DH told me infront of ILs to use my brain

[barbie007]

DH told me in front of ILs that I should do something with my brain.....why not a year of postgraduate law conversion? Or get into finance and earn lots of money? I used to be a schoolteacher so why does he think I want to be a lawyer or a banker now?

I've been a SAHM for 10 years and I love it. I use my brain all the time and it p**s me off that he thinks I don't. We don't need an extra wage btw. I've not spoken to him for the last few hours and when he asked if I could help with dinner tonight (we were only having cheese toasties!) I told him to use his brain and work it out.

I'm not sure why people think that because the OP's dh suggested she should return to work that he doesn't also appreciate her support over the last 10 years (and I think he has subsequently made it clear to the OP that wasn't what he meant). I appreciate my dh being at home. I know I have an easy life as a result. But I'd still like him to go back to work. Because we are both 40 and there are 25 years of work ahead of us, followed by an unknown period of retirement after that. Getting back to work after a long break is difficult and requires planning. That life would be difficult in some ways is certainly true, but we've done it before and it was perfectly doable. Most people do it after all.

I was thinking that SGBs formula for free time might work quite well as a thought point. My dh spends Monday and Friday school hours doing chores and the other three days doing whatever he likes (which includes his voluntary work). Even if he also spends an hour cooking/tidying every day he has way more leisure time than me (we both get to do what we like in the evenings except when we are taking/collecting the children from activities).

Now I hate being at home, and he enjoys it so it's not that how things are right now works better for him than for me (minus the stress I feel about money, the future etc) but a parent of school aged children is not rushed off their feet.

nooka - I agree with your post - a parent with school aged children is not rushed off their feet during school hours, BUT school hours are relatively short, and the SAHM is there every day to do all the things that need doing so that the WOHP doesn't have to do them and so they don't need to be done at the weekend. It also means that no childcare is needed and that if a child is sick, a concert needs attending etc, then no-one needs time off work.

If a family can afford to have one parent at home, then it makes life very smooth for the whole family.

if my job were not term-time only, the applecart in our family would be upset too much for it to be worth it. IMO

Have just seen I have basically re-hashed Karma's argument

But you put much more neatly than me

Jamie -I dont think it benefits the whole family so much as it benefits the WOHP.
I had Mat leave followed by a period of working P/T for several years mainly because my DP was very supportive and knew how much I wanted to continue my career. I landed my dream job 4 years ago because I had not lost touch with the workplace etc AND my employer could see I was well organized, committed etc. If my DP had not been prepared to ask to work flexibly ,drop off,pick up and pull his weight around the house etc I would probably have had no choice at all.
Most of my friends who are still SAHM with teenagers are miserable and spend their time running around after their DH and DC doing stuff they are mostly capable of doing themselves.

That's a point too, loveitthere. That's what I didn't want to happen.

Thankyou karma

I agree with you loveithere. It does benefit the WOHP to have a partner at home. But does it really benefit the SAHP? I think it does no harm at all for BOTH partners to try to be flexible. DH hasn't got a particularly flexible job, but by cunning use of holidays, you can cover most scenarios!!!

I know this isn't always possible, but I can't help thinking that maybe it suits the WOHP not to be flexible sometimes!!!

The OP's thread underscores for me something I've always beleived...that families are in flux. You simply cannot take a decision and expect it to hold good as infinitum...
Well you can, but frankly that is just stupid.

As a family you have to keep reassessing. Keep discussing. Keep asking your partner's opinion.

Don't wait for resentment to spill out.

RedHotPoker - you are quite fortunate to have a part time, 5 hour per day job. If the OP were to return to teaching she would be working longer hours in the day , plus juggling childcare for meetings, parents evenings, open evenings etc, plus be unavailable to take her children to after school activities. Same would apply if she went into Law, as her DH suggested. Not many jobs are a nice convenient 5 hours per day to fit in with school hours.

Exactly Inertia

My job isnt a convenient 5 hours a day job Inertia never has been .
My point is that if both parents (assuming not SP) are flexible and take an equal responsibility for childcare -women would have far more choices available to them .
Why is there always the assumption that childcare ,meetings,parents evenings etc are the womans responsibility ?

