Help me understand this argument with DH about our sick baby

[notaurewhatusername]

I’m trying to understand an argument my husband and I had this morning and would appreciate some outside perspective.

We have a 9-month-old and his mother usually looks after the baby during the day. We work for ourselves, though my workload is admittedly much lighter and more flexible than his.

Last night our baby had a temperature and I was up with him from 2am to 5am. At 6:45am I gave the baby to my husband and went back to bed, telling him to let his mother know about the temperature and make the decision whether to send the baby or not.

I woke at 9am and my husband told me his mother is also sick so can’t have the baby. There was no discussion over who stays home in these circumstances. It’s an unwritten rule it’s always me due to having the lighter workload and more flexibility. Though this particular morning, I had a doctor’s appointment at 10am so I asked if he could stay home with the baby until after my appointment, which would be about an hour. He said no his day is too busy. I then asked if he could watch the baby while I quickly shower so I’m not late for my appointment. He said “why can’t you just have a shower, why does everything have to be made easy for you?”

He said he has a very busy day at work and I’m not being supportive of how stressful his workload is. He’d already had the baby for about two hours at this point, though the baby was sleeping for most of it.

He suggested bringing the baby into work for an hour or two for someone there to watch him. I pointed out that no one wants to be around a baby with a temperature.

I said it’s fine, I’ll sort everything and he should just go to work but come home early Friday afternoon so I can go to the gym, since he often finishes early on Fridays anyway. This also made him angry and he said I have nothing important to do.

Some additional context: he can be flexible with work when it suits him. He often comes home for a nap then works later, or takes afternoons off for activities. When I’ve pointed this out before, he says he naps so he can work a full day when he gets home, though it’s usually only another hour or two of work. We also often argue when I suggest not taking the baby to his mother even when the baby is sick, so I tend to leave these decisions to him to avoid conflict.

I don’t understand why this escalated the way it did. Can anyone help me make sense of this?

“Why does everything have to be made easy for you?” What, like sitting up with a sick baby for three hours in the night whilst he slept?

One of you still needs to work and if your workload is lighter it makes sense for him to be the one to still work.

There’s no point adding a backlog of even more work left to do to your list of things including the poorly baby so it’s an obvious answer.

With regards to the gym, if my baby was poorly I’d probably be sacking off the gym for the day. I’m sure if you asked him to finish early to come home and help with the baby as a team it would have been a different answer but he’s probably wondering why the gym is of such importance on a day when your baby is poorly and things are already hectic enough with you having to more work.

I think the part that annoyed me was the morning bit, the fact he would not stay home while I did the doctors appointments and then I said ok just while I have a quick shower and the answer was still no. Perhaps ignore the gym bit as that wasn’t the bit that annoyed me. But no. I wasn’t sacking the gym off because otherwise I’ve been in the house all day and night and one hour of mental health break would be nice when he’s a parent too.

It’s the inflexibility from him that got to me.

He is obviously more ‘busy and important’ than you and sees it as your job to support him but not the other way around. Don’t try to understand it - it’s not your problem. Just point out to him the inequality of it whenever it comes up. He won’t like it.

I think the gym goes out the window if your child is sick, tbh.

I hear you about the inflexibility however I’m trying to see both sides. If he knows you’re not going to be in work for the day that puts more pressure on his already (as you’ve admitted) larger work load so it doesn’t make sense for him to be going in later or finishing earlier.

Could you not have showered whilst the baby was asleep?

I'm sorry, but sometimes you're up through the night and just need to get on with it.
If you got up at 9, he's probably already late for work, you've not given much time to get yourself ready and out, then make two separate requests that will take more time out his work day when he's explained he is busy that day. You've left the decision making to him on whether baby is well enough to go to his mum's. I see his point, do you have no problem solving ability?

@DaisyChain505no because I had one hour to have breakfast me and baby AND get to the doctors appointment, in the and I made it work of course I had to but it was the reluctance for him to just help to mean I wasn’t late for doctors that annoyed me. Like 15 minutes while I have a shower?

I certainly woudn't be prioritising the gym if my baby was poorly and had a temperature. However your husband sounds self important and inflexible. I would be addressing this for sure as it's not a good omen for the future and you may find that he always has an excuse not to share child care.

Much of this will be about how it was said. You’re obviously both tired as well as you have a small baby.
Both of you wanted to prioritise the things that you wanted/needed to do. Work, appointments..
From your side of things it sounds like he was being a bit of a selfish twat.

@Survivingnotthriving24context, I left the decision to him because otherwise we argue. I always say DS is not going when he’s sick, DH will say he should go and I didn’t want the fight. So I left that decision to him. The issue here is that I woke up with an hour notice of the fact my day has been derailed, and I had a doctors appointment in an hour when no one had breakfast, and the hour included travel time. I was late in the end to the doctors but made it three minutes before they cancelled off the appointment

There’s a lot of pressure around working for yourself.

