Young children and husbands.

[BusyCee]

Before I go on I don't really know why I'm posting, other than desperation really.

I've got 3 DCs, the eldest is just 5 and the youngest is 11wks. It's really hard, obviously, I knew it would be. Don't have parents or family to help out, although oldest is at school and middle goes to CM a couple of times a week

But I'm so bastard bastard tired. I've had 10hrs sleep in the last 48, as a result of a combination of baby not settling in the evening, wrapping Christmas presents, cooking (to feed and advance prep for Christmas). We've had family guests last night and this eve, then I have my sole Christmas event on Monday (for which I have to get ready with the DCs creating their usual havoc, drop the oldest two with sitters, take youngest (and probably BF all eve) and then leave early to collect, all the while having not had a drink because a) in BFing and b) I'll be driving), then I have to do a late night supermarket shop because I failed to book a delivery slot early enough. The children won't give a shit about Christmas really and DH is usually grumpy for some reason I haven't yet got to the bottom of (but it happens every single bastard year). I love Christmas but know there isn't anyone who really gives enough of a shit/takes any responsibility to do anything to make it enjoyable for me. If I want to 'do' a tradition I have to sort and then try to grit my teeth and bloody force myself to enjoy amidst the endless complaints bickering and whining.

I had hoped that the youngest two would be asleep while DH toon eldest to a friends for an hour or so, so I could get some rest. But guess what? The baby woke as he was leaving, I know she won't sleep if I put her down now, and sure enough she feeds, goes to sleep on the boob, but wakes the second I move her. So I can sleep.

Had a grumpy face a big sigh and a minor strop as DH was leaving and his response? 'This is the way our life is. You just have to get to used it'. It ENRAGES me to the point where I just wanted to scream and storm out. I feel so disempowered and utterly lacking in control. I talked to him on Friday about going back to work at the end of Jan for 8hrs a wk, just to give myself some space. But he thinks baby is too young for the CM and doesn't want to give her formula. For the same reason he's just about to veto my night out with the girls in Jan. He thinks I should express milk for her...but I just don't get on with it can't bear the final physical indignity of being an actual dairy cow. He points out that others do it and just can't or won't comprehend that I just don't want to do it.

Fuck fuck I could go on and on and on and on. There so much inequity between us at the moment. He can't understand why I'm so frustrated and angry and I think he just criticises me all the time. I don't think he cuts me enough slack given what I'm doing at the moment...in fact I don't think he's grateful or respectful of it.

Maybe I wonder why, given this whole thing ^^ is such a bloody cliche, men and women keep having this experience. What can I practically do to make it better? I love him and want it to be ok. But right now I could cheerfully actually murder him.

And he gets away with doing so little because I allow him to. He should step up, of course, but also I need to draw the line where I'm comfortable and tell what I want/need him to do. I'm not great at doing that, so when I'm tired I tend to just carry on and need to learn to allow him to help out too (instead of always stepping in and controlling)

As with most things it's probably 6 of one and half a dozen of the other.

No Busy, he's a twat.

Anyone who gets into competitive tiredness with a BFing mum of 3 under 5 is a twat. Anyone who watches their partner suffer without stepping up is a twat. Anyone who thinks they have any say in how a (exhausted) mother feeds her child is a twat. You have three kids, he knows the score, he knows it's Christmas and that gifts don't buy and wrap themselves. He's an adult. He holds down a job - I bet he doesn't have to be told every little thing that needs doing there. He just doesn't care enough.

A good man would be more concerned about his wife, don't you think?

I never had a single drop of breast milk & have high IQ, MENSA member, at age 52 (knock wood) never been ill beyond cold/flu, never hospitalized, well employed etc. had lovely relationship with mom. (And dad, who did the middle of night feeds and smiled when telling me how doing that prompted him to quit smoking cold turkey when he realized I needed him alive).

Breast feeding is great but it's not magic and many people have done as well or better than I have without it. You need to look out for yourself ASAP. He does NOT get a vote.

Is not up to him where he you use formula. He needs to do more and you need to let him. Why are you doing it all? Stop it!

*whether

In some ways he is actually right...this is just the way life is right now. It can reduce a lot of conflict to just realise this. But you are nearing the tipping point, as you know with 2 older DC already. There's a bit of a watershed moment around 4 months, and again at 6 months (usually) when you start to feel human again.

Part of the issue is breastfeeding, as you know. It doesn't make for equality. This is the reason I set myself with a 6 months target/limit with both of mine. No criticism of anyone who wants to feed for longer or shorter, but i'd have been quite demented beyond this.

Hermione - you're right. He's being a twat. But this deffo isn't a LTB moment. And yes a good husband would step up and support his wife. He needs to do more and be proactive about it - not wait for me to collapse before he does. But as a PP said above, sometimes coping and being in control all the time doesn't help him help me.

So it's a bit of everything. But most of all thank you MN for helping me over my mood and into useful thinking. Having a sob in the sofa is important but tactical. Now I've done that with you I feel (still tired) I've got some perspective.

Busy I am sending you any amount of

I breastfed my youngest for 1 year and she didn't sleep through the night until she was 3 years old. Sobbing on my hands and knees with a baby and pre-schooler climbing over me as I felt I was drowning in my role as a mum while DH just sauntered in and out, working, socialising and everyone praising him if he took the kids out for 30 mins.

You are at a very hard stage at the moment, but you seem like a fighter and you'll need that spark.

Outsource what you can - readymade food is grand, maybe get a cleaner, ask any teens you know to take the older 2 out for a few hours, do food shop online at night etc etc.

What is your husband's contribution to the Christmas effort?

Why does he get to veto your work and BF arrangements and your night out in January?

