To not want to leave children with DH because it creates work for me?

[butterfliesandbugs]

I know I’m going to get a bit of an online flaming for this but I’m genuinely wondering how many of us are in the same position.

Our children are four and one (two in may.) And I need a break from them but I never get one because I just don’t like leaving them with DH. I do love him and he loves the children but he just can’t seem to plan ahead for when he has them and it creates work for me.

So some examples are

Not giving DS anything to eat and then when DS was hungry let him eat an entire pack of blueberries and then he had loose poos the next day and was sent home from preschool.

Not offering them drinks - this is a biggie as DS doesn’t drink enough as it is.

If I go out and they are in the house I come back and it honestly looks like it’s been ransacked .

Driving somewhere that’s a fair trek mid to late afternoon so someone falls asleep and is then up till gone ten.

Not changing DDs nappy when it’s wet (only dirty)

I know people will claim it’s weaponised incompetent and it honestly isn’t. Just incompetence. And I know one of the issues is he isn’t used to having them but I frankly CBA with the fallout for when he does!

My ex husband was like this. Read I divorced him.

Bloody hell, I don't have children but could do a better job than him! He sounds a bit neglectful to be honest.

Don’t do everything - divide up bedtimes, meals, laundry, cleaning etc. He isn’t going to need to bother doing anything as he knows you will. To a certain extent you have brought it on yourself. Parenting is a joint responsibility.

People who say go out for longer clearly have never dealt with this. You are punishing the children by going out for longer as it's longer they are having to deal with this too waiting for op to get back. It doesn't suddenly snap him in to being able to look after them.

Does he see them and has he bucked his ideas up if so?

When things go wrong, who is inconvenienced? Does he try and make ds sleep after allowing a nap? Does he have to leave work and pick up ds from preschool because of the blueberries ? Parents sometimes learn from our mistakes (we’ve all made the car journey at 4pm one!) and make a note not to repeat it.

What would your h say about his parenting ? Does he agree that he’s made lots of big mistakes like not feeding lunch or would he say that he is a great parent but ends up clashing with you because you are too rigid ?

Some of your list are more serious than others. Even a childless person would know to offer food and drink every time they felt hunger and thirst themselves. If he genuinely never feels hunger or thirst then setting alarms every 2-3 hours would be an obvious way to deal with his inability to look at the time and think it’s time for lunch or whatever.

Despite what you think, your post screams weaponized incompetence. I suspect he’s happy with the current status quo when the longer you live like this, the worse it becomes and you end up having to wait until ds is old enough to make lunch and offer drinks to dd too.

He sees them if I deliver them to him, so now it’s just for extended visits in school holidays. Did he buck his ideas up? No. Far from it. If anything, in order to prove that it wasn’t his job to do wife work and if I didn’t like it then I should do it myself, he got worse.

He’s still a dickhead now. But not my problem.

I think he needs to be more involved in day to day life then,
Its frustrating to have to micromanage a grown adult and tell them how to parent but it’s what needs to be done -
“Ok so DDs nappy needs changing and DS needs lunch - which will you sort and I’ll do the other” and repeat
it’s not easy but might help

It's neglect. It's not shit parenting or incompetence, it's neglect.

I can see why you don't want to leave your children with a negligent parent who won't do the most essential parenting tasks like giving food and water and changing a soiled diaper.

I would never stay with someone who is criminally neglecting their children. He doesn't love them. Child neglect is not love. It's endangering them.

its also gross misogyny. My ex thought that his parental input should not be extended past making sure the kids didn’t catch fire.

Does he manage to hold down a job?

Or does he keep getting sacked for forgetting to do basic tasks at work? If not, how does he manage to remember to do essential tasks at work?

Out of interest, what does he do for a job?

You've already capitulated by doing it all.

STOP. You're the only one that can make this change. Find your voice.

Solidarity @butterfliesandbugs The dc were the only issue that dh and I ever argued about. He was a bit less useless than yours (he changed nappies) and did at least not repeat some of his mistakes (to avoid another roasting) but it was just infuriating. I think it boiled down to not being able to prioritise them.

As the dc got older, it got better. I think they have actively benefitted from our different styles and approaches. He’s been much more capable through the school age and into the teen years. Although he still seems incapable of grasping the concept of providing regular timely meals or that McDonalds for every meal is not ok. He’s not great at feeding himself properly either.

He’s brilliant in other ways - quick to pitch in with housework, generous to a fault, a great provider, and he loves spending time as a family. He actively encouraged me to take breaks, giving me gifts of spa breaks, etc so I don’t really understand the blind spot - as you said not weaponised incompetence but actual incompetence.

For me the solution was longer breaks because he recruited help (even if the price was mil clucking about poor dh being expected to do everything) or suggesting boundaried activities (eg take them to the zoo at this time, and to the cafe there, and bring them home by this time) but that can take too much mental effort when you actually need a break

Yeah sure. Any mother here would go off for 3 months leaving their one year old with a father they literally don't trust to look after their kids safely for 12 hours.

If you can't actually help, maybe don't post?

I think we know the answer to that.

Mine is a company director of a company you’d have heard of. Remarkable how he holds it together, isn’t it?

Not feeding them properly, not giving a drink or changing a wet nappy is cruel to the child, who is not old enough to complain. He is a horrible father, he is negligent and causing them harm! He really needs to deal with this, what happens if you need to go into hospital or something? Have you explained to him properly? He needs to sort himself out and become a reliable parent. The absolute basics of looking after small children is everyone fed and nobody dead, it is hard looking after 2 little ones but surely he can manage to do it for a day every so often, without one of them ending up with nappy rash or dehydration!

No I wouldn't be leaving the children with him even more so that 'he'll learn' because he won't and then they will suffer for it.

Problem is, if you leave him then he gets unsupervised access to them.

Maybe a threat that you will report him to social services if he doesn't step up and start providing basic levels of care for his children might do the trick.

I honestly think that a lot of men just walk around with their head up their arse most of the time. Oblivious to anything that doesn't directly affect them.

Saying oh but he has a professional job therefore he must know how to parent is comparing apples with oranges imo. I don't agree that he's necessarily doing it on purpose but that's irrelevant. Deliberate or not it shouldn't be happening.

Your DH shouldn't need your permission to take his own kids out. Stop being alpha parent, let him figure out parenting.

Absolutely. How the OP finds this excusable is extraordinary.

Well exactly!

If he can manage a job but not meeting basic needs of his children then it is not due to incompetence in the usual sense of the word.

I've said it before and I'll say it again-only form adult relationships with adults.

This ⬆️

So if he had taken them today in the car and they fell asleep, then let him do bed time and the putting back to bed etc. To be fair this is a risk you take if you go out in a car with young children, but you can't let that mean you never go anywhere