Husband Problems:( - Livingston,NJ

You sound like my micromanaging boss. She gives a task at some location in the building and then comes around to see if everyone is on their post. Chill out. I like him. You went way over board by going to look for them! Dang!

I would try marriage counseling first. My husband and were arguing a lot back when the kids were younger and counseling really helped.

I suggest that going out to find them shows that you don't trust him. I suggest that when you are always questioning him he will be defensive. I urge you to find a different way of talking to him. Learn to trust him. Know that he doesn't have to do things the way you do. Know that when we criticize someone it is natural to be defensive and try to convince you he is OK.

I suggest that when you can accept him as being OK even when you don't agree with him you can turn this around. Give him 10 compliments for every negative comment. Better yet stop making negative comments. Start conversations only when you 're not angry. Calm down before trying to resolve issues. Use I statements. "I was concerned that the kids would get cold" instead of what were you thinking taking the kids out in the cold?"

You will feel less anger when you stop making things a catastrophe. Being cold is not a danger. I suggest that if you'd showed up with jackets and supported the positive act of your husband by saying "it's good to take the kids out and they need jackets. Work with him instead of against him.

I think that you've stockpiled lots of anger. I suggest that you go for counseling to learn how to deal with situations so that you aren't so angry and how to get rid of the built up anger. Good if he'll go with you but go even if he won't. Once he sees that counseling is helping you he'll be more apt to go himself.

Focus on changing the way you think and react. You can only change yourself. However people do change when we change.

After your SWH: you really need to do a reality check. You would still have problems without him. You would have different problems and in some ways those problems would be more difficult. And......you cannot be in total control even without him.

Yes, your children were uncomfortable but they weren't in danger. Yes ideally he wouldn't have taken them for a walk. I suggest this happened because you have not found a way to work with your husband. I think you feel that if you don't control everything life will fall apart. I suggest that is the very reason life is falling apart.

You have a husband who is willing to work on your marriage. He goes to counseling. Just wow! I suggest the reason counseling is not working for you is because you want to change him. I suggest that if you would focus only on you, why you're so afraid that you have to have total control, and learn ways to let go and love him for who he is you will see positive change.

Each person parents differently than the other.

Men Parent differently than women.

Let him do it his way and you do it your way. The kids will be fine and they understand "Dads way" and "Moms way".

The more you criticize the less he will do.

Yes, money is tight for every family.
Sit down and calmly write out the budget. See exactly where you 2 are financially and work from there.

You are a team. You both want your children to be safe and happy. No one does it better than the other.

The amount that a child drinks, should not be controlled. A child needs to drink as many liquids as they need, to heck with worrying about wet diapers. As a child gets old yes, their diapers will fill up more until they need to move up to the next size. That is just a part of children in diapers.

Get an extra set of keys and hide them somewhere outside around the house.

Give each other a break and give each other the benefit of the doubt.
Be a problem solver. Everyone makes mistakes.

Start taking a deep breath and stop before you say something negative.
It will help so much to take away all of this stress you are feeling. 3 children in 6 years, would be hard for any couple. My husband and I were married 10 years before we even considered our relationship was ready to add parenting to it.

Take a day at a time and remember, you are doing your best and he is doing his best. Be kind to each other and appreciate your children, Work as a couple to raise them together. No one is the parent in the world. We are just trying to do our best.

If you made three babies in six years you must have been happy, gotten along well and had better finances at some point.
What happened? Is he not making as much money as he used to? Is he feeling pressure to support five people on one income?
Clearly you're both stressing. I'm not sure why you felt the need to go looking for him and the kids when they were gone for a long time. I would have taken advantage of the time to clean, relax, call friends, etc. Unless you live in the Arctic I assume your kids can handle the cold temps of North America. Maybe he feels like you're controlling, and most men don't respond well to that.
If you can't trust him alone with his kids then that's a whole different story, and I hope you don't have any more.
If he IS stressed about money do whatever you can do to help. Lots of people need before/after school childcare, or look for work you can do evenings/weekends so you don't need to pay for daycare.
If you guys go to church they usually have great resources for couples there.
Good luck, I hope you figure it out.

He's being defensive because you're micromanaging him. Seriously? You went looking for them? Why? I don't get the reason for that....did the kids not have coats?

