I had a phonecall this afternoon...

[Itwasgoodwhileitlasted]

DH had taken DS to swim lessons. This is the second time he has taken him, I've taken him once myself.

So it is a 30 minute lesson and parents are told to sit in cars in car park to wait because of covid.

DS swim lesson finished at 3.10pm and I had a phonecall at 3.30pm asking who was picking him up!!

It then transpires DH had dropped off DS and gone to run "errands".

I was livid and mortified. Swim school gave me a bollocking because there was no one responsible for DS in event of an emergency.

Not even mentioning DS was scared and freezing cold while he waited for a towel.

DH is swanning around like it is no big deal while I plot our divorce.

On a scale of useless arsehole what would you score him?

I've given him 10/10

I thought I had confirmed the towel situation.

No, he did not have a towel. He had to wait at reception near the front door.

He told me the swim teacher said dad was supposed to wait in the carpark, but didn't.

No idea if she reassured him. I hope so :(

I wonder why the pool didn't give him a towel to wrap round him whilst he waited.

@Itwasgoodwhileitlasted

I don't think my son's reaction was abnormal. He catastrophised because he was vulnerable. Plenty of adults do that, so let's not be hard on my 7 year old child.

Secondly, you don't build resilience by being a crap parent.

Thirdly, I posted in relationships not AIBU. Please note that before commenting.

I think a lot of children post-Covid have become a lot more anxious about things like this, because they lived such shut-in lives for so long -- I know I was remarking to another school parent that my nine year old is currently very anxious about us being late to pick him up from school or sport, despite it never happening (understandable in his case as we moved countries, and from a small village to a city just before the first lockdown, so he's had a lot of change recently), and a couple of people who were standing around chimed in to say their children were more anxious about it than previously.

I think catastrophising in a situation where they feel vulnerable in the OP's child's case, a parent who was supposed to be in the car park wasn't, he didn't have his clothes to change into etc, presumably the swimming teacher being concerned/annoyed is pretty natural for a seven year old.

OP, I missed that this wasn't your DH's first time taking your DS to his swimming lesson, so it wasn't even that he thought it was an hour-long lesson or something...?

If his dad was supposed to wait in the carpark, and he wasn't there of course he's going to catastrophise. The dad was supposed to have waited, presumably every other child's parent did wait.

I also remember being 7 and the bus missing our stop on the way home. Cue floods of tears from pretty much every child supposed to be getting off. Its a normal reaction for what is quite a young child. Absolute BS would your child not be panicking if their dad was supposed to be waiting for them in a carpark, with their towel and not there. It also sounds like the staff were not particularly reassuring about the situation. Remember this child was cold and wet, in his swimming gear standing in reception. I'm sorry but thats a total normal reaction for a child of that age.

I’d be furious, don’t blame the op if it is the end of the road. Does he know you’re fed up? It wouldn’t be the end of the road for me because my husband isn’t useless but I’d tear strips off him, if he weren’t suitably apologetic Id tell his family as funnily enough men realise it’s not ok behaviour when they think about other people knowing, and then he would prep takw collect and in future book every swim lesson for the next few years, as there is clearly a basic parenting gap that only practice can cure (obviously you highlight fuck it up again and you’re sleeping somewhere else)

'He put the wrong time in his diary'

What kind of parent doesn't know how long said child's swimming lesson is?! Where is he every week?!

@nocturnalcatfreetogoodhome

'He put the wrong time in his diary'

What kind of parent doesn't know how long said child's swimming lesson is?! Where is he every week?!

That's what I thought!

I wondered if it meant he got him there late or thought the lesson was more than half an hour.

If he's already taken him once surely even if the time was different is was still a half hour wait in the carpark?

@Itwasgoodwhileitlasted How's things OP?

The comments about murder are in such a bad, nasty taste, that I'm shocked adults would type out something like that or find it funny.
Just imagine on some forum with male audience :
She burnt dinner twice? Just murder her.
She doesn't vacuum? Murder her.
She's misplaced son's pyjamas? Kill her - cheaper than divorce.

WTF is wrong with people!

@HollySass

You only have to watch an episode of Faulty Towers to know that frustratration of a rediculous scale is incorperated into comedy.

It's called humour, not your humour but you can't please everyone.

DSs reaction is a bit odd, I’m not saying he’s unreasonable, of course he isn’t. But I would just be checking why he’s thinking about things like that at 7 and what you can maybe do to make him feel a bit more secure in general.
I remember my mum being late to pick me up from school a couple of times, I just assumed there had been some traffic or something. I didn’t go to murder. You don’t want him to be afraid of the outside world, and maybe he needs a bit of help with that post covid.

