Partner accused me of hurting our baby in front of his family? Am I overreacting

[Aristocack]

This has literally just happened and I've excused myself to the bedroom in complete shock.

I have birth 2 weeks ago to our son. My partner overall has been a really hands-on good dad and always steps in to help when I'm struggling the baby. This is good but I also find at times that he criticises me. This is both of our first child.

This week we have 3 of his family members visiting from abroad. They are staying with us for 10 nights, they arrived late last night (and I had a lovely meal spread put out for them) . I spent this morning upstairs with baby as he's been cluster-feeding and I'm breastfeeding and don't want to whip my boobs out in front of them.

At 4pm after me and baby had had a good sleep, I got ready (left baby in his bassinet in the bedroom) and then got the baby ready and was about to bring him downstairs when he had a blowout and covered himself, me and his bedroom bassinet in poo and sick. I got overwhelmed and called my partner and asked him to come upstairs and help as by this point our baby was hungry and crying. Partner took the baby downstairs to give him a bottle of expressed breast milk and I clean up the mess upstairs and showered and got changed again.

I come down and say hi the family and I was about to go and get myself a drink (they were having a BBQ in garden) and partner is feeding the baby with them stood around cooing. My partner calls my name and beckons me over so I go into the garden. He says "What are these huge red marks on the baby's face? These weren't there when I left the baby with you." His family members all stayed silent. I was in shock that he'd just asked that so I stuttered a bit and said "It is his nails, we need to cut them." It is his nails, they are very long. I tried to cut them last week but I was too terrified to cut his finger and had a close call so I stopped and haven't attempted since. I've been reminding my partner that we need to do them and that I'd like him to help as he has a steadier hand but we haven't got around to it yet. My partner then reiterated "These weren't there before I left the baby with you this morning." Everyone stayed quiet so I just sort of slinkered off to wash my pump as I have to pump every time the baby has a bottle.

As I was stood at the sink he shouts from the garden "Don't you think the baby was too hot upstairs? His face is covered in sweat." and I spoke back and said "He is fine, he is wet from the crying." and my partner said under his breath "Yeah of course". Keep in mind this is in front of all of his family members.

By this point I felt completely and utterly ashamed and humiliated so I went upstairs to pump. He's just come up again and I thought it was to apologise but then he said "Did you put the baby's teddy bear coat on when you went on our yesterday? I saw it out on the dining table. Isn't it too big for him?" and I just told him "No it's fine." and he left.

I can't stop crying, I'm really trying my best with this baby and he's just making me feel like a shit mother in front of everyone. The family are here for another 9 nights. I had been really looking forward to them coming over and showing them my baby and now I just want to run away.

Very good point.

My hands on DH slept in a different room (so that he could get a full night's sleep for work), I did all feedings (breastfeeding), so in the first couple of months I was up a lot in the night - this is normal.

My DH was hands on by always bringing me drinks and food, and with our second child by looking after our toddler so that I could concentrate on baby.

He never once overstepped. He never once tried to dictate or control breastfeeding. His hands-on role was literally feeding me and keeping me hydrated and doing the housework. Helping me get up the stairs when I was still swollen and sore after birth etc. Helping me get dressed when I was struggling etc.

That's the kind of hands on dad that women would kill to have.

This is all very worrying OP. He sounds selfish and controlling. Can you go and stay with family for a while?

God what a shit he. He sounds controlling and awful. Why the fuck are his family staying right after you have given birth? Tell them to go to a hotel.

This is one of the most sinister things I've read on here @Aristocack

In the space of 2 weeks this man has forced you into a feeding schedule that only benefits him, allowed non essential family (a cousin and her boyfriend - are you fucking kidding me?) to stay with you for 10 days, heavily insinuated you have hurt your baby, curtailed you taking your baby out alone and reduced your ML by 3 months.

He is an utter cunt and I'd be very concerned as to how this will escalate.

He sounds dangerous, devious and unscrupulous.

Go to your mum's @Aristocack as soon as you can.

Exactly this. It's so bizarre. So he hadn't seen his baby all day since the morning? He feels it's okay to have these conversations in front of guests? Highly suspicious behaviour. I'd leave the house and invite him over after a day or two to explain himself with witnesses present. And if his explanation didn't make sense, I would just leave.

This is incredibly controlling behaviour on his part. Do you have any family you could go and stay with?

This

wow reading that he has pressured you into pumping because HE is tired is infuriating. i expect it’s more that he’s trying to ruin your breastfeeding relationship because he’s jealous. pathetic little man should sleep on the sofa.

btw introducing the bottle this early is likely to mess up the babys latch. i bet you end up ff if you don’t change the system.

Stop being a garden path for him walk up and down on. Hormones are raging, you need newborn close. Just go with the flow and tell him in under certain terms baby’s don’t stick to his wants and schedules. If he speaks to you in an accusatory manner again. You will consider that he doesn’t trust you and that is a massive problemz
congratulations and yuor do is being very in kind to say the least.

Find your inner mama bear OP. Your partner is not in charge of you. And go down there and get a plate of food ffs.

