Does both parents working full time always equal chaos at home?

[HankyScore]

We never seem to get on top of anything.

There is a constant pile of laundry waiting to be put away. We are eating mainly freezer food. No one hoovered for two weeks until I did it on Friday when I was off work feeling ill.

There are piles and piles of stuff waiting to be sorted through. Everyone is exhausted all the time.

Neither of us have any more to give, and there is no money for a cleaner.

Is this just how it is?

I've been working FT out of the house for four months now, DH changed his hours to accommodate school pick up so works from 7am, I get in at 6pm, then we have Cubs, Scouts, music, riding. We are usually asleep on the sofa by 9pm.

We try to keep on top of the house at the weekends but if we go off routine (I was away last weekend for eg) , it all goes to shit.

How do other people do it? We just seem to be exhausted and messy and blah.

Help me.

I don't think it has to be chaos but it will be exhausting. We are a larger family and DH and I work about 130 hours a week between us. We do an hour a day before work and them probably about 30 mins each evening .

I am investigating a roomba

I dropped a day so I don't work on a Wednesday. Yes I miss the money but i feel happier and more on top of things by getting jobs done then.

Also having a day off in the middle of the week means its not long until Saturday and a quick clean up Saturday morning with everyone chipping in and then we can enjoy the weekend

We have three dc, 11,9 and 2.

The older two do their own rooms, lunches, put laundry way, wash up, etc.

We both work full time and I was doing 50 hours over summer. You just get used to it after a while. I hoover at least every other day, dh does all washing up etc when he gets in etc. We have little clutter and everything has a place.

No
Im like Preciousbane I find Im much more organised while working fulltime than when I worked part time .
Plus we all have our set jobs - mine is shopping, cooking and laundry

I think there is a difference between someone who works school hours and full time. I work at least 13-15 hours a day, my husband works about 9 hours a way, running a house on top of that is difficult

FLYlady. Ignoring the bits I don't care for.

I read a book called how to do everything and be happy. Our house looks a bit better now. It's tough. Don't beat your self up about it.

I would classify 8-4 as part time as well. Its less than the time most people would be actually at work nevermind about pick ups, drop offs, kids clubs etc.

It is part time though school hours positions are. Its a fact. Op you will get used to.it I used to moan and be unorganised when I did 25 hours ans had 1 child no I realise I was just extremely unorganised. Its because you have only just started it after a while it becomes second nature, but it does take time.

I am not going to get competitive about who works the hardest, I will always lose that one, working long hours does not mean working hard. I also don't work 13 weeks of the year.

However during those weeks when I am working , running a house is more of a challenge than it would be than if I worked school hours.

We both work FT (DH in a job that takes him away much of the week) and are between cleaners at the mo. We are both relative tidy freaks. Like others we manage by running laundry and dishwasher loads before we head out in the morning and transfer to dryer/hanging thing or put dishes away when we get in in the evening. We wipe down the kitchen after every meal, keeps on top of that.

DH and I split the housework/cleaning on a weekend morning. He does the ground floor, I do the others. I have more sq ft but his is dirtier/more high traffic. Kids do their own rooms and animals.

Shopping and whatnot, we do on the day. If DH is around whichever of us is home first will do the supermarket & start dinner. Sometimes it's from scratch, other times it's a defrosted batch cooked meal.

It takes a lot more organisation and we couldn't do it if both H and I weren't equally prepared to muck in.

I do feel like I don't sit down until 9pm every night though and every weekend is spent "doing" but it's fine. Busy is good and there's still time for individual wind down stuff for each of us.

We both work full time and are mainly on top of things. We just get things done in the evening between getting home and putting the kids to bed. I suppose it helps that we both get home reasonably early.

We only have two children though and only one who is old enough for clubs and sports.

In answer to your question, I think yes, two parents full time = stress and chaos and is not the optimum way for family living. I do however appreciate that for many people there is no choice (and indeed there are some weirdos who prefer it that way)

fucking hell, working 13-16 hours a day? So you're basically working and sleeping, surely there's no time for anything else after a 13-16 hour working day?!!!

We both work full time and it's fine but we are lucky with shifts.

Df works 8-6, 5 days a week (50 hour week but can't be avoided due to job type) and is off on Mondays and Sundays. I work a compressed shift so do 8-6 but only 4 days (40 hours) and am off Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

So one or both of us is home all day every Friday - Monday. On a Tue, Wed and Thursday the kids are in school at 7.45 for breakfast club and go to a cm for 2.5 hours afterwards. We both work close so we're normally all home by 6.15 on those 3 days...the kids will have already had dinner at the cms and will go to bed at 7.30 so we just cook for the 2 of us.

We make sure there are no activities on the 3 days we're both in work, and we do all housework between us on our days off. The house generally stays pretty clean on a Tue-Thurs as there's no one in it most of the day and no big family meal to cook (frequently df and I will make do with soup/sandwich/tuna salad for ease).

I do feel lucky with the way things have fallen for us though, I would hate to have to do our Tue-Thurs routine for 5 days because there's next to no time to relax or do things with the kids.

We both work & DH is away with work most weeks. We have 3 DC. The thing that stops it all falling apart is that we do not have after school activities for DC unless they are on school premises directly after school and the childminder can collect afterwards.
Ferrying children around in the evenings would make it all too much.

No suggestions I'm aftaid - we're exactly the same. We just about manage to keep on top of tidying, cooking and washing. It's exhausting!!!

Lone parent here and prioritising is my saviour. I use a dlow cooker a lot, I have massively reduced my laundry mountain by making jeans, fleeces etc have 2 or 3 wears before washing. Decluttering toys/paperwork etc helps massively. I have my own routine in the evenings so I have a list of things in my head.
Could you perhaps dedicate 2 hours on a Saturday morning when you all focus on housework ? I find that if Ido s big clean every week, it's easier then to give bathrooms a quick wipe every other day or whizz a mop around reslly quickly. I iron virtuallynothing apart from school shirts.