should have told him to get her ready for bed before I left at 6?

Also, don’t know if I’m being a bit precious but I’m not a huge fan of them watching American cartoons together. We did agree before she was born that she wouldn’t be a screen kid. I only put on a CBeebies for a few minutes on the occasional morning if I just need five minutes to gather myself together. Again, I could just scrap him looking after her all together if I just plonked her in front of the tele.

OP posts:
BarbaraHoward · 05/09/2024 20:12

YANBU, it's strategic incompetence.

Scottishgirl85 · 05/09/2024 20:17

That level of incompetence would give me the ick. I bet he holds down a professional job easily enough.
Is he not embarrassed when you point these things out?

Ethylred · 05/09/2024 20:22

They're happy together and you're enraged? Is that the person you want to be?

Todaysbetterthanyesterday · 05/09/2024 20:24

Yabu. Sounds very enjoyable sitting for cuddles with a content baby. These days are precious and are gone in a heartbeat.

SouthLondonMum22 · 05/09/2024 20:29

Ethylred · 05/09/2024 20:22

They're happy together and you're enraged? Is that the person you want to be?

OP clearly wants DH to take on some of the mental load. It isn’t difficult to figure out that dinner and bedtime is usually earlier than 8pm.

It will also be OP who will be left to deal with an over hungry, over tired baby who takes hours to settle. Just like before.

Changingplace · 05/09/2024 20:30

I couldn’t get worked up about the cartoons whatsoever, surely if she was hungry she wouldn’t be happily chilling with him?

Yes it’s bed time, but as long as he’s dealing with it all it’s his issue, he’s her parent too.

Changingplace · 05/09/2024 20:31

It will also be OP who will be left to deal with an over hungry, over tired baby who takes hours to settle. Just like before.

Only if she’s a martyr about it, leave him to figure it out or he never will. And I don’t think an over hungry baby would be happily watching cartoons.

DarkForces · 05/09/2024 20:32

I let dh parent his own way, but he also had to deal with the consequences. It's worked out really well and he stepped up. Over a decade on he just gets on with things

mycatsanutter · 05/09/2024 20:32

He is acting like an incompetent older sibling rather than a responsible parent . I'm quite a relaxed parent but surely to god he has noticed what time she eats and gets ready for bed ?!

Sprogonthetyne · 05/09/2024 20:34

Ethylred · 05/09/2024 20:22

They're happy together and you're enraged? Is that the person you want to be?

She's enraged because he 'forgot?'to feed the child, and it's now after her bedtime. As a result she possibly won't eat properly when her tea is cooked, as she'll be to tired, then wake up hungry in the night. She also may be overtired by bedtime, so difficult to get down to begin with.

She may be happy now, but 90% chance she will be tired and grumpy tomorrow, which isn't fair to the child or to OP.

NuffSaidSam · 05/09/2024 20:34

You need to let her M deal with the fallout of his decision making.

There's nothing inherently wrong with keeping a baby up late/being more relaxed with routine. It just sounds like you've got differing parenting styles. But he doesn't get to do nothing and then you come in and takeover. Let him deal with her being cranky/overtired/hard to put down. Maybe then he'll see the point of sticking to a routine.

I would also write down her routine/timetable and put it on the fridge so you both know what's supposed to be happening when. Then he has no excuse.

AsYouWiiiiiiiiiiiiish · 05/09/2024 20:34

YANBU.
Why do dad's get the "precious moments" without worrying about all the mental load work and organising?

The precious moments are the reward for all the mundane stuff.

He isn't taking over for you for the evening, he is doing the bare minimum until you have to step back in.

Why should you be effectively punished for taking some time to yourself by coming home to a baby that hasn't had their routine needs met?

This is why men get away with being Disney dads and the "fun one" and the mum is called a nag or boring.

I wouldn't be allowing this to continue.

SouthLondonMum22 · 05/09/2024 20:35

Changingplace · 05/09/2024 20:31

It will also be OP who will be left to deal with an over hungry, over tired baby who takes hours to settle. Just like before.

Only if she’s a martyr about it, leave him to figure it out or he never will. And I don’t think an over hungry baby would be happily watching cartoons.

Edited

Not yet. Doesn’t take long for a little person to get hangry.

Ablondiebutagoody · 05/09/2024 20:36

I think that you should stop being so controlling and let him find his own way with his daughter. If you don't and keep telling him off, you will be back here in a few years moaning that he never does anything with her.

Mooneywoo · 05/09/2024 20:40

Honestly I think you’re being over the top. If you are the primary carer due to will being off then he just isn’t going to automatically know and do things the way you do.
Sometimes our instinct it to expect our partners do do exactly what we would do, but they are a separate parent in their own right and your way isn’t the only way.
If they were both happy then she couldn’t have been that hungry or tired.

Was going out at 6pm with no handover to be a bit of a test?
I would explain the last time my baby ate or slept to anyone taking over their care so they knew when to expect them to be tired or hungry. Surely that’s just common sense if you’ve been the one with her all day?

