Would it be unreasonable to ask DH to let me have a few more lie-ins?

[ARunOfThings]

DS is 11 months old. Since he was born, he has never slept for longer than 4 hours at a time (apart from 1 stint of 5 hours a few months ago!). Mostly he wakes every 3 hours. As he's breastfed, I'm awake with him every time. I also co-sleep with him, as it's the only way he'll stay asleep for longer than an hour, but he can be quite restless, meaning I'm awake even if he's not. DH generally gets up with him at weekends, since I'm up every day during the week.

I'm exhausted, having averaged about 6 hours' sleep every night for almost a year. DH gets full night's sleep every night. I also have depression and suffer panic attacks, which gets worse if I don't get enough sleep (pre-DS I averaged about 10 hours' sleep each night, which my body seemed to need)

DH is about to have 4 weeks off work. He said how much he's looking forward to getting lots of lie-ins. I asked what he meant and he said he thinks it's only fair for us to alternate getting up with DS, so he gets up early one day, and I get up early the next. I feel this is a bit unfair, as his lie-in after a full night's sleep is a luxury, whereas mine is more of a necessity for catching up on sleep. Mine is also often interrupted by DS needing to be fed, so I sometimes only get an extra hour anyway.

I'd like to ask DH whether he would mind if I got an extra lie-in every few days, but I'm not sure whether that's reasonable, or just me being lazy. DH is someone who is very "fair" about splitting responsibility, but by that he means it all has to be split equally, whereas I think it can depend on circumstances.

The importance of rest and sleep just seen to be concepts he's not familiar with!

Apparently he is - and that is why he enjoys a full nights sleep + lie in!

The concept he doesn't seem to understand is that you also need sleep, and in order to achieve this he will have to sacrifice some lie ins.

Just another voice here I say that your dh is not being fair at all. you need to sit down with him and tell him that you are on your knees from sleep deprivation and that you need to use the time he is off to work together to help you get the rest you need. this means more lie ins for you, more input from him to give you time off.

Your dc is both of your responsibility, he needs to step up, big time.

To put it in perspective, dp does a hard manual job, waking at 6am, starting work at 7.30, not finishing til 6pm most days. I do the night wakings and when he stays at the weekend (we dont live together) he gets up with dd if I ask him to so I can sleep in and will take over with her at any point so I can go for a nap if I feel tired.

He understands that 21months of broken sleep has taken its toll. he needs proper sleep during the week in order to be safe at work, but he makes up for it at the weekends.

Your dh is being twunt to be honest.

Men who are into 'fairness' are usually very good at making sure any domestic arrangements are fair to them. EG the man who earns three times what his female partner does will often insist that it's 'fair' that they pay an equal amount towards household bills, so he has three times as much disposable income as she does. Your H's attitude to sleep is similar: what he fails to understand is that, right now, with a new baby, he needs to put himself last in the order of priorities and ensure that you get more rest. Unfortunately there are still men to whom the idea of prioritizing a woman's needs over their own is a totally alien concept: women exist for men's benefits and The Man Of The House must always get the best of all availabe resources.

I think it's very easy for someone who is getting a solid night's sleep to completely not understand how hard it is for the person with the broken sleep. DH almost always does early mornings and I almost always do the nights. But it means he gets a solid 5 - 8 hours of sleep while I'm up and down all night. However, DH does realise and as a result he happily gives me lots of lie ins, and will insist at various intervals that I sleep in the spare room while he does all the night stuff for a night or two to give me that proper break.

My point is that it sounds like your DH is a good guy who genuinely isn't getting it. But he needs to. I'd agree with a PP who said that for his first few days he should let you have a lie in every day so that you can get some catch up sleep.

I'd also say that he should take the baby during the day. I assume you aren't BF every three hours by day as well? Even if you are, a well planned departure within seconds of you finishing BF gives you three hours to yourself at home while your DH is out having coffee with the baby.

We have DermaSilk garments, show me, which i assume are similar. And I got DreamSkin vests for him as well, which seem quite nice on his skin. Unguentum wasn't great for us - I seemed to end up with it all over the room, and it didn't make a huge difference to his skin! The Epaderm that we have now seems to be working well.

WorkingBling, your right about him being a good guy who just doesn't get it! DH struggles to empathise if he hasn't been in a situation, so I don't think he gets how drained I feel. He's agreed to take DS out on Saturday, so that'll be good - bf tends to be every few hours if I'm there, but he'll go longer if I'm not there, so DH should be ok for the morning.

you're, not your!

If he doesn't initially "get it", that's one thing. If he still doesn't, and doesn't step up, after you've explained clearly how it is affecting you then that's not great.

