Am i being unrealistic (sorry very long)

[mrswoodentop]

I?ve name changed for this although I?ve been on her for more years than I care to remember and I know this is long but I had to get it off my chest and find out whether I am being unrealistic

Am I being ridiculous, I don?t know but I feel weighed down with sadness at the fact that my dh seems to get so little enjoyment from our children. We have three boys ;16,13 and 8 ,I am so aware that time is slipping away and they will soon be grown up and these should be the happiest days for us .DH is obsessed with ?jobs?; how tidy the house is ,how organised we are ,last week he decided it was more important to polyfilla some holes in the summerhouse then to watch ds3 on his first go on ds2s big bike which he is now big enough for ,despite ds3 pleading with him .

On Saturday I took ds2 into our local market town to change his library books and some one to one,dh and ds3 left on their own. There were so many things that he could have done with him but instead I come home to find dh has cleared out the study, in the process reorganising ds1?s GCSE revision notes in a ?much more organised way?WTF;ds1 now completely annoyed .and ds3 had watched TV all afternoon.

On Sunday he has to work,fair enough, but does he have to choose the kitchen table so everyone has to be quiet in the main downstairs room of the house .All fine until the children start to argue and dh responds with his usual ?stop it, stop it??what is it for goodness sake why can?t he be more discriminating instead of us shouting stop it when they argue and turning off the computer(subject of argument)cue tears and upset from both boys.

Finally he finishes work. Great I think we could do something as a family but no he announces he taking the dog out. Not disputing the dog does need a walk, or in fact that the children will moan if asked to go as well but he doesn?t even attempt to persuade them or make an effort to engage them?just gets dog ready and goes. So I took dses swimming (dh doesn?t like going swimming, too many people in pool, even though we belong to a gym and its members only, don?t know really he just always turns his nose up at it)As usual at the weekend the only others in pool are children and their Dad?s ,cue ds3 asking why his dad never does anything fun with them. I always defend dh but do you know I?m fed up with it, why doesn?t he take pleasure in their company and want to do things with them. On Monday we did take the dog out for a walk which was nice to get the children out but he never thinks of what they would like to do just expects them to fit in with what he wants

This makes him sound awful he?s not but he has turned into a bit of a killjoy ,always going on about tidying and cleaning and it struck me yesterday that when he is in the house its a more solemn atmosphere, we all know something is expected of us IYSWIM ,yesterday evening he went out for a drink with a friend within half an hour the house was a alive again with laughter .Ds3 and DS1 were in hysterics as ds1 (currently doing GCSEs ) read out his practice essays for French in english,ds2 and I were out competing with each other on angry birds .Silly things that dh would look down his nose at but it was a light bulb moment for me as we all lounged in our bedroom laughing,dh would not only not allow this the children wouldn?t behave with this much freedom when he is around but it just wouldn?t happen ,ds1 in particular would never ask for help with French (dh very good linguist) for fear of looking stupid in front of his dad.

He does love the children I know he does but his lack of interaction with them, he never listens to what they say,even the 16 year old ,he can?t second guess them because he doesn?t know them ,is breaking my heart .I feel so disappointed in him, both of us had disrupted and frankly pretty ghastly home lives when we were young if we are honest and he knows that my priority is that the children don?t have this. Who cares if the study is a mess or the dishwasher needs emptying if the sun is shining and there is a picnic opportunety!I?m tired of trying to persuade him to prioritise enjoying the children ,maybe if he doesn?t enjoy them he just doesn?t and I should just accept it .

Hmm. He's either a selfish knob who considers that he's the only person in the house and the rest of you are appendages who are less important than him - or he is possibly suffering from stress/depression. hence the irritability and need to control the environment.l

Has he always been like this?

It's hard to imagine someone turning like this overnight, so presumably there were signs. Did you talk about your expectations before having children? You also have a fairly big age gap between oldest and youngest, so presumably by the time your oldest was 7/8 you must have had some idea that your DH wasn't the get stuck in/hands on kind of dad? Yet you went on to have another child.

I'm not making a judgement, just trying to get a clearer picture. It almost sounds as though he's the type who wasn't totally sure about wanting to be a father. Unless this is a more recent thing, in which case I agree he may be depressed/stressed about something.

