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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Not to want my DP to go on a work trip two hours away when our first child is due in 5weeks?

74 replies

DorindaG · 02/01/2010 17:52

My partner is due to go on a trip with work about two hours drive away, and our son is due Feb 6th.
He says he'll take the car and stay sober so he can get back if anything starts. The trip is at the end of January.

I'm really worried that I'm going to end up giving birth alone, or calling on my best friend, and he's going to end up missing the birth altogether.
He reckons he'll get back in time, but I can't help stressing that;
He'll drive like a maniac
He'll get stuck in traffic
The birth'll be really quick and he won't make it back in time

_ I think I'd find it very difficult to forgive him if he missed the birth of our first, and probably only child for the sake of visiting another site on a fact-finding thingy that could just as easily be done after our son has arrived.
He seems to think that I'll have plenty of notice when labour starts, and I won't be in proper labour for hours, but I've so many stories from people who've only realised they were in labour like an hour before the little one popped out!

OP posts:
WhatFuckingYearIsItAnyway · 02/01/2010 17:54

does he have any choice whether to go on the work trip ?

DollyMessiter · 02/01/2010 17:54

Let him go; it'll be fine.

LadyintheRadiator · 02/01/2010 17:55

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JaneiteIsTrite · 02/01/2010 17:55

When is the trip? If next week or in a couple of weeks I think you are being a bit u but do understand why.

My first labour was around 13 hours, so I think dp would have had time to get back! Having said that, I was v glad to have him with me from the start.

rainbowinthesky · 02/01/2010 17:56

Yabu. In the unlikelyhood that you do go into labour he will have plenty of time to get back.

RainRainGoAway · 02/01/2010 17:56

Is it really the sort of thing that could be put off for work?
I can see why you are nervous, but my DH worked an hour and a half commute away from home every day for both my DCs. Pretty much only a bit more than your DH is going away for. There is no way he could have had several weeks off before the birth 'just in case'.
Personally, I kind of 'knew' when labour was starting even the day before and made him stay home on the morning that it happened, just on a 'feeling'.

Personally, I would 'let' him go.

DuelingFanjo · 02/01/2010 17:57

if it can be easily done after or before the due date then I think he should consider your feelings and change his plans.

You're very likely to not give birth on your due date though.

Heqet · 02/01/2010 17:57

These stories - were they first births? It's really unlikely that you will have a quick birth with your first, it's also unlikely that you'll be early. Many more people have longer labours and are late with their first, from what I read. So 5 weeks - probably not going to miss anything. Although you never know.

He's very foolish to annoy a heavily pregnant woman though I remember those hormones and how they made me!

Does he actually have any control over when he goes or is it dictated by his employers? they might not allow him to go some other time if it is 5 whole weeks before your due date?

violethill · 02/01/2010 17:57

FGS I thought you were going to say your DH is flying halfway around the world!

Two hours is nothing!! Some people's daily commute would take that long anyway. You're really being a bit precious here - it's work, be supportive, don't guilt trip him about earning a living.

And tbh with a first baby, two hours in is NOTHING!

rainbowinthesky · 02/01/2010 17:58

"unlikelihood"

thisparachuteisaknapsack · 02/01/2010 17:59

The chances of you going into labour early on that paticular day and having a very quick labour with a first child are very slim. Most women labour for hours before they need to go to hospital and then there is still a long time to go. I was in labour in hospital for over 36 hours with dd, dh went to work it was so slow.

WhatFuckingYearIsItAnyway · 02/01/2010 18:00

yes, I think you are being precious

read some of the stories on here about fuckwit partners who refuse to stop drinking alcohol, fire off to spend time with a floozy, get high on God-knows-what, don't even have a work ethic at all

I say get over yourself

< runs away from heavily pregnant lady >

< realises she can't run after me anyway >

< stays put >

TulipsAndTinsel · 02/01/2010 18:03

dp was working in a city an hour and a half away during my last pregnancy. as it happened ds2 was born on a day he wasn't working but i could hardly have asked dp to stay home from work for weeks on end just in case could i?

it's your first so in all liklines it'll be a long slow labour and you'll all be bored witless waiting around for things to get going. even for a quick labour though 2 hours isn't that far away.

my shortest labour was ds2, i went into labour at 6am, rang my mother within the hour but she was stuck on icey roads for almost 2 hours, we then had an hours drive on the same icey roads to the hospital to contend with.... my rather hysterical thread from last feb while i was waiting for her to arrive is in the archives somewhere it took him 6 hours to arrive all told, even with all the holdups i was in hospital in plenty of time.

pagwatch · 02/01/2010 18:03

blimey
I was in Surrey and DH was in South Africa when I was five weeks pre due date with DS1.
DS1 was three days late as it turned out.
DH is always at least an hour away and we couldn't put everything on hold just in case.Even when we had DD I was at home with DS1 and DS2 who has ASD so it would have been challenging, especially as I deliver so fast. But you just have to get on with life and assume it will be around the due date.

