*TLDR at the bottom if you aren’t into reading.*
My husband and I have a five month old baby. Since she started daycare, I’ve been handling all of the morning responsibilities. I wash her dirty bottles and prep bottles for the next day the night before, then wake up early to get both of us ready, pack her things, and take her to daycare before going straight to work. I’ve repeatedly asked my husband to wake up earlier and help with mornings, but he often oversleeps or focuses on getting himself ready first.
We’re in couples therapy, and a recurring issue is that I feel like the default parent and manager, while he feels criticized when I bring things up. I’m exhausted and trying to move toward shared responsibility instead of asking for help all the time.
Recently I said, “From now on you can drop the baby off at daycare at least twice a week.” He got upset and said I should ask instead of making demands. I told him he never asked me if I could do drop off every day, it just became my responsibility. He said he didn’t demand it, I just did it.
From his perspective, I’m being disrespectful to him by making demands. From my perspective, this is just a normal parenting task and I don’t understand why I even have to ask. Asking still puts me in the role of managing him, which is part of what I’m burned out by.
AITA for telling him instead of asking?
TLDR:
I handle all daycare prep and drop off for our five month old and have repeatedly asked my husband to help in the mornings. When I told him he needs to do drop off twice a week instead of asking, he said I was being disrespectful. AITA for telling him instead of asking?
Just divorce already. Yesterday you wanted to emotionally divorce him now its this.
Leave and the court can tell him what to do in terms of the child.
i second this, he doesn’t want to actively be a parent. So better to divorce him now while baby is still very young and wont remember much.
info – What was the discussion about this topic with your Couples’ Therapist? Seems rather clearly not TA, but curious about how solid advice from a professional could not address this?
No this conversation happened this morning and we have couples therapy the night before.
During couples therapy the therapist told him that, from their perspective, it seemed like there was an unfair division of labor and asked if my husband agreed. My husband said he thought that we both have an unfair amount of work to do in our lives but couldn’t really give a clear answer about whether or not he thought I did more/an unfair amount of work.
I understand what he means about us having too much to do but I just think that’s life. I do think I do more than he does. He is consistently responsible for taking the trash to the bins and the bins out to the street once a week and taking the sorted loads of dirty laundry (that I sort and put in laundry bags) downstairs to the washer and starting the washer and switching it to the dryer. I do all the other household chores
I think you need to approach it as a discussion. “This is what needs to happen, how do you want to divide it?” I’d do it in therapy, so you have a non-interested party to mediate if necessary.
NTA
while he feels criticized when I bring things up
If he doesn’t want to feel criticized then he needs to step up and start making changes. Saying he feels criticized is just a way to deflect from the fact that he isn’t doing what he is supposed to be doing. If your therapist hasn’t addressed this, find a new therapist.
After so many times of asking and them not doing, sometimes you have to start telling. You shouldn’t have to tell a grown man to step up and start taking care of his kid to, but it sounds like you have to.
NTA but this isn’t about drop off or daycare.
Hopefully you can discuss this – the BIG issue, that you’re the default parent – in couples counseling.
Another day, another version of, “I married and reproduced without Amy thought if the future or discussions of shared labor, and now (surprise surprise!) my spouse and I have different ideas about gender roles and labor.
So, in other words, you have a toddler and a baby. Sounds like you did ask and he ignored you. So you had to divide the responsibility of day care drop off without a discussion that he wouldn’t have been responsive to. Absolutely, NTA.
NTA. You have asked. He’s just chosen to behave in a way that fails to acknowledge your request and lets him skirt the responsibility (oversleeping, taking care of his own stuff instead).
NTA. He’s decided his time is more valuable than yours. You do it because you know it won’t get done if you don’t. Telling him he’ll take care of it 2/5 days isn’t anything he should be crying about.
This is a topic for couples therapy. He’s blaming how it was communicated to him, you just want some help. Him changing the conversation to “you didn’t ask nicely” could well be him using it a an excuse to not do his part.
Go to FairPlay Life .com it’s a therapy tool to help understand and divide up seen and unseen labor in households.
And no- NTA, you are exhausted and you told instead of asked, after asking and being ignored. Your husband needs to grow up and start being a supportive partner and Dad.
NTA
He’s not being an equal parent. 2 days a week isn’t even equal.
He feels criticized when you bring it up? Boohoo. He *should* feel bad. He just doesn’t like to be reminded that he’s exploiting his wife. He is choosing to prioritize sleeping then or getting himself ready, he is literally stealing your time for his own personal benefit. That’s exploitation, babe.
Heads up, it’s very unlikely he’s going to change. Check out the blog by Zawn Villines, Liberating Motherhood. You need support beyond a milquetoast therapist that doesn’t want to tell your husband he’s being an AH.