I don't doubt he loves his children, because 99.9% of parents do once the children arrive, but that doesn;t necessarily mean they are going to be great at parenting.

Sorry about all the question marks i am having a problem with my keyboard!

I think he is stressed he has a very busy job,long hours partner and income has fallen but i also think that he regrds time spent with the children as a luxury which can only be indulged in once all jobs and outstanding tasks have been completed IYSWIM

I think you need to make time to sit down and talk to him (without the children there) about the fact that he is stressed and working long hours and also about the money aspect. Be upfront and tell him your worries, and encourage him to talk about his. You need to re-negotiate things. Decide on some activities you will do as a family, and some things which you do with the children, and some things which he does. Not necessarily big things, but taking the younger one to the park for an hour, or playing a game. And look at what you can do to support each other. Do you work? Could you increase your hours to take some of the money worries off him? Could you take responsibility for certain aspects of household tasks so it frees him up?

Maybe go out for a meal or a drink with him and tell him how you and the boys feel
or get his best mate/ brother/ your dad to give him the light bulb moment

Hmm... I think he sounds as if he is suffering from stress. I suffer from anxiety and depression. Keeping my environment reasonably tidy and ordered is important to me - I have had to compromise over the years but there is a level below which I start to get very uncomfortable and stressed. When I am really bad I can physically start to shake and get headaches from too much chaos and noise. I have to constantly fight against the idea that I can leave the house/spend time playing with the DC when it's messy. I always feel like I'm, juggling 10 vital things and if I stop the world will fall apart.

Of course children are more important. I suspect that your DH would admit that but he can't relax and enjoy them in his current state of mind

We do have quite a long age gap,it just happened that way also we lost one between two and three and our middle son has quite severe SEN,enough to mean he is at a specialist school.

Actually he was keener than i was to have children and he was besotted with ds1 ,its almost as if in the last 5 years or so,as they have become less malleable and have stronger personalities of their own he has just become bored and not a little baffled with the whole thing.

He finds the whole idea of them having different opinions to him and him having to respect those quite baffling.I think deep down he expects his word to be the most important,he is also i have to say becomming more arrogant with age .He just doesn't value their thoughts and opinions as much as i do ,its taken me a long time to get him to accept that he should say please and thank you to them or knock before going into their rooms .He's not horrid about it but as far as he is concerned they are children and therefore cannot possibly have as valid opinion as he has!

He is also as are quite afew in his proffession a bit of a workaholic,if you saw the child of our time programme last night I would say he is definately a "conscientious"person and probably not that high on agrreableness either although he would always be there for us i know,but work comes first.

I can relate to what you're saying here as have somnething similar going on at home. My 2 DSs are more relaxed when H is away, we have louder music on in the kitchen so they dance about, more mess throughout the house and later bedtimes and though I get a bit exhausted being on my own, we all seem to have more energy somehow.

I also notice that mealtimes are chattier without H. When he is there he sort of directs conversation at me, so it's adult updates on the day, no interest to boys, or he directs it at them but on his terms. So if they go on in a silly way, like 5 & 9 yr old like to, they get admonished. I sometimes think - 'where's the child in you? join in and get silly!'

Sometimes I have asked H to lighten up and he tries. The sad thing is when he tries a little the boys love it so much - they sort of lap it up and i just think that is so sad.

I try and make sure there is atleast 1 activity per weekend that is dad/son for DS1 atleast, so they go off on run/bike ride or to get hair cut and shopping, just so they keep doing things together

Sorry ,answering in parts,yes I do work,i used to work more but he hated it and in an unguarded moment admitted that he wanted me to work less hours so that the house would be tidier and we would be more organised!

So i cut back ,my employers were fantastic but there is no going back, and it has had a big effect on our income.

Its ironic really because when we met he used to go on about how he loved homes that weren't perfect as they needed to be relaxed homes and not show houses,as he gets older hes turning into his mother .I would be honest and say that if he had been like this when we were younger it probably would have been enough for me to realise that much as i loved him we were not a good match

Our house by the way is not a shambles or dirty but its not a show home either .

I think that sometimes you can get carried away with getting jobs done, and like your DH just miss out on the joy of just "being". My DP is very similar, and if left to himself would spend the whole weekend doing jobs and working - not my idea of fun!

