Husband complaining about helping with night feeds, AIBU?

[DefyingGravity012]

Hi

My husband and I have a 7 month old and I have just found out I am pregnant. He has always been really helpful at all times with our baby, never complaining. Tonight though, he has got very annoyed about being up for a night feed with me, blamed me, and asked facetiously “what time do you get to sleep until?” . This started because our baby was taking his time to start feeding as he was fussing.

My husband has to wake up at 6:30 for work. Baby wakes twice in the night to feed, around midnight/1, then at 5ish. I stay in bed until around 8 when baby wakes for the day. I’ve sent him downstairs, I can hear him already snoring away. Our baby takes a while to go back to sleep after a feed.

I’ve always been so grateful for him being up with me and the baby even though he has work. It’s just the way he’s approached this I feel is unfair. It’s as though I apparently dont need the sleep. I’m pregnant, so I’m tired all the time, and have a medical condition (epilepsy) which is made worse by sleep deprivation (on meds that luckily block any seizures but if I’m tired makes me feel so awful until I sleep again)

AIBU?

thank you xx

He can't do night feeds when he has an early start the next day. You need a more efficient method so the bottle heats up quickly.

And agree ideally you shouldn’t be having to feed twice in the night at that age. 11pm then 5 or 6am.

It's not working for you both now. Your dh is unhappy.
Can't say I blame him if he's up for work and having to feed the baby twice during the night.
When I was on maternity leave, Sunday to Thursday I did the night feeds and Friday and Saturday dh did them.

I always did the night feeds when DH was working. I knew that even if I was knackered I could have a relatively easy day at home - I didn't have to commute to work and use my brain for 8 hours. I could sit on the sofa in my pyjamas and watch daytime TV.
However, I don't have epilepsy so I don't know how this changes things. OP, are you able to do all night feeds during the working week or is it too dangerous?

Hi OP,

Another epilepsy sufferer here 👋🏻

I have two children (3 years apart) and they were both awful sleeper.

When they were babies me and DH shared the night wakings as he knew how dangerous it was for me to have lack of sleep with regards to my seizures. I breastfed mine so I would do the feed and then pass the baby over to DH so he could settle him after the feeds whilst I went back to sleep. He said we were a team and we were in it together and that he would never leave me to deal with the nights alone even though he had work the next day.

When he came home from work at about 5pm I would then head up back to bed to get a few more hours sleep.

As the babies got older I found things got harder as they were still awake during the night and I couldn’t sleep in the day either because they needed my supervision and my attention far more than they did as new babies.

When they were about 6 months old I did say to my husband that he should go and sleep in the spare room because settling the baby after a feed was no longer a quick job like it was when they were newborns, and I really didn’t want him awake for hours during the night when he had work.

When my first son was 9-10 months old his sleep was still so bad and I was beyond exhausted, I spent most of my days crying as I felt like I just couldn’t go on. I was due to return to work and I was also so worried for my health.

Anyhow, I ended up paying for a Sleep Consultant at this point as I just couldn’t risk my seizures coming back from sleep deprivation.

I have no idea how hard you must be finding all of this whilst being pregnant too ☹️

I don’t know what the answer it as although it’s easy to say he shouldn’t be up in the night because he has work, he also has a wife who is pregnant and has a serious health condition that is triggered by lack of sleep - and the potential risks of your seizures returning and the implications of that on your health, your pregnancy, the safety of your 7 month old, and the way it could impede on yours and your husband’s way of living, do need to be factored in.

Oh god yet another load of posters going on an about how important it is to get a full night's sleep before work....like looking after a small baby isn't 10 times harder. Mine is 18 months and I've been back at work full time for a while now, it is SO much easier going to work when tired than looking after him when tired. Not to mention pregnancy being awful (for me), and your epilepsy.

I do agree it's mad to have both of you wake up, but it sounds like it's come about because you're both woken by the crying, and it's easier at that point to have one of you look after the baby/do a nappy while the other runs for a bottle. I only ever breastfeed at night and rarely had to change the nappy so I do feel for you having to actually do stuff.

There's actually no point really in asking the internet. All babies, home setups, sleep needs, relationships etc are so different that strangers can't say what's fair as it wont be the same for everyone. It's really hard for any parent so whilst I think it's unreasonable to have a go at you, your husband was tired and it was the middle of the night so it's probably best to forgive the snapping, and have a talk about how you can maximise rest for BOTH of you given you need to work/care/go through pregnancy.