My DD had eczema as a toddler and occasionally has it it but not severely.
I tried every cream going but them in desperation mil got me some Annique Rooibos Rescue cream ( google it, it's easy to find). It really helped her and I've recommended it to loads of people who have found it really good too.
You can use it for all sorts of things and obviously severe eczema may need steroids but if it's milder or between bad outbreaks it might help.
I promise I don't work for them!!!!

We found coconut oil helps DDs eczema. I used to put breast milk on it whn she was still feeding.

And not great but we do occasionally resort to antihistamines when we've had a few bad nights.

And yes, you need the lie ins more than he does.

He is choosing NOT to get it

Selfish.

Fairness in these things needs to be considered across the piece.

You need sleep more than he does because a. you are a woman (seriously, google it - there are scientific studies) b. you are breastfeeding, which is physically demanding c. you never normally sleep more than 6 hours, which is exhausting in its own right and d. you have depression and lack of sleep is known to increase the chances of being depressed.

I suggest printing out some relevant scientific studies, presenting them to him, and then demanding more lie ins as a right, not a privilege!

Update: Had a chat to him, and he (reluctantly) agreed to do three mornings out of four for a while. He wasn't happy about it, on the basis that it's not fair, he would help with nights if he could (as I said, this has ended each time with him throwing a screaming DS at me and storming back to bed), and we should take it in turns to do mornings.

He's done a couple of mornings, both of which DS has slept until 8am anyway (with me pinned against the bedside table for the final couple of hours, scared to move in case I wake him!), so DH has gone to bed at 10, and slept through until 8.

Of course, on my morning DS woke at 6.10am... Having been half-awake off and on all night. So I'd had about 6 hours sleep, and then had to get up. I was so tired I started crying while trying to get him dressed, listening to DH snoring away. Felt very sorry for myself! But hopefully that was a one-off, and he'll sleep till 8 on my next morning!

Sorry, but your H is being an utter twat. I can't really say much more than that.

Your H really is a piece of work isn't he?

You are so downtrodden you don't even realise how lazy and selfish he is being.

I would have written a very similar post about 13 years ago....

It never got better. The resentment within my grew with the sleep deprivation. The depression consumed me. I recovered without any help or care from ex dp.

It destroyed our relationship. It made me harsh & critical. I wish I had dealt with things differently. You have the opportunity to change this situation. Parenting should be joint at all times...

Good luck.

He's not happy because it's not fair? How twattish. He'll still be getting more sleep than you! As for him doing the night feeds if he could, has he attempted to induce lactation? It's occasionally possible for men. I'm going to go with no. As and when he does, then he can use the line about doing nights if he could. You need sleep for your health, OP. That has to take priority.

Ok I would talk about number of hours of sleep instead of having a lie in.
Lies in are an indulgence with young children anyway. But sleep never is.

Have a word and tell him you rould like things to be fair, ie gave the same number if hours of sleep. It will be obvious very quickly that he needs to get up in the am and leave you sleep.
If he says that 'it's not fair because he cant help bit being g able to deal with ds at night' (which is rubbish IMO. If he really had to, he would!), then remind him that we all have have put strengths and weaknesses. We sll have things we can and can't do. The idea if a partnership is to support your partner as you can do it. If he can't do nights, then he can do mornings.

Alternate mornings would be perfectly fair if you were alternating nights too. I think he's a massive twat to be complaining that getting 7 full nights and 3 lie-ins a week is unfair to him!

I have BF all three of mine well beyond a year and I don't believe they would ever have voluntarily stopped night feeds/night waking. I have taken action before I returned to work at 10/11 months with each of them to stop the night feeds so we all got some sleep. In your shoes I'd be wanting DH to do all the nights for the first week of his holiday to break that habit, then you can alternate, whoever deals with the baby at night gets the morning lie in.

Re the going out you sound a bit martyrish. If you don't want to go out with DH and his friends, then get some dates on the calendar to do something with yours.

Your DH needs to understand that equal doesn't mean fair. He says he would help at night, great, but until it's a viable option, he's not actually doing it.

Can he explain exactly why it isn't fair given that he still does fewer mornings than you and still does none of the night wakings? I didn't think so. Not fair my arse. Tell him he's right, it's not fair because that would be each of you taking turns at doing the night wakings, and till he does you don't want to hear any more teenage whining about unfairness. And before he complains, he could do all sorts of things to settle your DS without breastfeeding - walk him up and down, give him water in a bottle or sippy cup, pat and shush. He's just lazy and knows you will see to it.