Husband keeps having accidents with 15mo

[newmumabouttown]

My DS is 15 months old. My DH is incredibly accident prone. I have tried to talk to him calmly, I’ve also more frequently lost my temper. I’ve tried to approach conversations with seriousness, explain repercussions, but I feel he’s just not listening. Monday he closed the dishwasher and didn’t see our son had his fingers in it and trapped them. Just now, he had his wardrobe open with DS under him but was choosing an outfit and didn’t see DS trap his fingers in hinge. It is destroying our relationship as I keep thinking I just need to get him away / out.
I know he cares, as he can be loving, but I feel like he doesn’t care enough to be on alert all the time or make adjustments. I don’t know what to do… feeling lost.
Also, just to add it’s not just with our DS. He’s constantly stepping on my feet. I had an operation recently and when we were in car he accidentally hit where I’d been cut, and then seconds later slipped changing gear and punched my leg. It wasn’t deliverable, but it’s hard not to feel like it is when it’s so frequent.

I do not think it is possible to “accidentally” punch anybody in that situation, so we will have to agree to disagree. And your DS’ diagnosis is irrelevant to be honest. Because the OP’s husband does not have a diagnosis. And if he is unwilling to explore getting diagnosed, and therefore developing coping mechanisms that suit his diagnosis, then the OP cannot make any other assumption than his behaviour being purposeful.

In any case, as I have said, no diagnosis makes it acceptable to hurt other people.

You sound quite blasé about this. Are you not concerned that you’re a danger to your children?

OP, I'd recommend that what you do is write out a neutral, factual account of each incident.

E.g. date, what happened, effect, what you said, what he said/how he reacted. No adjectives.
Below each factual account I would include a commentary which is why you think it happened/what you felt.

Ideally do them in different colours or underling.

E.g.

Fact: 1 May: DH changing gears, hand collided with my leg, I said X, he said Y.
Comment: it hurt me like a punch, I felt very upset when DH said X because it came across that he was minimising it. I felt it could have been avoided by more carefully checking for tge gear. If he had been driving more slowly he would have had more time to do so.

When you have done it, leave it for a couple of hours and then check it (a) covers everything and (b) properly distinguishes neutral facts and commentary.

Then, if you feel able, ask a trusted friend or relative to read it for their views.

Give the account to DH. Tell him you want him to read and reflect on it calmly, by himself, and that he can write out his own commentary to each incident. Tell him it is not the details of each incident but the overall picture that is now upsetting you. Anyone can have one accident, but repeated accidents require an intervention. Tell him that you are doing this not to blame him but to find a solution that protects everybody, including him. Importantly, he is to write out and reflect upon his response to your log, rather tjan speak to you, because this requires calm and consideration.

His response to this will tell you what you need to do. Because if he refuses to engage in the exercise, or tries to fight or diminish it, I'd be considering (a) marriage counselling and (b) seperation.

Where does the OP say he is shrugging his shoulders and doing nothing? Its the OP telling him that there is nothing wrong with him and that its all his fault so what would he investigate?

The OP also says he does care, its her assumption that he doesn’t care enough because he hasn’t managed to rectify the situation.

Many posters here with experience of dyspraxia have said he should follow up for an investigation. The OP is the one providing google diagnoses which fit with her presumptions and losing her temper frequently.

OP said “I know he cares, as he can be loving, but I feel like he doesn’t care enough to be on alert all the time or make adjustments.” So yes, he cares, but not enough to do something about it.

Punching you changing gear in your surgery site sounds very much deliberate sorry

I don’t think it’s implausible either.
I accidentally groped my driving instructor while trying to change gears.
The shame!!😳

No - she is assuming he doesn’t care enough because he hasn’t magically fixed the problem.

"I feel like he doesn’t care enough"

What does he suggest as a possible solution? Does he accept that hurting his son like this isn't acceptable? I know you said he dismisses it as accidental, but that doesn't mean nothing can be done, does it? So what's he suggesting would help? If it's genuinely just clumsiness and he is planning to continue to be around his son, and even responsible for him at times, then he's going to need to come up with some strategies to prevent constantly hurting and harming him isn't he?

This! Exactly my thoughts, his lack of guilt and care and brushing things off as accidents is the issue. If it’s an accident then it’s an accident but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t care that you have hurt someone especially your wife and child.

