dad wants time off

[natandjacob]

My OH has his own company and works untill 6/6.30 every weekday and sometimes on the weekend. Our 1 year old son goes to bed at 7 every night so this means they dont get to see much of each other. OH has started saying that he wants half a "day off" each weekend for him to smoke, drink or just do his own thing without any parental duties. I can understand his work is hard and he does deserve a break but he goes to the pub most friday nights with his mates and barely has to do anything with our son apart from a bit of playtime on the evening as i do everything else. he does no housework as this is my job as i dont work.
am i being unreasonable not wanting him to have this? how many other partners get time off like this? i just want a general idea of how other families work so i know whether im just being mean or not!!!

[natandjacob]

hi, thanks for the advice again...cocoflower, fancy sending his brother my way?! haha!
have had a long talk with dh and got a lot of things cleared up. it wasnt an easy conversation and was very emotional but we got through it without any arguments so i'll consider it a winner! told him about some of the advice i've been given on here and what other dh's are like with their family and he did take it in, i got a whole morning off to chill in the sun :o
we've booked a late deal holiday for august for just the 2 of us so we can have some time to reconnect :) he's also agreed to help a bit more round the house and has set a date to stop smoking in 2 weeks....we'll see how that bit goes but i've got my fingers crossed!

[Cocoflower]

Wildly impressed! I like it. He he!

Anyway OP hope your doing well :)

[WhoseGotMyEyebrows]

What are you going to do nat?

[seeker]

SOOO depressing that people are wildly impressed by a man behaving like a normal adult human being!

[AnyFucker]

coco, you are not lucky you have a normal, decent guy

many of the selfish and self-entitled men described on these pages don't really want or deserve a collaborative family life

they just want to continue as a single man, and replace the domestic servant that was their mother with a wife

[TransatlanticCityGirl]

Not sure I have much more to add, as I agree with most of what the others have said.

For what it's worth, I am currently on maternity leave, and DH works in a demanding job from 7am-6.30pm (plus commuting time!) and he shares equally in all childcare / household responsibilities when he's at home, and some would argue he does more than his fair share. As I am breastfeeding that is the only job he doesn't help with. But he changes most of the nappies, settles baby, cooks dinner every night.... at weekends he gets up with baby and lets me sleep as much as possible... and he's also made sure I got extra help during the day with a cleaner so that I can focus on baby and myself.

I guess it's just to say that there IS a different way of doing things and you have to decide what you're willing to put up with!

I do appreciate however that since you already have children together it's a lot harder to change behaviour without inflicting some kind of risk upon yourself. Not sure how I would tackle that problem retrospectively.

[seeker]

When ours were little, we divided the weekend up into 6 bits - morning, afternoon and evening on each day. We had one whole bit off each, 2 bits as family time and the other two were negotiable, depending on what was going on, how tired either of us was, how daddy-deprived the chiildren were - lots of variables. But the bit free each was non-negotiable.

[Cocoflower]

Ha ha I get that a lot! The ladies at DD party last week were all impressed as he did all the washing up, food prep, cleaning etc and said I had him "well trained".

I like to take the credit but thats just how he came!

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

Blimey, has he got any brothers?
(opens door to let them in).

[Cocoflower]

I think I am very lucky with DH. He appreciates everything I do, never moans, does a huge amount of housework and always puts his family first.

Feeling a bit guilty for not appreciating him fully now!

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

Coco, what makes you think you are spoilt?

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

Just because he earns money does not give your DH the right to expect me time unless you get it too, OP.

Explain to him that, without you running the home and bringing up his DC he would not be able to work so much. And if you didn't do it, he would have to pay someone else to do these things. (£37,000?)

[Cocoflower]

It is still valid and the point of SAHM monetary worth is a good one.

I realised how spoilt I am with DH now after seeing this thread....

[CheerfulYank]

I believe it. SAHM is bloody hard and unappreciated.

My DH has tried the "but you don't work during the summer" thing before (I work at the school part-time September to June) to justify why I should do more and believe me, I nipped that in the bud!

I do everything around the house during the day as that is when I am home and DH is at his job. When he gets home he plays with DS. Sometimes he does baths and sometimes I do, but he always handles bedtime. If one of us wants to go out with friends, we go. I get to lie in on Saturdays as long as I want and he gets Sundays. He does some of the cooking and washing up on the weekends and we both do general tidying.

