To ask how many hobbies does you DH have?

[fiveplusfour]

DH is 45 and this is a summary of
his hobbies -

• Karate (Sat mornings with DS) and private lesson Tue mornings (on his own)

• Paragliding - odd day here and there when "the wind is right" and several weekends away per year. Plus the paraglider often comes on holiday with us.

• Cycling - about 3-4 "big rides" a year eg. across Spain, plus maybe 2 hrs on weekends, or up to 10 hrs if he's training, plus evenings.

• Mountain climbing - probably twice a year (most recent was two months ago in Alps - 4 day trip). Plus training beforehand.

• Car racing - this is on the increase. He's had about 4 track days in the last 6 months and a couple of 2-day events in Europe.

-Scuba - on every holiday we are near the sea - at least 3 or 4 trips.

• Building a kit car in a garage but this seems to be on the back-burner at the moment.

I've noticed the hobbies have escalated in the last few years, but is this average or would MN consider it to be a lot for a father of three who also works at least 60 hrs per week, plus overseas travel? I do get a fair bit of, "What's he up to this week?" And from friends, but it's hard to know. He doesn't go out socialising after work in the way many people do (unless it's business). He does not do golf or watch / play football.

Not so much an AIBU, but wondering what people think is normal for men of this age?

With respect, @PollyFlint, there's no children in the equation so in essence you get to accompany your OH on his hobby jaunts, compared to the OP who is left wrangling toddlers.
I know I'd choose your option if I could!

Just the 1, he's a gamer.

Just one, he's a retro gamer/collector, so it's home based.

It doesn't sound like your husband is fully invested in his family. I wouldn't have put up with it all those years.

That is a lot of hobbies! Do you have a chance to get out and pursue any of your own hobbies? My DH likes the odd bike club (he's into motorbikes) but if there is an event coming up he asks first even though he knows I'm going to say yes go for it.

You've said he's good with the kids (though you've also said you absorb all their emotional stuff). What does he actually do with them and how often/regularly? Does he have time looking after them without you?

It doesn't sound like it actually bothers you that much OP, more like you feel obliged to be bothered.

If you're happy just carry on.

I guess you have time to do your stuff if you are at home more.

DH and I are both outdoorsy people. We live in a part of Australia where that's the lifestyle of almost everyone.

DH is into:
Skiing (we both work at a ski resort, so part and parcel of that)
Cycling
Fishing
Tinkering/making things/fixing things/hanging out in his shed
Photography

He involves the kids in most things. When DD2 was a newborn (now 8 months old), he would put her in the bouncer in the shed and talk to her for ages while he was doing whatever he was doing.

He has a seat on his road bike and takes the younger kids on that with him. With the older two, he spends a lot of time riding bikes around the area.

Takes the two older kids fishing with him and swimming in the lake/rivers. This will be a common occurrence now that we're in spring.

And of course, skiing is a family thing. The kids go to a school where snow sports are a part of the curriculum, and the kids were on snow before they could walk (DH has a backpack carrier which they would sit in from early on).

It would bother me only if he did all of these things but was unwilling to involve his children, or was unwilling to adapt what he was doing to suit them.

My DH goes to judo once a week and our DD10 goes with him,they've both done so well so quickly in the sport and our DD is disabled I'm really proud of them both.

He likes to watch football on the tv when our team is playing(we don't live anywhere near our team)we all watch it together as a family and if they're playing near us my DH buys us all tickets to go and watch them and takes us out for dinner before hand.

He did love going to the Gym once a week with our 2 oldest DS's 21 and 19,but our lads had stopped going but they're starting back up soon and DS16 is going to join them.

We both like playing Golf and shooting(neither of which we've done together)were going to look into taking both up again and going together maybe a couple of times a month.

We do quite a few things together as a couple,looking round national trust places,going for drives in the country side finding new Restaurants to try out(were all big foodies)and then going for a nice walk in the country side,finding different markets and towns to go and explore.

My husband works 60 hours a week, too, and really wants to spend the time at the weekend with his kids. Which is not to make him sound like a dull martyr--he really enjoys it. Other than that we go out twice a week with friends or as a couple, usually for dinner and cocktails.

