I hate my husband after having a child

[Mum2Bel]

My husband (40) and I (39) had a brilliant relationship before we had our daughter (6mo) - I was convinced I had met someone who would be the best dad - thoughtful, kind and giving. During my pregnancy and birth, and the few weeks after, he was amazing, but things changed once he returned to work, and now I cannot stand him.

I do almost everything when it comes to our daughter - I do the night times; I put her down for naps; I feed her; I clean her clothes; I bought all her toys and clothes, furniture, signed her up for classes; I chose the nursery she will go to in September… I could go on. I mean I even organised the stuff for weaning.

I do all of this because I love her and want the best for her - plus, I am not working, and she is exclusively breastfed, but I just feel (most of the time) like a single parent.

He does try, but he just doesn’t ’get it’ - he seems to have no instinct. He helps financially and when he isn’t working he will split the time with me, but even then he isn’t really present. For example, he is with her, but on his phone. There is no thought behind what he is doing. Also, if I ask him to help, for example with getting her down to sleep, he tries, but she won’t go down for him. As I can hear him getting annoyed and it stresses me out, I always step in to avoid hearing her in misery or having him in a shitty mood after. I have asked him repeatedly to try to give her a bottle and he just doesn’t do it… unless I initiate it and prep it all.

I have tried talking to him about this, and at first he seems receptive - and things change for a bit - but then it all reverts back to as it was before.

Do most mums feel this way? Will things get better? I am honestly thinking of divorce, but most people say not to do anything in the first year.

This is common. Obviously he won’t be as good at it as you - you’ve got six months of full time experience at it and he hasn’t.

Assuming she is at least partially bottle fed (sounds like she is?), I would book a weekend away with some friends. Or go to see your family or just go somewhere by yourself. Give him a week’s advance warning. Don’t do the work for him, don’t prep any bottles or outfits. Just tell him he’s responsible for 48 hours and put yourself somewhere far enough away that you won’t be tempted to come back the first time he runs into difficulty. Make it a monthly thing. He’ll learn fast.

He needs more practice at settling her, then he'll be just as good as you at it. Tbh he probably needs more 1-2-1 time with the baby to learn and bond, without you being there or coming in and taking over.

Also, is your DC solely breastfed? Could he split some of the nights to give you some much needed rest?

There is a book called "How not to hate your husband after kids", apparently it is quite good. Sympathies OP, many if not most new mothers experience this

I ran a stay and play for years and I’d say 95% of mums were pretty angry and fed up with their DPs/DHs at some point (or most of the time!) in the first couple of years.

Sometimes it was about their DPs particular poor behaviour, sometimes it was more how difficult motherhood is in our society and culture and the unreasonable expectations.

I can’t comment on what your DH is like but I suggest you give it time and ask for what you want from him.

He does try , he just doesn’t seem to get it as you said . This is normal for some. It takes experience. Stop taking over and leave him to it.

I was definitely better with babies and up to under 12. My dh however is fantastic with teens and adult children. It has come full circle for us so my advice is to play the long game.

It’s resentment cos their life doesn’t really change but ours does! I experienced it a lot in the first year but now DS isn’t such a teeny baby my DP is doing a lot more than he was so that resentment etc has stopped. Don’t get me wrong I’m still the main feeder & who settles him at nap and bed but even just having that playtime relief is something we didn’t have before.

Hope it gets easier for you too soon x

I came here to say this when I saw the thread title. It really is a good book, DH and I both read it. Plus, try to hang in there. The first year or two can be incredibly stressful, everything has been chucked up in the air and when it comes down to land nothing is really the same again. That’s hard on everyone and it does settle again.

It is extremely common yes. However I read in the paper a few years ago a superb piece of advice: don’t be the expert.

Don’t be the person who’s “better” at bathing, changing, (bottle)feeding, settling, dealing with the baby’s laundry, playing with the baby, etc.

So what if the other parent does things differently. It’ll be annoying for you to watch BUT: they will learn what works for them, the baby will adapt, you will not carry so much of the mental load, you will personally ultimately end up happier.

Baby steps. Ask the other parent to pick out from shops some new babygros, toys or formula, or choose the next baby class, whatever it is. They then gradually take more ownership.

