Comparison - baby DC and DSC

[BoredofHearingAboutIt]

Does any one else get this?

And yes I'm being precious but I'm getting sick of hearing when DSC were little. DSC did this. DSC did that. Me and ex did this and me and ex did that.

We're different people. It's a different child. It's a different time. Advice is different. Argh!!! Please tell me I'm not alone in feeling like this. I get trying to be helpful but he simply isn't in any way atm generally and then adding what he did in the past with his ex and first two children is just winding me up.

How long ago did he have his first children? Different time sounds a bit extreme! What advice has change?

On the rest yes can totally see how this is annoying but I can also see that your DH is obviously going to bring his prior experience to bear on parenting his younger children. You will too if you have another.

I’m not proud of this, but when DP was doing this incessantly I brought it up in a midwife visit and told her, completely seriously, that it was making me feel like I didn’t want his input into our child’s life at all if he was never going to see our child as an individual from their DSSiblings. The midwife told me that I was definitely taking it slightly too seriously, but she also told DP that he needed to be more aware of what he was saying, as a FTM their role should be supporting you, not lording it over you as someone who’s done it all before. Tell him that if you need input from his previous experience you’ll ask for it.

Ah different time I was referring to the Coronavirus. There were simply things available to him and the ex which aren't available now. It's just how it is and I have accepted it but him pointing it out isn't helpful.

Advice on babies overheating etc. Babies not being in the room for sleeping and naps up to six months. I don't know whether the advice was the same 15 years ago but he claims it was not. I'm going on his word for this as he had children then. Advice on formula and weaning too. Again I'm taking his word on it. I'm going by today's up to date advice.

I can see why this is totally annoying.
Sure he’s going to have memories, but you don’t have to be all excited hearing about them.
This is your first baby and you have no prior experience to draw off, and you want to learn your own way without constantly being told how to do things because he and his ex did it such and such a way.

Oh, DSD is 17 and the advice is definitely different in a lot of ways, DH was comparing all the way through the antenatal classes! I'm also able to do a lot of things with the baby that just weren't available to him with her. Although he had SureStart which I would have bitten your arm off for in the early days.

In terms of comparisons, she and DC are so spectacularly different that mostly we've spent the past year with me going "Did she?" and him going "No! She was chill!" Wee man has no middle gears. None.

That's the thing I just want to do things in my own way and learn how. From talking to friends things that work for my baby do not work for them. They are all different and I think he forgets that. Even our DC is changing what works for him and what doesn't.

My DH made out like he knew everything about babies when we had our DC because he had had a child before. When baby arrived it was clear maternal instinct took over and he would look to me to soothe the baby. When DS got to upset he’d pass him back to me to settle. DS was also breastfed, that was new territory to DH and obviously limited his role a little in the very early days. I firmly believe all babies are different and you should be led by your child with many things.

When I was pregnant DH made a comment comparing our pregnancies and I told him quite firmly that was the last comparison he should make. I’d advise you to do the same. In the same way I don’t enjoy receiving unsolicited parenting advice from anyone else I certainly don’t want it second hand from the ex!

@DogBowlSpaghetti yes yes yes! This was us. I did mention comparison in pregnancy (I had hideous morning sickness) but the comparisons are back.

This is going to sound really cruel, but relevant IMO but one saving grace is that DSS has many behavioural issues and attachment issues (these are diagnosed so it’s not me being unfair) and so it helped me that I could say, well it clearly didn’t work for you so let’s try something else.

Yes! Our first DD was an incredibly difficult baby for the first 3/4 months. She had colic and reflux. When she was awake, she screamed which was most of the time. It was pure hell. OH was very unsupportive. He kept referring back to his DD1 who was such an angel, a ‘lovely, quiet baby’.

He barely did anything with our baby but the way he talked about how he changed DSD’s nappies, took her for walks to give her mum a break, bathed her and ‘loved every step of the way’ made me incredibly resentful because he was very cold towards DD and myself during those early months. That was almost 7 years ago and I’m still hopping mad about it to be honest. We’ve since had another baby and he’s been great with her but I feel sorry for my eldest that she didn’t get that treatment - although she doesn’t remember and I’m probably being stupid.

@User I feel your pain. I had talks of what he did with the first DC but won't with ours because I don't let him. I do but he just doesn't want to so I no longer ask. I just get on with it. It's a shame. As you say DS won't remember but I will.

Have you actually told him how you feel about this (recently, and calmly) or are you silently fuming?