He makes time at the office for three gym visits centered on martial arts, which is his main hobby; his other hobby is comic books, which isn't really time consuming.

My DP has no hobbies at all. He's 36, we have one toddler dc and I'm about to pop with #2, so my hobby is only reading, if you can call it a hobby!

He cycles to work and back, but always makes sure he is home before 6 to spend at least an hour with dd playing/ bathing/ feeding etc. before she goes to bed. I'm a SAHM so he really feels like the poor relation in terms of how much time he gets to spend with dd and misses us both horribly when he has to go away with work. At the weekends we do things all together, unless I'm really knackered in which case he'll take dd out for a walk to give me a lie in.

He's not a lazy slob - we both did loads of sport before children - it's just that we've got a family and our family is our priority. We both worked incredibly hard when younger and are enjoying the slower pace and time together very much. It's what we worked so hard for! Neither of us would take up a hobby unless the children were interested as well, so motor racing or paragliding would never work for us. Ditto mountain climbing; we were both adrenaline junkies before kids and did a lot of very risky stuff but we would never do that now. We live on a small farm so there's plenty to keep us all busy at home, anyway, which was obviously a choice we made.

Your DH may well look back in years to come and feel very sad that he missed out on so much of his children's childhoods. This is how I would approach it if you're thinking of taking issue; he's got the rest of his life to go paragliding but his children are only little once.

Mine doesn't really have any solo hobbies. He very occasionally plays golf. We ski at the weekends - again, something we do with the kids. We all go for walks, have beach days, have days out together.

OTOH he's away for work a lot, so when he's home he wants to be with the children. And our oldest is at boarding school, so when she's home he wants to spend time with her.

Right now he's in a taxi in Chicago on the way to a party being put on by the mayor or someone similar, and he's been on the phone to DS for about half an hour, so his life is a mixture of very fun and quite mundane.

So you do all of the housework, he helps by making the laundry harder, he doesn't cook dinners and you do all of the emotional stuff with the kids?

Where exactly is he a good husband or father OP?

I think you are selling yourself seriously short.

He sounds quite like my ex. He checked out of our family long before he actually left. Looking back on it now I realise he actually created more problems than he helped with.

It sounds like you have parallel lives.

Are you sure he's not having an affair or has another family as he doesn't seem emotionally invested in you or your dcs.

With my DH it's football.
He plays Tuesday night, Thursday night, Friday night and Saturday morning.
He also has a season ticket for his premier league club and usually has to leave a couple of hours before the match and is home about an hour and a half after it ends.
He will watch any televised game, at any level. Under 21s, women's football, foreign games, he doesn't care.

He used to play golf and squash as well but I told him that was unrealistic and to be fair to him he has stopped.

Also, provided it's not a 'key fixture' in his mind, he'll miss match if I ask and he won't necessarily play all 4 times a week.

It still feels like a lot though!

DH has had several hobbies/interests over the years, the months of (trying) to learn to bagpip3s was interesting...
Now it's photography which he is starting to build up to a business. So probably 1 night shoot a week from 7pm til midnight. Every few weeks a day shoot from early til late. He goes fishing every now and then which I sometimes go along with to keep him company.
I run a few times a week though i tend to go when DD is at preschool so it doesnt impact on DH that much tbh and I have a race every couple of months.
From your Op it seems way too much to me when you have a family. And expensive?

All these men continuing to do so much for their own personal growth! They definitely have a different mindset.

DP works 45 hours a week and then does his one main hobby - writing/recording/producing music

• about 2 or 3 evenings a week and one or two weekend days (for around 4 hours at a time) a week with others plus every night on his own once the kids are in bed (but I'm in bed then too as bf a baby). So probably he fits in a good 20+ hours a week.

I do yoga once a week and the rest of my time is with the children until I go back to work.

I like that DP has a passion and ambition, I think I'd find someone like me who didn't quite boring. And in the main he recognises that he is able to indulge it because I'm doing the bulk of the childcare/cooking/cleaning/household running. But still I don't think many men who engage in these hobbies truly realise how much slack their partner picks up.

It's not really fair and I don't know how I feel given I've ended up a woman who does most of the house stuff, which when I was a bit younger would have seemed intolerable.

