Dh has announced his retirement date and I feel irritated by it

If he retires he’s got to take the load off you, as you’re the working parent. Why should you be run ragged, whilst he enjoys himself doing f* all. The balance would be completely wrong.

I don’t want to be rude but he sounds quite selfish and ignorant.

Time for a sit down and adult discussion about responsibilities.

Bloody hell don't frame it as needing help! That suggests that you agree it's your job and not his, but you're asking him to help you (as a favour to you, you owe him, need to be grateful and accept he will only help you with your responsibilities if it's convenient etc).

I think he's made his decision, he clearly believes the finances will be fine and so if you can't afford to retire then yes, you have to hand the school admin baton across to him.

Work out what times you certainly can't make and lay it out to him everything where you will be appreciating some help. This is perfectly reasonable.

Just so you know, going forward, we're going to be needing your help with
parents evenings, options evenings, college open days, dentist trips, clubs, sports activities, school trips help, revision classes, homework deadlines etc etc. Now that you are retired I really need some more help from you with all of this.

You can do it OP. Firm and fair.

Also personally I don’t think anyone on the household should be retiring because they’re ready - it needs to work and make sense financially for the whole family. Life is expensive, teens are so expensive and there’s a lot to consider

Yes they’re more independent but that comes with much much harder work for parents - parenting teens is much much harder, exhausting, worrying. Later nights, constant conversations, and still lots of admin.
over to him !!!!

Assuming he is healthy and able, he should take on more household tasks if he is more available, including parenting. It's a no-brainer! Whether he calls himself retired or not seems to me to be irrelevant. Have you let him know that this is your expectation?

How old is your husband? And yourself?

Are you a bit jealous that he’s retiring?

The mental drain is the same whether you work full-time or stay at home or anything in between though - it's not something you can switch on and off. The mental drain is only less for dead beat or uninvolved, disconnected parents.

Believe me when I say the mental drain of the teen years far exceeds the primary years.

Why are you saying this?!!! I would already have told him that he was taking it over and I would be telling the DC that their Dad is the SAHP now.

And yes, mine are 26 and 18 and there is plenty to do when they’re in secondary.

But he can do it. If you make that clear and stick to it, he will have to.

He'll be bored. Or he'll take up cooking and make a mess. A close friends husband retired at 53. He drove her potty.
Took over the household. DC were sixth form.
If you have plenty of money let him crack on. No school gate at 11 so few chances to get invited for coffee or try to become one of the mums. Let's hope he's not into cycling!

Along these lines. Secondary brings a while lot more responsibility - deeper involvement in extra curricular activities, help with homework/keeping on top of it at least, sorting out tutoring if needed, phone calls home from teachers for bad behaviour, giving them independence whilst knowing you're still responsible, relationship issues - friends/boyfriends /girlfriends, inspiring/ motivating them to revise, sorting out work experience, monitoring tech whilst allowing freedom, making sure they get enough sleep, handling mental health issues, choosing subjects/ universities etc. The primary years are a dream so if DH is dealing with secondary - Good luck to him!! (I did both but if I could have handed secondary to DH, I would have done it like a shot).

Maybe he feels you had a few years off when kids were small and now he’s having a few years off while you work your last few years.

Don’t wait until September.

you need to have this conversation now - lay it all out and say you need support , time and space to focus in your own career and building your pension pot.

this means he has to take his turn in being the default parent and taking on the mental load of running the household.

Is it worth including your retirement in the conversation? As in, when does he think you will retire, and does he realise that it will be a long time after 55? Maybe he's not given it much thought.
If so spell it out that it's because you were looking after your children, who are his too,
then you took a less we paid role because of the need for one of you to be available for your children, which he wasn't open to.

You are getting older too you don't want to spend the rest of your working life also still doing everything for the children.

You need to talk to him about expectations, concentrate on your work now and allow him to take charge of the stuff regarding school and home. Consider this a chance for you to prosper without the background work involved at home

This thread isn't about me, I was expressing solidarity with the OP. I have no wish to derail. If I wanted to discuss my situation with a bunch of opinionated fuckwits, I would have started my own thread - but I don't. Ta-ra.

I don't think you're unreasonable for feeling that way. The intensive parenting years are largely behind you, and it's understandable to think, "Where was all this free time when I was juggling assemblies, inset days and sports days?" That said, if he's older, his retirement date may have more to do with pension eligibility than avoiding parenting. I'd have an honest conversation about how you're feeling rather than assuming his motives.