I agree that it is irritating that they are on their phone when they could be interacting with your baby, but you know what? Let them. Keep your eye on the goal (which for this purpose is not ending up totally hating them).

Agree with all of the advice upthread! Do go away for a weekend periodically and leave him to it.

Competitive parenting is a recipe for disaster. Your baby is lucky enough to have two parents, they will learn differently from both of ye.

@Mum2Bel This sounds like I could have written the post myself. My DH is doing maybe a bit more than what you have mentioned in the post but still resentment I feel at the moment is soul destroying. My life has irreversibly changed but he just carries on as normal.
I’ve started giving him more things to do and some evenings I just say that he is doing bedtime, sometimes it takes longer but I do not care anymore. I feel like an absolute fool because I knew that having kids is not a walk in the park but nothing prepared me for this shit show. Just wanted to say OP I can relate on every level.

This is all very common as we mums have a head start with our little ones, being the first to spend time with them in their early months of life. We've learnt first as it is. If your DH is lucky enough to have good pat leave then he'll have his own time to bond with the baby and learn all the tricks and rituals. Mine became the baby expert during his own special time with DS1. If your DH can't/doesn't have much pat leave you need to give him space to bond with them when he can.

I agree with the other suggestions of going away, although I would build it up gently (personally). Start with a couple of hours here and there, ideally during wake windows so baby isn't just sleeping the whole time and slowly increase frequency and length of time away. The goal isn't for him and baby to be thrown in the deep end but ensuring smooth handover - think relay race!

It might also help to look up the concept of "default parent", it's a real thing and more often than not it ends up being Mum x

Yanbu

I'm in a similar position and it's horrendous, I'm 17 months in and it's not getting any better really. Our baby hasn't slept for 9 months and it has really taken it's toll. But even before then, we moved house and I did all the admin and packed the majority of the boxes 3 months postpartum because he "couldn't take any more time off work" because he'd swapped shifts to sign for the keys. We moved cities and he still works in that city, and sets off 4 hours early to get there via public transport and sleeps there overnight. Even though I've struggled overnight alone with our baby from her being 3 weeks old this developed into PPD and PPA and I'm now in a position where I'm off sick because I burned out.

I'm responsible for most things and he doesn't think he has to pay for her toys and clothes even though I get paid significantly less than him but contribute the same towards bills/childcare fees. He doesn't take responsibility for the position he's put me in. Prior to this he was the most reliable person in the world. He was desperate for a child, and now we have one he does the bare minimum in terms of life admin, organising and effort and wants an award for it. He does bedtime and bathtime a lot and will do a lot when he's home. But our communication is bad and respect for me is just non-existent.

So I think it lies within your own confidence as to how you feel and what you want. It's easy to blame ourselves our hormones and bad sleep but it doesn't really excuse their shitty behaviour. It's so confusing when they were great beforehand. But like someone else said once parenting becomes a competition it's doomed. I don't really know how to reverse it. Parenting really reveals parts of each other you never knew about previously, upbringing, demons, belief systems, good and bad habits.

I think all you can do is talk about it with him and potentially nip it in the bud with couples counselling if he's willing. It's so hard. I really love my partner but the way he has treated me this past year, I've never been as angry in my life. I can't imagine being without him but he's making me miserable and I don't want to stand for it. It's so complex the prospect of being a single mum, and even just trying to discuss the craziness of being new parents is daunting. So I really understand how you're feeling but you'll get through it. And so will I.

I don't think true equality exists in motherhood and maybe that's the issue. We were sold a dream that never existed and now we're angry. But you know they could help to contribute towards it's existence. That's the issue, the lack of effort. Haha I could moan all day, I hope you're ok and feel free to message me if you want a rant x

Stop helping him and stand back. He needs to gain confidence. But drill it into him that he needs to take a deep breath and be calm around the baby.

I have two and am going through this for the second time 😂. With the first, it took until she was about 12 to 18 months and started following him about. He did 2 months of parental leave, which really helped. But he'd still forget stuff like suncream, unless I reminded him. I stopped to totally hate him at some point enough to have a second. Then I went through it all again.

