Unable to compromise

What do you and your SO do when you flat out disagree on how to handle a parenting situation? What if there is no room for compromise? This NEVER happens with my husband and I, until last night. I ended up sleeping on the couch. We could not at all come to an agreement. I 100% think I was in the right, and he thinks the same of himself. Not sure what is going to happen if/when this situation comes up again in the future...

What was the situation?

We have a few of these type situations in our lives right now.

If there truly is literally NO room to compromise,
eventually- the only choice is one parent changing their mind to the other's idea on the subject.

Til then, for us personally, after the initial argument, we just both lay low for a bit to let the other think.

Quoting James Mama:" What was the situation?"

So... I just got a job. And I'm in nursing school. Our 3 year old hasn't had nearly as much time with me as he is used to, and it's been hard on him but right now we just don't have a choice. DH and DS have a slightly rocky relationship because DH leaves randomly for army crap. Anyway. So last night DS wakes up at like, 11:30 PM when DH and I were about to go to bed, and comes and sits on my lap on the couch, he looked like he wanted to cry. We asked him what was wrong and he kept saying nothing, but he just looked so sad or something. He wouldn't even LOOK at DH, and wouldn't respond to him when he talked to him. He does this when he's mad, he just ignores. Well, we were all sitting there on the couch and I tried to get DS to talk about why he was mad or sad or whatever he was, and WHY he wouldn't talk to DH, but he kept saying he wasn't mad or sad or anything, he just didn't feel like talking. So I'm thinking, okay he's just being grumpy he got woken up in the middle of the night, whatever. So I tell him he's being rude to daddy and hurting his feelings by not talking to him, and take him back to bed. I was talking to him in his bed for a minute, and he says to me, "Daddy is really mad at me because I wasn't talking to him." and i said, "I don't think daddy's mad babe, he's just sad. It hurts daddy's feelings when you don't want to love on him." So we talk about it for a minute, and I suggest we all spend the evening together tomorrow playing DS's new Kinect game. So I try to call DH in the room so we can suggest it to him since DS was feeling better, and DH ignores me and doesn't come into the room. So DS starts crying again and says, "Daddy is still sad with me... Can we go apologize?" So I say of course, and get up with him to go into our room and apologize to daddy. I walk him in there, and DH just says, "Really? You think this is okay? No. I'm not talking to him yet. He needs consequences for disrespecting me." (Obviously talking to me, not DS)... And so I said, "He asked me if he could come apologize and I said yes... I think deciding to be brave and come apologize is what he needs to learn from the situation, don't you?" and he said, "No, he lives in a world of no consequences with you. With me he gets consequences." So I took DS back to bed sad, cuddled with him for a minute and told him that daddy loves him very much and he will come talk to him in a minute. And he did. But I felt as though DH was way out of line to flat our refuse to accept the apology of a 3-year old who was trying to make up for hurting his daddy.

DS gets consequences for EVERYTHING, leaving toys out, not listening, not eating his food, etc. But I feel when it comes to his EMOTIONS, he still needs to be TAUGHT how to handle them. He acted inappropriately, yes. He was rude to DH when he didn't respond to him and ignored him for no reason. So in my mind, the way to handle it was to separate him from the situation that was stressing him out, and help him understand WHY it isn't okay to do that, and WHY it hurt daddy's feelings and HOW to fix it. And all on his own, DS figured out how to fix it, and wanted to apologize. But DH said he had no consequences because it was "less than 5 minutes" before things were just okay again, and that's not okay. In my mind, we were all about to go to bed. What is gonna happen, We're all gonna go to bed upset, DS thinking he really hurt daddy's feelings, and then we're not even going to deal with it or make it better until 24 hours later when DH gets home from work? That makes no sense, you can't deal with a 3-year old's emotions 24 hours later, they need immediate action to be able to understand it.... I dunno. Dh thinks in this situation I let DS disrespect him with no consequences. But I thought DS was having difficulty handling our new schedule and needed to TALK about it, not be punished for feeling sad or lonely or whatever.... We both feel we were 100% in the right... It ended in a big fight and I slept on the couch because neither of us would cave. He felt I was letting DS off easy, and I felt he couldn't set aside his pride for the sake of his 3-year old's emotions..

When that happens what I say goes always... I know that sounds awful in a way but its the truth.

Quoting Mama MacGyver*:" So... I just got a job. And I'm in nursing school. Our 3 year old hasn't had nearly as much time with ... [snip!] ... cave. He felt I was letting DS off easy, and I felt he couldn't set aside his pride for the sake of his 3-year old's emotions.."

that sounds like a little too much from everyone. I would have just taken the kid back to bed and ignored that he didn't talk to him. Having a kid understand hurt feelings and being mad at each other is a lot to take in. I would be mad at your DH for acting like that though

Im with you on this one. How sad  

I would have got upset with DH too.

Quoting Blythe.:" that sounds like a little too much from everyone. I would have just taken the kid back to bed and ignored ... [snip!] ... understand hurt feelings and being mad at each other is a lot to take in. I would be mad at your DH for acting like that though"

I wouldn't have taken DS in to talk to him if I thought DH would react that way, ya know? I thought him deciding to apologize would FIX it all, DH wouldn't feel as hurt, and DS would learn how to make things better when you hurt someone you love. In my mind it was the only logical solution to what happened... I was shocked by the way DH responded.

Quoting James Mama:" Im with you on this one. How sad   I would have got upset with DH too."

DH says he felt like we weren't on a united front on it. Like, we weren't standing together on the issue. Which, obviously, we weren't! But that's not just on me, that's on both of us. And I can't just comply because DH thinks it's the best route, ya know? HIS way isn't necessarily right, what makes him think I'm going to just agree with him automatically every time? In this instance, I thought he would come around, and in the end we would be on the same page.

Quoting Mama MacGyver*:" DH says he felt like we weren't on a united front on it. Like, we weren't standing together on the ... [snip!] ... him automatically every time? In this instance, I thought he would come around, and in the end we would be on the same page. "

Did he understand that you just didnt feel the same about it and accept that? There is no way you are going to agree on every little thing but you should be able to discuss it and understand why the other person feels the way they do.

Quoting Mama MacGyver*:" DH says he felt like we weren't on a united front on it. Like, we weren't standing together on the ... [snip!] ... him automatically every time? In this instance, I thought he would come around, and in the end we would be on the same page. "

did you talk to him this morning?

That's really messed up and so sad for your son. No child should ever have to feel like they have to earn their parent's love and affection.

Quoting Blythe.:" did you talk to him this morning?"

No. He left early for work. He woke me up from being on the couch and we had a long, sleepy hug. But then I went back to bed and he went to work.

Quoting Mama MacGyver*:" No. He left early for work. He woke me up from being on the couch and we had a long, sleepy hug. But then I went back to bed and he went to work. "

maybe he'll come around today.

Quoting [[Breezy]]:" That's really messed up and so sad for your son. No child should ever have to feel like they have to earn their parent's love and affection. "

Thats how I felt about it. In DH's mind it was just like if he wasn't listening or didn't put his toys away or whatever, and needed to be in time out for a few minutes before we dealt with it. But I felt like this was different. So I DO see where DH was coming from. I see his logic in it, but I just felt like this situation was different than just disobeying. This was coming from somewhere deeper. Dh may be getting deployed in the next month or so, and lately I have been wondering how I'm going to explain this to DS, maybe that's why I really felt like it needed to be solved in the moment and that's just not where DH's mind was at....