Useless DP, do I stick it out

[DarkPlace213]

We have an 18 month old son. He's good with DS and shares night wakings, plays with him lots, cooks dinner. I however do everything else. I clean up after said dinner, for example. I make breakfast and lunch. I am currently working full time and DP is on a break (due to start new job in May). You'd think I have nothing to do since DS is in full time childcare, we have a cleaner and I am supporting a grown man to stay home. No, I have no time for a lot really. Laundry, car insurance, I don't know, just absolutely everything falls to me. We currently have 2 nappies left and I have to go to the shop to buy some.

He will do stuff if I ask. Until he gets annoyed with too many requests and decide I'm a nag. So I usually don't ask anymore (and he then says he would have done it if I had said anything).

Until a month ago, he had never taken DS out by himself. Not even on a walk. I had to beg and scream to get him to take DS to the park for 20 minutes on a Saturday morning. He has done it twice now.

I earn far, far more than him.

I'm falling out of love with him completely.

He's around because he's my son's dad. That's it.

I don't know what to do. I'm far too old to meet someone else and have another baby (37) and I wouldn't really be interested in another man anyway. So it feels like a big decision. Not only will DS have split parents, I will also not have any more children which really hurts. I have no siblings or extended family so long term life will be extremely lonely.

I'm also worried he will be a Disney dad and I will eternally be the one that does everything and be the bad one. He's great at entertaining DS so if we split, he'll likely just show DS a great time once a week at the weekend, I'll do all the donkey work and get zero fun.

At least this way it's all under my roof and I can outsource housework and spend as much quality time with DS as possible.

You suggested counselling to fix things and he said he would leave if you mentioned it again.

So he has made it explicitily clear that he will not change, has no intention of discussing issues and doing anything differently. He doesnt want to fix things, he doesnt care how you feel and what the stress is doing to you, he just wants you to shut the fuck up and keep paying for his lovely life.

Screw the counselling until you’ve actually left him and distanced yourself and your child from this environment.

Then work on yourself

Try be kind to yourself. Counselling for you will help, and is the first step to untangling everything.

It's really easy to type LTB on Mumsnet but it's very very very hard to do that IRL. Especially when there's a child to raise, acceptance to find and hopes to let go of.

I think the generational cycle adds another layer. One I'm currently untangling myself, after patting myself on the back that I picked right and would never end up like my mother. Adds in feelings of guilt and shame you ended up in the same spot, and I feel makes us more conditioned than this is normal. Clearly I am projecting!!

You might just have to play the long game until he’s back in employment in May. Slowly start dropping the ball with things at home though for your own sanity. Do what you can to financially protect yourself. Seek advice.

Has he got savings he could be using to contribute to the household or is he spending it all on jollies with his mates? I would restrict his access to ‘fun money’ if I were you.

I’ve only read the OP posts, but @DarkPlace213 it isn’t you being “a selfish bitch” at all- it’s absolutely reasonable to expect your partner to be an equal partner who supports you and the family as you support him. Each update made me first angry and then sad for you that you are being conditioned to feel this way, that you have to suck it up and your husband can just smugly tell you that he is who he is and you’re way over the line asking for a mediator! He is outrageous!

I left my DD’s father when she was 2 and honestly my life since has been SO much better. There was another poor relationship choice but after that blip I have gone from strength to strength, and she has seen her dad for who he is. She still enjoys the time she spends with him but she knows who the reliable parent is. Being a single parent (obviously with the caveat of no additional needs etc) is far easier than running around after a man. Most men are net generators of domestic work in my experience, and it’s a rare one who will give as much looking after as he gets.

I also wanted another baby, but I got a dog instead which cured me of broodiness, and now- although I can’t give my daughter the family experience I wanted for her- I think it’s better. I can cope more easily and have more resources to support her and myself with. She doesn’t mind because she also knows this (and has step siblings from her dad, which she sometimes likes and sometimes resents).

I hope the counselling goes well and you find a path you can feel peaceful with.