Have you tried just putting a bit less milk in the night bottles each time? Or attempting to comfort baby back to sleep without food? It's painful in the short run but they should be getting to an age to be able to start reducing feeds. One thing we did successfully was to feed the baby in his sleep 30 mins before he was probably going to wake up. It seemed to stop him waking up for food, and then once he was out of the habit of waking we just dropped the feed entirely.

The point is by both waking up for every single night wake with a 7 month old neither of them are ever getting enough sleep! It would be entirely more logical to split it so there are times when both of them get to sleep.

Was this 3rd pregnancy planned OP, and is DH happy about it and fully on board? Maybe the thought of another newborn and all it involves is scaring him a bit and this is how it's coming out?

I would have said you're being unreasonable, however, epilepsy is a serious condition. What if OP has a seizure whilst she's awake alone holding the baby? My ex died of sudden death in epilepsy syndrome. Sleep was a significant risk factor for her seizures.

OP is also pregnant.

Husband does also need sleep though as he's up for work. Baby does not need changing overnight at 7 months unless there's poop. That will wake baby up.

At 7mths being fed every 4 hrs isn't necessary, try and drop the 1am.
The pp saying you have to night feed until 19mths, utter nonsense.
No need for two ppl to be up with the baby twice per night, the road to madness!

No point two of you getting tried. He has work so he sleeps whilst you do night feeds. You can sleep when your husband is at work and baby is asleep. Slightly surprised baby at 7 months has feeds every 4 hours. Maybe a hug and put baby back to bed and don't offer milk

Sincere apologies I didn’t read your full op @DefyingGravity012 and didn't realise you have epilepsy.
That puts a different perspective on you both doing night feeds.

I haven't read the whole thread, but I just wanted to say, if he is usually very helpful and caring and this outburst was out of character, then don't think too much into it. Emotions run high when you're tired, maybe he's just got to a point where the lack of sleep has caught up with him.

Definitely no need for you to both be awake for night feeds though.

I’m also pregnant and got pregnant at the same time as you when previous baby was 7 months, it’s not easy going, everyone gets stressed and it is a lot of pressure, I did all the feeds as baby is breastfed………I still get called names in arguements and think he literally hasn’t had to lift a finger…….i did struggle doing it all as he works but I kind of made that sacrifice knowing we also needed money so although it probably doesn’t seem fair I would take the help he is able to offer whilst working……it’s not easy being pregnant while doing most of the work but I suppose it could be worse for you, just try and sleep when the baby naps to catch up if you can and if you have any relatives you can call on for help use that to your advantage too……..

What’s the point of both of you being up in the night for a feed?

The problem is, you want the boiling water to touch the powder to sterilise it. So this works if you do it the other way round, boiling water, powder, cooled boiled water.

You also have to measure the water without the powder in rather than making it up to the line once the powder is in. But yes, that's how I would / did do it with my formula fed baby in this century :)

Could you take it in turns with the night feeds maybe? So he does the early one, then gets a block of sleep, and you do the later one? Then you both get more sleep rather than both getting up each time.

I don’t think your U though to be clear about your need for sleep being at least as great as his.

He’s probably just snapping in the way people do when sleep deprived.

But it’s clearly not working for him? With my two we arranged it so only one of us was disturbed - me during the week, and he’d pitch in at the weekend. Sometimes that meant me sleeping in a separate room with the baby. He’d also take the baby/babies out for a drive etc to give me the chance to have an afternoon nap at the weekends.

why does he need to sleep downstairs? I get the baby crying will disturb him but if he doesn’t actually need to get up he will likely just fall back to sleep.

Ugh, a lot of people here who aren't factoring your epilepsy. Yes he works so he should get sleep, blah, blah, blah, but there is a well known link between having epileptic seizures and a lack of sleep, so for you and your babies safety, you absolutely, need to get a good night's sleep too.

We used to both wake up with the baby because he would cry that much it was impossible to sleep through. I think if you haven’t already, it might be worth investing in a Nuby rapid cool - they are a life saver with making speedy bottles. It takes less then 5 mins to make a bottle and then who ever isn’t feeding the baby can go back to sleep.

Which is significantly more likely if they split wakeups rather than both waking for every single wake at the same time.

Sorry, missed your epilepsy. I think you should chat to your health visitor about getting baby 1 sleeping through the night now they are 7mo and hopefully get some other strategies to support you both. Not sure if no 2 is a planned pregnancy, but perhaps the enormity of the fact that DH will have interrupted night for the next year or so, when perhaps he was looking forward to the idea that he and baby1 sleeping through the night, might have just rankled in the moment.

Agree and the fact that looking after a baby in the day is also work. Yes, babies do nap but at paid employment you get a lunch break.

Agreed