Nighttime and DH vent (long)

ScoobyM · December 2010

Hi Ladies! I've been MIA for a few days with a lot of things going on around here. However, I have been mentally composing this vent for about a week now, LOL. I just HAVE to get it out.

So, my DH is a really good guy and very helpful with the kids and pretty much everything. But at nighttime, he just can't seem to wake up enough to do much of anything. Even when he was still on leave, most of the time he slept through feeding and changing both DD and DS unless I woke him to ask for help. Now that he's back to work, I handle DS at night myself during the week, and lately on weekends even though he says he will help he usually sleeps through it and I let him. I usually feed DS and then soothe him back to sleep in our room, the whole while shooting daggers at my sleeping DH and ranting in my head about his inability to get his A$$ out of bed to give me a break with night duty once in a while.

This past week, he had a big moot court thing at work (he's an attorney) and since he doesn't normally have to do a lot of this type of thing he was rather freaked out. So he decided he needed to sleep up in our spare room the night before (on Monday). The moot court actually got postponed, so he did it again last night. Now, it isn't like he got up extra early or anything; he just had to get to work on time. And since he doesn't get out of bed when DS wakes up anyway, I just do not understand why he had to go sleep upstairs??? When I go back to work in a month, if I have a big meeting or something the next day, it's not like I will go sleep in the spare room, given that I have to feed my baby!!

I keep rationalizing back and forth. On one hand, if he gets enough sleep then he is more likely to be helpful during the day as opposed to being a cranky baby because he is "so tired". On the other hand, I have to suck it up and get up at night so I don't understand why he can't do it too; he could get up after I'm done feeding and put Noah back to sleep once in a while. On another hand, he's working and I'm not right now and it isn't really necessary for BOTH of us to lose sleep at night. But necessary or not, it really bugs me. I had this same issue when Ellie was first born and efforts to talk to him about it just did not work. He feels that the other things he does during the day make up for his lack of assistance at night - I frankly don't care about those other chores, my priority is nighttime. He will also argue that he's working while I am able to sleep during the day; except I do not sleep during the day as I have my own other chores to get done, plus I will be going back to work in a month myself so what excuse will he have then??

I know that not everything has to be 50/50; I can handle lack of sleep and night duty better than he can, so I should probably just keep it to myself and find other ways for him to help. And I know from our past experience with Ellie that any effort to convince him to be more helpful at night will probably just result in an argument and I will end up feeling bad and apologizing. But every night I get soooo frustrated and angry with him for just sleeping away while I am struggling to keep myself awake and not drop Noah on the floor when I doze off while soothing him!

I thought maybe sharing this here and getting my feelings out would help me stay cool and not flip out at him. So thanks!

Pesky · December 2010

You're a good woman. DH often sleeps through one of the kids waking up and if it was his turn (or is his turn -- we take turns), I'd smack him with a "your turn" and roll over and go back to sleep. Even when I was BFing, it was his job to get the baby, change the baby and hand the baby over. I would feed, burp and put back down. It worked. I think it is time for a heart-to-heart about it so your resentment doesn't continue to build. He is likely blissfully unaware of your issues.

pahokie · December 2010

Like Pesky said, you need to let DH know that you need help. He likely assumes that since you don't wake him, you don't need him up.

I assume you BF, and that is why you have to do the feeding? Could you pump enough for DH to give a bottle for one of the overnight feedings? Or he could give a bottle of formula?

Can DH take over once he gets home from work so you can catch a nap or in the evening so you can get to bed a bit early?

Out of curiosity, why does you asking for help end up with an arguement and you apologizing? That doesn't seem right!

superaunt · December 2010

i remember feeling this way during my leave... i finally had to tell him that while i may "be home all day" it didn't mean i was sleeping the whole time and that i was gonna lose my mind if he didn't help me out at least once a week or something. finally things changed. he'd come home (around 7) and be on baby duty till he came to bed (around midnight or 1) and i got up after that- when baby woke. it worked for us. it didn't happen every night but at least a couple nights... and on weekends he participated a helluvalot more. i don't think you should flip out on him

but i do think you need to tell him!

BrideBuddies · December 2010

My DH is kinda the same way. He can sleep through anything and NEVER hears C wake up in the night. I have to be blunt with him sometimes. "Your turn--I'm not doing this one." And I literally have to kick his butt outta bed.

Since he does work long hours, I try to limit this to the weekends, but it's easy to let the resentment build.

YaraC · December 2010

This is how Caroline ended up sleeping in the bed with us. I was going to have to get up to BF her no matter what and getting DH up to help involved me waking up fully enough to wake him up because he could sleep though it all. I finally decided that I was going to do what worked for me (which was to have her in the bed and just do side lying nursing) and if he didn't like it (he didn't) that was just too dang bad because he was asleep anyway. I started getting a lot more sleep and started resenting him a lot less then.

I know that won't work for everyone but I'm just throwing it out there as what worked for us.

debbadebbadoo711 · December 2010

Yes, I think you just need to tell him, but sometimes men just don't seem to get it. My DH and I have been having other issues, and no matter how many times I try to talk to him, it just doesn't get through his skull.

robynlesley · December 2010

My DH seriously cannot function with night wake-ups. When Aaron was young and waking, I was the only one who got up with him during the work week (Sun - Thurs.). DH did take Friday and Saturday nights and I recharged a bit, but I felt resentful.

