Please don't blame yourself or him for the stress. This is a stressful time. Maybe sit down with him as a planning meeting to figure out how to get through this. Say that what happened happened, let's just use that as a big red flag that says we need to find some solutions.

Now both of you need to work to find some ways to relieve the burden on both of you -- whether that means asking for help or paying for help, you need help. Don't label yourself bad mother or bad wife and don't label him. Label it bad situation and be a team.

Easier said than done I know, but sometimes reframing really helps.

Hang in there,OP. DH and I went through a patch like this when his mom had cancer. It will pass. You are not a bad wife. It happens to everyone if you stay married long enough. Multiple times over the course of a really long marriage.

OP, your husband has flexible hours too, don't let him kid you. If he can take all this time off to be with his family of orgin, he does indeed have flexible hours. Here's what I'd do. First, tell him he is not to snap at you or the kids. Screaming at you and/or the baby is unacceptable, it doesn't matter how stressed he is. Second, he needs therapy, not random therapy, he needs to talk with a therapist who is skilled at whatever is causing his sibling's near death. Many many families have issues like this. Many people loose someone in ways they wish they hadn't well before that person is expected to die. If the sibling is near death due to cancer, he needs a therapist skilled in that. If it's a long decline after years of diabetes, that is a different skill set. If it's drugs or alcohol, that too is different. If it's after a sudden accident, that again is different from all the rest. As for you, you do not need to pick up extra duties at home. Take care of yourself and your child because that is what women and moms do. If you need to work different hours so you aren't overtaxed, do that. Tell husband he is responsible for getting the child to daycare and/or hiring someone to come to the house. I say it this way because you do need to pick up your child at the end of the day. You have far more wiggle room in the morning as counterintuitive as that sounds. I would also not hesitate to mention to your husband that you have divorce as an option. If he refuses to be nice and/or to seek appropriate therapy, you will have all the hardships of being a single mom, and all of the hardships of being married. Why you'd agree to this is beyond me. To the people saying "this is temporary" all of life is temporary. It doesn't give anybody the right to slack off at work, at home, and to be an asshole. Your husband has gone way beyond the "bad day" stage, and is not seeking appropriate help for the pain he is experiencing.

Mr. Stress needs to take a walk around the block to curb his mouth and you need to quit making excuses for his behavior. We all have stress, all have family crisis to deal with. We don't all scream at the baby.

At times when DH had been under extreme stress (not just a little), I do not engage when he is snappish at me. I just ignore it, knowing that it's not who he normally is but the stress talking.

I agree with the advice to throw money at this problem. It is temporary; you aren't committing to a full-time nanny for life, for example, but you need to buy yourself some time in the form of whatever of DH's "jobs" you can outsource.

Also, show him your original post! Sometimes just getting to the bottom of why we're at each other's throats helps DH and me to be more reasonable with each other, at least for awhile.

Anonymous wrote:Do your best to not be short with him. This too shall pass. What he will remember is how you helped him through the stress or how you made it worse.

Flex what you can at work. Take on more responsibility for home hearth and kid for awhile.

But...you do need to talk and let him know that while you love and support him his stress cannot be taken out on you and an innocent kid. If he needs a break to cope give him a way to take the break.

This is sound advice. You can and should be supportive, but in no way should you and your toddler be the target of his emotions.

I've suffered several significant losses recently and this advice comes from a place of understanding.

Write. Write all of this down. You are not whining or being demanding. He is not able to see how his actions are affecting you and your cold. If you can get it in words without being judgmental (which I don't think you were - just very practical) it will give him something to reflect on when he's calm. Give it to him in a quiet moment and remind him you love him, you support him and his family and you hurt with them and that your little family of 3 is suffering too.

Anonymous wrote:DH's family is going through a god awful crisis and he is having to come to terms with the idea that he could lose a very close sibling. The family is devastated. DH's stress levels are through the roof and I find that he is criticizing me more, being very negative, reaching his temper "threshold" faster - meaning he starts screaming more quickly and just is inconsolable. Lately I've found him screaming at our 18 month old DC when he doesn't "cooperate." B/t work, family, and home, he just is struggling to keep it together.

I am also at peak stress. I'm taking on more of the parenting in addition to what I normally do. His travels to see family often leave me as the main parent - which is difficult b/c I work at minimum 10 hours a day. And, sadly, my patience with him broke yesterday. I'm finding it difficult to see him disconnected from us and from our DC, I'm exhausted from working and trying to keep everything together at home; and his negativity and criticism of me are really hurtful. I've suggested counseling, but he refuses. We can't afford much additional help as far as DC goes. My work schedule can be somewhat flexible, so I'm hoping to alter it in the coming weeks to make it work better for the family.

We had a screaming match yesterday after we had both been short with each other. Ugh.

Would love some advice.

we just went through similar. While it is very hard, try to support him in everyway possible. In hindsight, I can see now that my spouse and his family were going through a mourning process before their close relative passed away. This is likely what your husband is going through and he is realizing that things will never be the same. So try to get help where you can and drop any unnecessary obligations at work and kid activities to give your family breathing room. It is tough and I found myself as a single working parent through some spots and learned to grin and bear it and talk kids through it. Sure I resented it and we will never fully recovered from the loss of our close relative. What I think was hard was the fact that communications was already getting tough due to our busy lives, so make the best of it so you can not only weather through this, but find a way to better connect with your spouse rather than creating a bigger divide. It will go a long way for you to free up his time to tend to his sibling, whether it is to help with medical trips or allow them to have quality time together. Talk your kids through all of this too and let them feel free to ask questions or express fear as the sickness and potential loss of your husband's sibling and the significant change in mood around the house will have impact on your kids. Best of luck to you.

I'm comfortable sharing it, but DH is less so. He says if I need to share, then go ahead, but I've avoided telling people here - mainly b/c all of our friends here are mutual friends and I don't want to make him uncomfortable. Ugh.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the kind replies. I guess part of the problem is that I deal with stress by planning and figuring out how to move forward. I'm bad at taking breaks and letting things sink in. I think he's hit a point where it's incredibly hard for him to stay engaged without drifting into his thoughts. I'm an idiot and I try to pull him out through conversation or asking him to engage DC. It's actually more manageable sometimes when he is out of town.

It's tough too b/c we just moved and don't know very many people. We have a few friends, but not nearly as much as we had previously.

Man. I feel like a lousy wife.

You're not a lousy wife. You're just all going through a really difficult time - cut yourself some slack too.

As for friends - is this crises something you are comfortable sharing with others? I think a lot of times folks try to hide their troubles, but this is the kind of thing that can actually help create friendships if you open up enough to let people help you.