It's been this way since before our son (we'll call him Ollie) was born. The pregnancy was a nightmare. It was my first full-term pregnancy and let's just say he handled it dismally. There's a lot of emotional destruction to unpack there, but that's another story for a different thread.Ollie is a little over a year old now, and he's silly and sweet and so easy on the eyes, but he's my first attempt at being a mother, and it's a lot to do alone when there's someone sleeping next to you every night who is supposed to be sharing that responsibility with you. Don't get me wrong; I love him to absolute death, he's a good provider and we don't want for anything, although I rarely ask for much. But I can't remember the last time he changed a diaper, he's never once gone on a walk with us, he's never been there for bed time, he's fed Ollie less times than I can count on one hand and participated in bath time less times than that. He works a standard 9-5, 6 days a week, and when he is home he's gaming, full set up with the headset and everything.That fucking headset. It's like he puts that thing on and he's not even here anymore. Once, I told him that, and he got an attitude and made me feel bad for making him feel bad. That happens pretty much every single time I try to talk to him about it. He used to game to "unwind" because his job is stressful and he is admittedly doing much more work than he's being paid for, but we got into an argument about it then and I made a point about how no matter what I say, there'll alsays be a reason why he needs to do that instead of watch our son grow with me. But where was my time to unwind? I work a gruelling 24/7 on top of cleaning and cooking and making his coffee and shopping and laundry and all that. I don't remember the last time I had a moment to unwind, much less 4-6 hours at a time. (that's not an exaggeration.) Now he games for money, which was pretty tight before, so as begrudgingly as I must admit this, it's helpful. But that's so bittersweet. It's now another 'reason', and one I can't refute.I go shopping alone, after the baby goes to sleep of course, because God forbid dad has to handle a sleepy baby or go with us as a family to go grocery shopping for the next 2 weeks. Every single time, Ollie wakes up when or before I get home, and o times out of 10 he's crying his little baby heart out in his crib because dad's headset is so loud he can't hear Ollie screaming, or because he's "right in the middle of a money game". Once I begged him for help to just pick him up for a minute or help me unload the car and he said that shit, so I'm running back and forth while Ollie screams and I'm cut short by him crying so hard he vomits all over himself. What the fuck, dad?Ollie loves his dad so much, and it breaks my heart because he'll try to jump on him in the morning or wave him down from the game at night and dad just gets irate, because he's tired, because he worked all day yesterday, because he has to work today. Hey, I'M tired too. But i vant even run to the bathroom to change my tampon in the morning before I bleed all over the bed without being made to feel like a monster for waking him up to watcg Ollie for those crucial 40 seconds.That happened bit for bit this morning.I haven't had a shower in almost a week because I've been asking dad to watch Ollie so i could go get a good scrub in and when I'm trying to work around h8s work/gaming schedule, it leaves small, almost nonexistent windows of time to do it, and I've had to go to the laundromat and fold everything and go shopping and do fucking everything.There's no doubt in my mind that he loves me and Ollie, but it's almost like his life hasn't changed at all since we had the baby except for where his money goes. I feel like a single parent. I feel like if I actually was a single parent, this wouldn't be so frustrating, because I guess I just expected him to be as much a part of this as I am and now that he's abysmally NOT, I'm resentful.I didn't ask for this, by the way. I wanted to work. I loved my job, but he made the point that Ollie needed his mother and we couldn't exactly trust anyone to care for him while i worked my full time bakery job until he can talk and tell us everything that happens to him while we're not there. I didn't want to be dependent on dad, but here the fuck we are. I've gained weight. I never get dressed anymore because I'm always inside, we live in tye ghetto and dad has the only car so it's hard to take Ollie anywhere outside of walks around the block. I'm Depressed as all get out and I have no family or friends here, no interaction with sociable adult people. It's been a year.I don't know what I want out of this post. I just don't like the way this all panned out and I don't know what to do about any of it. I've tild him I'm unhappy, a zillion and a half times, but he's dismissive. It's not like he's exactly distant or apathetic or anything; he's very sweet to me most of the time and he does love our son. His priorities are just askew and he's complicated it far passed anything I can do to understand them, and all I've done is perpetuate this dynamic. It's drained me and it's killing me. I feel like shit inside and out.SOSEdit: sorry for the length of this. I've been putting off posting this for a long time because i didn't know how to say it so it all kind of just poured out. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/2HYFYoc
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