[somuchmore]

I'm so tired of his attitude. I swear he has 2 emotions, anger and indifference. So tonight's issue is that my 4 yr old son is scared of storms so he goes and gets in bed with his 8 yr old sister. It irritates my husband soooo bad. The way I feel is if he is scared who cares as long as its not every night.

So tonight there are storms and we find my son sound asleep with his sister. Hubs comes unglued tells me to deal with it. I say ok. Then 3 minutes later he goes stomping in there flips the light on and sends our son back to bed. When I ask why he didn't let me handle it, he say I didn't seem to concerned ...HELLO...I'm not! I feel good knowing they feel safe together. Aren't they supposed to???

I guess I needed to vent. What do you guys think? Is it no big deal, or should my son learn to stay in his own bed to work out the fear himself? Any suggestions on how to discuss this hubs without wanting to kick him in the face? We have been married for 15 yrs and do have a good partnership most if the time, he can just be so ridiculous sometimes. Ugh.

[Suki22]

would he be more or less upset if your son climbed into your bed instead? how old are the children?

[Elbie]

I don't get why is he so opposed to them being together. I think he minght have a trigger, Is it ppossible he is hiding a repressed feeling?
Please understand granted I am not a professinal. Why would he get so upset that his/your children find comfort when they /he is frightened.
Keep your chin up/ Elbie xo

[somuchmore]

@suki22 he would be more upset if they bothered him /us. My son is 4 and daughter is 8.

@elbie my husband fears very little. I don't think he understands what its like. Its almost like he feels like its such an irrational fear that our son cant really be scared. I don't know how many times a day I have to say honey he's only 4 or honey she's only 8.

Thanks for listening to my rant

[Leed]

Do you think hubby thinks it's obsene that your son is in bed with his sister? Could there be some abuse in his background? I'm just wondering if he thinks it's almost incestual if the 4yr old is in bed with the 8 yr old? It seems he's blowiing this TOO out of proportion to me. There's no rational reason for him to get this out of whack, without there being some underlying cause for it. He might have an abusive background that he's not talking about.

I'd try to get him to talk about his background -- if there's nothing, then he's being a nut case. There's not a darn thing wrong with him finding comfort with his sister. He's scared, and he needs someone to comfort him during a storm. He's still basically a baby. Leave the kid alone!

God bless & take care. Hugs, Lee

[Odee]

A four year old little boy seeking solace with his eight year old sister? That's adorable! Who would want to stop that?

Humans were meant to be social creatures. I don't see the point in forcing children to learn 'independence' when healthy dependence is what we're designed to do.

[Harley47]

I agree...I don't see the problem here. :/ Why on earth would he get so upset over something so small (and adorable, honestly)?

I'd understand discomfort if the children were older, but not rage like that. And at this age, there's absolutely nothing wrong with it IMO.

[somuchmore]

We are going to have some down tome today so I'm going to ask him what bothers him so much. I could see if they were teens, but they aren't. Lol, they fight like cats and dogs so it is sweet to see them snuggled up together.

Thank you all, and I will keep you posted.

[Glowiebird]

Somuchmore,
Your husband sounds a lot like my Dad. People like that don't change for anything. Maybe, but im not sure, as a child his parents forced him to search in himself for comfort or made it a negative thing for him to turn to others... Maybe you should sit him down & have a face to face conversation. First address the problem, then ask him what he think about it & why he thinks that it is wrong that your son turns to her when he's in fear. Then explain your side. Just try to keep a level head & try to find some middle ground.

Regardless of what happens, I wish you the best of luck with your husband & never let love die .

[Lost321]

I agree with the others about finding out WHY it bothers him so much. Although my husband seems to do that a lot too. He seems totally irrational about things that I think are cute or sweet. Some of reasoning I understand after we talk about it but most of the time I still don't get what the big deal is. Good Luck!

[Sojourn]

With some guys it's a masculinity thing. Since he shows no fear himself, he might expect the same from his son no matter how old he is. Perhaps he feels you are catering to your son's 'weakness' and that bothers him. There are some men who insist on toughness and manliness from their sons and feel this has to be ingrained from an early age. If this is the case it may be difficult to convince him that his viewpoint is rather extreme.

Just adding another possibility...

I'm not sure what exactly you are saying your husband gets upset about. Is it the fear of storms? Or is it the being in bed with the sister?

I suspect you mean your husband is impatient with your son's fear of storms, so I'll just address that. That's a pretty normal fear for a 4 year old. So, what is it about the fear that triggers your husband's anger? Is he afraid it is a sign of weakness, that this is an indication that your son is a too weak? That would be assinine but a good indicator that your husband needs to redefine manliness or strength or something. Shaming your son about this fear is not helpful at all and will probably only serve to make the problem worse.

I have a 13-year-old who is pretty close to phobic about storms. We live in tornado alley and the storms that come through truly can be deadly. Somewhere along the line he saw a wall cloud and feared for his life and ever since then it has been a real issue for him. He checks the weather radar if the skies look bad, and if a storm does hit, trust me, he is in the room with us often under a blanket and fighting tears. We feel so badly for him. This is the one thing in his life he reacts to that way, rational or not. Ridiculing him would definitely not be helpful. Talking to him, letting him be in our proximity, etc. is calming for him, and once the storm has passed he moves back to bed or wherever.

Last April during school, our area was put under a tornado warning and all the schools in the area and most businesses too went under lockdown. I found myself under the computer tables at school with my own students and thinking a great deal about how my son was handling it on his own at his own school. And you know what? I had students of my own who were as equally terrified of storms as my son, and my son found out that he wasn't the only kid at school who reacted so strongly either. He said the other students were kind and comforting of each other and he felt pretty empowered to find out he's not the only one. The nice end result? He's been handling the storms a bit better since then.

I guess my point is that your husband really needs to understand that his reaction that he is communicating to your son is probably only going to make this a bigger, longer issue. Fear of storms is completely age appropriate at 4 years old, and even if it wasn't the way your husband is dealing with it will do more harm than good. Time for a sit down, come to Jesus meeting with your husband about this.

[Vibe]

The rational part of me agrees that you need to sit down with your husband for a serious conversation and get to the bottom of this. The emotional side of me is angry that your son was treated that way. Not only is it extremely unhelpful and unfair on the little boy, but it doesn't give him the comfort and reassurance that he needs. Nor does it teach him to help deal with his fear. Instead it says that his caregiver, the person he should be able to rely on so he can feel comfortable enough to develop positive coping mechanisms, is unreliable and aggressive. If someone treated my kids that way I'd probably be the one reacting aggressively.

As far as the kid sleeping with his big sister - this doesn't seem like a big deal to me. If you wanted to encourage him to sleep in his own bed, the way to do this would not be to scare him further. I might let him stay for awhile but encourage him to go back and teach him ways to not be scared. It should be a positive and proactive event. Not a time to explode on a very young boy who's relatively new to the world and all it's intricacies.