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Original poster

Do you take "collective responsibility" for actions concerning your children?

243 replies

UnquietDad · 28/04/2008 14:49

OK, this is going to be a bit vague, for which I'm sorry, but...

Do you, where there are two parents, buy into a collective responsibility idea?

i.e. if something is done by Parent A which Parent B doesn't approve of and Parent B would have done in a TOTALLY different way - do you back each other to the hilt in public and only have it out in private?

Or do you say to friends, family, teachers etc. "actually that was B's decision, I didn't want to do that but (s)he wouldn't listen?" Or is that unasseptable (sic) and totally disloyal?

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Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:41

milou2 - yes, I know - but mine should have been the default position. (They go to school unless agreement can be reached otherwise, not vice-versa.)

yurt1 - I'm, struggling here. If your DH/DP was unfaithful (let's say), would you forgive him if he failed to say sorry and could not give an unqualified assurance that it wouldn't happen again?!

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yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:42

If you report the union rep you're just going to embarrass your wife and maker her even angrier.

Do yourself and your family a favour and let it go.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:43

I'm not really going to report the union rep. I do think he was unprofessional though.

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yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:43

I think being unfaithful is slightly different.

When we married we vowed to be faithful. We didn't vow to share political views.

You have lost all sense of proportion. She disagrees with you on a political issue. She's allowed to.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:46

yurt - allowed to disagree, but allowed to act on it in that way? (Involving the children?) Aren't they different things?... I've repeatedly said I agreed with the strike itself - even defended it here on other threads.

If I were a member of the BNP I could argue that was "disagreeing on a political issue", but a lot of people might see it differently, and quite rightly.

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UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:49

I think it's not so much what was done as the way it was done. Sh said "this is what I'm doing" and I was expected not to put up a fight.

I was railroaded.

I was bullied.

There was no consultation.

All these things, whatever the political debatability of the sanctioned truancy itself, are undeniable, and inexcusable.

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yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:50

In our house ultimate 'children' decisions come down to whose looking after them. I would never agree to keeping them home on a strike day if the school was open I think it's a crazy idea, but if dh was carrying on about it, final word would be 'fine- but you take the day off work to do it- I'm having nothing to do with it'.

We disagree about things to do with the children every now and then. Sometimes we disagree after the action has been taken.

We agree to disagree.

Now. What are you going to do. Buy that bottle of wine and move on, or go on and on and on at her about this and every other issue that you don't agree on until she's so fed up that she chucks you out.

First and foremost it's a marriage issue. You don't have to agree, you simply have to live with each other.

If there's an issue to do with the children where compromise is not possible- person who is doing most of the chid caring/child sorting gets the final say.

Simple recipe to a happy family life.

yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:51

Don't overuse the word 'bullied'.

She's your wife. Going against your wishes once is not bullying you- it's having her own independent mind.

edam · 30/04/2008 23:52

Oh UQD, I can see that you are very wound up about this but please don't start painting yourself as a victim. This is not bullying, this is a big row. Your wife hasn't tied you to a flagpole and hung a sign round your neck saying 'UQD wears girl's pants' or something.

Weren't you and Mrs UQD having a very tough time without all this anyway? So this is just the latest row in a very long list of rows?

Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:53

Yes I see that. But of course that "final word" couldn't be applied/didn't arise because she, as a teacher, was on strike! And I was 200 miles away!

I do the majority of the school-run. I somehow don't see her agreeing that this entitles me to make the decisions over attendance. That day was one of "her days" as well so she used that.

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UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:55

Not so edam. I thought things were fine before all this came out...

If saying to someone "I'm doing THIS, end of" is not bullying, what is it? I thought we consulted and agreed about things. This seems different. Something hard, militant and nasty in her came out.

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yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:55

Oh I didn't know that edam.

if that's the case I really suggest Relate to find better ways of dealing with disagreements. Insisting that every arguments is resolved into a he/she was right/wrong is not going to make for a happy marriage.

You can disagree frequently and still have a happy marriage. You just need to find a way to disagree.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:58

It's not about never disagreeing. We agree to disagree all the time. It's about respecting the other person's point of view, and how that disagreement is handled without steamrollering.

(no, no, its not a Relate issue, FGS. Not paying some patronising counsellor to tell us what we already know.)

