I need sleep and my husband doesn't understand - am I being unrealistic?

[momtobe1]

I'll start by saying my husband does loads around the house to, but the issue lies with sleep. We have a 5 month old daughter, she and I sleep in the same room every night and my husband in the guest room so he can be well rested for work. I ask that my husband take her in the morning when she wakes at 530/6 so that I can get a couple hours of sleep before he goes to work. He used to get up at this time to go to the gym (he needs exercise to feel sane, which I get) however now he says he needs to go to the gym a few mornings a week. I've asked him to go after work (which he says is unrealistic bc he then won't be home until around 8pm) and I make sure he has time to go on the weekends. My questions:

1. Does anyone have a routine that works for you and your husband, balancing sleep and time for gym etc?
2. Do most men sleep in another room? He has never done a night with her in 5 months.
3. Am I asking too much? If I'm up with the baby all night and then wake up at 530/6 again I'm up for the day. I can't nap as she takes cat naps.
4. He tells me he can 'help' front 7-9.... why do men think it's 'helping' when it's their baby too! The 7-8 hrs of uninterrupted sleep he has gotten every night for the past 5 months isn't me 'helping' it's me taking care of my daughter!

Tell him he can go to the gym (instead of giving you a couple of hours) as many times a week as he takes her in the night. So, he does the whole night on Friday and Saturday while you have uninterrupted sleep, then goes to the gym 2 mornings.

My ex used to do it with my second child every morningfro 5/6 am for many months even though I was SAHM. I was ebf and would not have been able to cope otherwise.
We co slept too.
Your dh is very self-centered. He chooses not to help.

And no, you're not asking too much. He's being unbelievably selfish.

We have twins. My husband is up with me for every night feed. With my first baby he never had a night out of our room and would take him for a few hours at the beginning of the night and another few in the morning as I was breastfeeding so he couldn't help overnight.

He’s mugging you off and using the gym as an excuse. He can go on a Saturday and Sunday day time or in the evening. If he needs 7-8 hours sleep and the baby gets up at 5-6am then he goes to bed at 10pm or earlier if necessary. Why are you putting up with this behaviour? Set the boundary now or it will only get worse!

He shouldn't just be 'helping'. He should be doing his share of caring for his child. It took me years to realise this, now my husband does (almost) his fair share.

Oh and if you are not bf (I don’t know if you are) then you should be doing alternate feeds in the night!

If your dp is good round the house and is happy to take over between 7 and 9 you can make this work. (I'd turn a blind eye to using the word 'help', just change it to take over whenever you are talking about the arrangement).
Why are you not sleeping well? How often does your baby wake? When do you go to bed?

You’re not asking too much at all. Some mornings when I’ve had a rough night DP will take DD when he gets up in the morning, he’ll change her nappy and let her play whilst he gets his breakfast then he’ll bring her back to bed then leave for work. Usually she’s tired out enough then to sleep for a few hours and I get a good lie in.

He gets up with her on weekends too.

I agree with PP, tell him he can go to the gym as much as he takes her in the night.

When do you get your break to feel sane? Parenting is a joint responsibility he doesn’t get to opt out.

I'm assuming you are not working at the moment.

We have both had to scale back exercise, socialising etc. We mostly reserve exercise for the weekend and then it is either running for 30 minutes or doing dvds in the living room. The gym is out of the question until our kids are older.

Are you still up all night at 5/6 months? Sounds rough!

His "need" for the gym doesn't trump your need to sleep. My husband never slept in his own room, and when I went back to work we both had to muck in overnight and fit in sleep and exercise around it. Your DH needs a reality check.

I do all weekday nights as dh has a hellish commute and needs sleep. He does weekends.

Your dh is taking the piss. He can’t have loadsa sleep AND unlimited gym time!

My DS is older now. But for what it's worth -

1. 'having a routine that works' sounds as if it's a static routine. But DS's sleeping pattern was completely different at 5 months than it was at 4 months or 6 months as his need to feed during the night changed and he developed and became more physically active during the day etc. So we had a bedtime routine to settle him which either one of us could do, and a morning waking up routine that either of us could do. I did most nights while I was on mat leave and breastfeeding but DH did plenty of night time getting up too especially on the weekend. At one point we had a routine where I went to bed early and DH would half-wake DS at 11pm to give him some expressed milk before DH came to bed. Then I'd do the feed in the wee small hours and then again first thing in the morning. But for the early morning feed DH would usually get up and give me DS so that I didn't need to fully wake up, and then DH would make me a cup of tea while I was feeding him.
2. DS slept in our room with both of us until he was 6 months, then we moved him into his own room.
3. It's not asking too much for you to get a night's sleep on the weekend.
4. That's not fair on men. They're not all twats. DH never thought he was 'helping'. In fact he'd correct me if I asked him to 'babysit' while I went out etc.

