to still be annoyed with DP when he gets home from work?

[KelaH]

Sorry, long one here, will try to be as clear as possible. And I do genuinely want to know what is reasonable, not just ranting

DD is 5 months old, and not sleeping that well at night, so I am shattered. DH used to be really good about getting up in the mornings and giving me a lie in, or taking her out for a walk to give me a break, but seems to have given that up, and now hardly does childcare unless I ask, and never gets up with her in the morning. He agreed to give her a bath every night (which he enjoys), but every bloody night I have to ask/tell/remind him to do it, and a few times he says he doesn't feel like it, so I do it. When he has a day off he goes off and does things around the house/stuff for work without telling me what he is up to, and I end up looking after DD all day whether he is working or not. Yesterday he disappeared during the afternoon and when I went to see what he was up to I found him asleep - I don't get to take 2 hour naps

Now I know I should have spoken to him about this before now, but haven't found the right time for whatever reason. This morning however it really got to me and I got quite annoyed with him.

He wasn't starting work till 11am today, so I asked him last night if he would get up with DD if she had a bad night, so I could catch up on sleep, and he agreed. She didn't have a really bad night, but for various reasons I only really slept between 12 and 5am, so was pretty knackered. I got her back down at 8am, and went back to bed myself, hoping she would sleep for a while, but only 20 mins Brought her back to bed, tried feeding her back to sleep (am bf) but no joy. He woke up, saw she was awake and not going back down, and I was yawning my head off, but went back to sleep. I then woke him up and asked him to get up, he said he was going to get ready for work soon (it was 2 hrs before he had to leave, and I was going to drop him off so had to be ready for the same time!!!). I asked again, he sighed, got up, made it clear (in a passive-agressive way) that he wasn't happy about it, so I got annoyed and went downstairs anyway (we were both a bit passive-agressive). He did come down anyway, and told me he would watch her, but I was up by then, and we didn't really speak much for the rest of the morning.

I am kind of over it now, but do want to have it all out with him (in a grownup, reasonable way ;)), and if I act like nothing happened then it will all get ignored, or he will have been feeling guilty all day, apologise straight away and I will tell him its ok and won't have the heart to tell him how annoyed I was/am.

So would I be unreasonable to be annoyed when he gets home? Was I being unreasonable in the first place? Any advice as to how to proceed?

I wouldn't bother being annoyed.
I would sit him down, tell him exactly how you feel and what you want to change.
He needs to pull his weight and he needs to be told.
You need to be quite clear that on his days off you want to do family stuff.

its give and take you need to both realise each others job is tiring and stressful so alternate let him have lie in he does bath at night

you get lie in he gets evening to watch tv or cook dinner you do bath

resentment is one thing thats eems to come hand in hand with having a child you will both feel hard done by

you need to communicate and not expect someone to know how you feel or your needs tiredness doesnt help as you can act more irrational

when he is at home try and have some you time around dd and have fun dont stress over non important things communicate and praise each other

me and my dp were terrible when ds was born but we now with alot of talking are at a common ground

the asking in my mind is quite normal men tend to act on instruction and this is fine if he says he doesnt feel like it dont be angry as his probably tired from work just say nicely just give quixck bath i'll get us a drink and we can snuggle when done
or something like that anyway worked treaet with my dp

we do have to remember there days are stressful and tiring to and they also need to unwind so making them feel appreciated and loved brings the reward of them treating us the same back

men work slightly differently from us females but now dp is more loving and as we communicate more we are genuinly much closer

Thanks for replies, I am going to try and talk to him tonight, but feel awkward about bringing it up. I guess what annoys me most is that I feel like the 'default' parent - ie I look after her unless he chooses to. I don't get a choice about it so why does he?

And in terms of bedtime routines, we don't have much of one at the moment, but am going to try to stop feeding her to sleep and sort it out once she is settled in her own room (moved there on Fri), so his part in routine will be much more important

im afraid the mother is the default parent and when bf even more so

my dp works away and had to from when ds was only few weeks old his not away all the time but i was very resentful

but not now i am understanding that he doesnt enjoy not being around but he was feeling so down as was very tired and my tone when talking to him was like he wasnt doing ANYTHING when he had been working all day

i think get him to do bath make yourselves something to eat and drink give him big kiss say thank you and tell him how your feeling but dont do the im doing everything as your at home all day your role will be more just i would appreciate some more help then i can rest and be a nicer person for it and we can have quality time when dd is down

and as a woman i know i tend to do it all and then stress when im at breaking point when he could have done things way before but me being me i'll do it then i do everything

dont do it ask nicely and relax

the first yr was very much like this for us and now he ahas more of an understanding and helps more but i find i still have to ask but thats ok as it gets done and not by me but i ask nicely i dont throw things in his face

as when we sat down i found he had alot on his plate to that he didnt want to tell me about as already stressed men find it hard to adjust to find more things that you can do together

i used to sit in bathroom and say oh he loves you bathing him your so good love you see you soon

men have no confidence and in all honesty dp didnt show to much interest until ds was able to do things he just didnt understand baby but is fab with him now chasing about being a real dad

But why should the mother be the default? Ok, bf means he doesn't feed her, but why, for instance, when we heard her crying over the monitor last night, did it not even seem to occur to him that he might go to see to her, rather than assume I would?

