pissed off DH says he could do my job this is his trial day

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DH is home from work to help out we are having major problems with our puppy and probably have to rehome him.

So far he has had lovely long talks with DS really exploring DS's mind which is lovely meanwhile I am tidying up, dealing with the dog etc and he is doing one task at a time namely being a wonderful father to DS and it is pissing me off you know I would love to have nice long talks with DS in the day too but instead I have to manage him, appointments, animals, an aggressive puppy etc I dont fucking have the time.

the playworker is here and I am hiding in the bedroom since I have tears streaming down my face. she has never even met DH before this is so awkward.

HIDTL, sorry you are having a hard time of it again.

Relax.

Breath.

Ignore the mess.

Right, I know exactly how you are feeling. your dh has taken time off to give you a hand, and all of a sudden, he is having the morning YOU want to have, every day, right in front of your eyes.

It isn't that you can't have conversations with your ds - it's that you want to, but that you are the one he shouts at/hits/gets frustrated with.

I have it exaclty the same.

All week I have dd1 going on and on at me - pushing buttons, stretching things to the limit, shouting, tantrumming (I make her sound so horrid, and she isn't, but I know you know what I mean). And then at the weekend, dh is here, gets the girls up - no shouting over the fact that the T shirt is not her swordfish one, no arguing over the fact that he changed dd2's nappy first, no meltdowns over the fact that he has given her a different bowl.

It happens, and it happens because dd1 (and your ds form the sound of it) have a NEED to control us, but not a need to control their dads.

It doesn't solve anyhting, knowing this, but I hope you are not feeling that your dh copes better - he doesn't. He just does things differently (in part because he is allowed to by your ds)

Don't worry about the tidying up - professionals have seen much worse, believe me (most of it in my houe )

Please try to take a step back, I do know how you feel, but none of it is anyone's fault, least of all your own.

Oh boy it sounds busy at your end. I think you're stressed to f*ck and you need time away. Your dh is home and apparently reckons he can do everything, so let him. Go out. Sit in the sun with a book, have an ice cream. Take your time. DH has said he'll do it, so you really need to let him see what it's really like. He wouldn't have been able to have a long chat with ds if you hadn't been running around like a blue-arsed fly. So don't.

Go out; go on, go.

The puppy is a month old, so it isn't going to be trained or socialised, that is your job as it's new owners.

Crate it. It will howl, but that will get better. It sounds like a living hell for you, so take it out of the equation for a while. Do you have a room you can put it in, close the door so the howling isn't so intense? Or a shed (just for a short period to collect your thoughts without the howling).

Tbh it sounds incompatable with your lives at the moment, so I would ring the people you brought him from & say that you are unable to home him. If they are responsible they will take him back.

I think removing the puppy will help you focus a little on everything else.

I cant go out now I have to hide in the bedroom til the play worker leaves I had DH tell her I was in bed with a migraine which isnt far off I think I have one coming on.

I am so in love with my husband but sometimes I just feel like he is a danger to me emotionally and I can never prove it or reason enough to make him understand. He is so loving and wonderful and most of the time everything I could want but sometimes he seems so heartless and abrupt and I just dont know how to feel.

and silverfrog you are right I was upset DH had the day off to help & then had the time with DS I wish I could have. I am always having to not immerse myself totally in DS for all the other things. And DS and I, our relationship is suffering he has known I am upset lately and I just dont know. I sometimes wish I had never married someone from a different country it so limits your options.

the puppy is 4 months old my 4 key sticks

oh I am sure I am wrong about DH I know he feels I am and I am clearly such a fucking nutcase why should I trust my own perception.

We got the puppy from a lady 3 1/2 hours away by car - she is in Wales. I just cant face a 7 hour car trip to return him. Its horrible I love him so much (the dog) he is lovely to me but I cant cope with this. I was wrong I will hold my hands up I fucked up. I thought I could and he would be a great comfort to me but I cant.

I think you need to see your GP. It sounds liek you have got bogged down and can't see the wood for the trees. Everything is on top of you and you can't deal with it. I know what that feels like. If the prozac isn't helping, then you need something else.

