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That sucks and I'm sorry he is being critical. Is it possible to say to him politely "If you don't like how I am doing this you may do it yourself?" and if he agrees then let him do so without comment but if he declines to do so then say something along the lines of "unless you are willing to do the task yourself you need to stop telling me how to do it" Does it work to brainstorm solutions together for a problem instead of him saying you should do X better, could you come together and say X is a problem how do we make it better?
My husband is not super critical but he likes to understand the logic or reasoning behind something so for some of my parenting choices he questions what I am doing until I can provide him with an explanation and sometimes even research for what I am doing. It can be a pain to defend things but he is then much more willing to go along with what I am doing if he understands why.

"being a critical person" doesn't give you free reign to be an asshole. we all want to be good parents. I'm sure you have googled a million times how to get better at something.
In my mind, its kind of like telling someone they need to lose weight. Everyone is very aware of how they look. Its not helpful.

There are definitely times when we need some support. For example, when I've noticed my husband is getting short with our daughter and its become a pattern, I've brought it up and said "usually this happens when you are tired. Do you need a break? Why dont you sleep in tomorrow." Or whatever.
My husband observed that I was kind of becoming a bitch about keeping the house clean and yelling at everyone about it, and encouraged me to get someone to come clean every other week to help take the stress off.

Disregarding your feelings, disregarding your requests, and acting as though he is "helping you become a better parent" by scolding you are all very disrespectful. I'm sorry that you are dealing with this. You are doing a really great job, I'm certain of it. Parenting is hard and I'm certain you are an involved and caring mom. I wish that your husband could lay off and appreciate all that you do a little more.

I’m so sorry you have to deal with this. There is so much good advice above. We pretty much have the if you’re not going to do it yourself you don’t get to complain rule. And i do think there’s a lot of gender bs tied up in it.

At one of my jobs they taught us to give interpersonal feedback like “when you X it makes me feel Y” which could be an approach to try. Also being reallllly direct over and over about what you need. I don’t think anyone in a marriage gets to think someone else’s love language stuff is dumb - that’s selfish. I don’t always understand my husband because ours are totally different, but I’ve learned things I can say/do that are meaningful to him. And then when I see it work that’s positive for me too.

I think it’s great you are thinking about it now even though it’s hard. My take so far is that this kind of stuff only gets worse as you deal with less physical care issues and more behavior or other issues as they get older (and I’m pretty sure that parenting a tween/teen is really going to stretch us). So if you can get to better modes of working together now it will be a big help.

And last but never least, you are an awesome mama! No one is doing everything right (because it’s an impossible standard) but I have no doubt you are exactly what your baby needs.

Something that I've appreciated in my marriage is a frank discussion about things we want to do better and the other spouse can help.

We're having a pretty interesting transition to two full-time WOH parents while DH is still doing full-time school. It has been a little rough.

I can't tell you how many times we have looked at each other and said, "I'm sorry, but my patience is a little short because I'm tired, let's go to bed early tonight." Or "I'm sorry, I just want to do this in peace, can you take the kids out for a little bit?"

I won't say we never criticize, but we try really hard to recognize our own limits and work with each other.

Perhaps you could try responding to his criticism with an "I'm sorry, but I'm prioritizing this over that right now, so I need you to...."

And no one is ever going to be a perfect parent, is he planning on criticizing you the rest of your life!? Plus, I'm willing to bet that a lot of his criticism is just his way of saying 'well if I did it, it would be this way because that's the right way'.

@Silva: I completely agree, we try to never offer criticism without offering to help. In response to DH buying happy meals after daycare every day , I started prepping snack trays in the fridge he could just pull out when he got home to hold the kids off till dinner was ready.

Hmm, I can take criticism from people whose parenting I respect, but from anyone else, it makes me ragey.

And then there's my husband. I wish he wasn't so hands-on, because he has an opinion about every single thing and his is always "right." I let the kids pick their clothes? They have to change, it's "not a good look" or "wrong for the occasion" or "was worn yesterday." I feed the kids? It's either too much food, or too little food, or the wrong food. And it's OK to question my choice in front of everyone, but goodness, the mantrums he throws if I'm not backing him 100%. I've got half a mind to tell him to move into his office and boss people around over there, but I'm giving him a break for now cause his mom is so sick. For now.

I don't think spouses should ever "critique" or be critical about how the other person parents.

I think I'm lucky that DH is willing to do a lot with our baby. Does it bug me when he complains about how awful things are when I know they would be better if he didn't do them "wrong"? Absolutely! [like feeding the baby in the middle of the night. He used to feed the baby, THEN change him. Then complain about how he'd be wide awake...um...maybe change him first?]

Instead of being "critical," I started presenting things by saying "So, I've noticed if I do things this way, they seem to work a lot better. Have you tried it that way?"

Maybe you could talk to your husband about HOW he presents things to you? Let him know that if he thinks there's a better way, you'd like for him to try it out and see how it goes and then let you know. Maybe make it a rule that you'll only be "critical" of each other if the babies physical health and well being are on the line (if the car seat isn't buckled right or the baby might fall from somewhere, etc)

I was pretty critical of DH when we first got married. He didn't work the first year, but he did a lot of the household chores. When putting clothes away, he didn't understand that there's an underwear drawer and a shirt drawer and a PJ drawer... He just put things where they fit.

Even though my mother would have told ME that that was the "wrong" way of putting clothes away, when I complained to her, she said "Just because it's not done your way...is it necessarily the wrong way?"