This is actually mostly about your anxiety and nothing to do with the very slight chance that things could start early.

Talk to him rather than be hissy about it. YABa bit U to be honest

Fleecy · 02/01/2010 18:04

I had this both times - the first time he was going to be away for five days, two or three weeks before I was due. He asked his work to send someone else but they said they couldn't.

He was due to go away on the Monday and I went into labour on the Saturday at 37+1 - so they had to send someone else after all

Second time round he was going to be about 5 hours away, although it was just for the day. But it was the day I'd be 37+1 and I was convinced I'd have the baby that day again (pregnant and irrational!). I lined my sister up to be there if DH couldn't.

But I need not have worried - DS was four days late!

So both times DH has been away or going away, and both times it's been fine.

I have read that you're unlikely to go into labour unless your body feels safe so if you're worried about your OH being away, it's probably not going to happen then.

BitOfFun · 02/01/2010 18:04

YABU, I'm afraid, but I understand your worries.

Oops, that didn't help, did it? But it was highly unusual.

Original poster
DorindaG · 02/01/2010 18:06

It's not a question of me 'letting' him do anything! He's a big boy and will make his own mind up.
Maybe I am being a bit 'precious' but it's our first baby and I just hate the thought of ending up on my own dealing with labour. I just want the comfort of knowing he's going to be there I suppose.

Knowing my luck, he'll be down in Nottingham, I'll be in Yorkshire, my mate won't answer her phone, and I'll end up with the little one popping out at home and my calling the emergency services to ask how to cut the umbilical cord.
Slight paranoia mixed with imaginative dreams and pregnant hormones conjure up some crazy ideas I know!

OP posts:
Chynah · 02/01/2010 18:08

As I worked til 38 weeks and me and DH work an hour from home in different directions we were always 2 hours apart - have to say I never even gave it a thought.

foxinsocks · 02/01/2010 18:08

there are 2 blokes at work whose wives are pregnant and they have both announced that their wives refuse to let them travel from 28 weeks onwards, I kid you not.

One of them isn't even a first birth!

I can understand your concern but if it's your first and you phone him on the first twinge, you'd be very unlucky for him not to make it back

dh went to Washington when I was around 36 weeks pregnant (with 2nd child and history of fast labour). He got off the plane, came home and I promptly went into labour. He was so jetlagged but I refused to go to hospital until he had put up the cot (as he kept insisting we had so much time before he went on his trip!)

violethill · 02/01/2010 18:09

at first-timer thinking that two hours in you might be popping the baby out and cutting the cord!!

BitOfFun · 02/01/2010 18:09

Well, if you're as luck as I was you'll be informed at a check-up that you are actually in labour, and your DP will happen to be working in the same hospital- simples

dreamingofsun · 02/01/2010 18:10

you will be fine. as people say, you will be in labour for hours before he gets back. more seriously my husband was 2 hours away so kinda understand - but they didn't have mobiles for my first - so all the pubs were forewarned in case i went into labour during evening. you will have signs before and even if you don't it will take ages - mine was very quick - proper labour for 4 hours and in discomfort for 6 hours before that

Original poster
DorindaG · 02/01/2010 18:10

You're right though; can't just not go anywhere or do anything for the next five weeks on the off-chance.

I think I know this really, and if it wasn't for my emotions doing as many somersaults as the little guy inside me does when I try to lay down and sleep, well I probably wouldn't even have started this thread, and would be a bit more brave about it!

OP posts:
pooka · 02/01/2010 18:10

YABU.

2 hours isn't that far, and 5 weeks is a long time off. So even if you were to go into labour, he could get back, and it's more than likely that you won't.

With ds1 (second child) DH went to a wedding about 3 hours away as a best man on the due date. DD (first child) had been born on her due date, but.... well we just reckoned that if anything did happen, he'd drive like clappers to get back. IN the end, ds1 was a week late, and while the actual labour took about 3 hours, I'd had niggles during the lead up that, if they'd happened on the wedding day, would have stopped him going.

Morloth · 02/01/2010 18:11

DH's commute was about 2hrs when I was pregnant with DS.

It will be fine, very unlikely indeed that all the things you are worried about will coincide.

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