To be devastated that my husband won't let our 2yo be a 2yo

[anonymousi]

He works full time, I'm a SAHM. When he gets home around 6-7 the house is a mess because I've been looking after our DD all day and cooked dinner (so DD would have been playing with her toys in the same room as I cook). My husband likes to bring this up in arguments or if there's a particularly big pile of toys sigh, roll his eyes, say something like "you girls have been busy" or "daddy's going to have to clean this up now eh". The reality is, yes daddy has to clean this up because I will tidy up the kitchen area after DC mealtime and prepare her for bed, then put her to bed. Of course, as she's 2 she understands what's being said and I don't want her to grow up to the sound of "urgh don't get your toys out" "no don't tip all the pencils out of your box" - if she's drawing she needs her pencils. The house is never dirty, just mess in the sense of toys scattered. And if I ever have him watch her he will keep getting grumpy at her every time she tries to take a toy out - LILLY, NO! Urghhh why did you get your legos! If she spills a drink "LOOK FORWARDS when you're eating" or "why did you tip that??" I've tried explaining that kids play, that part of their development is dropping things and exploring how they fall, that she's excited to play with her toys as she should be.

There's no way he can do bedtime duty because it would just stress her out - for example during bedtime stories if she gets out a second book or tries to colour and tips her pencils out, he will complain at her. The bath - same - why are you splashing water everywhere, why did you throw that bath toy out, now I'm all wet.

To avoid a drip feed I'll add that I'm a SAHM because we both saved £££ before having our DD, so no he isn't fully funding me. My family have also helped out financially so allow me to be a SAHM as it's always been my dream. We have a cleaner who comes 2 times per week to deep clean (whereas I do more of a daily surface clean) so the house is clean, hygienic and safe.

I had a similar trajectory. Sahm to working with young children.

With all due respect, there is no real comparison between the two spheres, and one should not be run as a launching pad for the other. The fundamental and most important relationships in a child's life are those within their own family, and these must be nurtured purely for their own sake, not with the next step in mind. Equally important is the child's developing sense of his or her own self - the feeling of being unconditionally loved and accepted is the most important one to nurture within the family.

The important sphere is home, where two parents can cooperate nicely together to pick up whatever toys are still strewn around at day's end, and the other is a group environment where it is imperative to maintain a good deal more order than is strictly necessary at home, and where there is generally an organised routine of activities of a loosely educational nature which the children are expected to participate in. A home can and should be far more flexible than an early years environment.

Children can profitably play whatever way they want to at home as long as safety isn't compromised and as long as they are not allowed to be destructive. It won't turn them into little hooligans at age 3 or 4. That comes from ill treatment of many kinds, from the subtle to the egregious. Yes, they can be gently encouraged into "helping" at home at an age/attention span level that is appropriate. The expectations expressed by many posters here are wildly inappropriate. Holding a child to inappropriate expectations is ill treatment.

The only children I've encountered in formal early years environments who have had problems adapting to routines, to tidying, to the social-emotional requirements of these environments (sharing, manners, peaceful dispute resolution) are children who have not been allowed freedom to just be themselves, who have not experienced loving patience on the part of their caregivers, who carry burdens of inappropriate and sometimes inconsistent adult expectations, and are treated as if they are nuisances in their own homes.

That's a leap! Sounds like he's nagging her passive aggressively through her toddler to me.

Yeah I would also say it's developmentally appropriate to be putting toys away!

I like the above suggestion.
Clean up sesh before you start cooking dinner and then one toy out. Ie puzzle, colouring etc.
She might not like the rule, but she'll soon realise the boundary.
And pp is right, such boundaries are everywhere.
As a side note, I think with our first we don't realise how capable they are.
By the time your 2nd or 3rd comes along they're doing wayy more at 2, but the first one we treat like a baby for too long.