Defo rehome the puppy. It's what you want to do, and it sounds like it'd be the best thing all round. The puppy needs time, and you have too much on your plate. Can you find a dogs home, and concentrate on dealing with that and leave your dh to sort out that?

HIDTL, it will all work out in the end, it really will.

You are going through a very hard time just now - how is the dx process going?

I have again been exactly where you are - but the rpoblems you are having are not all of your dh's making (obviously I don't know the exact dynamics of your relationship).

I felt it was all dh's fault - he could help more, he should help the way I want him to (without me telling him) he shold instinctively know how I do things, and not change routines with the girls as I will just have ot pick up the pieces later, etc, etc.

But, my frustration, resentment and dissatisfaction were all down to just being pissed off at my lot in life.

I did not ask for a disabled daughter.

I have one, and I love her dearly, but it does turn your life upside down. And dh's life is not as affected. A large part of his life has stayed exactly the same.

so he can breeze in and out, having lovely mornings with the girls, because he is not ground down by the daily shit I have to take. he can wake up, ook at things with fresh eyes, and get on with doing something, rather than still having the leftover lists form yesterday that just didn't get done to get through.

I have really struggled with dd1 at times. I have tried things with dd1 that go horribly wrong, andthen dh waltzes through, and she will do it perfectly.

I have actually now started embracing this.

For eg - toilet training. dd1 had major freak outs when I tried to introduce the concept. so I got dh to do it - she sat happily, and no freak out over the change in routine, which enabled my to tackle the rest (the inevitable messes/clearing up etc while she got used to it). But it took the heat out of the situation.

if you want to have a morning with your ds, then do it. ignore the cleaning/washing/hoovering. do it. your house won't fall down. I spent a large part of dd1's babyhood doing htis, because dd1 was more important. my house was a tip, but I had time to do what I wanted with dd1, with less stress all round.

at times, something's got to give, and I didn't want it to be me, and so it was the housework (no great loss in my book)

it doesn't all have to be done today, after all

A creche, surely you can't use them as 'proper' childcare?

I use the one at the gym and sometimes at shopping centres but would never leave the building whilst they are in there.

we are waiting for CAHMS assessment on 10 June, that is the next step for a DX.

I miss my DS. I really do. I dont feel like I have enjoyed him for a while and I miss him so much.

right, well between now and the 10 June, I think you should stuff the daily grind, and get back to doing the things with your ds that you enjoy.

Go out for walks/fingerp paint the patio, whatever he and you like.

Stuff the housework/chasing appts etc.

do what you need to to get through the time as a family - ALL of you as happy as possible, including you.

You are alllowed to be knocke dof rsix by what has happened for you this year - it isn't something that you are just going to wander thorugh without a lot of emotional upheaval.

But it is ok to be pissed off about it all. you, understandably, just want the life you used ot have back, before things went a bit loopy and your life ending up being run to a set of everchanging and mostly incommprehensible rules.

Rehome the puppy. we ar ehaving to rehome our dog as dd1 cannot cope with her (and the dog was here first in or instance) but it has got to the point where she screams if she even sees the dog in the garden. the dog isn't having much fun, and neither is dd1.

don't try to take on too much - small things, one at a time. It doesn't matter if all you do all day (as long as you are willing, obviously) is sing nursery rhymes or read stories.

you are totally right silverfrog and I will do just that

I think what is wrong with me, is that everything I have done as long as I can remember has been working for the best of my family (including myself in that)

And now I am in a place where I cant leave my room for crying and every problem I see us coming up against is my fault when I take it back to the root of it. So all the time I have been the morale booster and the leader and the worker and the support and information gatherer and all of it I have been doing it all wrong. I dont know how this happened I just really dont. I have tried so hard and now DS and I dont have these loving times and I brought a dog into this house which may have scarred him for life and how do I undo that? And you know what everyone thinks DS doesnt have SN - health professionals and most friends and family - so what if I have just raised him so badly I have made him into this. And its all truly my fault. I just cant beleive it.

I am sorry please no one say I am feeling sorry for myself. I am not I am truly in shock at seeing the horror of it all. I feel like I have just woken up and I dont know where I am.

You need a break and some help.

When your play worker leaves go out. GO OUT!!!