He's saying he'll leave to shut OP down. He's got it good here and wants to maintain the status quo. He's taking the piss. He knows it, OP knows it and we know it. He's hoping OP is too daunted by the threat of single parenting that she'll put up with him as he's not as bad as some other men.

I voted that Yabu to stick with him. You’ve got two dc, he’s treating you like his mother and simply playing with his sibling.

you’d find that you’d have more time on your hands as a single working parent because you’d not have to clean up, cook and parent your dh as well as your ds.

as for how it’ll impact your ds, well it’ll teach him that women aren’t put on this earth to breed and look after men, you will also teach him how to ‘not’ become his father.

Disney dads are all well and good (I’ve been there and got the tshirt), but it doesn’t last long when your ds eats beans on toast every other weekend and only does things to fit in and around his df.

your son will respect you more in the end for being a proper parent, kids like and thrive on boundaries and having an invested parent.

my dd is 18 and spends very little time with her df because she can now see just how useless he is, and this is without any input from me, I’ve never bad mouthed him and always encouraged her relationship with him. The only thing I’ve not done is facilitate their relationship, that’s on him

Disney dad is a very real prospect. Would you carry more resentment sticking it out or having some freedom and space but also having to hand DC over only be criticised by them both?

What DID you love about him? How did the tasks share between you before you had DC? Have you always picked everything up?

Whats his longer term work situation?

It’s worth knowing now that things are actually harder (not easier, as I stupidly thought) when they’re in school as there’s so much wraparound to organise plus homework to fit in etc. it’s probably all coming to you. BUT by this point the kids are genuinely good company and some dads do step up when they start to have relationship with the person; rather than the baby. Not saying this is ok, but it’s definitely true.

I think you should do 2 things in the short term while you’re mulling things over/thinking about getting ducks in a row:

calmly agree a time to sit down and divide tasks -
Both start by choosing the ones you prefer/are naturally good at, then divide the rest by suitability, skill sets, how they fit in with your life. Trade off things you hate. Then you HAVE to let him drop the ball. It’s uncomfortable , your DC might be affected very short term, but you have to let it happen. Let him run out of nappies on his watch and have to deal with it. It’s not fun. It won’t happen twice. But I think you’re partly doing the thinking before he’s had time to feel any friction so he’s unaware how overloaded you are and how fucking ragey you feel (rightfully)

Secondly get him back into work again asap so you can see how this actually shakes down in a realistic situation. Right now you’re carrying everything and you’re furious because he’s literally thumb twiddling. But presumably that’s a short term situation. You shouldn’t leave your marriage until you’ve tested it out in a real life scenario of both parents working etc

Counselling would definitely be good.

most of us grew up in this dynamic OP - it’s patriarchy, women serve men, it’s very hard to break and it’s not our fault that “even the good ones” are socialised this way.

Counselling for you is a terrific idea. Probably the best thing you can do for yourself right now. I'm not surprised that you're feeling so sad and heartbroken. He has let you down so very badly ❤️

By the way, the nerve of him telling you he does more than most men and that this is just who he is! He really doesn't see any of the drudgery as his job. He thinks he's doing you a big favour by doing as little as he does, and that you can't possibly expect any more from him because ultimately he sees it all as your problem, not his. I'm just fuming on your behalf

You do NOT have to put up with any of this, you really don't, no matter what he threatens. You have options, and counselling will help you to understand the best option for you. It will be painful, and give it time, but it's a big step closer to a more peaceful life for you, whatever you decide. Very best of luck

I’m not judging you, it’s good advice for someone who has limitless resources (eg major inheritance, no mortgage etc). But a second child is more than twice the work and if it’s hard to imagine going solo anyway surely making it twice as hard and twice as expensive isn’t the way…?!

Walk around the house with a sandwich board on ‘I WANT TO GO TO COUNSELLING!’

i can empathise. He’s a lazy bastard

mine is the same. I have friends in the same position

i say take advantage. Go out after work, meet friends. Dont get up in the night, stop making breakfast

have you considered leaving for work early? Get a coffee out? Go to the gym straight from work

play him at his own game

if you do split, be aware that he will recouple immediately so that when he has baby at weekends, he has a skivvy to help

Just mention counselling again. The trash will take itself out. You sound utterly done with him and no wonder!