PS : my dh also hates a mess, and we're trying to work through that.
I'm trying to be more understanding of the fact that coming home after a longgg day at work to a tip, must be so triggering. And he is more understanding of how hard some days can be with babies at home ( we have 3 under 4)
I will say, if it helps you OP, I spent a long time blaming my dh. 'you don't understand' ' days are hard' ' I was just going to get to that, it was clean earlier' until I starting doing some introspection.
Realistically I wasn't setting enough boundaries.
I was allowing them to eat a biscuit in the living room/ nursery because I was breastfeeding the baby there and 'it kept them busy'.
I was allowing them to tip allll the toys out because I was too lazy to spend 20 minutes facilitating clean up. It was easier cleaning it all myself when they were asleep
But really I was doing them no favours, I was depriving them of learning the skill of clean up, I was allowing them to behave unstructured , to make my own life easier.
It was a slow decline-by the time the 3rd came it was " easier" to allow them free reign.
But this bit me.
It's not good for them, they shouldn't live in a house were toys are scattered, what example am I setting.
It's better for me and my mental health, it's harrrd juggling everything you have to do while stepping on a Lego or spilled milk. 😅
It was better on my marriage. And sure my husband could have been more understanding, but he had a point!
And yours going "ooh you've been busy" is pretty mild imo.
I hope I don't come across as rude to you, just that we often tell ourselves a single story and this becomes the whole narrative.
"Dh doesn't understand, he's rude, and he doesn't even no anything about child development."
When really, multiple other things are true at the same time.

This! I got a bit stuck with the " but they should play and .y dh just don't understand" etc.
When really he had a point!
I was setting no boundaries in the name of 'development' and ' free play' when really I was wrong

My DP is a SAHD and hates it when ALL the toys are out, however, he helps our DS put them away. “Ah great, are we building a tower with the LEGO now? Let’s put the jigsaws away so we’ve got plenty of room” that sort of vibe. Nagging a toddler for basically bring a kid a good way to suck the enjoyment out of parenting. He needs to learn how to communicate with her and probably spend more time with her. He should be able to put her to bed, it’s a nice thing to do when he’s not seen her all day.

There's no way he can do bedtime duty because it would just stress her out - for example during bedtime stories if she gets out a second book or tries to colour and tips her pencils out, he will complain at her. The bath - same - why are you splashing water everywhere, why did you throw that bath toy out, now I'm all wet.

Why would she be tipping pencils out to colour at bedtime? What's the issue with trying not to get water everywhere? Perfectly reasonable to play with bath toys in the bath and to splash without getting water everywhere.

It'd annoy me coming from work to a mess to be honest, as long as there's accessible storage ie toy boxes or whatever, why can't she start to tidy up? It doesn't have to be serious, DS used to be fine popping his toys away to the tidy up song.

That is simply not true.

He clearly doesn’t understand what it is to look after children and if he works full time, then he simply wouldn’t. He needs to recognise everything you do and how hard it is to be a SAHM.

He should spend a full day with your toddler on his own, only then will he really have any appreciation for what it is to look after a little human being. He needs to chill out and cut you some slack.

I think YABU here

You know he doesn’t like to come home to a messy house, which he then has to clean up after a long day at work. Fair enough I wouldn’t like that either and would be annoyed.

You are a SAHM with one child and a cleaner who comes twice a week, you are not short on time / I’m sure your child gets ample playtime though out the day.

So why not compromise a little and when you’re cooking dinner you tell your DC she can only pick one toy to play with, or she can’t use the messy ones she can only use ones that don’t make mess. Or get her a play pen and then all the toys will be contained within there. Or 10 minutes before DH is due home, tell her it’s time to start tidying up.

Seems like an easy solution to me for the evening issue.

It does sound like she had a bit of a free reign to make as much mess as she wants, and I think it’s fine for your DH to tell her she can’t splash water all around the bathroom or throw her toys out of the bath.

Also I wouldn’t be letting my child colour and play with her pens at bedtime when it was reading time - she can play with her pens tomorrow because it’s bedtime now.

Clearly if she’s going to bed she won’t be helping clean the pens up - and in my house if you make the mess you have to help clean it up. Therefore no pens at bedtime.

I understand your point, but also see his. Can you and DD do a quick tidy up every couple of hours so there's not too much left out? Just off the things that DD is not still playing with. Then a big tidy up just before you start cooking. I used to make that like a game with my kids - see how quick it can all go back in the box etc.

How is your house a disaster with one child and daily cleaners?

Oh hardly 😂 most SAHM threads I’ve been on people fall over themselves to say parenting is a full time job and the SAHM can’t be expected to do anything other than parent.

Oh but also that their partner should do a full days work then come home to do the chores the SAHM hasn’t done, and take over from parenting.

We have a two year old, we don’t allow toy chaos and we expect her to tidy her toys away when shes done. If I’m cooking she has to pick some sensible things she can bring into the kitchen without making a huge mess/chucking them everywhere so I could trip on them etc. Once she has chosen what to bring into the kitchen everything else is put back in boxes, not left strewn on the floor of the living room. It also means we tidy toys three times a day, so the living room is never an absolutely disaster with every toy box empty.

