Husband decided to keep kids home today without talking to me

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pretty awful to send your kids to child care on a snow day when you WFH honestly. But DH behaved badly too.

This

Both of you sound insufferable.

Please explain to me how it is awful to send your kids to childcare when you need to work?

[Anonymous]

How old are the kids? This will seriously inform my views.

[Anonymous]

I think it could have gone either way, probably a little more him in the right, but you guys clearly have communication issues. Go to couples therapy. You both seem like control freaks, probably why you got along before this, and both need to learn how to pick your battles and be on the same team with parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pretty awful to send your kids to child care on a snow day when you WFH honestly. But DH behaved badly too.

This

Both of you sound insufferable.

Agree.

Snow days are magical as a kid, especially around DC where they don't happen very often. OP's DH made for a nice day with the kids, outside in the fresh air getting exercise and having fun, which is so much better than daycare. And it sounds like very little actual impacted OP's precious workday.

It sounds like OP's mad because her DH made the decision unilaterally. That's not great. But this sounds like something OP needs to accept went better than expected and perhaps say thanks to her DH for making a nice day for the kids.

I also didn't like how in OP's post she dismissed her DH's very legitimate feelings about childcare from his own youth. Lots of kids don't like all the professional childcare, and certainly they would enjoy a snow day home with mom and dad more than going to childcare.

OP's DH needs to not yell and slam doors at all, esp in front of the kids. That is not good for anyone.

I just feel like OP sounds cold and like she can't ever be wrong. OP, are you a lawyer by chance?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pretty awful to send your kids to child care on a snow day when you WFH honestly. But DH behaved badly too.

This

Both of you sound insufferable.

Please explain to me how it is awful to send your kids to childcare when you need to work?

Because it sounds like the only problem that came from keeping the kids home was the problem that OP created by acting like a twit.

OP's DH took care of the kids for almost the whole day. It doesn't sound like OP had a major project or other crushing deadline. If she did, she should have gone somewhere else to work or just told her DH that she couldn't help at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I always made that kind of decision without consulting my spouse. I mean it’s just childcare. It’s not important. I would not however expect my spouse to do childcare.

Same.

Sounds like he spent most of the day playing with the kids. What's the big deal if they watch a movie or veg out on screens the other part of the day? My kids never liked the daycare options offered by school on snow days. They did not enjoy hanging in a cafeteria, gym or multipurpose room all day even if it was with friends. It becomes boring very quickly.

Op, you should work at Starbucks or go into the office on snow days for your own sanity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
There comes a point when a parent has had enough, if their parenting decisions are constantly second-guessed by their spouse, even though they shoulder most of the parenting, and they are constantly made to feel as if, by virtue of being male, they need to always ask permission and change their parenting plans if their wife does not agree.

Lots of men have anger management problems. But here... maybe you're just too annoying to deal with, and he's had enough.

I'm a wife and mother who has witnessed fathers being verbally abusive. I'm not getting that vibe here.

You are 100% not a woman, but you are an @sshole.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It would never occur to me to ask DH’s opinion about keeping kids home. I’m a SAHM and once or twice a year kept my kids home from morning preschool just because I felt like it. Now that they’re older, I decide when they’re sick enough to stay home or other acceptable (to me) reasons to miss school.

You aren't in OP's situation. You're there to look after them, op's husband still planned to work.

[Anonymous]

So you wanted to send your sick kid to preschool to contaminate all the other kids and screw over the other working parents and also send the other one to all day “after school” care which is boring as hell instead of letting them just be home. Turn on the tv, make easy snacks and lunch and calm the F down. You are completely over reacting. Both of us work from Home and managed our work days just fine with several meetings throughout the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. This is a pattern of him constantly keeping kids home without discussing it with me and telling the kids first. Any sniffle, cough etc he wants them home. He then expects me to not do my job and watch them and play fast and loose with WFH (when I only transitioned to WFH under extreme pressure from him). He thinks WFH means I should play fast and loose with my workday, that it’s fine for me to not be working during core business hours or picking kids up early every day because I WFH. I’m not comfortable with that. This is not just one day but a pattern of him expecting me to do this.