If you feel the need to tell him how to do something, do it by first saying something positive: "I really appreciate you taking all 3 kids out today, a lot of dads don't....but we should remember to pack extra warm clothes next time; today was colder than I thought it would be." I can guarantee he'll be more receptive to information this way.

Also, you need to let him parent. So he gives the baby an extra drink before bed? Is it unhealthy? Will she be scarred for life? No. Move her up to the next size diaper for the night and she'll be fine. Pick your battles.

I would also suggest you two find some time to reconnect as husband and wife. Even if it's just playing some games once the kids are in bed or sharing a bottle of wine. But you seem to need a reminder of why you two got married in the first place.

From just this short post, we can all see that there are many issues your dealing with and this is something that can only be fixed over a long period of time.

A good marriage consists of communication, respect, and teamwork. All of which are missing in this situation.

Start with picking your battles.

Some ideas of what you can do better next time...

We all know a child shouldn't have a lot to drink before bed time. I know you want what's best for your child, but try to see this from another point of view, he did feed the baby. What's the worst thing that can happen, a huge wet diaper and maybe some dirty bedding? Not good, but not worth fighting over.

If the kids were going out with dad, what was the big deal that he was out for over 3 hours or so important that you needed to go looking for him? You could have helped to pack a bag that included extra cloths and some snacks. That's something you should keep in the car anyway. Use the time away from the kids to do things that you can't accomplish when the kids are underfoot, this will reduce the overall stress level.

When he was following you continuing to fight... try this... let me put Susie to bed and then we can discuss this.

Say thank you, he can't be defensive about that.

You know what? He does sound like a great dad, just by taking them for three hours to play. Sometimes, just by being the mother, you like to take extra precautions to make sure they are warm, and maybe he just did not think about it. My husband has the best heart towards his children, but sometimes I just look at how he dressed them to take them out and we both just laugh after I say, "Honey, how's about we get something more appropriate on, mm-kay? Make things more lighthearted, pick your battles, and slough off the small things in life. I know that if there is a month where money is tight, he is more agitated. That is understandable, but I make sure to make things easier the best I can. The house is cleaned, I budget more and it's easier to get along. Sure, we have arguments, but we make it work. Marriage is hard work, and loving the person through all the hard times, is worth it. Get to the root of why he is so irritated, and work on that. Definitely go see a marriage counselor to get to talking again. I hope you get the fire back in your marriage! Blessings, fellow momma!

I'm impressed that he took three kids under 6 to the park for 3 hours.

Marriage is hard. The first 6 years are super hard, and then, if you make it to 8, your chance of divorce goes down to less than 80%.

I couldn't imagine having three kids in the first 6 years of our marriage! We didn't even have our first till we had been married for over 6 years.

Try counseling. Also, maybe start reading some books in marriage.

He sounds like a good dad. He took 3 kids under 6 out for 3 hours to the park.
You drove around looking for him?
Could have been resting or doing chores.
That seems odd to me.
Like others have said--micromanaging.
We have a saying here "Dad does it differently." And he does. But I'm grateful he DOES stuff!
TALK.
Get a sitter & go to dinner and TALK.
About a budget.
About the kids.
About your goals.
About your plans and dreams.
Raise your voices if you need to.
But for goodness sake--stop fighting in front if your kids!

I can't even think of one scenario where dead phone equals search for them like they are lost in the wilderness.

If you treat him like he can't do a thing right he will and maybe has risen to your standards.

You guys need help. You need counseling.

In regards to money - you guys need a budget. You need to work TOGETHER on the money. You are SUPPOSED to be partners.

There's nothing wrong with him taking the kids out. However, he does need to pay attention to whether they are cold or not. If money is tight - and you drove around looking for them - yeah - I'd be pissed too. You basically told him without saying it - you don't trust him with the kids. did he make a bad call by not paying attention to them being cold? Yes. STOP being passive-aggressive with him.

Him not having the keys is NOT your fault. You should NOT accept responsibility for that. My ex-husband did that - would blame me for things - we were in Belgium for all of one week and he rear-ended the car in front of us - and he wanted to blame me. HUH? No freaking way. He locked himself out of the house and thought it was MY job to know...uumm NO. You're a big boy.

You guys need a middle ground. Something brought the too of you together and you liked him enough at one point to marry him and have kids with him.

Money being tight is a stressful situation. But if you can't work together on this - it will be even more so.

Find a counselor. Learn to COMMUNICATE with each other. Stop the passive aggressive stuff and state your mind, your expectations and stand your ground. You are NOT his door mat.