Temushopper · 05/09/2024 20:42

Let him crack on with the rest of the evening and get yourself an early night. If she needs a feed then he can bring her in and then he can put her to bed. It may be it’s fine and he gets her sorted with no real bother and all is well. It may be it’s not and he has a rough evening and maybe he realises it makes sense to do things differently next time. Ultimately it’s ok for you to have differing approaches but not ok for him to enjoy the fun stuff and then expect you to do all the hard bits when you get home.

Edingril · 05/09/2024 20:44

When I see ''we did agree' was it really a mutual decision? But regardless I don't see the issue

One person demands things to happen there way and it doesn't the other person is in the wrong?

theduchessofspork · 05/09/2024 20:45

YA (mostly) NBU

If you are her primarily carer right now, you get to decide if she has a routine. Your sister is probably right you need to write up a timetable, as you would for a nanny, as he appears not to be familiar with it. If he just ignores it - leave him to deal with the consequences

When / if you go back to work near FT, you will be joint carers (make sure of that) so how you raise her becomes more of a joint decision re free range vs routines.

One thing you shouldn’t do though is dictate how he spends time with her. The ‘we agreed she wouldn’t be a screen baby’ is fairly Mumzilla - people say all sorts before a baby arrives. If your husband wants to watch telly with her that is up to him - if he watches so much she gets wired, then that becomes a discussion- a bit less telly a few more bricks. Don’t fall into the trap of trying to control the details of his parenting because it will lead to him
backing off and you being angry - you want him leaning in, not out.

RedWinePoliticsAndHair · 05/09/2024 20:47

DarkForces · 05/09/2024 20:32

I let dh parent his own way, but he also had to deal with the consequences. It's worked out really well and he stepped up. Over a decade on he just gets on with things

This. Don't man manage it, just let him make her tea and put her to bed. If she is as over tired as you suspect, she will be a nightmare and he will learn a valuable lesson about bed timings. Or maybe she won't be and you'll realise you don't necessarily have to be as strict with these things as you think (this isn't a barbed side-swap at you btw- I was that soldier and letting DH just do things his way, even if it wasn't my way, actually was fine. Different, but fine).

My kids are pre teens now and, as I say, with my first I was a hardcore fiend for "my way or the highway" with her for the first year or so... but then I realised that DH (or my parents or his parents or my sister or his brother) did things differently, and that if they were in charge, it was up to them to do things their way and up to them to deal with the consequences of that, good or bad. A lot of my "my way or the highway" stuff was to do with breastfeeding tbh, it made me feel I had to do things for my daughter, because her routine was so entrenched in breastfeeding. Things got easier for me from a control POV once she was weaned.

But mental load is a different matter to routine and if your DH isn't taking on his share of mental load or is weaponising incompetence or something else that's making you feel things are unfairly weighted to his advantage from a labour point of view, then you need to sit and have an honest conversation with him because that's not fair and not what being a parent is.

RedWinePoliticsAndHair · 05/09/2024 20:52

Oh and the cartoons I couldn't get het up about. I understand wanting her to only have a few minutes CBeebies time at the moment when it's ideal, but really this stuff isn't going to damage her. And sooner rather than later it'll be Peppa and Bluey and Frozen and those annoying American kids who open eggs on YouTube (are they still doing that?)

As long as you've got half an eye on this stuff she won't be unduly impacted developmentally or psychologically by TV.

coxesorangepippin · 05/09/2024 20:56

Next time get home later and let him deal with it

Ghosttofu99 · 05/09/2024 21:03

My DN went through a phase of doing all imaginary play in an American accent. I was in the library the other day and a little girl was doing the same. I find it a bit freaky tbh.

Nothing against tv screen time in general. (better than phone or tablet at any rate)

If they are watching something like Paw Patrol they can watch the version dubbed into British on My5.

Original poster
Glasscabinet · 05/09/2024 21:05

Thanks all.

I apologise to DH as soon as I did this post. He’s been working from home today and has been helpful between working/meetings. DH was right, I was barely out an hour and he had just finished work.

I’m just feeding/settling DD now. PP who said it’s not the end of the world. It wasn’t. She got pretty angry in her high chair, was angry for DH getting ready for bed but now she’s calmed down.

One PP said it feels like I get all the mundane things and he’s the fun one.

OP posts:
ToBeDetermined · 05/09/2024 21:05

Yes, yabu

The child is happy and if she had gotten hungry she would have fussed and he would have figured out to feed her.

You are too regimented and inflexible. Why are you having “meltdowns” and “rows” make him parent your way? That doesn’t sound pleasant for anyone in the house.

He is still fed her and got her ready for bed, so just chill. If you keep saying he is doing it wrong, he will start refusing to have her, you wont get any me time and then you’ll be back here wondering why everytime you need a minute, he’s in the toilet for an hour or has disappeared in the garden shed muttering about the lawnmower needing seeimg to.

BarbaraHoward · 05/09/2024 21:09

Ah OP you shouldn't have apologised!

Letting things slide once in a while is fine, but why does that get to be on his watch not yours? An hour of screens is no big deal because you do the hard yards of entertaining her day in day out without.

Likewise, he has eyes in his head, he lives in the house. It can't have escaped him that she eats dinner and goes to bed early in the evening.

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