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June 2011 Moms
Does DH help with middle of the night wakeups?
I sit here at 4:25 in the morning for what seems like the millionth time in the last month, on my couch, trying not to cry from fatigue while DD sits in the playpen watching Baby TV "night time" shows. She's got a cold (as do I and a sore throat), she's teething again and after and hour of cuddling in bed with her, putting her back in the playpen while I lie on the floor as she screams/cries and finally giving her some tempra she's wide awake and full of beans.
Aside from preventing her from crawling off the bed while I went to get the tempra, DH has done nothing. He just stays in bed through all the crying, playing, etc. It makes me very bitter because right now I'm not happy with myself. My patience is wearing thin and it makes it harder for me have energy to keep her happy the next day....thus perpetuating the cycle. I know that I don't work in the morning and he does but I just feel like it shouldn't matter. I also feel like this won't change once I do go back to work in August.
If you both work are the wakeups dealt with equally? How about those of you that SAH?
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Re: Does DH help with middle of the night wakeups?
DH never has and never will help with mid night wake ups. the 1 time i left him for the night with DS when i was at my best friends baby shower interstate DS was teething and was up all night - when i got home DH acted like it was the end of the world and that he had done so much to help me out.......... seriously it was like he thought he deserved an award for 1 night! I was like - sweetheart i love you but welcome to the world of mummyhood, i've done that every other time for the last 10 months! suck it up!
edit : we both work full time i went back at 6 months and nothing changed...... i still do 99% of the housework and caring for DS. I'm going to make sure that second time around when #2 comes along things are divided 50/50!
Background: When A was first born I was literally raising her myself. He did nothing - like absolutely nothing. He didnt change diapers, he never ONCE got up. Even if I'd ask him to, he would say he was going to get her then he'd fall back to sleep. At first I thought, well I'm nursing so there's not much he can do. Plus I was off from work at the time. But then I got really angry. And I finally broke down and yelled at him that he needed to help. He did better for a while but things have never been even close to equal. He does do a lot around the house but I still do the majority of the housework too.
This weekend I had a complete meltdown. With all the m/s I'm up and doen all night and A has been waking up super early lately. I work also (part time now not FT). This past weekend, DH slept in both mornings and left me to get up with her at 6am. We had friends over on Saturday night and they stayed until 12:30 so i got almost no sleep. Plus she had a tough time going down so i was upstairs half the evening trying to get her to sleep while he hung out with our friends - he never offered to help. I was SO angry because I feel like he's very selfish in that regard. And when he does do something he thinks he expects a medal. After this weekend I told him things need to change or this isn't going to work out with us. I love him but I'm so tired of doing this alone. I actually think that scared the crap out of him. He just doesn't realize how much work it takes to raise a baby. Now with another on the way I really need his help. He's been better but it's only been 2 days so we'll see.
I hear this! I told DH that he was selfish this weekend after taking friday off to play golf, then wanting to stay out after his footy game for a few beers after i'd run around all day with DS he couldn't just get home to help out with dinner / bath / bed time.... then when he went out he asked if he could go see the avengers with a mate.... I was like any other selfish things you feel like doing while i raise our son.... suffice to say he got up early with him on sunday and took him out to the park so i could do some housework uninterrupted.... but still - sometimes i just think men are selffish because in reality their day to day job doesn't really change when a new born comes along because its mums job to feed etc.... i will make sure next time around DH knows that i need help rather than me trying to be strong and do it all myself just because i know i can....
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No, because he doesn't have boobs.
He did help me some in the very beginning when I was nursing and pumping and supplementing with bottle, but then he went back to work so I tried not to wake him up too much. On a few occasions when her sleep has been really bad he has gotten up with her early in the morning. He used to also get up with her on weekend mornings but since she's been sleeping better he hasn't. I've been frustrated with him a few times, but mostly she sleeps ok and iti doesn't really bother me.
I still enjoy nursing her to sleep but when I do wean her I look forward to sitting on the couch while DH puts her to bed.
We haven't had a real night wakeup (like she won't go right back to sleep) since we sleep trained at 4.5 months. She has woken up here and there, and DH does help go in and do the back pats/Ferber checks to get her back to sleep, but the times when she's been sick/growth spurt, she wants to nurse anyway, and goes right back to sleep after, so of course he can't do it. Until she started STTN he did help a lot though. He's actually the one who sat up all night long with her sleeping on his chest the first few weeks, he'd just bring her in to me to nurse and then take her back out.
Sounds to me like you need to have a conversation with your husband. I'd go into it making it about how you are struggling though, not saying "you don't do this, you don't do that" so he doesn't get defensive. Just tell him you're overwhelmed, exhausted, at the end of the rope, and you just really, really need some help.