OOOPs Sorry -just realised that parents evenings etc part of job not her own DCs parents evenings etc

Loveitthere - yes, I meant that OP would have to work evenings if she returned to her original job.

I don't assume that child care issues are always the woman's responsibility. The point is though, that in some households it is impossible for both parents to be flexible - one parent may work away, or much longer hours that fall outside those offered by child care providers. Work pattern changes may be last minute. If both partners have a predictable work pattern that's fine, but often one parent has been able to take on a position with unsociable or unpredictable hours only because the other parent picks up all the child care. It becomes difficult and expensive to get child care late night / overnight, and if that is the case then families need to consider whether it even pays its way for both parents to work.

I dont know of many men though that would even consider asking for flexible working or working from home and I think that current working hours and practices are the result of assuming that women will do the bulk of the childcare .
Interestingly though my DP does work unsociable hours and overnight and that is how we have made it work.

It can work as long as the hours are predictable and don't overlap , or if there are family members who can help with child care gaps. It is a lot harder if both parents are expected to be at work regularly in the evenings, especially if it's last minute, and you have to pay out a lot more money for hastily arranged child care. The thing is, what works for one household does not work for everybody; there's not just one right way.

Very true-Inertia my DH works in IT and loves the overnight work -its regular and predictable and quiet
Not everyones cup of tea though.

I think it's a little unfair to say that not many men would consider working flexibly. I think a lot of employers are not particularly keen for employees to do this and no one wants to stand out as needing special treatment at work. Also working from home doesn't mean you are free to do child care and ferry kids to their activities. My DH does work from home sometimes, but he is expected to be actually working during the day, not taking the DC to swimming etc.

Karma employers probably arent that keen but women often have to ask to work flexibly so why not men ?
I assumed that working from home would mean that and just drop off/pick up at school btw

I can only speak for my family, so for us DH had the potential to earn a lot more money than me, so it made sense for me to be the one to SAH. Had I been a very high wage earner and DH a much smaller one, then I'd not have asked for flexible working if that would cause a potential risk to my job/career development. I would also have been okay with DH being a SAHD if that's what he'd wanted to do. If not, then I would have wanted him (as the lower wage earner) to be the one to ask for flexible working if that was possible.

I agree that it shouldn't be automatic for the woman rather than the man to ask, more that it should be something the couple decide taking into account salary, career type, personal ambition etc.

Inertia - I am FORTUNATE to work 5 hours a day but it is not luck. I have planned and negotiated for a LONG while (way before actually having the DCs) to get my five hours a day. I also do a fair bit of unpaid work in the evenings at home as I am in a management position and there are certain expectations that I must meet in order to justify keeping my senior position.

I deliberately stayed in my current job pre-DCs rather than looking for other more challenging/financially advantageous jobs. This was because I had felt I had become indispensible to a certain extent, which worked in my favour in terms of negotiating reduced hours when I had DC.

Of course it is not easy to find jobs that you can do for five hours a day, once you have dropped out of the job market for 5 - 10 years. There are choices - you either don't become a SAHM to start with and negotiate a part-time position or you prepare to have to either retrain or work up from the bottom pay-wise. Or you become a permanent SAHM.

And FWIW, I have no family local to help out with childcare. It IS possible to work things out to cover meetings, sickness, hols etc, without having to put your kids in childcare 12 hours a day.

My DH does work from home sometimes, but he is expected to be actually working during the day, not taking the DC to swimming etc.

They don't call it "shirking from home" for nothing

Hadn't heard that expression before, but perhaps it's the fear that employees won't really work from home that discourages employers from promoting it as a standard way to work.

I think it's a case of "the minority ruin it for the majority", but I don't blame employers for being suspicious.

I have been in a position of authorising working for home on a one/two days a week, long term basis (the people wanted to avoid the commute) and I'm afraid I have always insisted that for those with pre-school children, the children must be in childcare or the other parent must be a "SAHP". No-one is really working when they're also supervising a three year old.

True.

That's also the problem with some flexible working. Even if you did the school run, if your partner is at work when the kids get home, then you can't reasonably leave them to their own devices and continue working. It can only really work if the DC are older or if the other parent comes home soon afterwards to take over.