To ask for more help from DH?

[timealone]

Been feeling quite overwhelmed with balancing work and home the last couple of weeks. I work 4 days a week, DH works full time and we have an 18mo DS. I am out of the house 7.30am-5.15pm, while DH works from home.

In some respects, we share things 50:50 eg nursery drop offs, bedtimes, cooking meals, ordering food etc. However, I do all of the laundry, cleaning, cleaning out the guinea pig cage and most of the day-to-day tidying. In addition, I sometimes find myself finishing off DH's jobs, for example he will do the washing up but leave things that don't fit in the dish rack, and won't wipe down the worktop. On the other hand, DH does do some other jobs that I don't eg. mowing the lawn (not now obv) and the occasional DIY job.

I seem to find myself rushing around before and after work and not really spending much time with DS. Things feel a bit frantic. Sometimes he is a pain to put to bed, and then I come downstairs and find there are still dishes to do etc.

I mentioned to DH that it would help me if he picked up some more of the chores. He said a surly ok, but said it wouldn't help me as I would just find other things to do. It's as if he thinks that a lot of the things I do aren't necessary or important. So not only do I feel that he doesn't appreciate what I do, but it's almost like a negative that I spend time doing it rather than spending time with him!

And I do not have particularly high standards with regard to cleanliness. Vacuuming is done once a week, or once every two weeks for upstairs. Bathrooms once a week. Sheets changed every 2-3 weeks. Dusting and mopping every 2 weeks.

It's his child and home too - he shouldn't be helping, he should be doing his share.

If you look at how your spare time is distributed, do you get equal amounts, or does one if you get more?

I can kind of see where he's coming from in wanting to spend time together rather than doing housework, but it depends so much on the details. If you're rushing around trying to get everyone fed and clothed while he's sitting on his bum, he's clearly not pulling his weight. If, on the other hand, you're ironing everyone's socks at 11pm, he'd have a point.

It's not 'help' as such though is it?
This implies it's your responsibility and anything he does is helping you, like a favour, rather than what he should do as a member of the family.
Read that book, Wife Work.

It's not realistic to expect him to share stuff IF it's stuff that he doesn't believe needs doing.

You need to have an adult conversation about both your expectations and standards and compromise.

When i was living with exp we had an unspoken rule that if one of us did bedtime the other did the kitchen which meant all dishes, counters, table, highchair and taking the rubbish out. It also meant pouring two glasses of wine ready for the bedtime handler's return from upstairs. We didnt even have a set "take it in turn" rule. We would just say "ok bed or kitchen?" And the other would either choose or say "dont mind, you choose" if exp had cooked it was usually an elaborate affair so i would tend to do dishes afterwards whereas my cooking consists of opening a jar and throwing it in the direction of the oven. It worked for us and meant once those two jobs were done we were both done for the night and could veg out or whatever we felt like and it felt fair.