Put a stop to this, now. The baby will pick up on it. Tell him he either respects you, or leave. You are far too emotionally fragile for this, and he is ruining your bonding with your precious child, also your self esteem

Very worried for you OP. This man has shown you who he is now. At best he's selfish and uncaring, worst he is controlling and abusive.
He shouldn't be dictating how you feed the baby because of his sleep patterns, surely this is part of having a baby, broken sleep.
He also shouldn't have his family and randoms over to stay, cousins boyfriend wtf.
He is undermining you in front of them to knock you off balance, make you look bad. Eventually he will do this so often you will doubt yourself and you'll be stuck in a fully coercive controlling relationship.
He's presenting himself to everyone as a great guy and father and you as unstable, incapable. It's completely chilling.
You do sound meek and I don't know what your relationship was like before but if you don't feel its in you to stand up to him you need to get out. Please tell health visitor, trusted friends and family. This is a very unhealthy dynamic already.

Well done. You sound a lovely, caring and capable mum. You seem to have p l envy of milk which is encouraging.
You could breastfeed only. With ample milk it would be easier. Tell him calmly. There will be years ahead for him to stay with your son. Ask a midwife and tell him a midwife told you to exclusively bf.
My adult son still sleeps in the spare bedroom as their 4 month old baby still wakes during the night for a bf. It's just a season a nd very special. It is normal for dads to go back to work two or four weeks after the birth and common , tell him, for mums to exclusively breastfeed. It's a bonus that you have a good supply of milk.
You may have to tell him you will stay at your mum's for a while with DS if he can't sleep while you feed during the night. All the best. Please keep in touch on MN. WeAtrust it will work out and you'll get your ealks soon.

Hey OP - I posted something not dissimilar when I was 2 weeks ish PP. My partner is also from a Western European country (yours isn’t French is he?!) and wanted to introduce a bottle for his ‘convenience’. His family also came round (albeit 2 months postpartum and stayed in a hotel).

Tell your partner to sleep somewhere else. Do not express. It feels scary right now, and you’re probably reading all the comments and it’s affirming what you already know. Whatever you decide, tell your DH about how you feel. Say you’ve made your decision regarding pumping/maternity leave and it’s YOUR choice. Do NOT try and make his life easier - he should be supporting you.

Regarding the comments, they are bizarre. I agree with previous posters in asking (maybe trying to frame it naively) what he meant by that.

sending love!

This. Fuck whether he thinks it's better than way, it's not working for you.

He's a selfish prick.

Did you H try and make it look like you were hurting your baby and not looking after them ok in front of family? Did he stick his middle finger up at you when you said you wanted to prioritise his new car over you taking full maternity leave? Did he force you to express to save his sleep?

Did you stay with your horrible man?

No, he didn’t. And I think that’s all horrible, selfish and I have no idea why he would do any of those things if not to show he has some sort of power over her. Some men do seem to go insane after birth.

I went down to get the baby and they were already giving him a bottle. I took him off his aunt so I could give him the bottle then I felt a gush of PP bleeding so I quickly handed him back to her so I could run upstairs and change before I leaked blood everywhere. It took me a while to find appropriate underwear and there were people everywhere and I was trying to make sure nobody saw me leak. Baby's auntie then shouted for DP once baby had finished the feed as baby needed burping and partner (who was busy watching something on phone with the cousin's boyfriend) asked me to go down. DP's sister has also just mentioned to me that they've ran out of fridge bottles (meanwhile I'm trying to burp and settle baby)

Every update he gets worse, he wants you back at work so he can upgrade his car?
Listen, things aren't fair, if they were fair he'd have given birth too. You might not know exactly how to say what is wrong, but I expect you know how you wanted it to feel. It should feel like you're working as a team to do something really difficult and you're both leaning in 100%. Believe me, he really thinks he is being the modern, hands on Dad but the entire thing is performative. He is in a competition with you, not a partnership. I'm not sure you'll be able to get it through his thick skull.
It isn't a case of being fair because here there's a hierarchy of needs, the baby comes first. Your supply needs to be established by what will feel like pretty much hourly contact between you and the baby. Then you and your rest and recovery comes second, which involves as much sleep as you can physically manage, I would recommend co-sleeping if you can. Your partner should be doing everything else, washing, cooking cleaning, sending visitors away. People don't like to say this, but in the early days, the first year, really, Mum is everything. You must be so disappointed.

We are as I spoke to him and gave him the riot act. He accepted it after I explained it all. It hasn’t been an issue since. However my issue was about my Dh wanting me to express/bottle so he could feed the baby to bond/go places with them, not to do with insinuating I’ve hurt our baby.

No bottles, no more pumping. Doesn't suit you or baby, keep the whole house awake if you need to. They are in your space and can leave if necessary.

This is kind reading a horror story.

Your relationship should be over. This man is toxic.

Forget the shift thing. It's putting you at risk and not good for baby.

Really, you need to leave him while you're still bf.

If you want to maintain breastfeeding, you're probably going to have to reduce bottle feeding. It's too early to establish bottle-feeding IMO. Your baby is already confused and your supply is getting messed up. Also, your husband wanting to get a 6-hr stretch of sleep is not a good reason to make you pump in the middle of the night. Insinuating that you had hurt your baby was beyond unacceptable. I am not sure where you go from here.

No bottles are no issue if you’re exclusively BF.

Take the bottle option away. This may help you in months to come.