The whole point of a bedtime story is some calm reading and bonding time, theres no point even attempting it if shes allowed to be tipping pots of pencils about etc, and at two I wouldn’t want that sort of thing to be accessible in our daughters bedroom without adult supervision. We only have toys in there she can’t harm herself with while alone.

As for bath time, its fine to manage the amount of splashing, so she is no longer allowed to jump and ‘bomb’ herself back into the water, otherwise its like being at bloody seaworld.

YANBU

I can't believe the number of people on this thread who are 'telling off' the OP for not doing a better job of having a tidy house.

The child is TWO. There are toys around. So Fucking What!!

Crikey - the 2 year old is playing/colouring still whilst her Mum makes dinner. Big deal. Maybe when Dad gets home he could just help a bit?? It wouldn't kill him to be a grown up and not complain about stupid shit.

If you want a perfect show house that's always tidy - top tip - don't have kids or pets. (Especially a black dog with longish fur)

I'm with your DH . Tidy up , put things away as she finishes playing with them . She doesn't need to be surrounded by toys . If she's playing Lego dolls are put away . Make a point before you start tea she puts her toys away , picks one activity to do while you cook .

My H can be like this too. In some ways I feel like he drives them towards more screen time because of the fuss he creates about any mess from playing.

I think it's very easy to be a dick about mess when you're only seeing a snapshot of the day.

I'm with you OP! It's like having a backseat driver constantly saying, 'right, I really think we should park now, come on, hand break up!' when you're on the motorway!

You don’t need to justify being a SAHM and he should be funding you to some degree because being a SAHP is still a valid contribution to the family. Anyway - to your main point - it’s just a pile of toys. It can be cleaned up after kids in bed! I think at 2 they are capable of starting to tidy up their own toys. Just before dinner I put on Mambo no5 on the Sonos and my 2.5 year old stands on a line of tiles in the kitchen like a race starting line and then does a tidy up race 😂 basically involves shrieking and throwing all his toys back in their boxes before end of the song!! Works quite well if anyone wants my hot life tip. Ha ha!!!

@anonymousi I don't think you are unreasonable with the toys. It's worth having a discussion with your husband about his passive aggressive comments: your standards are that it's ok to have a few toys around at that time of the day. Period.
Others on this forum might disagree and want everything away at 5pm, but you're entitled to do things your way in your own home.

Your husband is also entitled to a tidy home of that's what he wants, but since he is not contributing to anything else after he come home from work then he will indeed have to do it himself.

However where I disagree with you is that it seems you don't allow him to do anything else related to your child, because he doesn't do it your way. She is going to grow up with both parents, he is also entitled to teach her his values and standards, and she will learn from it.

This

"Devastated" is a real overreaction for this situation. I was expecting a thread about death or divorce, not a bit of an argument over tidying the house! Stop over-dramatising your position; put it into perspective and follow some of the advice here to reach a compromise.

Completely on your side, but I was wondering if there are little things you can do to contain the mess, e.g. a tuf tray for toys, a plastic tray to tip pencils into, one of those rugs that turns into a bag that you can tip Lego into that you can bag up immediately. Just start to teach her that it makes it easier to tidy up. And kind of making designated areas of play so your husband feels it's more under control. And it's obviously fine if things also go everywhere.

At the same time he needs to learn that kids need to play, and young kids don't have impulse control and will tip and make a mess. And that he needs to manage his feelings without putting down you or your daughter.

I have two children, they are 17 and 13 now but I simply don't recognise this hellscape that being at home with children is supposed to be. I've done it all, worked full time, been a stay at home parent, worked part time etc. The time I was a SAHM was great and relatively easy because I managed my children's behaviour and didn't let them run riot. We spent lots of time outside, if we were inside there were boundaries in terms of how they treated their things and our home, we all sat down for a nice evening meal, cleaning and cooking was done as I went along throughout the day. I most certainly did not play with them all day, how tedious for me and how overbearing for them. There was the odd bad day for sure but mostly it was fine, a pleasure even. There is no comparison between being in charge of your own home and your own children to being in a job where you have to suck up infinite amounts of crap and performance reviews and all kinds of nonsense. I know, I have a job like that now. The OP's husband sounds a grump for sure but I suspect he is at least partly over-correctjng for the OP's overly permissive parenting. They both need to meet in the middle because in my view, neither of their approaches is serving their daughter well.

Devastated??? Oh, come on !!!