Go back to the office.

[Anonymous]

Wow this is a crazy thread! I am always left wondering what people do (or more accurately don’t do) that it’s not disruptive to have a preschooler home while they work. I am of the minimize childcare camp, much more-so than my husband, and for years have stayed up until 1 AM to get my work done after taking time off to be available during the day for sick babies and toddlers. Hard but you do it. But if OP is local, schools were closed yesterday too and if you pay attention to your kids during the day you already had to make up work last night and be behind today.

I would not be happy to have my husband make this decision without consulting me unless he really covered the whole entire day. Even expecting you to cover one meeting can be problematic if you have an obligation at the same time. Of course you can miss any meetings if you have too but OP should get a say in that decision not have it made for her.

I had two meetings I needed to attend this afternoon (especially knowing school is likely to be canceled Friday…). I told my husband he could watch the kids or they could go to childcare- his choice (we opted to have kids home this morning and covered the time together). He decided to have them go to the childcare for a few hours and I supported him. Our kids didn’t want to go because they didn’t want to get dressed- but then when he went to pick them up our daughter asked to stay longer because she was having fun with her friends.

Anyway I agree that there aren’t a lot of rights and wrongs here besides making decisions about other people’s time. Childcare is not evil and if the alternative is putting your kid in front of a screen (especially for multiple days) or missing a meeting or having to stay up super late then it might be the right call to send the kids to care for a few hours. Can you when you are calm just ask him what his expectation was for you? And just very calmly say you are happy for him to keep the kids home when he can watch them but that you would like to discuss if there are times he is expecting you to watch the kids? My husband and I had a lot of strife over this (generally how to decide whose work is on the back burner when a kid needs to be home) and it’s taken a lot of really honest communication to get to a semi-decent place.

I feel bad for your kids they heard that fight. I hope you gave them extra snuggles and told them how much you loved the time you did have with them and helped take away the sting of the nasty stuff your husband said. I was always so worried my kids would think I didn’t want to take care of them if I had other things going on (which is kind of crazy) and I would be sick if my kids heard my husband say I loved a spreadsheet more than them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Team Husband! I can’t believe you wanted to send a (mildly) sick child to daycare on a day when schools are closed for extremely low wind chills. That’s just cruel. What kind of person would do that to a child?

One that needs time without kids at home to work to a level that guarantees she will be able to keep her career and, perhaps, advance to a bigger salary, which she will need once she can no longer tolerate her abusive, controlling husband. That's what kind of person sends her kids to daycare when daycare is open.

OP, the stomping, the yelling at you, putting you down in front of the kids, slamming doors, giving you the silent treatment, etc. All of it is abusive. That it is happening in front of your kids is worse. Your husband is teaching them by example that such behavior is normal, and you are teaching them by example that they should accept being the recipient of such behavior, even from someone they love.

The kind of abuse your DH is engaging is "coercive control". It is threatening or intimidating behavior designed ultimately to condition you to be meek and obedient to avoid fights and aggression.

As bad as your DH's behavior is, he is right about one thing - you need individual therapy. Your husband has told you he is not going to therapy, and he is not interested in changing his behavior. Your only choice is to go to therapy, and work on yourself and the life you want to build with your kid. You need a professional to help you figure out how to do that with or without him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am increasingly feeling like my DH of 10 years has become more controlling and is emotionally and verbally abusive since we have had kids. An example would be this morning, the kids were both supposed to go to school but MoCo called a snow day. Elder child could go to the aftercare program that is open all day. Younger child who had a small cold and was home yesterday could go to preschool that opened at 10. DH decides they are staying home without discussing the decision with me, when I wanted to send them both in. (We both WFH but he hates child care because of bad experiences he had as a kid of a single mom who was always in care so he constantly wants to minimize the hours they are in care, even if it impacts our working hours.)