If the former, he's a dick and I'm really sorry, if the latter maybe try sitting down and telling him how you feel?

Though by the sound of the "doing stuff with baby" thing i imagine he is just a dick. Maybe it's time to stop asking and start telling? "He's fed and clean and won't need a nap for a bit, I'm going out for some air/up to have a bath/to sit in bed, drink wine and scroll MN, I'll be back in a bit, don't come get me unless something catches fire." Id seriously reccomend leaving the house, even if you just drive the car one road over and nap with the seat back.

Yabu to expect him not refer to his reference points aka his children.

You sound as though you're incredibly insecure and massively blowing this out of proportion tbh.
You need to rein it in a tad or you risk the relationship exploding.

@Solomummy, it irritates me to death when my mother, SIL or MIL give me out of date, potentially dangerous advice so it would definitely annoy me if my partner was doing the same.

I have spoken to him calmly about it. He knows it grates on me. I'm not asking him never to mention them but not a conversation about DC goes by where a comparison isn't made. It is upsetting. He just doesn't want to spend time with him at the moment as DS is "boring".

@solomummy I don't quite understand the reference points? We do, of course, talk about his children. I probably am insecure 🤷 but I don't see why I should have to accept his and his ex's way of parenting when it goes against how I want to parent. I can listen and still disagree. They left their babies to cry it out. I don't wish to do that. I don't need to hear more than once why it is better than how I deal with things. And what am I reigning in exactly?

I’d take some of it with a pinch of salt.

My DH cousin did this nonsense with his second wife. However a lot of what he was saying was bullshit as he wasn’t the hands on father with his first children either which was part of why that marriage ended.

Second wife was made to feel inadequate (why did he help ex but not me) while not realising that she had basically had a child with a dud.

For the record, yes we called him out when there but 2nd wife kept me at arms length because 1st wife was and still is a friend of mine.

YABU, this is your issue, not his. It is completely normal/typical for parents to use children as points of reference. I had a 6 year gap between my last dc and was constantly comparing the experience and how things were different/had changed.

@Laaf80 I can relate to the inadequacy. I don't really have much to do with DP's family as I've not met most of them. The ex is very much part of their family which is good. They've known each other a long time.

@belfasteast fair enough. It is my issue. I'll get back in my box

i can see both sides to this tbh.
he has a history that you knew about, of course he's going to be involved, he's the father. He has just as much right to parent the way he wants to, as you do.

On the other hand it can't be good to just take his word for it, ask others what it was like and call his bluff on something he gets wrong, see how he likes it.

Is your child going to meet his family whilst you stay at home? You sound quite resentful of his past, you need to form some sort of relationship with your ils for the sake of your child.

YABU, this is your issue, not his. It is completely normal/typical for parents to use children as points of reference. I had a 6 year gap between my last dc and was constantly comparing the experience and how things were different/had changed.

That’s fair enough as long as he isn’t constantly doing it. The op clearly doesn’t want him banging on all the time about how he and his ex did things.

He needs to remember that he chose to have another child with someone who wasn’t a parent while he already was, so he needs to let the op have that new parent experience like he had. And yes have the odd moment where he relates to his past experiences, but it shouldn’t dampen the op’s experience.

If he is waxing lyrical about what he did and didn’t do yet barely pays attention to his child, then spot the contradiction.

How is he with your step children? Is he hands on?

It’s a shame that you don’t have much to Do with his family. In our scenario, the family had to support cousins ex as he wasn’t. In all honesty we’d do the same for 2nd wife but I think she thinks we prefer 1st. Generally we don’t, we just know her better.

The poor woman does all the heavy lifting for all the kids while he will sit there and say I remember when I did x,y,z for 1st children (like fuck he did). While 2nd wife just looks.... crestfallen.

Do you recognise that pattern?

The point I’m making is - is he gas lighting you? Bringing up history not because it’s a fairly natural thing to do but because it puts you in your place?

If you had two biological children op you would compare how you did things then and how you do them now too.
It's natural, I think you sound insecure.

It sounds as if you are claiming that you know best and his experience is invalid. I think you could alienate him from his child by making him uncomfortable in sharing his his experience of raising his other children.
I understand that you feel sensitive but you are both your child's parents and you both have a right to parent your child.
I wonder if you also exclude your step children? It is early days to exclude and disparage your your child's father and his family and his half siblings.
Be generous and encourage your husband to spend time with his new baby so they develop a real bond and he becomes a protective, loving Dad and a supportive partner