ETA...we both work full time. If he wasn't helping out somewhat I would be curled up in a ball!
My sister and I just had this conversation on Saturday. She has a seven month old and I have three kids (my youngest is 11 months).
My husband has never really helped with middle of the night wakeups. Even when I worked full time (I work part time now), I was in charge of all things baby. Was it hard at first? YES! It was a HUGE adjustment when I first had a baby and couldn't get used to always having to think about someone else besides me. It is exhausting and I remember wondering why my husband isn't being a good father and wanting to be with the baby 24 hours a day! He would come home from work and pretty much walk by the baby without even saying hello. (Not that babies can say hello but I wanted him to come home and proclaim love for the baby instantly)
When I had my second baby, my oldest was two and guess who pretty much took over taking care of her? My husband. I took care of the baby, he took care of our two year old and I saw him as the good father that he is (not as a slacker father). I let go of stuff that used to bother me (like unmatched outfits and unhealthy dinners) and let him feel around what it means to be a parent without me worrying if he is contributing 50/50 and all that other stuff. Now that we have three kids and two of our kids can have conversations, I am not hung up on how much or how little time he spends with the baby.
One thing that was nice when my oldest was a baby is that my husband would occasionally take her to his parents house for an evening so I could have the house to myself to sleep without interruption and just hang out without doing chores. I highly recommend encouraging (or begging) him to take the baby out for a while so you can rest at home!!!
Absolutely! We had a routine when I was still nursing. When she woke up in the middle of the night, MH would take her and change her diaper while I tried to wake up and get situated. Then he'd bring her to me and I'd nurse her and get her back to sleep.Now, he usually gets up and gets a bottle ready for her and I try and get her to calm down until he gets back with the bottle.
We've always worked really well as a team! So this baby stuff, it's just one more thing that we work well together on!
If V wakes up in the middle of the night, I get up and take care of him. This doesn't happen very often; so I don't mind. DH doesn't usually hear V, but I always hear him. If this was more of a regular thing I would wake DH up and make him do it every other night. We both work and V doesn't need to BF in the middle of the night so there is no reason DH shouldn't share in the sleeplessness.
Nope. It's not really an acceptable excuse, but DD is breastfed, and nursing her is the fastest and easiest way to get her back to sleep. But, even during the wakeups that I do not want to feed her DH refuses to get out of bed. He does get up with her on Saturday and Sunday mornings to let me sleep in. I'm actually really bitter about it all, but whatever. DH used to complain about how he does more than me around the house and yardwork. But, I pretty much told him to shut his trap when he tried to complain recently. Actually DH can say whatever he wants, I will never believe it again. DH also used to tease me that I'm wimpy, but motherhood has made me tougher than I ever could have imagined!
I'm actually concern about when/if we have a second child. I really want another one, and I want DD to have a sibling, but I can't imagine the thought of handling the middle of the nights all by myself again.
DH works 40 hours a week. I work 32 (four 8 hour days)
DH helps for sure. Last week was a bad week for some reason. Audrey would wake up in the middle of the night screaming like she was in major pain. Then, the second one of us would go in, she'd smile at us and just be happy to see us. So we'd hold her a few minutes, then put her down and she'd go right back to sleep. Well, she kept doing this for a few nights in a row. I realized we were giving her exactly what she wanted instead of getting her to go back to sleep on her own.
So, we had to go back to our roots -- sleep training. Unfortunately, the ten minute checks are no longer quite as effective. When she did woke up, we gave her a few minutes, went in did a paci check, laid her down, patted her back and told her it's not wake up time, it's still night night time. Go to sleep my love. Once we left, we had to go full on extinction. After a little bit, she went back to sleep waking up at 7am happy as a clam. Since then, she has gone back to her normal 8ish-6ish sleeping time without wake up.
Idk if this helps or not, but it's just what worked for us. GL! I hope A goes back to sleeping.
I'm really sorry that you're feel so unsupported. I hate that feeling and hope your DH starts helping more.
Yes, my DH helps at nighttime wake ups. He actually does more than I do now. He is more patient in the night and does a better job than I do at getting her calmed back down. I try to repay him by letting him sleep in on his days off. For the record, I am a sahm mom, and he works.
I SAH, and DD still wakes up several times at night. I handle about 98% of the night wakings. He will get up only if I tell him I need him to. If I am getting exhausted at just can't handle it anymore, I will tell him to take over.
She wakes up at 6:30am every day, and about once a week I will ask him to take her to the living room to play while I get an extra hour of sleep.