I get upset at him because he tells the kids they are staying home without even talking to me. I explain I have a lot of work to do that I’m behind on and he yells at me, slams a door, tells me I am being a baby because we all have work to do and when the kids stay home he is the one watching them anyway, and that I’m not a team player because my Excel spreadsheet is more important than my family, etc. Does all this in front of our kids. When I ask him when his meetings are today so I can cover for him, he refuses to answer. He storms around the house angrily, is now not speaking to me, and just loaded the kids up in the car for an errand and is refusing to talk to me.

This isn’t normal, right? Are there husbands out there who would discuss the childcare decision of the day with their wife and not unilaterally make a decision without taking their partner’s opinion into consideration? It’s not normal to yell, slam doors, and fight in front of kids, right? I’m not a bad mom for wanting to be a responsible employee, and do my job, and use the child care I pay for, right?

And yes, I have asked him for years to do therapy (he says either the problem is me and I need to go alone and that will fix our problems or he says he will go but not if I lie the whole time about our relationship and force him to defend himself to a therapist).

Both need individual and couple's therapy and rethink their priorities in life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am increasingly feeling like my DH of 10 years has become more controlling and is emotionally and verbally abusive since we have had kids. An example would be this morning, the kids were both supposed to go to school but MoCo called a snow day. Elder child could go to the aftercare program that is open all day. Younger child who had a small cold and was home yesterday could go to preschool that opened at 10. DH decides they are staying home without discussing the decision with me, when I wanted to send them both in. (We both WFH but he hates child care because of bad experiences he had as a kid of a single mom who was always in care so he constantly wants to minimize the hours they are in care, even if it impacts our working hours.)

I get upset at him because he tells the kids they are staying home without even talking to me. I explain I have a lot of work to do that I’m behind on and he yells at me, slams a door, tells me I am being a baby because we all have work to do and when the kids stay home he is the one watching them anyway, and that I’m not a team player because my Excel spreadsheet is more important than my family, etc. Does all this in front of our kids. When I ask him when his meetings are today so I can cover for him, he refuses to answer. He storms around the house angrily, is now not speaking to me, and just loaded the kids up in the car for an errand and is refusing to talk to me.

This isn’t normal, right? Are there husbands out there who would discuss the childcare decision of the day with their wife and not unilaterally make a decision without taking their partner’s opinion into consideration? It’s not normal to yell, slam doors, and fight in front of kids, right? I’m not a bad mom for wanting to be a responsible employee, and do my job, and use the child care I pay for, right?

And yes, I have asked him for years to do therapy (he says either the problem is me and I need to go alone and that will fix our problems or he says he will go but not if I lie the whole time about our relationship and force him to defend himself to a therapist).

Aftercare on a none school day is torture for and on children. Sounds like your dh made an assumption that no school means no school. Do you not have a standard family plan for when something like this happens? I wouldn’t expect my kids to go to daycare on a snow day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of those threads where I would love to hear the DH's side.

OP keeps complaining about all the childcare she needs to do today because -gasp- her husband didn't cancel one remaining meeting this afternoon. Meanwhile her DH has taken their preschool and ES age kids out for errands and then pivoted to take them sledding. Sounds like a pretty great dad making the best of a WFH snow day.

His stomping and slamming doors and yelling in front of the kids is obviously not acceptable, but I suspect it was in response to OP escalating things first.

Agree! I feel like he’s a good Dad too!

Nope. Good Dad's discuss expectations with spouses ahead of time and don't throw tantrums in front of their kids.

A lot of people on this thread calling OP "controlling" for wanting good, basic, reasonable communication and respect for her work. That is what this is about. The idea that OP asking for that is controlling is BS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Some of you can't read or are projecting your own BS onto this.

OP has stated that there is a pattern of DH expecting her to NOT do her work to take care of the kids when she is supposed to be WFH. OP also stated that she already covers medical appointments and sick days and when her husband travels. So it sounds like this snow day is the straw that broke the camel's back for her. In isolation, maybe you could say the OP should let one go, but this is not a one-off. And then, on top of all this, he has a tantrum.

Totally team OP. Your husband is acting like a jerk. He wants you to be a SAHM. He makes decisions that impact your workday without discussing it with you first. He is in the wrong.