That’s a vastly shorter list than primary school though, I could probably triple that list with my 8 and 5 year old.

You need to be really, really clear about what his retirement will need to look like, it's not fair on you if he thinks he's off the hook. Is he a prison officer by any chance?

I haven't read to the end. I feel like you need to lay it all out and have a proper conversation. Maybe even with a neutral person if you think he'll talk over you.

If you were me I'd be outlining that he'll be taking the day to day bulk of the childcare as he has the time during the day to deal with it. You'll also need to train the kids to contact him first. Then on an evening after work is framily time, you'll do your share of the chores but you won't be leading on it. He'll still have plenty of time to do hobbies, chill or whatever he wants to do as secondary are home later I.e no school run.

I would also be highlighting that you'll not be answering your phone at work and any emergencies they call the main office number. Honestly make yourself unavailable during the day.

This is not in spite of him but as he'll never have had that free time at home in his career it would not cross his mind to pick up any of the stuff you had to do whilst they were growing up. Don't expect that he will just do anything like the kids he will need training.

Your dh has retired from paid employment. Great! But he hasn't retired from being a parent or a partner in your lives. (however much he might think he has)

Your pension has suffered so it's great that he has retired from work, he can do more at home and you can do more (employment wise) to cover the pension gap. Maybe you need to do some extra studying? Maybe you need to change job and have more commuting hours and leave before the pack lunches are made, or take on more responsibility be less available to cover any emergencies.

Surely that's about being a partnership over the long term? My comments above are a bit tongue in cheek, but they have a serious point. Please, please do not talk yourself into continuing to be the 'default' parent. You are both parents. Now is his time to step up in a different way. Both for your dc and domestically.

Devolve a whole task to him e.g. laundry. Washing, drying, ironing, putting away. If any item of school / sports wear is missing, it is up to him. You do not rescue the situation. He can do those things anytime, morning noon or night, doesn't interfere with golf or cycling, he just needs to be organised.

Or maybe the food: meal planning, shopping, cooking, clearing up, freezer management etc.

You are still working so you can maybe pay for a cleaner to cover your half of those chores.

Life admin: you leave him a list. "Honey the car insurance is due for renewal - here's the paperwork, can you sort it this week while I'm working".

For important dc things (concerts etc) you sit down with and say 'Patrick has a swimming gala next month, with 4 practice sessions, how will we split that between us. btw I've got a meeting on x date so you'll have to do that one.

You need to be right on top of this. In advance and then once his 'retirement' starts. Of course he can play golf, but only on a Tuesday or Thursday when you can be around for emergencies. If you have to, arrange to work away from home for critical periods - even if you're only going to the local library. Get out of the house so he HAS to parent.

This is very unreasonable. The only reason he can retire now (presumably) is because you did the heavy lifting at home so he could lean into his career and build up this pension pot he has. You even provided 50% of the funds whilst you did it! For these last years whilst your career took a back seat, who did the cooking, cleaning etc as well as child care? Assuming it was you, I would be telling him, and yes the word telling is deliberate, that from now on he is responsible for cooking, meal planning, cleaning washing etc etc and primary interface for children. It is utterly unreasonable of him to assume you will do this on top of working whilst he sits on his arse all day. If he doesn’t like it, he can either use his funds to fund both of you to retire and then you will happily do your 50%, or he can go back to work until you both can afford for you to retire too. If he refuses, ask him to explain how he would feel if you were to retire now and as well as still working, he takes on all household tasks too - feel unfair? Why then does he expect it of you? Personally if he really wouldn’t back down neither would I. I would go on strike. Probably go to live with a relative or friend or airbnb during the school week for a month or two (back at weekends for fun mum) and leave him to it - cooking washing cleaning…Maybe then compromise will seem more appealing. I’d possibly look for more responsibility at work or take on travel commitments to increase my responsibility and pay to build my retirement fund faster - which should be easy now there is a parent at home for the kids. He might understand that kind of commitment better too.

He said that after he was retired. I was working. So I had to work fewer hours so I could get them up for school.

Of course it's not swanning around but it's definitely more flexible. I went back to work 3 days a week and it was much harder to get up at silly o clock to drop DC off at nursery/breakfast club than my days off looking after them at a slower pace and taking out to fun activities.