Difference in parenting styles?

DH and I have always had fairly different parenting styles, we were raised in very different types of families. His mum did 99.9% of everything for her two boys, while his Dad went to work and at home didn't do much, DH has mentioned he didn't realise his father loved him until he was in his late teens/early 20's. DH is very materlialistic, which I think stems from his mothers need to spend money to prove love. MIL BF, but weaned when each of the boys were 9months, frowns upon me "still" BFing, co-sleeping etc etc.

Whereas I was raised primarily by my mother and step-father (my parents divorced when I was 3), but the care was always 50/50 between my parents, mum breastfed until we weaned, around 1yo, she fully supports me BFing and most of my attachment parenting style.

My problem is, that because of DH and i's different upbringing our parenting styles are almost virtually polar opposite and I feel like we are always butting heads about DS's care. The latest two things that are really upsetting me, are that DH doesn't like that I'm "still" BFing DS and he thinks I should be going back to fulltime work and putting DS in daycare. It breaks my heart to even think about these two things and when my maternity leave was coming to an end this time a year ago we discussed it in depth and both decided DS would be better at home with me, and of course we have another child on the way.
I just feel that if we can't agree on this, something that is so so important to me, how can we move past it and work as a united family??

So if you have different styles/values as a parent to your other half, how do you deal with it?

Sounds like your DH was parented the same way as my Dh too.
DH and his siblings were not bf at all, and my Mum bf me for 6 months and by bro for 6 weeks- but Mum has been and continues to be extremely supportive of me "still" bf at 20months as does DH- Ive given her info along the way so she could understand the way we are doing things and then shes right behind me- same with DH,...I basically look into and decide what I want to do- tell him why I want to do it and hes happy! Im talking home birth, extended bf, blw, baby wearing etc etc. He also naturally helps me with whatever he can around the house, with a bit of prompting and direction from me at times, but never expects that I have everything done around the house and dinner done etc when he gets home. This is very different from how he was bought up, and his parents dont get why he is so involved, why he chooses more often than not to stay home with me and the kids than go out fishing etc all the time, and why I only work part-time etc.

The only thing DH and I have differing opinions on is leaving baby to cry- We did CIO and all sorts of "sleep training " with #1 and it was always traumatic for me and her and never worked anyway. With #2 I have refused to do any of that, and DH still thinks that when he is sure that there is nothing wrong with baby- like after we have checked him and done everything, that we should just leave him so he will learn to go back to sleep- I disagree. These arguments usually take place in the middle of the night when baby has been up ages and we are tired and stressed. During the day we calmly agree to disagree on this.

I really dont know how I would manage if we werent on the same page about everything.

Sorry, Im not really sure how to help.

Kellz we have the same issue with crying in the night. DP tells me she's fine leave her while I disagree and we often have arguments in the middle of the night. After I've been up to her a couple of times. Other than that we pretty much agree with everything, if he's unsure I generally have info to back up my decision so he can understand where I'm coming from. Even if he initally disagrees he'll usually come around.

I think we have to be careful using our parents as a gold standard too. It's easy to say my parents did a great job and DH's didn't - but actually, for all I could merrily throw them off a bridge right now, they must have done something right, cos DH is pretty awesome (and my parents can't have done it perfect cos some of my siblings are pretty nutty!).

So I am careful to choose the bits I liked about my parent's parenting and to try to leave behind the bits I didn't.

We have similar differences to your DH and you, I think. I was very attachment parented, and sometimes I'm not sure DH was parented at all for the amount of interest and intuition they show.

DH was open to CIO originally, and tbh I wasn't dead set against it until it came to the reality that someone suggested I try it on my week-old baby. It seemed so insanely wrong, so I looked into it and decided no way was it for me and my kids. I had some long talks with DH after a few night time arguments, and now he's very much in agreement with me that it's never acceptable in our house. It was really good to have those talks in daytime though, cos there is no way to be reasonable at 3am when you haven't slept yet!

As for BF, I wanted to BF until 2, and DH didn't really mind. I think truthfully he was a bit weirded out at first, but he quickly came round when he saw how good it was for her (and I). He stood up for me when I was getting grief for BF her at my brothers wedding when she was 15 mo - apparently at her age she shouldn't BF in public. Oh sorry, would you rather I let her scream and disrupt the wedding then?

Anyway, I did find DH became a bit more proactive about encouraging me to wean once I was UTD, but that was more about looking after me, cos I was pretty run down. He let me decide for myself that I didn't want to tandem feed, although he may have had something to say if I'd decided I did. In the end I honestly don't think I could have handled it, so that's would have been his motivation for interfering, not through being weirded out.

I think you maybe need to sit down and find out why he has a problem with certain things. Try and do it non-confrontationally, when neither of you are too tired. See if you can address his concerns, and also take on board his opinion too. He's one half of the parenting team so he has a say in things too.

Maybe he's feeling the pressure of providing for 2 kids? Perhaps you could show him how much you'd earn if you went back to work to see how little it is compared with the value you get staying home with your son.

I dunno if any of that helped sorry!

I do believe that parenting needs to be 50/50, but these couple of things seem to be things that neither of us are willing to compromise on, no matter how much talking we do.
At the moment I think DH is ok(ish) with the co-sleeping and breastfeeding, but he won't let the work issue go. I am currently working 8 hours a week in the evenings so DH takes care of DS while I'm at that, but he is insistent that I need to go back full time. Although I'm pretty sure that by the time we factored in daycare etc we wouldn't be much better off than we are now, perhaps I need to figure out some ways of calculating it all out and show him the figures?

Thanks for all the replies, it is certainly good to know that I'm not the only one who butts head with their other half over these things

Yeah your on the money Kelly, she doesn't say anything about me being at home, but she stayed at home until her kids were at school, so it'd be pretty hypocritical if she dud, but she does always ask DH if I'm still breastfeeding and DH's cousin, who breastfed her youngest till 3, used to get grief from the family a lot.

just for comparing, I got offered a job last yr & it was 10 days on 10 days off. I needed care for DS3 from 2-6pm & DS1 & 2 from 3-6pm, sounds easy right??? well the cost was about$600 a fortnight & the weekdays I was off I still had to pay for care as I would of lost the places, all up my take home pay was $700, so factoring in child care, extra petrol, & not being there for my kids it was not worth it. With DH on call it would of been to hard to do & at that timer I did not want to take DS3 out of kindy & put him into full time care so I could work during the week....so you really need to make sure it is worth it $ for your family & make sure you are not missing out on your kids while they are young as you don't get that time back.

I've used the excuse that there aren't that many jobs available that suit out needs and getting a suitable job would be hard enough.

Do you get WFF? That will go up when #2 arrives.

My DH would love the extra money as well it would make things easier, it wouldn't be what's best for DD, and from what I've seen of other Mum's who have gone back to work they end up with babies getting sick all the time and having to take sick leave. Doesn't seem worth it.

My DH had some really funny ideas from my point of view. What bothered me the most was that he based everything on what he saw his mother do with his sister (18 year age gap), without thinking about how it would work for us or even looking into any alternatives. I tried to discuss things with him, but he'd kind of get grumpy about it. So I just started talking about the benefits of things I'd researched, how it would save us money, time, what the development benefits for the kid were and so on. I found he'd kind of parrot the things I'd say back to me as if these thing were his idea and as we got on with the various choices he'd talk about what a good idea it had been, how he didn't know how we'd manage doing things another way and so on. There have certainly been things that haven't worked for us, but at that point we'll try stuff and move on.