It's nearly 9pm and I've just come downstairs and left my husband to it because I don't think I can take much more. Frankly I feel like moving the hell out.
I am trying to get DS1 and DS2 - who are 5 and 2 respectively - to sleep at a decent time, together in their own beds and in their own room. I have been trying to do this for several weeks, and am getting nowhere. At the same time, I don't feel hubby and I are on the same page in any way over what we expect from their bedtime routines or lack of same.
Previously DS1 had a great routine. Hubby would hold on to DS2 while I put his brother to bed. DS1 enjoyed the attention, and I enjoyed the 1on1 time and all was fine but DS2 never went to bed anywhere near early enough this way and my parents argued that it was wrong to put the eldest down first (not that there is any way at all DS2 who is a night bird would ever go to bed earlier than 7ish when DS1 was going down).
I would have preferred my partner to read DS2 stories and settle him in a quiet, dimly lit room until I was ready to take him, rather than sit in front of an over-stimulating telly letting him chug a whole pack of fromage frais while they waited for me but hub didn't always listen to my wish which I feel has set us up for terrible problems. Now it feels as though I am the only one trying to change the situation to one that is acceptable and that he is wilfully undermining me!
More info: DS2 climbed out of his cot young and has slept in with us, or rather me as hub would move to spare room for his own comfort, for most of his young life. (I am prepared for stern judgement from some of you but in my defence co-sleeping was the only thing that kept me sane over the early months and it ensured that I could carry on BFing until DS2 and I were both ready to stop.) He does stay in his own bed now but only if we carry him to it after he has gone to sleep with one of us on our own bed rather than at the same time as and with DS1.
What I want is for both of them to lie down in their own bed near their brother and have story time together then go to sleep with a smile. Preferably at a decent hour.
I feel like I am the only person who cares if they do this and that I am also the only one who wants them to sleep around 7. Many nights I have come down at 10pm or even 11pm because DS2 won't go down, and I am in tears because I haven't been able to eat and am too exhausted to consider doing anything in my (ha bloody ha!) so-called "free time". This has made me feel that a firm routine for both is very important, but hub won't play ball and seems to undermine me when I do try to be firm (in case you've not guessed by now, I am the "bad cop" here and he is "Wonderdad" - that old story again).
An example from tonight: I had them both in bed, DS2 was actually looking likely to go to sleep in his own bed for a change, when DS1 started messing about and upsetting DS2 to gain my attention. I told him to stop several times, gave him the usual warnings and counted down and then took DS2 out of the room because he had been thoroughly reawakened by this point.
DS1 started crying in his room because he knew he'd done wrong. I had to tell hub not to get involved and not to go in and comfort him because it was between me and him, but I then let him come to me to tell him again what he had done wrong but that I love him no matter what and that he needed to go to bed now without being tucked in again (a delay tactic), which he did like a good little boy just 1hr after his supposed bedtime (!).
While I was telling DS1 the above, my husband was sitting on the other side of the room saying: "You're (DS2) the troublemaker aren't you, not DS1, he never causes any trouble" - this within DS1's range of hearing, without even knowing what had happened in the room to invoke my telling-off. He couldn't see how that undermined me, so I had to explain it to him in black and white and he still looked smug which of course made me even more angry and resentful (though I kept my expression of this in until DS1 had gone back to bed).
So I told him again for the umpteenth time that it's not fair his playing Good Cop to my Bad and that it's bad for the children not to get enough sleep and that it's also bad for our health, sanity and marriage, and that he needs to stand firm and be on the same page as me at bedtime or we'll never get anywhere. I said that he shouldn't undermine my parenting in front of the children (I think he does it on purpose to make me blow my top thus proving his point and his superior parenting skills) and that frankly if it doesn't change he can do it alone because all he seems to be doing is undoing all the work I put in with his words and actions. Naturally I didn't manage to keep my Quiet Voice and DS2 was in the room and probably got even more woken up by me than he had been by his brother.
It is now 9.30pm and hub still hasn't come downstairs i.e. DS2 is still awake and most likely still on our matrimonial bed reading stories because hub won't even TRY to put him down in his own bed, path of least resistance etc. And I am absolutely knackered resentful and cross, and will have to keep out of his way to avoid conflict until my own bedtime.
It's just not on, any of it. Please help :(