Maybe you could ask DH to set aside 2/3 hours at the weekend to do something specific with your children, but then tell him to work (in the study, not in the kitchen!)/do jobs the rest of the time?

I think the suggestion to sit down and talk about it is good. I do this at regular intervals and it helps for a while. I read Steve Biddoulph Raising Boys when I first had a boy and i remember one really key thing was he thought that boys 'pass on' from their mothers to their fathers around 8yrs and that their fathers are then really key role models for them. I often remind H of this and point out to him that while i can do a huge amount for our DSs by being nurturing & loving, it is as crucial that they have that nurturing love from him too.

My H didn't have it from his own father which is hard as it means we're trying to fight against a deeply ingrained picture of what fathering means.

I think what you describe is actually fairly normal, just your DH is at the extreme end.

People have children, and its easy when they are little, because you have more control over what they do/how they are. Even the things that are stressful - lack of sleep etc are just the run of the mill parenting stuff.

As they get older, and develop into individuals, its harder to cope with that if you have a personality type which likes to be in control, and is a bit fearful and bewildered by people who think differently. And you've got the added pressure of a child with complex needs which must be even more bewildering for your DH. It sounds like what many parents go through. You want to have children, you enjoy having them, but as they grow up and become more challenging and individual, it's just plain hard sometimes!

Communication is the key. Talk to him about your children. Try to reassure him that its ok that they are individuals. Some parents have a blueprint of how parenting is going to be, and he sounds like one of these. Try to let him see that he is making it harder by doing this, because ultimately, he can't control what your children will do or become. The key thing is maintaining a positive relationship so that as adults they want to spend time with you both. As you say, they grow up fast. When they are adults, they will have their own lives, and won't have to spend any time with their dad if they don't want to - so its in his interests to nurture the relationship now.

Yes, from your last post it's clear he has issues about control - controlling the environment, having things ordered etc. Very often that's an outward sign of not feeling in control of the bigger issues. Your house being a bit dusty isn't a big issue. Whether he is building a good relationship with his sons IS a big issue. But it's so easy to focus on the less important things rather than face the big ones.

He doesn't sound like an inherently bad man at all - just someone who has become ground down with the reality of family life, work etc and he needs to have the 'light bulb' moment you describe. Talking to him is essential. but also, are you having a famiy holiday anywhere? Or even just a day out? You need to do something as a family which is just fun. Not something with a purpose - clearing the study or tidying up - just plain unadulterated fun.

Could you try and use the fact that he likes getting 'jobs done' and being task focused at home and get him to do such jobs with one of your sons? Rope them in on the sorting out of the shed and ask them to do it together, then go off and share an ice-cream at the local shop afterwards? Just think of ways to get them to spend time together where they are sharing something like a household task then a bit of relaxation time??

Sorry MrsW, for coming at you with totally different suggestion to violet! Sure that both have their place in the grand scheme of things!

All suggestions welcome loves2walk and violethill,its good to know Loves2walk that some of tese things are not so unusual.Family meals with dh aer just one long table mannnars battle,I know they are important but we only really manage one family meal a week,as he is rarely home during the week and I just think he could maybe pick one item,say elbows,for a week and let the others go.Ds1 in particular would in the past use this as the ideal opprtunety to wind dh up and the more dh dug himself in the more ds does the same.

you just want to say"you see them so little why don't you use this as an opprtunety to find out ablout what theyv'e been doing or who their friends are "but dh cannot see beyond his duty as a father to teach them table manners!

his own father was hopeless,actually worse then that.He hsa a fantastic stepfather who came on the scemne ewhen he was about 14 and who dh idolised until he was well about 30 really when he just became a bit mre realistic .His stepfather would bnever have behaved this way and sometimes i poiint out to dh that he wouldn't have beaved like that to him, but it doesn't seem to make a difference.

I want to talk to him but we have had this conversation at least 4 times in the last 3 years ,he just doesn't seem to hear it .I did have some luck when once again he wasn't comming to any school events and sd2 was playing his cornet in a school concert ( a very big deal for him)I just told him quite calmly that I wasn't goinmg to get upset again about him not comming,I wasn't missing out because I was going ,ds2 wasn't missing out because he no longer expected dh to come and there fore the only person missing out was dh.I must have struck a bit of a nerve becasue at 3pm the school hall door opened and in he came ,I could have cried and ds did so well and was so thrilled that Daddy was there .