It sounds to me like you need to have a very clear talk with him He probably has no idea that he is being selfish.

Our mat leave rules were I'd try to do all week nights but if it was bad then dh would step in without complaint. For me bad could mean I'd been up for over 2 hours in one go and had already done a couple of other wake ups, or it'd got to say 4am and i'd not really slept more than a couple of hours or I was just at the end of my tether.

Friday and Saturday either we'd share 50/50 or dh would do it on his own depending how broken I was. Dh also regularly expresses gratitude for me doing all the week nights even though that's what we'd agreed.

Dh also loves the gym but wouldn't go if I needed him. In the early days he would look all crestfallen when he couldn't go but I quickly told him that made me feel like a shit for asking him so he stopped and puts a brave face on now

God forbid his life should change in any way when he has a baby eh!

ferrier
Are you a man?
Or a woman who has no children?
Going out to work is much easier than looking after a baby 24/7.
Especially if the baby's other parent doesnt help.

He can pop her in the pushchair and go for a run!

He should at least be doing Saturday nights, that was always our agreement, Saturday nights or any feed where I woke up in floods of tears as I couldn't face getting up again.

When I was on mat leave I did all the weekday nights and early mornings, we did try him getting up if DS got up any time after 6 but realistically I just got up for the mornings.

Weekend days we took it in turns and had a full night and lie in each.

Now I’m back at work we just take it in turns each night if he wakes up and just both pitch in in the mornings.

I'm another one who can't stand this 'husband helping out' bullshit.

Until recently mine used to refer to it as help all the time, until I just completely lost it and informed him that he wasn't helping me out - it was his parental duty! Help is what you get from a friend, grandparent, babysitter etc.

He needs to change his mindset but to be honest so do you. Make it very clear that when he's home, the baby is every much his responsibility as yours. Him going to the gym in the mornings is just an excuse to get out of looking after the baby and so he is being extremely selfish.

At the weekends he should at least be getting up in the night, no question!

Tell him he either wakes up and decides to parent instead of refusing to even 'help' now, or you will end up in tatters and it's more likely he'll eventually be looking at entire weekends and weekdays alone with her, after you've split.

You need sleep. You cannot function without it. This can't go on, and it most definitely overrides the gym.

He should be taking over on the weekends to the extent where you recharge.

Your health is really going to suffer unless he starts doing his share.

What worked for us was week nights i would see to the dc- dh had a motorway commute and, as sole earner, him being on his game at work was essential. I was on mat leave so didn't have to be work fit. He did early mornings though and we shared weekends. He too slept in the spare room midweek but not all the time, mainly when we were going through a bad spell.

Is the gym near home and does it have a creche that is open early.? If so that might be an option to take the baby and leave her in the creche for an hour or so. He would need to bring her back before going to work of course.

Otherwise as others have said he can get her up, change her,, feed her etc pop her in the pushchair and got for a run instead.

OP I was up and down with DC3 until he was 2 1/2 years old. I am sure I died a couple of times and came back to life. It is brutal.

I think because this wasn't our first child, it was so much easier for DH and I to sit down and just 'own' that we were deep in the trenches. Our sex life took an enormous hit and I just co-slept in another room with our son. It was tough and very drawn out (which is not necessarily the case for you. I co-slept with my other kids but by 8-12 months old, they were sorted, sleep-wise, especially DC2).

I think if you and DH can sit down and make a pact that you're both in the trenches, that in itself will help ease pressure off the pair of you. It's a real 'get through it' phase. Go to bed earlier. So boring. But do it. It won't be forever. Know that the 5am wake up calls are a phase. Take the 7-9 offer and go to sleep for those two hours while DH takes over. You can fight over this or go with it. He does work all day, he does help out around the house, and it's only fair to take into account that night wakings will interfere with his performance at work. You do have the option of napping with your little one during the day, I assume (unless you have other kids and this is really impossible to do if that's the case).

Choose your battles. Believe me, I feel for you. I could have brained DH at times for his lack of support. He was rubbish at times. I felt so resentful. But once we sat down and said, "This sucks. We love our DC but f*ck this is so hard. I need to co-sleep and just catch any bit of sleep I can, when I can," it was like a weight lifted. We both agreed that we were too knackered to even deal with each other, so we gave each other space and support. I did the lion's share with the kids and took the 'lack of sleep' blow. But on weekends, he would take over and I would sleep in. Sometimes, he would just say, 'Go to bed. Lie down. Get some space. You're getting grizzly.' And I would do it.

I felt unhinged! Lack of sleep is just awful.