Husband Wants Nothing to do with Our 8 Day Old Baby

Dustykitten

daska wrote: »

My experience is that GPs will prescribe sleeping tablets for short term use when they feel it's necessary......


Could you co-sleep with the baby for the time-being? Especially if you're breast feeding it's far less like hard work than having to get up to give feeds. And, more importantly, it will reduce the disruption to your husband's sleeping thereby enabling him to cope better. Sort of a win:win:win situation

Please do not go for both of these options. I have nothing against co sleeping but do not think it is a good idea if either of you has been drinking or taking sleeping tablets.

sassyblue

Mojisola wrote: »

Not necessarily. If the things she was doing for him meant that he was well enough to go to work, then not continuing could have a massive effect on their finances. OP's OH may only be managing to keep going to work because of the things she does for him at home.

For example, I was able to spend time and energy caring for my parents because I knew that someone at home would make an evening meal for me. If I had needed to "keep back" enough energy to make a meal, go shopping, etc, I wouldn't have been able to spend so much time with them.

So who is going to look after the OP then? She has a new baby that's she's getting to know, it's important she isn't stressed out anymore otherwise there'll be a mum suffering from PND and an unhappy baby.

I can't believe you are advocating the OP takes on more responsibility.

Whenever we have someone asking advice about becoming a new mum we all advise her to delegate jobs, yet here people are saying 'oh he's ill you'll have to prop him up aswell'.... erm, NO!

CH27

sassyblue wrote: »

So who is going to look after the OP then? She has a new baby that's she's getting to know, it's important she isn't stressed out anymore otherwise there'll be a mum suffering from PND and an unhappy baby.

I can't believe you are advocating the OP takes on more responsibility.

Whenever we have someone asking advice about becoming a new mum we all advise her to delegate jobs, yet here people are saying 'oh he's ill you'll have to prop him up aswell'.... erm, NO!

But she knew he was ill before she got pregnant. Surely she factored that into her planning?

LannieDuck

...but he knew he was ill as well. I think he needs to take some responsibility here - he can't have expected his life to remain totally unchanged (or if he did he was extremely naive).

The OP has a whole raft of new jobs she's having to do while getting very little sleep and no help... and you're expecting her to continue everything she was doing before as well?

Maybe she would have enough energy to carry on supporting him if he took on some of the new work that a baby generates.

sassyblue

CH27 wrote: »

But she knew he was ill before she got pregnant. Surely she factored that into her planning?

Both of them planned for the baby....

Nicki

sassyblue wrote: »

So who is going to look after the OP then? She has a new baby that's she's getting to know, it's important she isn't stressed out anymore otherwise there'll be a mum suffering from PND and an unhappy baby.

I can't believe you are advocating the OP takes on more responsibility.

Whenever we have someone asking advice about becoming a new mum we all advise her to delegate jobs, yet here people are saying 'oh he's ill you'll have to prop him up aswell'.... erm, NO!

Depends what she needs to do to support him really. I think you are being a touch hysterical here. There are loads of us out there who manage perfectly well looking after more than one children, which might include a baby at some point. I don't think mojisola envisaged that OP would have to look after her OH to the same extent that she would have to look after a 2 year old for example, yet a huge number of mums have a 2 year age gap between their children and manage perfectly well to look after both their newborns and their toddlers and run their homes when their husbands go back to work!

Personally, I managed with a sick newborn who screamed 20 hours a day and was failure to thrive for the first 6 months, a 7 year old with severe learning difficulties and an 8 year old when my husband went back to work after 2 weeks paternity leave and am still here 3 years later alive and kicking to tell the tale.

We aren't asking her to run a nuclear power plant single handedly whilst attachment parenting a baby! Just to accept that she cannot rely on her husband for a consistent level of support every day, and to plan for the fact that she will have to make allowances for his health on a regular basis.

Nicki

LannieDuck wrote: »

...but he knew he was ill as well. I think he needs to take some responsibility here - he can't have expected his life to remain totally unchanged (or if he did he was extremely naive).

I think on what the OP has written, he IS taking responsibility here. He has a serious medical condition which is worsened by lack of sleep and by stress. He can't do anything about that. Ignoring the fact will just make him iller and even less able to help out.

OP has said that he IS helping to an extent, but that he is also saying that he needs to be able to sleep at night relatively undistrubed and that his stress levels are high and he is emotional and already worrying about how he will cope.

Sounds to me that OP'S husband is trying to ensure that he manages his illness (in the way that he has discovered works for him - ie enough sleep and reducing stress) sufficiently to make sure he stays well enough to be able to go back to work on Monday and keep a wage coming into the house whilst OP is on maternity leave. When he feels well enough he is feeding the baby during the day and helping out, just not as much as OP would like.

Is it really better (and would OP really find it less stressful) for the husband to suffer a serious downturn in his condition, and for them to be surviving on his statutory sick pay, which is £85 odd per week, plus OP's maternity pay and child benefit. I wonder if that would be enough to pay their rent or mortgage and all their bills?

All the comments about manning up, etc are only really relevant if you believe that the husband is faking his illness really or that ME does not exist as a medical condition.

LannieDuck

I've read the thread properly now. OP, is your OH willing to discuss the problem and try to find ways to make the situation better for both of you?

If he is, you have options: i) is there a GP he trusts who believes his ME diagnosis and could discuss how that might be affecting him at the moment? ii) could he set up a bed in another room, esp on work nights, so he is assured of a good night's sleep? iii) would he take on some of the additional work that a baby creates so that you feel supported, if it's specific jobs that won't trigger his ME? e.g. you do all the night feeds, but he takes responsibility for doing the feeds every evening (or if the baby itself stresses him out, he could do the bottle-washing in the evening, take responsibility for the laundry etc - something to help and make you feel supported).

If not, would his mother be willing/able to have a word?

LannieDuck

Nicki wrote: »

I think on what the OP has written, he IS taking responsibility here. He has a serious medical condition which is worsened by lack of sleep and by stress. He can't do anything about that. Ignoring the fact will just make him iller and even less able to help out.

OP has said that he IS helping to an extent, but that he is also saying that he needs to be able to sleep at night relatively undistrubed and that his stress levels are high and he is emotional and already worrying about how he will cope.

Sounds to me that OP'S husband is trying to ensure that he manages his illness (in the way that he has discovered works for him - ie enough sleep and reducing stress) sufficiently to make sure he stays well enough to be able to go back to work on Monday and keep a wage coming into the house whilst OP is on maternity leave. When he feels well enough he is feeding the baby during the day and helping out, just not as much as OP would like.

Is it really better (and would OP really find it less stressful) for the husband to suffer a serious downturn in his condition, and for them to be surviving on his statutory sick pay, which is £85 odd per week, plus OP's maternity pay and child benefit. I wonder if that would be enough to pay their rent or mortgage and all their bills?

All the comments about manning up, etc are only really relevant if you believe that the husband is faking his illness really or that ME does not exist as a medical condition.

Our posts crossed

I think the main point may be that OP's husband isn't talking to her about all of this. He's angry and tired and, (as far as i can tell...) refusing to discuss the problems (I'm a bit worried about what OP means by "If I challenge his behaviour it WILL make things worse from my past experience").

What actually needs to happen is a sensible discussion about i) what he's finding difficult and ways the OP can help, ii) what's upsetting the OP and ways he can help.

Mojisola

sassyblue wrote: »

Both of them planned for the baby....

It's possible that the urge to get pregnant and all the work involved eclipsed their thinking about how they would cope when it actually happened.

Many fit and healthy people are completely thrown by how much the first baby disrupts life and how much work is involved!