Are there any women on here who work and their partner is a SAHP?

[Pinksunset40]

Not an AIBU but posting for traffic and AIBU is the only board I use

I've just graduated wahoo! with a 2:1. I have been studying for the past 6 years, 3 at college, 3 at university. I have been looking at jobs and the wages for the field of work I want to go in to are anywhere between £22k-£35k a year.

My partner works 9-5 Monday-Saturday for £17k a year, I was considering going part time because we have a 6 and 2 year old. But looking at the salary I have been thinking to myself why don't I work full time and he work part time.

I was just wondering if their are any families on here who does that and it works for them. I worry that I will end up being busy with work and still end up with the day to day chores (he is a terrible cook) plus full time work.

And if you did decide to do this is it because of the salary do you or would you end up being the main earner of the household?

He has never been unemployed and he thinks it would be piss easy HA HA HA! Yeah right!

I would just like to hear other people's experiences about this.

Are you married? I dont think it is wise for either sex to become a SAHP unmarried. Its risky. Additionally and I only say this in the interest of informing if he were the dc main carer and you and he separated, he would more than likely become their main carer, if 50/50 couldnt be agreed.

Back to the OP. My dh works term time only, TA hours, and when he is off the holidays I do no laundry, no cleaning, no beds, no food shoppibg (apart from grabbing the odd thing on the way home), no diy, no gardening etc.

Im a better cook so he buys and preps stuff and I finish it off while he bathes the kids.

Weekends is 50 50 however he gets so much done in the week that there isnt much to do.

DH wishes he was a SAHP!!!
Sadly we can't afford it

I work full time and my husband is part time.

After our son was born I was the SAHP for about 6 months, then he did 6 months, after which we got into our current arrangements.

It works really well. He is better at the household stuff than me, and I have a higher paid job which involves lots of admin in the evening after a full shift during the day.

I know that despite the long hours I work, a day for him with the 1 year old is infinitely harder work than a day at my job!!

I'm a teacher and DH is SAHP. He was working when we adopted our DC and I was on leave. Then his company relocated about the time I went back to work and it was too much of a commute to be worth it plus he wasn't loving it. He left and did some bits and pieces of freelance but there wasn't much work and he took on all the childcare and housework duties. It's working really well, I earn at least twice what he did now and I have school holidays at home. He enjoys being at home more than I did and I like working more than he did!

I should say that we have some extra income from a house we rent out, we could manage on my salary but it would be much much tighter.

My DH left his job (which he spent years training for and is brilliant at) to meet the needs of our DD - school drop-offs, music lessons etc, whilst I work in London (2.5 hour commute each way) in a job that pays way more than his did. He loved his job, and hopes to get one part-time, but meanwhile spends the school hours as a director of a charity, trustee of a music trust, parish councillor etc etc. He has a full on life but my job pays our bills. As soon as DD is old enough to drive (we live too rurally to cycle or walk, and no school bus) he will be hoping to restart his career.

We are pragmatic - my wages pay the bills, but I would love to work at home, however my work is in banking and it will always pay more than his. So here we are. He is a wonderful father, keeps the house semi-clean and regulary cooks me fab meals. I cook too and join in the cleaning when home.

I think the key is recognising that you are both making sacrifices and supporting each other as much as you can.

No, but two close female friends are the breadwinners with male SAHPs. Both men had been doing entirely equal shares of household chores, cooking, childcare etc when they were WOHPs, though. Yours sounds as if he thinks running a household and looking after young children is the same as 'unemployment', though, so not the same situation.

We did it. We've actuallu done a bit of every combination.

I worked full time, dh became a sahd for around 6 months after quitting a really shitty job. He then went to college, then did an apprenticeship and is now full time employed.

I began studying part time while he was a sahd (We had 1 dc at the time). By the time I graduated we had another dc, dh was just starting his apprenticeship so I was the sahm while on mat leave. I went back to uni to do my masters just as he finished his apprenticeship so I quit my job (never went back after mat leave) to concentrate on kids and study.

Now he is employed full time and I'm on a year long full time vocational course so we are now in a two working parents scenario again.

We just do what needs to be done to get ourselves where we want to be. We married and had kids young so I like that they get to see that ambition and hard work can pay off, even if you don't or can't do things the conventional way.

I did this years ago after maternity leave, DH worked pt from home and we had 2 children. So he was a SAHP until DD was 6. It takes organisation, setting out who is responsible for which area and a strong relationship. Otherwise the balance skews and fails.

Yes, DH is a SAHD and I work full time.

He was made redundant a few years ago, my earning power outstrips his so it made sense.

Kids now all at school though so he's going to get a part time job.

not here but 2 good friends work with their DH being the SAHP.

agree with PP - both DHs were very much involved in helping at home when all were working. DHs did more than their fair share of cooking, cleaning etc. guess this is one of the reasons why it world for them so well.

We did this shortly after DS was born when DH decided to leave his job and become a SAHD. It worked well - so well in fact, that he never went back to work - that was over a decade ago!