I want a list of his Xmas tasks to be precise.

The biggest issue you are facing right now is exhaustion. It's awful, makes you think and act irrationally.

Please tell your husband you need to sleep, hand over the baby and go to sleep. Afterwards everything will be much better but not for long if you don't get regular sleep.

I feel for you OP I have a 13 week baby and a toddler it's hard. My main piece of advice would be change to formula and tell your DH you are taking it night about with the getting up. It'll make all the difference and once the baby's on formula she might sleep longer. If he starts with the competitive tiredness BS tell him it's not about him it's about you and he needs to help you. Men have no idea how relentless it is looking after small babies and toddlers all day.

Sorry my 'I want' sounded very rude.

You don't have to list anything on top of all the demands you are coping with already!

I'm just cross with your husband and 'I want' him to pull his finger out.

My guess is his Xmas tasks were buying the wine and the Xmas tree.

I know exactly how you feel. Been there with dh actually working away from home in Rome and other various locations and he had the gall to say he was tired.
What worked for me was breast and formula then at least I could go out. Did that for about a year. Best of both worlds.

I totally agree re formula. It's absolutely fine - Heath and well being of children is about so so much more than what they consume. But I'm not up to the fight with DH at the moment - haven't got the energy and just get so angry so quickly. The second I do that I lose the argument.

It really worries me that this is being characterised as an argument OP. It's not. Argument implies more than one side, some discussion perhaps. But your breasts are a dictatorship. If you want to stop, stop. DH then has three options: purchase breastmilk from elsewhere, induce lactation himself or fucking deal with it. There's a special place in hell for men who pressure their partners to breastfeed.

Twinkle. I bought the Christmas tree

MN is brilliant because having somewhere to vent and get supportive advice can be a life saver.

It's not great because it can't capture the idiosyncrasies and nuances of a relationship. It's totally right to say he doesn't have the right to decide how the baby is fed. But I can't adequately the more subtle nature of our conversation on this - it's not that he was looking over me demanding his own way. More that he was saying 'she's so small still'...but in my beleaguered state I could muster the logical 'but they're MY sodding boobs; she's not too young; we totally trust the CM; it's for my mental health which ultimately benefits you etc'. So he probably wasn't aware the effect. Once I've got my shit together more I can have a better conversation with him about it...which is why I felt so frustrated. It's a vicious cycle isn't it?

Right now he's bathing the older two and putting them to bed. He's done spontaneously suggested we 'get rid' of the guests earlier than usual and I get to bed early.

My post earlier was a spontaneous rant about the general lack of equality and frustration inherent with small children. It DOES drive me mad that he doesn't seem to totally 'get' how knackering it is. But I wonder if it's a coping mechanism for him too? Practical practical practical.

I don't know why, given so many couples decide to have children (plural), this is so common an experience, between otherwise 'good' people who love each other. Why haven't we found a way to deal with it better? Why don't men learn to say 'yes darling, it's unbelievably hard and you're doing an amazing job' as they look over their shoulder from the washing up? Why do they default so much to the SAHM (no matter how temporary that dynamic is)? Why haven't we developed a better cultural/social way of managing it? (Now you've rescued me from my earlier mood I'm more philosophical about it)

So what I really mean is; yes he's being a bit of lazy twunt; yes I need to tell him to pull his socks up; but he's a good man and I know he will because he loves us and he's not a heartless misogynist (despite his upbringing - he's actually doing quite well to buck the modelling from his childhood); we both know you can't pour from an empty cup, so my happiness is important too. BUT no he's not perfect, and I hear the same complaints about husbands/children/home/work from so many women, it's such a common experience, why don't we deal with it better?

Meh. Maybe I do need a bath and bed after all. I may not be making sense...

Sorry for the typos. I'm BFing while I type. Oh the irony...

OP, have you read Wifework by Susan Maushart ?

It makes me so sad to see otherwise savvy women making excuses for their inadequate menfolk like this.

Whatever his reasons are and whatever he said, if you're refraining from introducing formula because of what he'll have to say about it, that's a problem.

Some men are just lazy and selfish. Many women have been socialised to believe that they should put up with it and do everything for everyone before taking care of themselves.

Not all men are like that though, it's something he is choosing to do. Society facilitates men choosing to be lazy and selfish but it doesn't force them to.

Many years ago, I knew a consultant surgeon, highly regarded in her field, who, for a while, couldn't work the weekends she had been assigned to because she couldn't leave her consultant surgeon husband alone with her twins. She did it once, after returning from maternity leave, and never again. He never fed them, never changed their nappies, never once looked after them. She had to seek out and pay for someone to come in to look after the children. She was still with him as well! He put his children's needs at risk and also her career prospects. He didn't care.

Oh yes, Elendon

Social standing has no bearing here

Sleep deprivation is torture. You are allowed to hate him temporarily, and when you get some kip you won't anymore. (In my experience)

elendon whhhyyyyy????!!!!! Why do women stay with these twatbadgers?

Smart women with options? Why? Is the thought of being alone so much worse that carrying a man child passenger? I would lose all respect for him, and all attraction.

I always hated the dairy cow aspect, and it turned out, could never express any appreciable amount anyhow, and DS1 looked at me as though I was mad (he's a master of the withering stare even now) when I tried giving him a bottle (never got to that point with DS2, who was a gut who didn't feed anywhere near as often anyway)

Take the evening - or take the evening and go somewhere and sleep. The baby can last the evening even without expressed milk - they might not be happy about it (you can leave formula - which they might not want), but suggesting you're starving them is a bit of a cop out - mine always fussed more in the evening, just to fuss, not because they were hungry, and they weren't much more happy with me than with DP (even though DP wanted to think they were)