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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Husbands never home for dinner

107 replies

Chichi444 · 18/09/2025 18:24

AIBU for being mad at the fact that my partner works all day from early morning till after 7.30 sometimes 8 he’s in construction and so hes never home for dinner or help out with the youngest of children with dinner and bedtime routines.

and to be fair I wouldn’t mind if he was making all the extra money so we could afford extra luxuries in life like a car fancy dinners day trips nice presents etc… But we barely get by to the point where I’m constantly borrowing from my parents…

it just doesn’t make sense anymore
because out of all the other mums I know I swear their husband are always home for dinner and it seems that I’m always struggling on my own 😫😫 doing it all alone.

anyone relates?

OP posts:
amylou8 · 18/09/2025 18:39

I assume he's working all those hours to keep a roof over your head, while you're doing the equally important job of caring for your children but not bringing in a salary?
It's almost impossible to support a family on one wage these days. I know because I'm also working 12 hour days to do it, and we're barely scraping by either.

Ginmonkeyagain · 18/09/2025 18:37

We had a building site next door to us for a year or so (building a small block of flats) and the workers tended to arrive at 8am and be done by 4pm. The site foreman would maybe stay until 5pm.

MissCallaneous · 18/09/2025 18:35

Chichi444 · 18/09/2025 18:24

AIBU for being mad at the fact that my partner works all day from early morning till after 7.30 sometimes 8 he’s in construction and so hes never home for dinner or help out with the youngest of children with dinner and bedtime routines.

and to be fair I wouldn’t mind if he was making all the extra money so we could afford extra luxuries in life like a car fancy dinners day trips nice presents etc… But we barely get by to the point where I’m constantly borrowing from my parents…

it just doesn’t make sense anymore
because out of all the other mums I know I swear their husband are always home for dinner and it seems that I’m always struggling on my own 😫😫 doing it all alone.

anyone relates?

If you're barely getting by and he's working all the hours, presumably you'd be even worse off if he worked fewer hours. That's not what you'd want, surely? I mean he's presumably not choosing to be working all these hours, and I'm not sure it's fair to expect help with bedtime on top of all that.

Farmwifefarmlife · 18/09/2025 18:33

A lot depends on the circumstances, if he’s working long hours to provide a roof over everyone’s heads then yes yabu if he’s swanning off to the pub not actually working then that’s different. I’m presuming he’s always worked in this industry so you knew this before committing to marriage & children?

Seriocomic · 18/09/2025 18:32

What exactly does he do in construction? I'm in the middle of a house renovation with my second set of builders (great, efficient, reputable company), and while they sometimes arrive early to beat the traffic (I'm on an awkward rat run), they start work at eight and finish by four or four thirty at latest, as did the last company. Only a couple of individual occasions did either set work later to finish something.

I appreciate that if it's your business, you might then have paperwork etc to manage, calls to make etc, but, by the sound of it, it isn't his business -- so where is he between the end of the construction working day and 7.30 or 8 pm?

MaskAndMartini · 18/09/2025 18:31

Are you working full-time as well, OP?

Tunacheesequesadilla · 18/09/2025 18:27

Do all the other mums have husband's with the same job?

If he's really genuinely working those hours, then yes, YABU. Can you go back to work? Take some of the financial pressure off. How old are your kids?