It IS easier without a shit man long term. Yes there are logistical challenges when kids are sick and can't go to school and so forth. However living without that bubbling pit of resentment in your stomach is fabulous!!!!!!!!!!

So mention counselling again!

I stopped reading after I saw you're working. He's not and your.doing all the housework AND have childcare. What's the point of him? We both work close to full time in our family (I say close to because I do part time and variable self employed on top so some weeks 6 days some weeks 3) he does 90% of the cooking, all the dishwasher loading and most laundry management. I clean the house. Clean the bathroom and change bedding. Everything else we just do as we go as best we can. He does more hoovering, I do more mopping. If one of us is off, even a day, child free they do a big clean to help us get ahead.

But you already are the same OP: cycles repeat, and that’s how patriarch continues unabated. If you do not break this cycle now then your son will just end up treating his partner like this because that is what he is seeing in his key development years.

Do you want to raise a deadbeat man? If the answer is no, then get rid of your deadbeat partner.

Stop looking at the short term: can you say, hand on heart, you would be prepared to spend potentially another 60 years with this man? If the answer is no, then why not rip the plaster off now rather than wasting your time and spending the next X number of years feeling like this only to then break up anyway? Do yourself a favour.

I think at this point, given he hasn't listened and DC is still little enough to adapt and you dont have multiple kids, I'd first take a 5 day holiday alone (you could lie and say you're working away) so he sees how much you do.

Then follow up by initiating a split shortly afterwards on the grounds that you

1. enjoyed the time alone
2. Know he can cope with solo childcare
3. that your experience of parenting alone when he has been away is easier than doing it with him

So on paper a split makes life easier even though you love him but your conversations have never amounted to permanent change or action from him.

Then actually split for a bit. Either he will beg to come back and make a permanent change or he won't. Either way your life moves on faster.

But if you don't really scare him you're either going to end up in the same place in 5 years and telling yourself now the hardest years are over that you might as well stick with him now.

He has no respect for you.

at 37 do you really want to live with no love, no sex, no respect for the rest of your life until you die? Why?!

And how is she meant to do that when her partner refuses to try? Or did you mean to tell her to be a good girl, shut her mouth and realise she should put everyone else above herself whilst setting an awful example for her son, who will no doubt grow up to be a lazy entitled arse like his father?

You can afford the help and have weekends free to have fun with your son. Let him go your husband. Waste of space

You are right to be disappointed. It is so, so disappointing when someone you love looks at you and says 'I don't care what you need, I'm going to suit myself, so shut up.' You feel bad about ending the relationship but the fact of the matter is that he has already ended the relationship by refusing to be a partner to you. If he had any integrity he would walk away and allow you to be happy. Instead he is leeching off you. And you're letting him do it.

Letting someone walk all over you in this way corrodes your self esteem to the point where it is almost impossible to build it back up again. Don't do that to yourself. Grab hold of whatever respect you have left for yourself and make moves to get rid of this leech from your life.

In the meantime do nothing at all for him - no washing, no cooking, no cleaning. Do whatever it is you want to do. It will make you feel a lot better.

Definitely don’t have any more kids op - it will be so much harder with 2.

Ive got a lazy H and although I earned more it wasn’t a massive difference. My job was also ‘handily’ the more flexible one so I did much more with DS.

We’re still nominally together but I’ve got my own life with a wide circle of friends and I do absolutely nothing for him at all. It does mean that I do all the housework that the cleaner doesn’t but I’m fine with that.

It’s interesting that it’s H that’s now dissatisfied with how things are (he made sure he was unavailable when the hard shitty work was needed). I’ve got loads in my life and are enjoying myself and DS is now an adult and has his own life and job and girlfriend etc. While H sits at home on his own feeling sorry for himself.

You might want to properly leave but counselling is definitely a good step to help you work out what you want.