Between a rock and a hard place...

Between a rock and a hard place...So I am utterly confused and stressed at the moment. Probably won’t sleep tonight until this is figured out.Don’t even know if this is the right community, but I seriously need help.About 6 months back, our natural gas water heater broke down. My dad, having put a couple water heaters in before, offered to help us fix it. So they went and got a water heater from Lowe’s just like was there, and got to work.Thing is, some things seemed off during the repair. They had a few different parts and things were just not seeming to fit right, and my husband raised the red flag, but my dad said we could make it work. I was nervous but we already had spent ~$600 on this new heater, so I said go ahead and my husband just went with what I said, as he and my dad don’t have the best relationship (whole other long story).So they get it installed and lo and behold we have hot water! We smelled something a little off but dad said that was just because it was new. Okay, I could accept that. Probably in his mind my husband didn’t accept that, but he has learned from previous experience with my dad to just keep his mouth shut, so he did.Fast forward to Tuesday morning, and I go downstairs and smell natural gas for about the third time. Worried, I called our natural gas provider to report a leak, who reported the source was the water heater. Because it was...the wrong water heater. Our home requires a direct vent, but the one we installed was atmospheric.And so I took the day off and called a plumber and arranged repairs while my husband was at work. Plumber confirmed it was indeed the wrong water heater. Price of new water heater and installation today: $1050. So we basically wasted $600 a while back and my husband Blew. His. Top.It doesn’t help that we had to put it all on a credit card because we don’t have the money right now in the bank, and we had another $300 repair to pay for on our home heating system on Tuesday as well.My husband says I need to take the initiative and ask my dad for compensation since he fucked up.He really did, I agree with that, but he didn’t screw us over on purpose. And my parents aren’t amazing with money, on top of the fact that my mom is out of work right now because her school is closed, so I know for a fact that they don’t have the money to help us.Furthermore, I could see how badly my dad felt over his mistake when we found out what happened (he was truly mortified and wanted to help us install the right one), and it’s true that the system was set up wrong when we bought the house (they bought the exact same heater that was there), so that’s what I told him when he found out. And that’s why I think my dad wasn’t totally at fault, because he was trying to set it up the same way it was. He just believed in himself too much and tried to McGuyver and push his way through instead of taking a step back.My husband is right to be upset. I’m upset about the situation too. But I think the blame should be placed on me for not speaking up and focusing more on money than the job being done right, not my dad, because I was the one who didn’t speak up and insist when my husband had concerns. If I would have stopped the job because of concerns, my dad would have listened, but because I didn’t support my husband, he didn’t listen. So I am actually the one at fault.I did not stand up to my parents for a long time and this “fix” was part of that time. I was weak and controlled by my parents too much. To my parents I pretty much can do very little wrong, but for some reason to them my husband will never be good enough. I just learned to stand up to them though when needed a few weeks ago (see a previous post of mine about my child). In this situation though, my not wanting to demand compensation is about logic, not wanting to please my parents, because:1) I know they don’t have the money to give us 2) My dad would consider it a slap in the face; from his view he did his best to help us in good faith and save us some money and now we’re asking him to pay when it didn’t go rightI’ve offered my husband for all of my personal spending to be directed at the credit card until the repair is paid off (in times that are not apocalyptic we usually allot $60 for each of us a month). This isn’t what he asked for, but I just think that by demanding compensation from my dad, we will not only get nothing, we will stir up emotional trouble with my parents when there’s already been a lot with them.And so reddit, if you have read to the end, thank you, thank you for doing so. And if you have any advice I’d be glad to receive it. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/3bsrVBT