To not get up when my DSD wakes up?

[Frozened]

I’ve been with my DH for 3 years, DSD is 6. I work full time in a hospital and it’s really full on. I have always loved sleep! I will sleep for hours and hours if I can.

DSD is with us half the week, and always at the weekend. Yesterday she was dropped off at 7am so I got up with DH and was with them all day.

today, DSD got up at 6am and DH got up with her. I’ve just woken up now, and I can sense DH is annoyed I didn’t get up too.

we don’t have any shared DCs atm, but we are trying to conceive in the new year.

aibu to sleep in and let DSD dad get up with her?

Sounds like having a child isn’t right for you as you like sleep too much!

I have 2 kids, both are also my husband's, of 1 of us is up before 6 at the weekend the other one gets up at 8ish and the early riser can go for a nap if they like. But we're almost 8 yrs in to terrible sleepers so it's all about survival here. That said if it's only once a week is want to get up and have that 1-1 with my child so your oh is being a bit of a lunatic there really. 7am though isn't an early rise to me and I also love sleep but even before kids 7am wake up is fairly normal. Staying up past 10 though? Madnes

He's shown you who he is.

Your choice is, do you believe him?

I suspect not.

We never both get up except on a birthday or Xmas! Usually we take turns on a weekend. The passive aggressive mood would annoy me .

do you always talk such absolute shite?

We often split wake ups on weekends but if DD goes to DH first on both weekend days he just gets up with her. He’s knackered but it’s quality time they don’t get during the week so he’s happy to get up. If he only had her half the week he would definitely be up with her no questions asked, no moaning.

Honestly I would be very careful about having kids with him. He really does think this is woman’s work.

You say ‘ I look after her when DH is at work, pick ups from school, I just don’t think I need to get up with him?’

Is her mother also unavailable to pick up and drop off - too many men want 50/50 to avoid maintenance. What would he do if you were not together?

The op and this update. I’d be reassessing your relationship.

Why did he split up with her mother?

She can go down and watch tv on her own at 6!!

I know (very well 😊) that with some kids it isn’t feasible, but at six I feel your DSD is old enough to be trying to entertain herself if she wakes so early, there are clocks you can get that indicate when it is still ‘night’ and she could have books/toys/water etc on hand. Obviously even children who are good at this won’t do it all the time, but still.

YANBU though, and I would be quite firm about this kind of thing to test the water for having your own DC. Was your DH ever in a long term relationship with DSD’s mother? If so, what led to them splitting up? I would be sceptical enough to want to know more when a man has left the family home while his child is so young.

There is no point in you getting up to your stepdaughter when she wakes up early in the morning. That is her father’s responsibility. She’s not your child.

My sister in law got my partner to sleep over her house and baby sit his two nieces while she went out (no idea where she went - it was somewhere overnight).

This left me with a special needs toddler to look after and weekends were my only break.

It pleased me so much to hear that those girls woke him up at 5.30am. They were a lot older than your stepdaughter is. My partner was a wreck all weekend.

You’re not obligated to get up. You work a job and this child is not your own.

I had one of these. Kept coming in and out so I couldn't go back to sleep. He'd leave the door open to encourage DSD to come in. I'd get up and close it. Stand your ground OP. He does not get to dictate how much sleep you can have and you don't need to justify it.

Tell him straight. You'll get up when you're ready and mean it. She'll be fine once she's used to the new routine of 1-1 time with Daddy on a weekend morning.

He's trying emotional blackmail to avoid solo parenting. When she comes in the bedroom ask her to get Daddy to help make you breakfast in bed (preferably with freshly made bread as that takes a few hours 😂). She'll love that, he won't 😁

He resents you for not having to get up. Sadly, I think once you're up with a baby anyway, he'll try to claim back every one of these 'unauthorised' lay ins.

we don’t have any shared DCs atm, but we are trying to conceive in the new year @Frozened

He’ll make you do all the childcare, all the night feeds, all the early wakings. This is probably why his ex broke up with him. 6 year olds are so easy compared to a baby or toddler.

I've never gotten up with my own dc, it was always dh who did the early mornings. I was not a morning person (am now!) and dh really enjoyed both spending some quality time alone with the dc and giving me a nice lie-in whenever he could.

Your dh is being an arse.

You should keep going, as you mean to on. Don’t get up with dsd- she’s not your child you don’t need to get guilty.

Also she’s nearly old enough where she can get herself up and go watch tv for an hour or so.

If you start the early mornings now. It will become the norm

Have to wonder if his attitude to childcare is a reason his relationship with the child’s birth mother broke down…….maybe he left it all to mum and she got fed up of doing it all. Boot on the other foot now……is he getting a taste of his own medicine perhaps?
FWIW OP, I’d think seriously about having babies with him……you might eventually find yourself doing it all!

6am is quite early for a six year old. By that age she is old enough to understand it's early and to have some rules about getting everyone else up..

We had a 7am rule for the weekend. If kids were awake before that they could stay in their rooms and play but they weren't to wake everyone else up.

It wasn't fair to kids of different ages as well as to us.

If you are going to have another child you really won't want her waking a baby you've just got back down so a few gentle rules now would be sensible for all of you.

Yes because we all practiced getting up in the middle of the night before we needed to 🤔

OP has a busy job, it's Sunday and she's not lying in til lunchtime.

Why should she have to? She's not getting up stupidly early

I can tell you divide and conquer will be what you want if you both have kids. No chance I was getting up to watch my DH parent our shared DC!

I agree with those who say that once you have your own child to get up for, the lie-ins will all be his, while you take care of his child as well as your own.

The fact that he kept coming in to whine and then left the door open says it all - he thinks the nanny he procured is letting him down.

Fuck off fella.

Unfortunately OP it sounds like he saw you coming.

This wouldn't even be reasonable behaviour if DSD were your joint child. It really is quite obvious what he's going to be like if you have a baby together.

Perhaps you’re just not compatible. Poor kid.

I think you might want to think strategically here. He has obviously no right to expect you to get up with his child. However, if you are ttc then soon you will have a joint child / children. Do you plan to get up with your dc every morning or will you hope to share the load with him. If you go down the route of this is your child, you must get up then he might throw that back at you once you have kids together. You could offer to sometimes get up with her to give him a break occasionally.

And this leads to people wondering why their parents don't treat their step-grandchildren the same as 'their own'.
Going against the grain here, I know, but I would absolutely treat any step child exactly the same as my (future) own.

What have grandparents got to do with this? Do you have step children?