Counseling - try it. Communication skills - work on them. Active listening - utilize it.

Counseling so you learn how to talk to each other in a productive way. If he is a good dad, then think about what parental choices are worth fighting over. They were crying? Why? Was it too cold to be out or were they whining about something? Young children cry all.the.time. Was it necessary to undermine him? Etc. If you can't talk, find someone to help you learn how. To mediate. If you divorce, you will STILL need to communicate for your kids. Might as well learn first.

ETA: If you have been in counseling for 1/3 your marriage, you need to find another counselor or find a lawyer. Either the counselor isn't helping (there are good and bad ones), or you shouldn't have married in the first place. OR one or both of you isn't doing more than giving lipservice to the counselor. My mother tried counseling with our father. Then he'd go home and throw the phone across the room anyway. The counselor cannot do the work for you.

You say you have a 17 yr old. You don't say when you split from his or her father. You don't say how long you were a single parent. I think it is worth considering that you may be so used to going it alone out of necessity that you have forgotten how to coparent. There are times when I will remind myself that while I might feel anxious about DD, DH is her father and a very good and capable one. Maybe he didn't make the most brilliant choice to take the kids out if they were sick but there are also some schools of thought that getting out in fresh air is good. So maybe it wasn't as far fetched as you thought it was. And even if he made a truly boneheaded choice, did you need to go find him? Can you trust him as a parent to your children? You may say yes, but your actions say no.

The other thing to consider is that if you want to just get things done on your own...sure, you can divorce and do that. But he remains their father regardless and you will have even LESS say over his choices with them if you are not in the same household. So you need to prepare to let it go. Fight the big stuff. Not the little ones. If you feel your only job is their health and happiness, are you neglecting yourself? If YOU are not happy, then it is not THEIR job to make you happy. Mothers need their own interests and lives, too. It is not healthy to be only about the kids.

When I first read your post I thought, is this not normal? My husband and I can do this to each other, especially when we're tired or stressed. That doesn't make it ok, but we're only human.

On our good days - and there are more good than not so good - we are supportive of each other, let the little things slide and say things like, "Oh, Daddy and I didn't realize it was going to be so cold this afternoon. When I realized it, I thought you might like your jackets," or, "The baby sure does fill that diaper at night. What were the tricks we used with the older kids."

It's not that you're wrong. It's just that he's only human, too. He has bad days, too, and doesn't always act as he should. He probably felt really stupid and was probably kicking himself that he locked himself out of the house. Ridiculous that he blamed you, but we all sometimes do stupid things when we, ourselves, are feeling stupid.

There are just some days when both of us need to take a deep breath and try again. Maybe the two of you just had one of those days.

Therapy, if your insurance will cover it. I suspect your arguments are not about all the small issues you mention - but that you are both angry with each other about more fundamental things. Who does the lion's share of the work, perhaps how things are going in the bedroom. etc. and a neutral person could help you figure it out.

The first thing to do is to realize that no marriage is perfect and no one is perfect. There is arguing/fighting in every marriage and sometimes it will seem like everyday. The reality of your situation is that it is very typical. The most common things for married couples to fight over are money and kids. Why? Well money involves budgeting and since a married couple is made up of 2 people, each person has a different idea of what is important and what can be budgeted in and what needs to be cut. Kids added to the mixture only make things worse, since each parent grew up in a different environment and was raised differently by their parents. This means that you've got 2 great parents with different ideas of how to raise the kids. There will be some issues one spouse just can't compromise on, so the other spouse will need to let it go. The things you are arguing about really are small stuff, but in your eyes and his eyes they're big important things. DH and I have been married for 22 yrs. Do we argue? You bet! A lot? It sure seems that way. Tried the family meeting thing and it works for a few weeks. I find the best thing to do is to weight the importance. Not calling...phone dead...it happens, no reason to make everyone unhappy for that. Kid not studying hard enough...I just stand there for support and let him yell....Then come back later and offer suggestions to the kid. If DH starts yelling at me about something small, I learned to just leave the room like my mom used to. My mom used to take me window shopping. It gives hubby a chance to calm down, so a more productive solution to a problem can be reached if needed. Nothing can get done or solved when either party is heated. Another thing that helps is to help each other out. I've notice that when I help my DH rake leaves, he will find a way to help me out with my chores. It's so much more fun to be partners rather than working independant of each other, although sometimes you have to. In those cases, I just tell my DH I've got stuff I need to do and will be doing X at Z time so try to leave me alone at that time. Also keep in mind that your DH might yell and will direct the yelling at you as in the case where he forgot his key, but it's really just that...a bunch of "hot air." He's just letting off steam. He's really mad at himself, but he has an external locus of control so he will blame other people instead of himself. External locus of control are really hard to deal with. My DH has that problem, so I try really hard to ignore him...A lot of times I "bite back" and then wish I wouldn't have. It's just meaningless yelling.