I’d also be asking why his swimming instructor thought it was ok to leave a wet child with no clothes and no towel near a front door. covid or not, I’d be concerned about their common sense if they were looking after my child.

This doesn’t seem like enough reason for divorce but there’s obviously a lot more backstory to this.

I don't want to derail the thread (might start a separate one on this topic) but I really don't think most would find the same murder comments with sexes reversed acceptable.
Are rape "jokes" OK? Can I in a jokey way suggest a mum on this forum murders her tantruming toddler?
We have to draw the line somewhere. That line could be at keeping those risqué jokes for your inner circle (like most of us do! ) .

It's also strange how "go kill yourself" would be considered an awfully offensive thing to say here, but "go murder your DH, MIL, DP" is all a bit of a joke.

I'm happy to accept that I'm lacking my funny bone on this one.

@HollySass the reason it wouldn’t be ok the other way round is because men DO kill their wives and women ARE raped and sexually assaulted at a much higher rate.

Typically women neither rape nor murder their husbands.

Men simply do not face the same statistics of rape and murder.

I wouldn’t joke about murder personally, but getting annoyed because ‘it wouldn’t be ok the other way round’ doesn’t really work as an argument for me.

@Cheapskatewedding

I'm not advocating "because it wouldn't be OK the other way around" as a measuring tool here. Quite the opposite - I'm saying murder as a joke is not OK either way.

It doesn't matter in this instance that it doesn't happen typically - otherwise am I free to make "jokes" of all the crimes that don't happen typically?
No sex? Rape your husband! Lol!
Impale your kids! Lol, lol!

I mean murder references are so ubiquitous on any given thread here, it can't be that novelty-endearing-funny anymore?

I only posted this as I was a bit tired of my own eye rolls at every 10th mention of murder. I'm obviously weird in thinking this. I'll go hang myself now. 🤷‍♂️

I grew up in the 80s and routinely had to wait hours at activities for my parents to turn up. I hated it, it made me feel like shit and I compared myself to the others kids whose parents turned up on time and gave a shit about them. That’s minus being cold, not having a towel and clothes. It didn’t teach me resilience, it taught me that my parents didn’t care about me. You don’t teach resilience by letting your kids down and not apologising. Worst case, something bad happens as a one off/very occasional scenario and you teach them that things sometimes go wrong, you’re sorry but this turned out okay etc, what practical things they can do themselves if they are worried. Ops Dh doesn’t even think it’s a big deal.

I am not saying LTB at all, I hope you can sit down with him and talk it through. But the idea that shitty behaviour teaches resilience is such bullshit.

I'm really surprised that staff left a dripping wet child in the reception area for 20 minutes. That would not have happened at my centre. The staff would give the child a towel and charge the parent for it when they arrived.

I'm not.

They probably couldn't leave him in the changing rooms, and it's likely that no single member of staff could supervise him there both for staffing reasons and because individual staff members probably can't be alone with children in the changing rooms.

Standing at the reception area meant the reception desk could keep an eye on him and he could be seen by the parent arriving, without the parent having to lead a search party.

It's possible that towels are not available thanks to covid.

@mathanxiety

It's possible that towels are not available thanks to covid.

Maybe but all the centres I know have still supplied brand new towels for sale. Also goggles, floats, etc. as it's so common for people to forget things and as they are new, they are not affected by covid. I'm just imaging a dripping wet, shivering child standing in reception for 20 minutes and no-one offering him a towel. It sounds like an unlikely scenario.

The place where my DD had her swimming lessons did not have towels you could buy or borrow.

I'm stunned that some people think this is fine, and no big deal. If it was a genuine mistake, then that's one thing, but if it WAS a mistake then most parents would be mortified, not think, "Hooray, another opportunity to teach my child nobody cares resilience"

And OF COURSE the poor lad thought something dreadful had happened. Children will fill in the gaps in their knowledge with their imaginations. He wasn't to know how long Dad would be, or even if he was coming back. At the same age I couldn't find my parents after a school play and I remember thinking that as I was fat I would probably be able to survive for a while on the streets and live off my fat reserves and the two sweets I had in my pocket. It was probably only about 10 minutes.

IF this were a one-off.
And IF dh was massively apologetic and not minimising the situation to ds.
And IF it weren't CV times when not being picked up leaves you with nowhere good to be.

Then I would think... ds is fine. Shit happens. Move on.

But that's not what's going on here, so...
11/10 on divorce.

Thus your DH has ensured that if there’s ever a need for you or your son to rely on him, that you’ll be sitting there sweating that he has done the job properly.
That would do my head in. Why do some men leave all the grown up stuff to the missus?