He cooks, does the washing and did all the baby groups etc when DS was tiny, play dates, homework etc, and DS and him developed a brilliant bond.

It's allowed me to have a great career; I work away a lot now (wfh at least once a week though) .

The one thing I'd say though is that some (not all) other full-time SAHDs I've met have been forced into that position through circumstance not choice (redundancy etc) and aren't really sold on the idea and perhaps a bit resentful. Make sure your DH buys into it 100% as we're in a society where a job tends to define you - especially if you're male...

I work full time from him and my husband just quit his job. I do very little in the house now, because I used to do 99% of it and frankly it's his turn. If you don't do stuff your dp will have to step up. It'll become his job and that's fair.

We've done it. It worked quite well, he did everything in the house. We both work now and both do equal amounts of housework and childcare. I think if you both have an understanding of what staying home is like, you get less arguments.

I earn more than DH so he's the SAHP - he cooks during the week (we take turns at weekends), does the school runs, grocery shopping, hoovering, washing up etc. He's crap at dusting but that's not exactly an arduous, daily task to be left with!

That said, he was a functioning grown up to start with - i.e. could do a shop without coming back with nothing but a bag of potatoes and 10 tubes of Smarties. Start him doing the cooking now, while you still have a sense of humour about it. Sit down together and make sure you're both on the same page when it comes to standards as well - if he thinks it's easy because the bathroom only needs cleaning twice a year then you'll know there's going to need to be some changes before you seriously consider going ahead!

Not us but I have two friends who work full-time London (good careers) and their husbands are both SAHPs to three school-age children.

One DH is great at housework/home admin etc and the other is useless and leaves all of that to his wife to do in the evenings and at weekends.

It's all dependant on how you decide on the division of labour and good communication I think.

DH is a SAHP.

Like previous posters we've done pretty much every combo over the years. DC are now all at school and it makes no sense for him to work. It's not required financially and it's good to have someone at home to organise the DC

I always earned more than DH so when the boys came along it made financial sense for me to work and him to stay at home (which we can do easily on my salary).

He pretty much sacrificed his career for mine before that though, as my training required frequent moves around the country and we weren't in one place long enough for him to find a job and stay in it.

He hates cleaning so we have a cleaner. He does all the food shopping, laundry, child care, dog walks, household maintenance / DIY, recycling, bins, around 75% of the cooking, keeping on top of tidying and top up cleaning. I work part time (45h a week plus the occasional 24h shift, weekends and overseas trips) and it's much easier not having to stress about finishing in time to pick boys up from after school clubs or worry about who will look after them if I'm called in at 3am. In terms of job sharing - I work & bring in the family money, we all hang out together at the weekend doing fun stuff and I do my share of cooking and clearing up then. Although often he won't let me because I'm tired from working in the week - he says he can rest or have downtime while boys are at school, and it's his job to support me so I can support the family.

my dh is a sahd and i work, i wont lie it has caused problems in the past when i didnt think he was pulling his weight. now im happy with the divison of childcare/housework. i stil cook most nights but he does the bulk of housework, at the weekends i give everywhere a thorough clean, he does swimming lessons etc. it works well for us now but it was hard to get used to.

We do it. When we emigrated to my birth country he couldn't work so became the SAHD and I worked full time (from home though). Now he can work, he's asked me.if I would like him to get a job to take the pressure off me. He's not work shut but with a 19mo it isn't fully worth it when we make this work. He's does do some of my research for work for me though, so I can get more done through the day and finish in time for the 5yo to get home from school.

He handles the majority of the housework and the kid stuff though. I do my share at the weekend except cooking. He's the better cook and has cooked since day one since he likes doing it. I like the washing up (the water heat is good for my wrists) so I get that done on every night and I bath the kids for more heat.

If I worried about him doing the housework, I'd have encouraged him to do more when he was in work to make sure the arrangement would work out. Nothing worse than cleaning up after someone who should be able to look after himself!

It has been had handing control of the house and financed to him though. We both make financial decisions but he keeps an eye on the direct debits eye to make sure money is going into the savings account and clearing the credit cards properly. All joint so I can check in when I want or need.

Handing over anything to do with the kids has also been hard. I was the one that arranged everything before the move. It's just habits though that you can get out of, but trust in the other person is essential.

Me and DH intended to this when I became pregnant, however once I was on Mat leave I realised that I didn't want to sacrifice that amount of time with DD, and DH realised that being at home with a small child wasn't as easy as he anticipated!

So we compromised and both went part time, I work 3 days a week and he works 2 days a week. We are pretty broke but are both really happy with our work-life balance.

We did for a while when the kids were young. Dh went to university, and was home with the kids holidays /summer etc (9 weeks here) . I worked full time nights So pretty much only saw them an hour or two a day.
He kept the house spotless, made the kids clean their rooms and help out, and made sure they got to play with their friends and cousins loads. They had a brilliant time, to be honest, I felt a wee bit left out.
By the next year I was in university as well, so we were back to shard household duties.
He was really good at keeping up with things like doctors appointments and school meeting and such as well, he volunteered at school which was nice too.