Works for us. :)

I would go along with what everyone's said: it's fine if he gets "me time" as long as you do too. He could use the time to bond with your son.

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

Okay, I admit, it was the Mail, but I do think it was valid.

[Cocoflower]

Intresting. Which paper?

I know life insurance for housewives is valued around that amount

www.legalandgeneral.com/life-cover/confused-about-life-cover/articles-and-guides/value-of-a-mum.html

I put it in a thread a few months ago and got slightly flamed!

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

It was in todays newspaper.
If a SAHM was paid for all the hours she puts into being a SAHM (70 hrs per week), as cook, cleaner, laundress, etc, that is how much she would earn.

[Cocoflower]

Where did you get that info Nick?

[NickRobinsonsloveslave]

Does your DH earn £37,000 a year? Cos that apparently is how much a SAHM would (should) be paid every year for all the "non work" she does.

[notmyproblem]

Nat fwiw you sound like a sensible strong intelligent and loving young mum. You've got your whole life ahead of you and it's quite obvious how much you care for and care about your DS. As much as your DH might have his good points, don't ever let yourself believe you deserve anything less than the best in a partner. If he's not cutting it, don't hold back -- tell him, give him an ultimatum, if he doesn't shape up then get rid. You and your DS deserve a real husband and father. Like you said, it's just not normal or acceptable to play 30 mins with your son once a week and consider that a fair share of "parenting". Don't let him make you doubt yourself! YANBU in this relationship.

Good luck!

[SpringchickenGoldBrass]

Oh, yet another bloke who has smelled out a vulnerable woman with damaged boundaries and low self-esteem. Sorry Nat but men like him do target women who are underconfident about relationships, because a woman who has high self esteem will tell lazy sexist stoners to fuck right off and not come back.

[redskyatnight]

FWIW my DH behaved a lot like this when DS was 1 (and I worked p/t as well). DH honestly believed that as I "only" worked p/t while he worked f/t it was "fair" for me to do the majority of the childcare and housework. It took months of careful explaining exactly what I did and how little sleep I had (DS used to wake multiple times in the night), and how much I resented him having a lie in on a Saturday, followed by 2 hours of reading the paper whilst I never had any time to myself for him to "get it". But he did get it (eventually) though it was a series of baby steps over a long length of time, so I suppose it was worth the trying.

DH's (slight) defence was that his dad was a long distance lorry driver while he was young, so his mum did EVERYTHING, and his dad mabye occasionally took them to the park when he was home, and DH considered that to be "normal".

[WhoseGotMyEyebrows]

I was shocked by this:

I have tried leaving OH with son without much notice before to go do food shop on my own but he ended up ringing me telling me he was taking our son to go stop with his father for a few days and that i was a bad mother for just leaving son on the floor with him in another room.

[AnyF]

blimey, he has deigned to "allow" you to come to the pub with him for the afternoon ?

so you just sit there and have to witness how crap he is

FWIW, if he has a free afternoon, you should spend it doing child-centred things eg. go the park, not sit in/outside a pub

you are too easily mollified

I also agree with everything notmyproblem and snorbs said

[natandjacob]

notmyproblem now you've pointed that out i can see it :( this is my first serious relationship i've been in and i didnt have the most balanced of childhoods so im still learning the ropes on what family life should be like. i know i am going to have to stick to my guns though, but i do realise he needs to want to give up if he's going to get anywhere with it. doesnt matter how much i nag, it has to be his choice.
cocoflower i am a bit nervous about leaving them cos he's never been left with him for that long before. he is very firm on not smoking around ds so i doubt he would just because im not there. he is a good dad when he spends time with ds, he just needs to realise that its not normal to only spend 30 mins or so playing with ds and it takes a lot more than just playing with toys to raise a child. i'm close with mil so was thinking of having a subtle word with her about all this. obviously dont want to be critiscing her son but she is very fair minded so im sure she will see my point.

on a brighter note, he seems to be aware im not so happy at the mo and has invited us down to the pub with him this afternoon (its a nice family pub so no problems bringing ds), lets just hope he keeps it up!