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yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:58

No of course "I'm doing this end of" is not bullying.

it's just refusing to go round in circles in an argument anymore.

She's not going to say she was wrong. Presumably that's not grounds for divorce. So I suggest that you say to her "ok can we forget this and I'll cook dinner tonight and lets have a bottle of wine and talk about something else'

yurt1 · 30/04/2008 23:59

ONe off argument not issue for Relate- but perhaps a series of them are (I'd only read Edams post when I suggested Relate).

But FGS let it go.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 30/04/2008 23:59

yurt - I realise you are trying to be the voice of reason here - but the thing is, "I'm doing this, end of" wasn't the end point, it was the start. There was no "consultation".

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yurt1 · 01/05/2008 00:01

So it's something she can't compromise on. We all have those issues.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 01/05/2008 00:03

Trying to think what mine are now...

(apostrophes don't count)

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yurt1 · 01/05/2008 00:04

Well mine would be vaccinations. Over my dead body was ds2 oor ds3 getting any vaccinations as babies. Would be prepared to compromise on ds2 now, but not ds3.

Luckily dh agreed, but there was no compromise possible on that one.

PaninoPan · 01/05/2008 00:18

read and pondered this thread.

Briefly, I DO thing you were being 'disloyal' to make plain your disagreement to the Head. I'm not sure what purpose there was to that, other than a desire to preciously maintain your 'position' and make it seem as a valuable one to a third party, for their approval of sorts. Motivation to d othat remains personal and unclear.

I'm also pretty sceptical on the "bullying" point. There is no right/wrong here, and it IS very tricky, but bullying is the wrong description, for the afore-mentioned reasons.

IT's as likely to reflect what you see as an imbalance in the power-dynamic in your rel. as you see it, perhaps, and to involve a third party is your way of inviting a judgement on your DW's choice, from a source that you know will be sympathetic to your position.

yurt1 · 01/05/2008 00:22

Hmm good insight from Pan there I think.

Original poster
UnquietDad · 01/05/2008 00:38

I don't think it was necessarily about the power dynamic. More that I'd realised there was nothing, absolutely nothing, I could do which was going to change anything on the day. So it was a frustrated desire to do something.

pan, do you not think going to school should have been the default position unless agreed otherwise? There is legal and moral weight on the side of attendance, moral weight only on the side of the sanctioned truancy. Surely in that sense it's a bit more complex than an argument in which there is "no right or wrong". (As I said above, it's not like debating the merits of "Desperate Housewives".)

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PaninoPan · 01/05/2008 01:01

default position? No, I don't there is such a thing here. But I do see you wishing to create one though.

to amend the 'right/wrong' bit...the issue isn't about school attendance, it's about, as you have indicated, how the diffeence is being managed. DW has been unmoveable, which would drive me up the wall too. But do you not see how you have behaved quite similarly? REfusing to let go of your postion, though expressing that in a different way. I have been involved in workplace mediation for years, and this has largely been about getting parties to recognise 1. what they have in common, rather than the diferences between them 2. to appreciate the other parties view 3. to think flexibly about 'give and take'. 4. to examine the more deeper-seated reasons for them adopting their position. Oft this is rooted in fear, of something not immediately clearly expressed at the time.

And this is sooo clearly a 'power struggle', who's will should win out. Stop struggling over it. Being two sensitive intelligent types you WILL both come to appreciate each other's reactions, though at a later date??

oops · 01/05/2008 09:01

Message withdrawn

Original poster
UnquietDad · 01/05/2008 09:33

The idea that attendance should be the default position hadn't clearly occurred to me until it was mentioned by someone earlier in this thread. That seemed to have great clarity and strike a chord when I read it.

Presumably mediation is about concession and understanding happening on both sides. What made me furious was that I was giving some, and getting none.

Did I refuse to let go of my position? I'd like to think not. I made numerous attempts to engage in conversation/ requests for compromise (can they go in half a day, can you express your dissatisfaction ion another way, etc. etc.) It's very hard to keep compromising when the other side shows no sign of giving any concessions at all. After a while you just give up - I'm only human - and think "sod it, why am I taking the fight up a blind alley?" Which was the point at which I gave up arguing, and decided my policy would be just to make it clear it was not my decision.

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