Talk to your husband about how much you're doing. Let him know that you'd appreciate it if he wants to help (or do it himself), but if not, he can cut out the critique! At the end of the day, is the baby clean, fed, and asleep? Then you're not doing anything "wrong"!

I think you've received some good advice here, so I'm just going to weigh in and say kicking you out during bedtime for singing out of tune and then getting annoyed when you say that's mean (it is REALLY mean) is awful. Beyond criticism of parenting awful. Is that what it's like most of the time? Maybe someone has some resources for you, but I just want to say I'm sorry that's happening to you.

I haven't read any of the responses, but my response in these situations is always that while the destination is the same, the journey is different for everyone.

So basically, when I am seeing red in how my husband is executing a task, I ask myself if the end goal will be the same no matter the method. It helps me to regain my perspective.

I would either find a way to address this between the two of you or seek counseling. What you just described above is not being critical, it's being a jerk. Who cares if you sing out of tune. As PPs said, it's going to get worse as your son gets older. We have couple friends that very apparently struggle with this. We have stopped hanging out with them because they are constantly bickering about handling stuff - even little things like how food is served (she says he's opened the hummus the wrong way or provided the wrong utensils). A simple dinner with our kids goes from one hostile conversation between them to another. The worst part is that the wife (who is the critic) ends up being the "bad guy" in our head when in actuality I don't think she is - they are just in a bad pattern and he's never stood up to her. It also leaves their relationship seeming so contemptuous because she's constantly correcting him (IN FRONT OF US). Last time we left we both said it was a good reminder of how important it is to support your spouse and never make them look bad in front of others... which oddly both did, him for doing "everything wrong" and her for being so critical.

Beyond the rule that was previously stated in posts above, we feel very strongly about presenting a united front. If he tends to think his way is the right way, this is going to become an issue. Even if I think my husband is being completely irrational, I NEVER question his authority in front of our child. I will sometimes ask him if we can take a quick side bar. This "critical" attitude is going to spin out into your husband undermining you since he thinks he knows best. You all are a team and he needs to realize that and respect that you are an equal say.

@LBee: I'm kind of struggling with the untied front thing lately. Like, if DH is being just plain irrational, I can roll with it and talk to him after bedtime. But if he's being mean? How do you handle that one? I can not stay quiet in front of the kids if that happens, the best I can do is pretending to agree with DH and coming up with some "compromise"

Incidentally, DH doesn't say anything in front of the kids if I'm the one being an a-hole. I think this is also not right, and I've told him many times that he should just forget looking like a team and tell me off on the spot.

@periwinklebee: Based on your anecdote, your husband is not just being critical. He is being a dick. Sorry not sorry. That is a shitty way to treat anyone much less an exhausted new mom much less YOUR WIFE.

My husband can be fastidious about certain things (and then he does things like leave his dirty clothes all over the apartment). At this point I just roll my eyes at him or ask exactly what he was trying to accomplish with his jackass comment. Our relationship is far from perfect and went through a rocky period around my son’s birth. But I will not tolerate being bullied and I do not care how my response makes him feel when he is being obnoxious.

We are in a much better place than we were a few years ago but if things has persisted I would have demanded marriage therapy. I still think we could benefit from it but the logistics and cost are hurdles, plus he is not really on board with the concept. Since things are better I have not pushed it yet.

@periwinklebee: i didn't read all the above but making you stop singing to your kid because you're out of tune is seriously a**hole behavior. I would be livid if my husband told me to stop singing to our daughter. Baby doesn't care and neither should he

In a broader sense parenting has a giant learning curve for everyone. I feel like I learn every day but the most important thing has been learning to support my husband and that he will support me. Sometimes we don't agree and that's OK, we can talk about it and come to an understanding or compromise

@periwinklebee: Echoing what many above have said above. It's playing on your emotions to suggest something like singing a lullaby out of tune is in any way, shape or form you "not wanting to be a better parent." The newborn days are hard, but I believe you're past those, and if he's criticizing the "small" stuff, it'll only make the much bigger decisions that much harder to make.

Wanted to share my perspective, as someone who was your husband when my daughter was born. I was incessantly and incredibly critical of my husband for the first 2 years of our daughter's life. And ironically, he has way more experience with kids than I did because he has a brother 11 years younger and helped raise him.

In my case, I was definitely struggling with PPA, but I don't use that as an excuse. I was an asshole to him, plain and simple. I was convinced he did everything wrong, I refused to leave him alone with our daughter, convinced he'd mess up her sleep schedule or something ridiculous like that, and even told him that I didn't want him to take our kid to his parents house without me over Thanksgiving (we celebrate differently so we tend to split up holidays), because he couldn't take care of her properly. I want to cry just thinking about how much I demoralized him.

After a come to Jesus from my mom (something I also noted in my response on the mom criticism thread), and a realization that I needed some serious help for how I was managing my relationships in general, I worked through most of this in therapy for 2 years, and I have become very intentional about how I talk to my husband now. We definitely do things differently, but not only have I learned to accept that, I have also become much more focused on how I approach him about things we disagree on. While we're not perfect, we definitely don't criticize each other.

I say this because I hear a lot of myself from those years ago in your husband, and you are being incredibly tolerant of this and frankly, you shouldn't be. He needs to be in therapy for these issues. You will grow to resent him, and your child will notice how he treats you and he will learn from it as well. I know how hard this is, and I really don't mean to make you feel badly, but if you want to model healthy relationships for your son, you or someone needs to convince your husband to get help, asap. You both deserve more than this.