He works about 9am-7pm every day, sometimes later. He doesn't like getting up early, and sometimes he complains when I ask him.
He also travels a lot. Sometimes she doesn't recognize/want him in the middle of the night if he's been gone for a while, so it just riles her up. I'll let him try for a while, but I can't sleep through her screaming anyway so I usually take over.
DH does most of the nighttime wake-ups because he is just plain better at getting DS back to sleep. He puts him to bed every night (it's kind of their thing to do together) and can get DS to sleep faster than I can...and that's what we're all shooting for in the middle of the night.
Nickie, that made me LOL. I practically have to stand on my head to lay DS down in the crib! Ha!
And while I was at home and DH was working, we had a rule that I would get up and try to get DS back to sleep because I didn't have to go to work in an office and DH did.
When DS goes through growth spurts or teeth issues, we have a rule that no one has to stay up longer than 45 minutes. So if I get up and do my 45 minutes and DS is still awake, I can wake DH up and he will take over. OP, maybe something like that would work for you...I find that it makes it easier for both of us since we each know we won't be up all night when we get out of bed. Just a thought!
DH hasn't helped with a night waking since Maya was about 4 days old- and even then I was still up and he was like a deer in headlights next to me. I"m a SAHM so I end up doing 95% of the baby-related care. We had a big fight a few months back when I told DH I was tired and needed help, and he said I could sleep all day since I don't work (riiiiight, I'll let the baby know I plan on sleeping half the day and we'll see how that goes).
He does stay alone with her for a couple hours 2 days a week now so I can go to the gym and to my spouses' club meetings- but he acts like I ask for soooooo much b/c I said I needed those days to myself. I had been bringing her to the meetings, but once she started crawling and I couldn't just hold her, I told DH she had to stay home with him. As PP mentioned, he acts like he deserves a medal for those 4 hours (and sometimes she sleeps for most of the time I'm gone).
I LOVE that idea. I will mention it to DH tonight
I feel like I need to explain things since I was pretty sleep deprived this morning. I don't expect DH to get up every time she cries in the night because I know I can always nap in the day (though it never happens...I've never been able to sleep in the day time). And every Friday night is HIS night...he will get up and comfort her or bring her to me to nurse and then put her back to bed. But when it's been 3 or 4 days in a week where I have only had 2 hours of sleep before she wakes up and decides she's going to stay awake for 3+ hours I just start to lose my mind. I still nurse but sometimes that doesn't get her back to sleep. Same with bringing her into our bed...sometimes it works other times she wants to play with mommy and daddy instead of sleeping. She STTN about 90% of the time now but she has these random weeks here and there in which she does this. She's got a cold and is teething so I know that's why. I feel like once I've nursed her there is no reason why I have to be the only one to comfort her.
What upsets me is when he hears me crying from fatigue and frustration (and I KNOW he could hear me) but doesn't bother to get up and help.
ETA: I texted him this morning and he called me from work to comfort me which was so sweet. He said as soon as he gets home he will take over so I can try and sleep for a bit or at least just have some quiet time.
We both work, and this is the one area of our life that I consider totally equal. Thankfully Ty is STTN, but when he wasn't I'd get one night, and DH the next. Now it's hard to keep track since it's not frequent, but we know that deep down we know who the last one was to wake with him. The only time we don't take turns is when we're sick, have an early meeting, etc.
The sleep/equal issue I have though is that if he wakes up earlier than normal I'm always the one to get up with him. DH will lay in bed pretending to sleep (it's between snoozes and Ty's not quiet once he's up so I know he's not really sleeping) while I'm trying to get ready and entertain Ty. Then, once he does get up he takes his sweet time in the shower so I did it all by myself. Normally I don't mind getting Ty ready by myself, but if he wakes when I'm still getting ready it's hard.
i plan on making sure he knows that i can't do it alone.... like cassopea i can do it on my own now - which i guess is why i always have and have never really asked for help.... with #2 i plan on faking it if i have to so DH notices that there is a big difference between what he thinks "helping" is and what actually raising a child can be like. Right from the get go I'm going to be asking him to help more with C because "i'm too tired, or MS" i'll use whatever i need to - so people may say i'm lying to DH but seriously i think my H needs to feel needed and I am one very independant woman who can manage things on my own - so if i make sure that i need his help with #2 and not do it alone then I'm hoping that will help!
wow are we married to the same man????
I'm SAH and DH does get up at night with DS if I ask him to. Yes, he has to work all day and makes the money, but my day requires energy at well. I can catch up on naps with DS but I can't always count on naps. I try to not ask every night for help, but if I'm wearing then, I don't hesitate to ask.
I hope she starts feeling better and you too.