Get some time to yourself and when you feel a bit better you will be able to look at your situation more constructively, but right now you need to go out. Take advantage of dh being there. Please.

i dont know where I would go. I dont drive. There is a cafe in the village I suppose I could go get a coffee there. Or I could take a long hot bath and exfoliate which I havent done since we got the puppy.

none of this is anyone's fault.

you brought a dog into the house because oyu thought it would be a nice thing. it hasn't worked.you didn't do it on purpose. I do understand the guilt thing, but it really is just a waste of energy.

friends and family don't count when it comes to dx - they only see (mostly) the good side of things, and like most people, are in denial - as htough they can change the whole course of events by not believing it.

health professionals are also hit and miss. my gp didn't believe me whenI told him dd1 was ASD - this was AFTER she was dx'd. But he'd only ever seen her being quiet, and not talking, so not heard her speech delay, and certainly not seen her meltdowns, so why would he think any different? on a good day, most people would be hard pressed to pick up that dd1 is ASD. but that doesn't change the fac tthat she is.

if you have a referral for camhs, then someone has seen something that warrants it. which means that all is not quite right. you may not end up with a dx - your ds could be borderline, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have traits.

even with no dx, this is not all down to your parenting.you didn't make your ds inot a control freak - needing a certain bowl/blanket/routine/word/action etc. I used ot question myself too.

but since I have had dd2, and she is now in the middle of 2 year old control freakery , I have seen that there is no way that I created any of dd1's issues. dd2 likes me to sing the same song a few times, and will ask for her favourite cup etc. but she does not howl as though the world has ended if I don't sing Twinkle Twinkle sodding Star for 5 hours without a break

she does not cry as though in pain if I give her the wrong plate, or a different spoon. she doesn't refuse (and refuse is the wrong word, it is more that dd1 is not able to) to get dressed because it is the wrong t shirt - the list goes on.

if there are things that you could be doing differently, well, you will learn them.

I totally understand about the just woken up thing. you must have been linked to the Holland poem by someone well meaning. everyone goes thorugh the unreality of living a life that is not the one you should be having. I woke up in a parallel universe when dd1 was baout 11 months old. the house was the same, dh was the same, dd1 was the same, but I saw her differently - I was the only one that didn't fit in.

dd1 was dx'd at 2.7 - she is now 4.8 and it is only very recently that I have started to get ahandle on things.

it is a very long road, and everyone says that the pre-school years are the hardest. be kind to yourself.

DS is outside in the house howling while DH talks to the playworker. I want to go to DS but I have said I am bed bound with a migraine so cant show my face while playworker is here. I cant even enjoy the fact that DH is getting a taste of having to spread himself thinly because I want my son with me. DH is also regularly having to stop the dog from various forms of misbehaviour.

Silverfrog thanks so much for your posts. It really means the world to me. Somewhere there is a tiny little thread that says I am not the worst, last person standing in a world I have messed up.

I really cant say enough how I feel I have just woken up and dont know where I am. All the noise outside in my house. DS screaming. Me in here crying. The jabber of it all. It is as if I am trapped in a stage setting. I just dont know where I am.

don't go to your ds!

if there is one thing that took me far too long to learn, it is that I do not just exist to help dd1.

your dh will cope.

he will not do ti the way you do it.

he ma y not do it in a way that you approve of/think is right.

but the world will not end.

you are YOU, as well as being your ds's mum/dh#'s wife etc.

I felt for so long that i had to respond every time dd1 was upset. of course I had to - she needed me. I was the only one who could calm her down/understand her/knew what it would take - which song/story/word/sequence.

but it doesn't help anyone.

it doesn't help you, as you end up feelinga s htough you never get a break, and that you have ot do EVERYTHING.

it doesn't help your ds in the long run, because ultimately there will be times he has to settle with someone else, not you.

it doesn't help your dh because he doesn't learn how to settle your ds, and he may also end up thinking you feel he is helpless because you keep taking over. it also leaves him without a role. my dh has said recently this wa the hardest part - at times he wanted to help (and this still hapens sometimes, but we are both working on it) but he had nothing to do - I would do it as I knew it would be quicker, dd1 only wanted me because she had only ever had me, he was left feeling on the outside.