Your husband works, right? Most big companies have some kind of employee assistance program that provides a few sessions of free counselling. You and your husband should look into it and figure out how to talk to each other.

I would also suggest a date night, with kid talk being off-limits, since that seems to be a trigger for you. Doesn't have to cost much, just get out of the house together and remember how to be a couple.

Your kids' health and happiness is not just YOUR job it's your husband's job too.
I just don't understand why women have babies with men they clearly don't respect or trust, and not just one baby but three (?!)
Is he just a paycheck to you?
I think you need a new counselor, if your husband is calling you names and you are hounding him down because his phone died then something is wrong. This is not an adult, equal partner relationship, this sounds like two very unhappy and immature people.

All marriages have issues and this is the time that they start arising. I think every single married person can attest to that. Hopefully you guys will start to look at things together and realize how ridiculous you both are being. And if any married person says their marriage is perfect is not telling the truth. Marriages are hard work, especially when you have young kids that demand so much of your attention. Talk it out with him and talk about the issues you need to work on. Before the conversation tell him that is not a "blaming" convo but a way for you guys to get back on track and start working together as husband and wife. Stay strong and don't give up! If you love him and he loves you, there will be a way to work it out.
Good luck!

Either counseling or divorce, really. You cannot continue to fight in front of your children. It's a terrible thing for them to have to live with.

I hope you can get him to a marriage counselor. Really and truly.

Well the fighting in front of the kids isn't good. You can change that today if you want to, just don't do it and don't rise to the bait if he is doing things that tend to push your buttons. You can control yourself, it's hard, but you can do it, especially for your kids. If he starts getting upset, just say something to the effect of 'hey can we talk about this later?' Or if you start to loose it on him, just take a breath and tell him you will talk about it later. Yo can only change yourself, but maybe by just living in a more peaceful way with him could be a way to start. We have actually in the past made sure the kids were safe for a moment and just stepped into our room to discuss something. It's amazing how just those few breaths and the thoughtfulness of not arguing in front if kiddos can diffuse things. But I think some counseling could help, communication is the hardest thing. I don't understand exactly why you would think you would need to go look for your husband and kids either, maybe you aren't sharing some details, or you are a big time worrier. If it's the latter, chill, he's their dad, he is the other person on the planet that loves them as much as you do. Telling him what to do with the baby is also unwise. What if when you went to do something for the baby he just told you what to do. Might you think 'hey, this is my child too!!' One parent dictating to the other can be very belittling even if the intention is good. One wet diaper will not ruin the universe. Later on you could ask, 'hey babe, how much did you give the baby drink?' Listen to his answer and them just say ' oh, ok, I just ask bc when she drinks a lot she pees all over the bed, that's the only reason I was asking.' Just common courtesy goes a long way. Now he should not call you names, but hopefully that is not a regular thing at all. But I do think if that is the norm, talking about that in a non heated moment is important, that kind of talk just destroys real intimacy over time. Well, good luck, didn't mean to go on and on and I hope you guys get it worked out!

When I hear about this kind of communication in a relatively short marriage with multiple children, this set of questions always comes to mind: How long have you known each other? How much effort did you put into getting to know each other before marrying? How much energy did you put into creating a solid foundation before adding children to the mix? What kinds of conversations and discussions did you have about your goals, as individuals and as a family? How do you resolve issues and complement each other; what can you expect when you disagree? How much actual thought and planning go into your decisions about parenting your children and partnering with your husband? How aware are you of what you bring to the table, what unresolved issues you bring to the marriage and to your parenting style?

In my mind, six years is a relatively short period of time to marry and have two or three kids. You should cut yourself some slack and realize that you haven't had time to establish your rhythm--as a married couple, as parents to one, as parents to two, as parents to three. Each phase is different and requires its own foundation.