To think the one who wakes in the night should sleep a bit later the next morning?

[Oneandaquarter]

DD wakes in the night and she also wakes crazy early at around 5 … AIBU to think DH should get up with her then since I’ve been up in the night?

My dc was a great sleeper generally unless sick or teething. I mostly did night wake ups due to feeding and because I could settle baby quicker. My dh 100% got up in the morning if we'd had an unsettled night.

What are you hoping to get from this thread?

What are you hoping to get by continuing to post on it?

Genuinely?

Because I asked last night anticipating another disruptive night and it’s still going this morning and a lot of those posts are you so you’re clearly getting something from it: what?

I do the vast majority of night wakes for my toddler (2 years old) because she's still breastfeeding. At 5am especially, it's either feed in bed or start the day! Sometimes she sleeps through, sometimes one wake, sometimes two. It's very variable. DH sometimes tries to settle her but inevitably she wants me so it's usually easier if I just go. This morning after I tried and failed to settle her with a feed around 5am, he got her up and I had another hours sleep. At weekends he tends to do this, weekdays he needs to get to work early so can't. He definitely knows that I'm doing more than him so this feels the least he can do! I do also try to help myself by going to bed early though. It's rubbish having no evening but I have accepted that it won't be forever and sleep is my priority over TV etc!

I know. OP asked for opinions though.

@zebranotzeebra i have to admit that for all every parent should be equal I don’t think that’s true when they are two and under. It just isn’t. It does change (older DS is in a decidedly only daddy will do phase) but for very young children / babies really it does tend to be the mother they gravitate towards.

I am feeling exceptionally irritable and more than a bit overwhelmed with everything today and DDs sleep is just a nightmare, I know it passes, but it’s very hard when in the thick of it and being told endlessly you’re doing it all wrong is so stressful.

Why the thread then?

I mean, separate rooms is a pretty vital piece of info don’t you think?

Opinions are absolutely fine but (meant generally not aimed at you) when someone does say no, that really doesn’t work for us I do think tempers are improved if people just accept that rather than keep endlessly pushing the one true right way.

Is it? Why?

The thread is about whether DH should get up early or not. I genuinely don’t see why him being in a different room has any bearing on that.

It's unusual to be in different rooms and also helps explain why he can't hear, and also why you have to get up to wake him.

But you clearly know what you want.

So has he agreed to do every early waking?

@Dishwashersaurous … I haven’t sat him down, MN style, and asked / told him.

at the moment, I bring DD into him when she wakes for the morning.

i asked if I was being unreasonable to continue doing this. You clearly think so; that’s fine. What isn’t fine is to keep on and on at me, telling me what to do, when I’ve made it clear I’m not asking that.

Anyway, she’s finally conceded to nap so stuff to do, as per always.

I know you don't believe it but actually everyone is trying to help.

You sound utterly exhausted and at the end of your tether.

So people are suggesting ways to help you get more sleep. And getting a full night sleep consistently for a few nights would help

You don't have to pay attention but people are trying to help.

Definitely but unfortunately my kids disagree.

It’s not DH’s fault. We completely share the load. The kids won’t let either of us sleep in.

I’ve been clear I’m not finding it helpful. I really, really, am not finding it remotely helpful. I couldn’t have been clearer. But some just had to carry on. That’s not trying to help me.

You alternate at the weekend...one gets up on Sat at 5am with dd and the other on the sun

That still means I’ve had a broken night Friday or Saturday and a crazy early start the following morning, though.

If you think that’s fair then fair enough, but I’m just pointing out that potentially that could have me sleeping for around 3 hours!

Hi OP. I don’t think you are unreasonable at all asking your DH to get up in the morning!

you are up in the night; he has an uninterrupted night of sleep - he can do the early start. End of.

i do think you are being a little bit U snapping at pp’s on this thread who are just trying to offer different solutions for sharing the load. But you are knackered- I get it ❤️

@PiggleToes coming here finger wagging has made me want to snap again 😂

When polite ‘no, I’m afraid that really doesn’t work for us’ responses go over peoples heads I do get irritable, I’m afraid, especially when I’m dealing with very little sleep, two very young children, a demanding albeit part time job and various other worries and pressures. I’ve never found the ‘no, you do THIS’ posters helpful.

I was honestly just trying to be supportive , not trying to finger wag at all 🙈🙈🙈

I didn’t read it as people trying to tell you what to do- some maybe, but I thought that most were just offering different solutions. ( But that was just my outsider interpretation I guess. ) But it seems the only solution that works for you is you doing nights and dh mornings which makes perfect sense and no not unreasonable at all.

You need to find a way that works for both of you.
DH didn't wake when the kids woke - and doesn't do early!
So I did overnight wakes,and the early morning. But he stayed up until after that late evening wake (11-1 typically for us).
And I'd get up at the weekend, then about 9am go and boot him out of bed, and have a mammoth nap - like 9 til 2. And yes, I could still go to bed at 9pm that night!

I agree with you: sharing the wake ups doesn't work if you are woken anyway. What I desperately needed was solid chunks of sleep. Work on a way to get some of those in a routine that works for both of you.

@Oneandaquarter im so sorry, you sound absolutely exhausted.

I do empathise as my DD was an awful sleeper and when you’re in the thick of it it just feels never ending.

YANBU to expect your dh to get up in the mornings if you’ve been up in the night. Some solutions maybe/maybe not -
DD sleeps in the same room as DH in the hope he hears her first.

DH stays up late (when he’s not working the next day) and does the first wake ups (assuming you’re not breastfeeding) and you do the 5am one.

If it’s a regular time she wakes, DH sets an alarm for 5am so he hears her when she wakes.

I don’t suppose you have relatives nearby, my mum once had my DD overnight for me when I felt like I was on the edge (she actually bloody slept through for her too)?

I know the recommendations to go to bed early etc. are good but I for one cannot sleep in the day or too early etc. and once I’m awake then I’m awake so that’s frustrating.

I really hope you manage to find a solution so that you can get some sleep, it’s easy for me to say now as mine is a teenager but it does pass, although I look back at those 3 years of not sleeping through with horror, I don’t know how I survived but I did. Good luck @Oneandaquarter

OP, you are not being unreasonable. If you do all the night wakings, he should get up with the baby every morning to let you catch up on your sleep.

I'm going to put the nastiness of your responses OP down to tiredness.

You need to sit down with DH and have a proper conversation about in the short term, managing your lack of sleep by him getting up in the mornings and how, in the long term you are going to solve the night wakings.

I get the sense you haven't both actually sat down and discussed it, at least not discussed it from a place of anger. Because if your responses on here are anything to go by, your temper is not helping.

Yes, I am short tempered at the moment. I’m not however ‘nasty’. No post here is nasty. Some are frustrating and have annoyed me but that’s not the same as nasty, just as my saying (politely initially then a little more firmly) that being told what to do, what to say and how to organise my life is unhelpful, is not nasty. You may not like hearing it, but it doesn’t make it ‘nasty.’

Maybe just accept that this phase of parenthood is shit? Trying to think of things that actually would help you, since everything else has been rejected. Maybe acceptance? Yeah, it is shit. Yeah you’ll be tired for a few years. And to answer your title, yeah, the one who wakes up in the night, if you’re not gonna alternate night wakings, should get a lie in. But doesn’t seem that, your own suggestion, is doable either??