Each to their own and all that, and I like my husband having hobbies and being his own person. However from a conservative reading of you OP your husband is physically away (without you/ children?) a minimum of 14 weekends a year. That's quite a lot. Then factor in all the activities he does when at home. It would be too much for me

If it works for you as a family then I wouldn't worry what other people think.

It does sound like a lot but if you are a SAHM with school age children then you are presumably able to keep on top of household stuff and your own hobbies during school hours which means your weekends are probably less pressured than if you also worked full time.

Both DH and I have several hobbies (not quite as many as your DH admittedly!) and although it can be tricky to fit everything in I would far rather be married to someone with a wide range of interests and passions than one that just sits in front of the TV watching football

This post makes me really sad - the more info you add, the angrier I get for you!

This is so far removed from my marriage I don't really know what to say. My husband works very hard, but he works from home and he doesn't have any hobbies that take him out of the home. If he has some time (which is rare for either of us as we have one year old twins) he does his own web projects, or games. Rarely ever happens though. I don't have time to shower or pee most days (constantly holding in a pee it seems!) so I would be pretty pissed off if he were spending time doing other stuff often. My hobbies are all art or craft based and are done when the babies are in bed.

I realise having older kids is different, but I'm sure it's still extremely demanding and tiring. What time do you get to rest and recharge or do something for you? He sounds incredibly selfish to me and I couldn't live like that, especially doing such dangerous things that put him at risk. I would be constantly stressed about it.

If he's working that many hours then you should be getting some rest when he's home, not just constantly left to get on with it.

Dh doesn't have any hobbies. Neither do I.
Does sound like a mid life crisis to me.

My dhs hobbies are mainly forms of exercise.

I see it as part of normal life rather than a selfish indulgence or a ploy to be away from the family or me. People need to keep fit to be healthy and happy.

He also goes to the pub with the people he exercises with, again I see socialising at part of being a happy human.

I also exercise at least two nights a week and at the weekend. I also have hobbies, although I think the word 'hobby' is a bit lame. They are my interests, such as playing instruments, learning languages, reading and so on. I also go out regularly without him with friends.

We do things together, too.

I think it's important for dcs to see parents with full active lives-they are more likely to keep their own interests into adulthood.

I can't work out when you see him in the week. Our kids are 8, 11, 11, 13.

DH spends 2 hours a day with kids in car. They leave at 7 get back at 7. We eat together. Currently a couple of games of cards after supper then baths and bed. So all family time.

Weekends we are renovating, gardening etc but kids help for a couple of hours per weekend. Girls do a sport that takes a morning. DS does a sport that takes an afternoon. Sunday chilling. DH there for every meal. No actual hobbies.

There's time for family or hobbies not both. I'd say anything over 3 hours a week is too much.

Just to give it perspective, what will it be like when the kids are older, doing their own thing or left home? Will you be happy doing your own thing? Will you have things you enjoy doing together? Will he do his share of the responsible stuff and grunt work, or enough of it to make you feel you are not the hired help?

If I'm absolutely honest, the only reason I put up with it all is because I do get the time when the kids were at school to recharge. If I was working, I don't think I could cope and something would have to give massively.

He does do a lot, but his time is more flexible than a lot of my friend's husbands, many of whom go out at 5am every day and come in by 9pm. Those kids hardly see their dads in the week. If the truth be known, it's easier in many ways when DH is away. That's not to say I don't like having him around because I do, but in terms of my routines with the kids it doesn't make that much difference.

He's not having an affair, it's not like that! I suppose I can't imagine him just being home and cooking dinner or something every evening because it's never happened that way. All families are different. He is not disinterested as such, it's hard to explain.

Gosh OP, your DP is certainly busy isn't he, he must have endless energy. It makes me exhausted just reading about all his hobbies.

My DP have pretty low key interests. He sails in summer (we live next to a lake) and goes wilderness bushwalking/backpacking a few times a year. He (& DD) like to go downhill skiing a few times each winter. He also likes to go cross-country skiing, this he does alone because it is too much physical work for DD who just likes the thrill of skiing down hills but not climbing to the top.

Now he has a personal EPB (emergency gps beacon) & a mobile phone, I feel a lot happier about him going off alone into the great unknown.