To be so fucking angry that DH woke me up?

[AngeloMysterioso]

We have 3 DC 5 and under including a 14mo who is yet to sleep through the night and is still in our bedroom.

I have a PT job working nights and am also responsible for all school and nursery runs etc. So at most I get maybe 4 hours sleep at night and maybe another 4 on the days when younger two are in nursery and older one is at school.

I am (and I can’t be emphatic enough about this) exhausted. Mentally and physically absolutely fucking exhausted. My right eyelid twitches non stop because I don’t get enough sleep and survive on tea and shitty sugary drinks and convenience food.

A lovely relative of mine offered to have all 3 DC overnight so I could get some sleep. This is a real rarity for us- my PILs have two of the 3 overnight once a week but nights off from all 3 only happen once in a blue moon.

Unfortunately, my body clock being what it is, I can’t make myself go to bed early so was up til my usual time (and DH knew this) but was really looking forward to getting a good long uninterrupted sleep this morning.

Except DH woke me up at 9:15. He was getting ready to go and pick the DC up and wanted to ask me a- if he needed to take any clean clothes for the DC (he literally helped me pack their bag yesterday) b- to double check he just needed to take some of DC’s milk to nursery (we discussed it yesterday) and c- to ask me to tell my relative he was on his way (I told them what time to expect him yesterday and told him that I’d told them).

So basically, there was absolutely no need to wake me up at all. And it’s over an hour later and I’ve been trying but now I’m just too fucking angry to fall asleep, and even if I did it will now be two smaller chunks instead of the long uninterrupted sleep that I was looking forward to and so desperately need. I honestly feel like crying.

I don't need a medal, plenty of mums have much harder working pattens me. I just have an issue with anyone suggesting a woman quits her job to become fully reliant on her husband and the benefits system. Not really much to aspire to is it @LikeWhoUsesTypewritersAnyway

I am sorry but you are burning the candle at both ends, and have been deliberately sleep depriving yourself for a job that provides what you acknowledge as extracurriculars & playgroups. It’s not a matter of survival, of being able to heat and eat. It’s for nice to haves. Kids that young don’t need all this. They need rested parents. They’re just as happy playing at home as in a playgroup when under 5.

You can’t blame your DH waking you a bit early once for the damage that self-inflicted years of sleep deprivation have done to you. Your irrationally high level of rage and anger is a very common symptom of sleep deprivation.

This is a sign that you can’t keep on as you are. You need to pack in the night job, get a regular day job, split the DC work evenly with DH and just pay the nursery fees until they are all over 5 and in primary school.

Christ. No wonder you're exhausted.

Your h has been spectacularly thoughtless. Or unkind. What a twat.

Does your h know how exhausted you are??

Sounds like something has to give. Job, h taking up some of the load you are carrying...

You had me at husband woke me up...I'd be raging.

Lack of sleep is torture, have you look into a different job/shift if possible?

Look into changing your job ASAP and cite his resentment at you 'having a lie in' as your reason.

You clearly need a break!

You are clearly taking on a lot of work for a lot of kids. Best to sit down with DH and discuss that you are burning yourself out. It wouldn't be surprising if not being able to sleep is related to stress too, and this could lead to something more serious like falling asleep at the wheel.

Sharing more responsibilities with DH might help, but if not, you might need to make some changes with your job.

It may be prudent to have a better system in place too - how about writing notes, texting him the key information so he can refer to it later and he doesn't have to. Stick sticky notes on the doors and walls if you have to!

Consider investing on some soundproofing like foam for the noise!

My DH has become considerate of my sleep over the years. But I've had to at times yell 'do not wake me up ever / even if I'm dying - please let me' - to get my point across.

You have my sympathies.
Please invest in earplugs and enjoy the deep sleep you can in the hours you are able to. ESP if you choose to do a hotel night.

Please don't ruin your health for your family/husband. Pay for the childcare and stop working at night. You can earn money over the years but your health might never recover from lack of sleep. Soon enough you'll be in peri-menopause which will again not allow you to sleep well - so make the most of the time you have now to recover mentally and physically from your pregnancies, deliveries and raising little ones.

YANBU. He owes you a nights sleep.

Choose a date and book yourself into a Premier Inn and ask for their quietest room. Ear plugs, eye mask. Mobile on silent. Sorted

Better for the OP to quit work for 4-5 years til the children are older, than get complete burn out. The OP is working a night shift (with THREE children under 5,) because her lazy arse of a husband CBA to try to earn more money, and also can't be fucked to pull his weight around the house, (and with the children.) Leaving her to do all the housework, grunt work, and domestic shit, as well as the childcare. AND her night shift job! She is also lucky if she gets 4 hours sleep a day.