I know that if we have this conversation again ,he will be hurt and sad but he really believes he is right.I however feel heartbroken and I wonder if I even love him anymore because when I look at him I just feel hurt that he is behaving like this to our 3 precious children ,ds1 is quite open about it to me ,he will come back to see me but not his dad ,he says he has tried to talk to his father about things which are important to him but dh just dismisses them as not important,"you'll grow out of it"I had to deal with harder things "you don't know what a problem is "etc

I really don't know if I can face the rest of my life with this person who I loved so much but seems to have changed so much

Sorry awful typing hope you can forgive me

mrsw, sadly I have no experience or anything helpful to add but your posts have made me well up with tears. I'm so sad for you and your DSs. I suppose the only thing you can do is tell him how this is affecting your relationship and your feelings for him - perhaps then he will try harder?

It does sound as if he is perhaps acting out some of his natural father's views and perhaps he's not really aware of that?

I hope you find a way to communicate this to him. You sound so unhappy.

mrswoodentop, your posts make me feel sad for you

I do agree there is some element of control or stress/depression, and especially what you wrote about his own dad. he'll really need help to break that cycle.

I was wondering, what is your relationship with him like? take the kids out of the equation for a moment. is he distant from you too, or if you had a meal out by yourselves what would it be like? does he have close friends, or just acquaintances/drinking buddies? sounds like he has intimacy issues, I don't mean physically, but being close to someone IYSWIM? if you have an emotional relationship with someone, be it partner/kids/friends, it can make you vulnerable and people don't like that, it's scary.

sorry I'm waffling, I hope that made sense (apologies if I've got the wrong end of the stick)

Maths, I don't think you're waffling. I think it makes sense. I'm like that myself

No he's not distant from me,we have been together for 25 year now!We had a lovely day out at the chelsea Flower show last week ,it is me that is distant in a way because this whole thing about the children and family life is getting to me more and more,I think that with ds1 taking GCSEs it is becomming more and more evident to me that time is running out.

He poor thing is bewidered he thinks it is just me being ridiculous and there is no problem.In a bizarre way i think that although he would like to be closer to the boys ,he just doesn't think thats part of being a parent,hes not there to be their friend but their parent and if that means they don't come running back as adults well thats sad but hes done his job well because they are independent.May be i've not got that quite tight but that is sort of it.

Sorry,quite right not tight!it is affecting our relationship though,because even physically i struggle to get past the disppointment that I feel over the relationship taht he has with the children.

Can you approach it through talking about his own experience with his father?

Does he wish it had been better? Does he regret that it wasn't the sort of relationship where he would have wanted it to continue into adulthood?

Sounds as though he has a fixed blueprint in his head - you feed them, clothe them, bring them up and then wave them off as independent beings. And this is really tricky, because there's nothing wrong with that, it's not abusive, but it's just that there are other ways of parenting that he might find more fulfilling.

well that's a start that he's still close to you, but if it's affecting the way you feel about being with him it really has to change, does he know just how much it upsets you? would you show him parts of this thread or write it in a letter maybe? get the boys to write one? (or is that too blackmaily? )

I dunno, it sounds like the cliche old-fashioned parent doesn't it, distant, tucked away in the office sort of thing. perhaps 50 years ago it would be fairly normal, but that's not the point.

I think he is frightened. Frightened of getting it wrong, just as his father did. The problem is, that however good his step dad was, his father was the one who was there, getting it wrong, whilst your DH was little. By the time Step-dad was on the scene, the blue print was made IYSWIM. I don't know how to resolve it, but I suspect that whatever is said and done, there will be sadness. Maybe he needs you all to show him how good a family can be. I expect he is also stressed about work, let's face it, most of us are finding it harder these days, and if you have had a drop in income, even though it was at his instigation, he is going to feel duty bound to keep food on the table and pay the bills, so therefore, probably feels he needs to do all the extra work.

I don't know what to suggest I am afraid, but I do wish you success in showing him the sort of family you could be!