He may be so tunnel visioned on “Well she won’t be in work today, that means my days going to include a lot more work and a knock on effect of a backlog of things.”

and this mindset see him focusing on work and expecting you to focus on baby.

I think you were both under pressure and things got on top of you as a couple. A sick baby, sick childcare and two jobs is just hard. It sounds to me as if he was facing a tough day at work and already stressing about the pressure as he was going to be late. I would have found the requests about the shower and the gym quite irritating as well if I’m honest - surely if you were both up and going and the plan for the day reasonably set, the priority at that point was for him to get to work?

I think I’d make a plan to make a nice peaceful Friday evening. Tbh I’d apologise for loading him with requests when he was trying to get out the door.

It all sounds incredibly complicated and I am not sure how either of you get any work done between naps / last minute childcare / gym etc. I think he sees childcare as your problem. Maybe that's fair because you have less work (part time?) and more flexibility. However, if he can have a nap in the middle of the working day then it sounds like he has plenty of flexibility and he should step up.

@PermanentTemporaryfair enough, thanks for the outside perspective I suppose I didn’t see it like this. I guess it was lack of understanding on both parts

@Doveyouknowi think that’s where im
coming from. End of the week he always swans off for lunches finishes early etc. he can change the schedule when it suits HIM.

I asked him what he had to do that day and it was things that he certainly could have been flexible with. I’m in similar line of work so know this for a fact

I have been in a similar position with a man who would not hold his baby while I drank a cup of coffee safely.

He did a bunk a couple of months later.

The disdain your partner showed here is alarming.

Fair enough then with letting him make the call on childcare.
The being up with an hours notice of your day being derailed is wholly on you though, you chose to sleep until that time knowing you had an appointment, you need to take some personal responsibility. I suspect if he woke you at 8am you'd have been angry at being woken.
Unfortunately you can't have it all ways, the lighter workload and someone else to take on the bulk of responsibility with home/childcare.

We have a similar set up to you. Both work for our own business from home. I had maternity leave, then have worked flexibly since then, my work load is drastically lighter than his and he works full time plus several evenings a week.

Our child is basically my responsibility, i used to have him all week but he has had 15 hours at nursery from 2 years old and 30 hours from 3 years old and we have no other childcare.

He'd get annoyed at me for borrowing him during the day when our son had been sick or asking him to put him in the car when he should have already started work. I saw it the same way that he could be flexible when he wanted to but not for me but ultimately we're making them fall behind at work when we use them too much.

DS is 3.5 now and the balance is better; I have him all day Monday and Friday and I don't disturb DH during his work day anymore, I take DS out and leave him to work, he is fully my responsibility during that time as I'm not working that day. However, the time before and after work must be fair, we both get time to shower and get ready properly before DH starts work, and after work he needs to come down asap after 5pm and get stuck in.

If I'd have been in your position I probably would have done the same and been upset about it but perhaps it would have just been better to reschedule the doctors appointment as your childcare was gone for the day.

You don't need someone to look after the bay while you have a shower do you? I used to pop the baby in a bouncy chair nearby. I can see how it would be a bit annoying for him that you wanted him to stay longer when he was already later than usual.

@MapleOakPinenor usually no, but anyone with a baby knows getting ready to leave the house takes twice as long with a baby, at my surgery they cancel you if you’re more than ten minutes late.

also for context, my appointment was for a blood test in readiness for hospital appt Tuesday so if I cancelled it then my hospital appt would be useless and would take me months to get seen again so wasn’t as simple as just cancel it

Both of you were tired. The baby was sick and the wheels fell off a bit.

I can see both sides.

why did you sleep so late if you had an appointment?

and why get at him about the gym?

was your husband late to work?

do you normally sleep til 9?

how do you usually manage a shower?

@Stronglei had gone to bed at 11pm, up with baby 2-5am then again 6.30am, I was tired. No I don’t usually sleep in that late. If it were just me which I assumed it was. An hour would have been plenty of time to make the app. It was when I woke up I realised baby couldn’t go to usually childcare.

usually having a shower is fine with baby, I would have Factored in more time but this was n initially situation.

people are acting as if they haven’t had babies, baby often shits as walking out the door for example. It’s rarely straightforward and the appt was crucial and nonviolent be rearranged as I explained earlier up post. He handed baby to me without breakfast. We both had an hour to have breakfast, me get showered and then travel to the appt.

@Strongleno he wasn’t late. I had to cancel my day and still let down an important meeting btw.

this is the thing, I just feel like I don’t even matter anymore. Like my life is totally unimportant