'AITA for coming out to check on the baby who was screaming for 15 minutes?' 'I asked my husband to watch him.'
"AITA for coming out to check on the baby who was screaming for 15 mins after I asked my husband to watch him?"
My husband, 42m, is really angry right now. I had asked him if he could watch the baby (3 months male) so I could take a shower. He said yes and took the baby right away. I took my time getting my soaps, towel, wash cloth, and other shower things organized in the bathroom.
During the entire 15 mins of me being in the bathroom, the baby was crying so hard that he was losing his breath. I was wondering why he was crying for so long, so I came out of the bathroom and found that my husband had brought the baby swing into the kitchen and left the baby to cry while he cooked dinner on the stove.
The baby's face was red and tears down his face. I grabbed his pacifier and tried to calm him down a bit, and my husband became irritated that I was fussing over the baby instead of getting in the shower. I went to the sink to grab a clean bottle, intending to make a bottle and sit down to feed him so he stops crying.
My husband reacted instantly. He swore at me, and grabbed the bottle himself and started making it. He said I was ruining his plan for the night, and that I was taking over. He made the bottle and took the baby to the living room and fed him, telling me to go take my shower already. Why didn't he just feed the baby 15 mins ago?
I went and took my shower, came out and found the baby to be perfectly happy now, and my husband back at the stove and babbling with the baby. His mood was perfectly fine at this point. I decided my best option would be to go sit in my room and try to calm down before I talk to him. He comes in and asks why I closed the door. I say that I don't really want to talk to him right now.
And that he is not to swear at me like that again. He immediately becomes angry, and says that I didn't need to be messing with the baby when he has him. It got a little heated, with our voices raised, but nothing was said that was regrettable. In the end, I went back to the bedroom and he finished cooking.
Later, he came into the room and angrily took his pillow and brought it to the living room. A clear statement that he wasn't sleeping in the bed with me tonight. I got the baby to sleep and put him to bed, then swiped his pillow off the couch on my way back to our bedroom.
I then crafted a text message basically telling him that he needs to come in and communicate with me about this, because I don't think that i deserved to be swore at for fussing over a screaming baby. So, AITA for "taking over" when he didn't feed the baby?
Here's what top commenters had to say about this one:
CivMom said:
He didn’t have the baby, though, did he? Job one is meeting the need of the baby so you can trust that he’s meeting the needs of the baby. Job 2 is having an adult convo when things go off the rails. NTA.
laps-in-judgement said:
NTA 3 months is too young to "cry it out". There are longterm mental health consequences (anxiety, etc) to not meeting a baby's needs. Dad should step up & learn how to NOT neglect a baby.
Clean_Factor9673 said:
NTA. When a baby is screaming like that, yes, you do need to check on him. The first rule of babies is figure out why they're screaming and hold, change, feed as appropriate.
Mandiezie1 said:
NTA it’s absolutely unacceptable to allow the baby to cry and scream until they lose their breath, especially a 3 month old. I don’t give a damn what way or things he tried, none of them worked. So yelling/screaming/swearing at you for helping out when he CLEARLY needed help is out of the question.
At best, you choosing when you want to address him could be seen as passive aggressive, but I also think if you’re unsure of how you’d respond to him that the only thing to do was to communicate with him that you needed time (which it appears you did just that).
International-Fee255 said:
NTA. It's psychologically damaging to let babies cry, it's easy enough to research if you want. What your husband was doing was cruel. He has no right to curse at you or raise his voice.
New babies are tough on a relationship but this needs to be ironed out quickly, his reaction was aggressive and his refusal to talk it over is worrying. Please make sure you and baby are safe, such an over the top response needs more help than Reddit can give.
Personibe said:
NTA If you had checked on them after 2 minutes, yeah... that would have been a little much. But it was 15 minutes of the baby crying hard. While it is possible the dad has been trying to soothe him, it kind of sounds like he was just going to let him cry while he did his thing.
Like... literally the opposite of WHY you wanted him to watch the baby while you showered. You could have had the baby in with you crying in the bathroom so you could shower. But you wanted the baby attended to. It is not the least bit relaxing to try and shower with a screaming baby. Then for him to yell at you? Not okay.
TheEternallyTired said:
NTA. A child that young crying for that long needs to be attended to. If your husband had been actively trying to settle, it would be a different story. He wasn't, he was ignoring your child, which is never okay.