So he does not care then, as he is prepared to carry on hurting his son and his wife rather than find a way of managing the situation. The OP’s posts make it clear that he is doing nothing about the situation. She is so upset she has told him she can’t carry on like this and wants to see a psychologist and he is still not acting-so he clearly does not care. Are you not able to deduce that from behaviour like this? Actions are more important than words, and he is failing on both counts.

Exactly. Fair enough if his hand slipped and he tapped her leg but to have a balled fist and bring it down with enough force for it to be classed as a punch? That sounds deliberate to me.

Or maybe it’s not so straightforward to change when you’re neurodiverse?
And people get defensive when people shout at them too so I don’t think that approach helps.

To be clear, I do think he needs to put strategies in place to help protect DS, but it probably isn’t as simple as ‘you’d remember if you cared enough’.

Sadly, there’s no such thing as magic. “Fixing the problem” will likely involve some type
of investigations into the likely cause of the accidents, seeing a professional, adopting strategies and such like. OP says “I’ve just said to him I can’t go on like this, he refuses to accept it’s nothing but an accident. I suggested maybe he needs some medical help, because something is distracting him. He refused to see it.” Based on OP’s posts it doesn’t sound like he is trying to fix the problem, magically or otherwise.

Again, he has not been diagnosed with anything and seems to be refusing to go down that road, so why should the OP alter her behaviour to placate his behaviour when he does not even have a diagnosis? Stop making women responsible for male behaviour. Not to mention the actual baby that is also being hurt in the process.

I feel the same, the paragraph about “accidentally” punching OP’s surgical wound really raises an enormous red flag to me.

I have dyspraxia, it’s pretty bad, as a symptom of MS. I’m constantly bruised and often have abrasions from walking into tables, walls etc. When my rabbits are running around or small children are visiting I watch my fucking step, as I couldn’t cope with the guilt of hurting a tiny being through my lapse in concentration. It’s not an excuse, and certainly won’t be if OP’s baby ends up in hospital as a result.

So many on this thread letting their pure unadulterated hatred of men cloud any intellectual thought that it might actually be a psychological/dyspraxic impairment effecting his judgement and reactions and he just can’t help it. Of course when one of your own sons becomes obviously dyspraxic you’ll all be heaping as much contempt on him too because he’s just male and doesn’t care. 🙄

It’s a hard truth to accept, but neurodiverse or not, he is a danger to his child and really shouldn’t be left with the child unsupervised. Neurodiverse or not, it is his responsibility to get help and investigate strategies, not for OP to gently persuade him to (which, based on her first post, hasn’t worked).

Alter her behaviour?

I just suggested she stop shouting at him!

This☝️
Everything I would say to do.
I imagine your so fed up each time it happens you respond pissed off with him (which is totally understandable) but it's keeping you in a loop of annoyance and him defensive.
Once kid is at nursery it could be flagged up if incidents keep happening.
Don't move his wine glass for him, let it get knocked down repeatedly and ensure he cleans it all up properly every single time, don't get involved apart from monitoring it's all done correctly, otherwise kid could get hurt, and record it. If he breaks multiple glasses surely he would want to move onto a plastic cup? Then it's just wind spillage to correctly clean up
If he can't reflect on how his behaviours are making you feel, and getting hurt from then he's a prick who doesn't care

I wouldn’t be prepared to let anybody get away with constantly hurting me-man or woman. The difference is that when it’s a man more often than not the advice is to placate and excuse the behaviour and alter the world around him so that he is comfortable while everybody else is walking on eggshells.

I would shout too if someone kept hitting me.

Um we’re talking fingers near a drawer not outright uncontrolled violence.

In my care my son both rolled off the bed and burned his hand by grabbing my straighteners - I suppose I should only have been allowed supervised contact too?

But why would he do something about it when he's being told that theres nothing wrong with him by his wife and he just needs to be more careful?

If you're dyspraxic, you can't suddenly not be dyspraxic. Being more careful can't happen if your brain is wired different. The same way that someone autistic might say things in a blunt way, they can't just change how their brain processes words because someone has suggested they be less blunt because their brain doesn't perceive the world in the same way.

You give more attention to one single detail, and then other things start going wrong instead. That's the problem with executive functioning issues.

Well I would say if he had kept rolling off the bed and kept being burned by your straighteners across multiple instances then yes, that should have been flagged. Once is an accident. A pattern of behaviour is not accidental.