Breaking yourself, destroying your health, suffering sleep deprivation, and not being the best version of yourself - for your children, just so you can polish your shiny medal and say 'I am better than you because I had children, and worked til I dropped!' is not something to aspire to either @Greenqueen40

And you are cherry picking what I said. I said to the OP 'do you really need this job? You should not be working night shifts and doing all the wife work and all the childcare with THREE children under 5, can you not take a break for 4-5 years until the children are a bit older/more independent?' I did not say 'QUIT WORK, and depend on your husband forevermore.'

And anyway, what if the OP does want to be a stay-at-home mum long term/til the children leave school...?! It's perfectly OK to do that. Just because you made different choices (or maybe had no choice but to work,) you have no right to judge other women! Quit being so smug, and step down from your pedestal. Women who stay at home with their children, and have their husband provide for them and the children are not beneath you, so quit acting like you're better than them!

.

What a load of nonsense.

Your husband hates you and wants you to suffer.

If everybody thought like you no hospital would be staffed. What on earth do you think shift workers do when we have children?

Absolutely incredible that people think the problem here is the job.

Op you need to change jobs. Myself and friends were talking about shift work when I was looking for a job and all said post kids it’s just a form of actual torture for your head and body (without kids it’s torture enough).

Or a different husband!!!

To be honest I’m amazed (but not really surprised tbf) that people are slagging off the husband so much, he sounds like he has pretty equal childcare responsibilities, op does the morning drop off and pick up and DH presumably does all the evenings/bedtimes/nights while she is at work, sounds similar to our setup, and just because I am tired from having little sleep and working silly hours doesn’t mean my DH is lazy and useless, it just means I’m tired, I may be annoyed at his lack of thought, but I wouldn’t be ripping him a new arsehole for waking me up.. neither of us get more than 6 hours sleep a night during the week anyway.. we catch up at the weekend.

she also says the littlest doesn’t sleep through so DH is the one at home having broken sleep too, she isn’t painting the picture of a useless DH, so why do people think he is a vindictive arsehole who hates her and woke her on purpose to make sure she didn’t get a lie in? It’s a bit of a stretch.

op could have gone to bed and tried to go to sleep at any time from when all three children left to go to relatives m the night before and didn’t actually need to stay up till 4am like she did, no he shouldn’t have woken her, but maybe he assumed (reasonably) that she would have at least tried to go to bed a little earlier and had already had a good chunk of sleep by then.

I really hope they have apologised to each other and OP considers whether working nights and trying to maintain sleeping patterns on her non work nights is the best way forward.

Men can be so pathetic can't they. Of course he didn't need to wake op up with silly questions - though it might have been more sensible to go to bed earlier. And going to the gym very selfish. Hopefully this won't go on for ever but meanwhile maybe you need to work out a more manageable schedule.

I really feel for you. You need to cut back if at all possible, and think of your overall health. I ended up mentally and physically exhausted with chronic depression eventually. See your GP as soon as you can. If you wish, ask for something to help you sleep. My disabled son didn't sleep through the night until he was abt 13 years old. It was horrendous. I was a single parent with another young son, working, and trying to be ever8to everybody. Act now to save yourself burning out later on. Sleep depravation is a serious, under rated condition, and life changing. Get some help please. Lots of love xx

This all sounds very dysfunctional.

Why do you feel the need to swear? I hope you don't swear in front of the children.

why the fuck shouldn't she? 😂

"I am fucking livid" sounds a lot more realistic than "I am angry" and express the situation a lot better

Pack your job in and budget to make ends meet. You need your life back before you mentally and/or physically crash altogether - there’s a reason you put your oxygen mask on first.

I find it very embarrassing when people use bad language, it is not necessary and shows a lack of appropriate vocabulary. Maybe I am in the minority but that's how I feel. My late husband and I never swore, perhaps because we had been well brought up and educated to be aware of people's sensitivities.

I think you’re on the wrong forum if you don’t like swearing.

Dude, you'll have to get a bit of a skin on you. Mumsnet is full of swearing and it's nothing to do with how you're brought up.

I don't have much to add, except to say that I've been there in that exact situation, and although it was probably almost 20 years ago, the emotions this reading this just awoke in me were almost as powerful as what you're feeling now. YANBU and I completely understand how you feel.

I'm struggling to remember how I dealt with it now (stupid middle-aged brain). There wasn't just one overarching solution unfortunately, I think it largely involved me severely rowing back on a lot of the jobs and responsibilities I had at home and things like visiting relatives, that were adding to my stress and lack of down-time. I let quite a few chores slide, and prioritised doing stuff that made me happier and more fulfilled - ditched that sense that I should always be doing something else and rested when my kids were resting. I also just told dp he had to do certain things to pick up the slack, and never interfered in those things even if he did a poor job.

Sorry that's probably a bit nebulous and not much help as far as advice goes!