Now that Aaron is older and STTN, I seldom have to wake, so it's not so bad. But it sucked big time that I did it most of the time.

ScoobyM · December 2010

I know you are all right. I know the only way anything will happen differently is if I talk to him about this and explain what I want. I have just been so hesitant because we had this exact same thing with Ellie and I did try to talk to him about it, and when he explained his side of things I ended up feeling really bad because he genuinely feels he pulls his weight and I knew I had hurt his feelings by complaining. Part of the problem is the stuff he does to help out is just not as important to me as it is to him. For example, he's really big on cleaning up the house and he is the one who makes sure the house is all put back together each evening after Ellie has finished destroying it. I appreciate that we have a neat house pretty much all the time because of him, but the truth is if I have a choice between a neat house and him rocking Noah back to bed once a night, I would definitely choose the rocking! That's why I usually end up apologizing to him, because he will come up with a pretty good list of the stuff he does to contribute to running our household and I end up feeling like I'm not appreciating him for what he does.

Like Robyn, he just doesn't deal well with lack of sleep. This was true before we had kids as well. I keep trying to tell myself that once Noah is sleeping more at night this will all go away, as it did with Ellie, and I should just take one for the team on this. But I know I'm going to snipe at him one of these days. For example, he joked the other day about how we should start giving Noah formula right before bed to "top him off" so he'll sleep all night (this was based on an anecdote from a friend who had success with this recently). I told DH I don't want to give him formula until we have to because I felt that contributed to my early end to BFing with Ellie, but he cracked the same joke a day or two later. I controlled my urge to snap at him that he should not notice a difference between now and when Noah begins to STTN since he doesn't do anything when Noah wakes up anyway! I also had to fight the urge to tell him when he mentioned sleeping in the spare room that it made no difference to me as I was doing all the work anyway.

I really don't think he is aware of my frustration and ignoring it, I think you are all right that he is just oblivious. I just don't know if I can clue him in without insulting him or making him feel unappreciated. I guess I will think about how to approach it some more and see if I can find a way to discuss it before I start hurling insults.

M.Amy · December 2010

DH and I are very scheduled around who does what (this is the project manager in me) and we split everything 50/50 once I went back to work. It has helped our fighting about who does more tremendously.

Before Matt STTN & I was still nursing:

DH gave Matt his bath and I nursed Matt to sleep. I would pick up the house during bath time and DH would finish while Matt was nursing.

DH had the 12-3:30am shift and I had 3:30-7am. Then we took half hour turns until our nanny arrived.

Now this is our schedule for weeknights:

Every other night one person gives the bath and puts Matt down to sleep while the other person picks up the house and cleans up after dinner. If it was your turn to give Matt his bath then you have him for the rest of the night. That means all get-ups. The next night you are "off-duty."

This system works really well for us. We always know who has to do what and no one is stuck doing something (night duty) all of the time. It also helps because Matt gets put down by each of us so that he doesn't want "Mama" to put him to sleep or "Dada" to give his bath.

The only area where we don't have assigned roles are around making dinner and feeding Matt. We just both work in the kitchen and someone shoves food at him while the other finishes up dinner.

Piranha54 · December 2010

Talk to him. Calmly. You'll feel so much better. I so get what you said about he does things that just aren't high on your list - DH and I had the same problem. So we talked about and each got 3-4 high priority things - I can't stand messy counters so would go ape when he made sure the laundry was folded and put away, but left remnants of dinner everywhere. Now we are each more mindful and are better at asking each other what needs to get done and both agreeing. As to the nights, while on leave, I too took more night duty, but he had Fri and Sat nights and one weekend morning. My DH can sleep through anything, so i did often have to kick him out of bed, but...I was at least still warm and snuggly.

stever · December 2010

Pesky:
You're a good woman. DH often sleeps through one of the kids waking up and if it was his turn (or is his turn -- we take turns), I'd smack him with a "your turn" and roll over and go back to sleep. Even when I was BFing, it was his job to get the baby, change the baby and hand the baby over. I would feed, burp and put back down. It worked. I think it is time for a heart-to-heart about it so your resentment doesn't continue to build. He is likely blissfully unaware of your issues.

Everything she said.

Sunsh1ne · December 2010

No advice, but I know how you feel. I was b-feeding exclusively, so dh couldn't really help much at night. But I do distinctly remember one day when LO was just a few weeks old and dh was complaining about his "splitting headache" due to lack of sleep. All I could think was "are you kidding me?" Even now that I am back to work PT (I don't sleep during my days home with LO, it's chores, chores, chores during naptime), I only get 5 hours of sleep on a good night.

Sorry, no advice. Except that if you are formula-feeding, I'd not just seethe in anger, but give your dh a kick in the ribs when the baby wakes up in the middle of the night - "Honey, it's your turn!" And then let him handle it and go back to sleep. Don't pick up the slack when it is his agreed upon turn, or his night (don't know how people negotiate this when you are bottle-feeding).

I appreciate when my dh offers to help at night. Sometimes he will say "do you want me to give him a bottle?" It's really nice, but unless I want to lose my milk supply, that's not practical.

Good luck!

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