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We are having and have always had an issue with my wife's parenting.

Due to a lack of empathy she can't seem to understand why our 5 year old daughter doesn't do as she's told all the time, has tantrums etc. My wife seems to think our daughter should be a robot and judges her as if she is an adult.

For instance this morning we were all running very late. My wife was getting very stressed. She started shouting about everything. My daughter also gets stressed when she has low blood sugar/is hungry. I tend to let the tantrums go as I know my daughter can't help it. But my wife takes it very personally. I could see things were going to blow up so I asked my wife to go and do something in the kitchen. My daughter wanted a spoon and wife grabbed her by the arm and tried to force her to get her own spoon. I told her to stop it. So my wife leapt up and told me to shut up in front of our daughter then stormed off.

I did the rest of the morning routine on my own without further tantrums.

My wife stormed back in and said we needed to talk about me "undermining" her. We had already had a conversation about it yesterday because similar things happened yesterday evening. So this morning I steeled myself to sit calmly and listen. She went on about how I don't support her and I let our daughter get away with too much. So I pointed out that she is only 5 and she needs my protection when I feel she is being treated unfairly. I explained that I was trying to be supportive by giving the two of them space from each other. I said I knew my wife wants to be a good parent and I was trying to help her by taking away the difficult situations. She just went on about how I don't want her to be a parent. Threw every insult and accusation at me.

In the end I just stopped the conversation about the rights and wrongs. So I said we need a strategy and made a point of taking her suggestions and saying how they could work. I also made it very clear that I will not accept her manhandling our daughter and that my priority is to protect our daughter when needed.

Afterwards she apologised for shouting and being rude.

But how can we avoid these situations and how can I show her that I'm trying to help not undermine?

Hi wundress,

May I suggest you also post on the Co-parenting board as well. They are very helpful with advice and support about the issues you are facing. It's not just for couples that have broken up.