I don't throw things in his face, in fact we never argue (and I mean never - a few things like this morning but never a real argument in 4 years), and I don't expect him to do much, just maybe alternate lie ins on days when he doesn't have to get up early for work, offer to take her for a nappy change etc.

He is not pulling his weight but you are wasting your energy by seething inside. You need to talk to him, building up resentment is not a good idea.

im not sure why men do that but just say can you go and i'll go next time dont automatically persume he'll get up men dont and i dont know why maybe he thinks you'll feed when you go in

i think men need training so they know there place and whats expected i didnt mean you do throw things in his face i used to when it came to talk time i woudl find lots of things and throw them at him

not saying you would but im remembering them days and so glad there gone

all you can do is tell him what you expect of him and leave it at that it gets easier i just hope you can catch up with some sleep and feel better soon gets easier when they sleep through its so nice but i still woke throught he night out of habit lol

I don't agree that the mother is the default parent; it doesn't have to be that way.

Yes if he's at work and you're at home with her clearly the childcare 'defaults' to you. When you are both together, apart from BF, you parent JOINTLY. This was the aim DH and I had and mostly we muddled along fine. My DH has even said that often men are lazy creatures and if the woman will be put upon, they will continue to let her take the load! I did have one or two conversations where I had to remind him to pull his weight but he always came up to scratch. We would take turns getting up at night etc and he would ALWAYS give me a lie in and he let me 'escape' on a saturday morning, and he took ds swimming at weekends too.

OK I did sometimes have to be the engine that 'drove' the arrangements to make sure they happened but he did do it.

Don't let your DH do this; many men do it, they find this stage of childcare a chore perhaps and very tiring, which it is; but if they just keep on doing the work, it pays absolute dividends in terms of their long term relationship with their child.

Please don't feel awkward about bringing it up - he's behaving badly at the moment and you will be doing your dd a big favour if you speak up - she needs an involved dad.

And if he keeps on, it does get easier as they get older, more fun for him as well.

Good luck!

i understand about the lie ins he has got up twice in 3 years and let me lie in he has every intention to wake up but is such a heavy sleeper i have to get up to see to ds then impossible for me to fall asleep

i guess in my relationship im default i know no other way as dp works very long hours or away so mainly me and ds alone and when dp is off he wants his time which is understandable as woked non stop

but now when he is home he gets his time in morning and i get to go out and leave him with ds

I think I am making him out to be worse than he is. He is excellent at doing other stuff around the house - does the washing up, a lot of laundry, tidies up. He loves playing with DD, and taking her swimming, and has taken her for several full days recently so I can go to tennis matches. All, I want is a lie in once a week and for him not to wait till I am at the end of my tether (ie sobbing) before he offers to take her for a while.

So, AIBU?

I think you should first put yourself in his shoes and see it as much as poss from his point of view. Then you'll be prepared to be reasonable and convincing.

It's easy to get into a pattern where you get sour because you're exhausted by spending all day and night with a baby, and he is sick of you nagging because as far as he's concerned he's the one doing all the work to support the family while lucky you get to hang out with your friends and spend lots of time with the baby. Both of you would be right, of course, but it's only half the story.

Anyway, after all that waffle, my point it that I'd just set out how tired you are and the way you would like him to contribute to domestic life, in a non-accusatory way.

It's definitely true that it's easier to be patient with babies and small children when you are in the habit of it, which he's probably not.

Yeah, but he wasn't working at the time though, was he? It was his day off, and default mums don't get days off, they work 24/7. It really hacks me off when you hear about men "helping out" around the house and with childcare. Like they're doing women a favour. Humph! Bah! Rant!

Thank you clam, that is exactly my feeling. Anyway, he seems to have felt a bit bad about it, and took her off for a bath without prompting as soon as he got in, and put her to bed too as I was struggling to get her to sleep. Didn't manage to talk about stuff though as I fell asleep waiting for him to come to bed, as he had fallen asleep on the sofa while checking his emails!!

Hi KelaH - I was having the same issues with my DH throughout my maternity leave and beyond! I would have to really spell it out to him how bloody hard it was and how I didn't get a break at all. DD is now 9 months and he actually said recently that he now sees that had he just done 20 minutes of tidying up when he got in rather than complaining about tiredness to his running-on-empty, hormonal wife, it would have made things alot easier on us both.