To feel so terrible about DH doing bedtime for the first time. Please reassure me!

[GetMeATomCollins]

My DH is currently doing bedtime for the first time with our 5 month old baby son. Our routine up to now has been DH does the bath, and then I take over and feed DS to sleep.

We gave him a bottle for the first time yesterday of expressed milk. He’s been exclusively breastfed from the breast until then. He didn’t get on well with the bottle yesterday but we tried again today and he did a little better.

I can hear our baby screaming as DH is valiantly battling on with the bottle of expressed milk and the bedtime routine. I feel bad for my DH and awful for our son.

Have we done this terribly? Is this going to scar our son for life? I just keep thinking he must be so confused about why I’m not there. I feel so terrible and like I’m going to pass out. I’m wearing headphones to try to hear the crying less.

The reason is that we have an event on Sunday that I need to attend, so DH will need to do bedtime. So this is our practice run.

Please reassure me. Will it get better? Is this going to give our gorgeous son attachment issues? Is this essentially cry it out?

I feel so awful.

Tbh I wouldn’t have done the trial run. I also wouldn’t be stressing about bedtime routine/doing everything the same when you are away on Saturday. Sounds like you are making things harder than they need to be for all 3 of you. If he needs to put him in the pram or car to get him down that’s fine. Personally I can’t be in the house and just listen to the baby scream upstairs when I know I can settle them quickly. Feel unnecessary but when I’m out the house it’s none of my business 😂
My 4 year old was at least a year when my DH could do bedtime normally. My 6 month old hasn’t been put to bed by my DH but my older child is going in for major surgery next month and I will be staying with him in the hospital. My DH will manage fine even if it’s a shit show. She won’t remember, my 4yo will.

Thank you so much, everyone 🙏 and thank you @BertieBotts for the extra reassurance and the recommended reading - I will look into this further. DS went to sleep eventually and DH emerged looking a little shaken and sad, but we’ve chatted about lots of these ideas for when he tries again in a couple of days. I think we’re also going to aim for him doing one bedtime per week from now on, so he and DS get more used to it. I appreciate everyone’s kind words very much!

Agree with the above sentiment. Both baby (and Dad) will be fine. I have a 6m old and have a regular weekly commitment which I returned to when she was 3m. Sometimes I'd get back and he'd be sat, ashen faced, she'll shocked and exhausted with her asleep on his lap. Sometimes it's gone better.

I was very protective of my DC1 and wouldn't allow anyone else to do bedtime and it definitely created more problems than it solved. I decided that if DH can manage to keep a job, drive a car and various other things which take a degree of intelligence, patience and determination, he can put an infant to bed. And the more he does it's the more confident he'll get, they find their own rhythm.

I think it’s worse for your son to be entirely dependent on you only. It will be so good for him to be comfortable with either parent. There’s only one way to do it, leave them to figure it out. Take yourself for a walk , they will be fine.

You’re playing the long game remember. We both did bedtime from a very early age and it paid dividends massively. Can’t The he do it more than once a week? That’s a lifetime for a baby.
Anyway well done. The absolute salvation when ours were small was that we knew at bedtime either of us could put them to bed at night and they’d sleep. It made everything else so much more bearable.

Were your babies breastfed? It’s more that it’s a feeding issue - I would need to express a lot of milk if DH were putting him to bed every other night. I really dislike expressing and find it painful and stressful. Once a week I can cope with. I agree it’s a long time for a baby, but better than not at all.