With the second, it was probably worse. He volunteered to cover a guy at his work's late shifts when the baby was a couple of weeks old so this guy could spend the time doing a creative writing project. I could have divorced him. I had a C-section and was looking after a toddler and a baby into the evening so that some colleague could do creative writing!

He seemed to think all I did was sit about watching TV and go to cafes and was pressuring me to do more housework and so on. In reality, I was 24/7 with the baby and doing 70% of the care of the older one and 100% when he worked. We had a conversation where he said he did a lot of the childcare at the weekend and I had to point out to him he'd forgotten about the baby, who he'd never looked after. It was like the baby didn't exist until he was 6 months old and again, started crawling.

It has gotten a bit better now and is continuing to improve

My daughter was 10 months before she would accept my partner as a care giver. There was a period at around 12 months that she would only go to sleep for him so it can swing around the other way too! Prior to 10 months it was down to me to settle a very unsettled baby but he did absolutely everything else and did his best in the mornings at the weekend to keep her settled whilst I got some better sleep which made all the difference.

I think you need to have a talk about how best he can support you. I get the sense from your post that currently you aren't getting to rest properly when he takes her as you are waiting to step in. I think you need to find times he can take her when it's most likely he's going to be able to meet her needs, maybe bedtimes are something to come back to in a few weeks/month. You need to come up with other ways he can support you whilst you are being the care giver too to release your mental burden

Yanbu, he's being passive. My DP is like this. You can't really encourage or discuss someone out of being passive.

Although I considered leaving we get on otherwise. After a lot of thought and deliberation, I decided to stay but to focus on me and my life, whilst staying fair to him. I plan meetings out with friends, schedule in time to get out of the house, remind him he needs to get dd out of the house so I can have some time in the house by myself. I still get to live my life and if he decides to be passive when he's looking after her then do be it, she's not neglected it's just maybe not perfect.

I EBF too and baby refused bottle. Once they get past 1yo and are having bigger meals it gets a lot easier.

I think when the kids are older we'll get on again and so it's worth riding it out.

I wanted to kill dh many many times. I was on mat leave so had more experience and it took ages for me to accept that. I will say he held his own when it came to baths, when we moved into the big bath if I did bath time then he and I would be soaked, if dh did bath time it was a delight for him and ds. I don't know how I screwed it up every time. Ds1 was formula fed and dh more or less did all the bottle prep. But I still remember roaring at him one day that the only reason I knew more is because I read all the books and not some innate baby whispering skills.
By DS2 I thought dh was the devil, and by DS3 he was carrying us all and I'd say hated me. The youngest is 4 now and we adore each other again. I will say I'm a SAHM so the first years were horrific even thought dh is amazing. Also it's much easier when someone is at home doing all the household bits during the day, so we both can sit down at 8pm and relax.

I really get the bit about reading the books - it just frustrates me that he asks me all the time ‘how do I do this’ - ‘what should I do?’ I had to learn for myself from books etc, why do I have to teach him? It’s like having two kids! I think the issue is that his passive and nonchalant nature is making me lose respect for him and just makes me rage.

Yes to him being passive - it’s infuriating. I think your advice is sound though; I need to stop expecting him to be better and just focus on me.

Stop stepping when he's struggling OP. I know it's hard but it's the only way he can learn.

Wow - I’m so sorry. But I get it. It really resonated with me when you said ‘Parenting really reveals parts of each other you never knew about previously, upbringing, demons, belief systems, good and bad habits.’ I have discovered things about him that are so disappointing - things that I would never have known had we not had a child together. I thought I knew him so well.

You also said ‘I don't think true equality exists in motherhood and maybe that's the issue. We were sold a dream that never existed and now we're angry’ - and I 100% agree. I almost feel stupid for thinking my experience would be different.

He should be doing a lot more.

But equally, and I say this as a woman who is nearing 50. Many men just don't give as much of a shit about many things that many women do.

Like nursery decorating, or baby clothes or baby groups.

They just don't. And expecting them to is just setting them up to fail and creates division in relationships which doesn't need to be there.

Weaponised Incompetence is definitely a thing and men use it to get out of caring responsibilities.