AIBU to be annoyed that DH never puts family first?

[Millipede170]

DH and I have a lovely nearly-2yo son. I went back to work full time after a year’s maternity and have taken a fairly significant career hit to make sure my work life can facilitate childminder runs etc. I don’t mind this and am fortunate that I have been able to broker such an arrangement; the baby/early years are short and actually if I could balance things more in flavour of mothering than work, then I would. But I digress slightly.

DH works shifts for a company that is contracted to the emergency services. His shift patterns are a bit of a pig, days, nights, weekend work and that’s fine, it was all part and parcel of this job that he wanted so much to take in the first place. But what irritates me is that he is absolutely rigid on never requesting any flexibility from his work for the family. There is a mechanism for requesting shift changes, they are entitled to sick/parental leave should the children fall ill, but he has told me point blank that he will never do it. Son is sick? I have to take time off work. Family emergency on my side? Arranging childcare is my responsibility. I’m really only talking about in extremis situations, but the message is clear: Not his problem.

AIBU to be a bit cross about this?

What a depressing thread! For everyone who’s facilitating their husband, take a look at the Facilitiated Husbands thread over on Feminism, or the Incompetent Husbands thread in Relationships.

And then hope against hope that the great provider doesn’t get sick so can’t work as you’ll likely be screwed financially.

We have insurance for that.

Out of interest OP. What would happen if you were physically incapable of your caring role. Illness/hospitals etc. If you were laid up with knock on your arse flu, would he step up (could he) and take over comfortably?

dont we too have insurance and decent savings. One plus of the facilitation is that his career is doing well and this means we have a safety blanket my work would never provide.
That is a very different proposition to OP's were DH wants both paid work and all of the childcare managed by OP.

gamerchick sure, it would take some adjustment but of course he could do it. He’s not incompetent by any means.

For goodness sake, I leave some pasta sauce and fresh undercrackers for my son when I go out for the day. Not because no one else can do it but because I like doing things for my child because I love him. I really don’t think this makes me undermining, overcontrolling or anti-feminist.

hope against hope that the great provider doesn’t get sick so can’t work as you’ll likely be screwed financially

Rubbish. I out-earn my husband.

You are right OP that both parents can’t both know all the little things for a child but you should’t have to have the whole mental load. When I have felt I am managing everything I have just asked DH to do something - he sorts out nannies and nursery pay, pick-up on one day, washing in the week etc. Sometimes you just have to stop doing something and let him pick it up - my DH has felt more confident as a parent by me stepping back

theworstwife yes I do agree. Going back to where I started, I think the day-to-day stuff doesn’t really trouble me. Tiring as it is keeping on top of all this stuff, I am an organised person and I q enjoy it.

What I find stressful is that I am on constant standby for when things outside my control go wrong - DS is poorly, childminder lets me down etc. I would like DH to be less sensitive about upsetting the apple cart at work and do his bit, so it’s not me having to have that awkward conversation with my boss every bloody time.

I think if a job genuinely does not offer flexibility that's one thing. It is usually the case that the higher up the food chain you are, the more flexibility you have - even if you are very senior and have a lot of demands on your time, it's easier to say you're coming in late because you need to take DD or DS to GP or indeed because you need to take child to nursery because other parent is unwell.

But in this case your say the flexibility does exist, but your OP refuses to take it. Why? That's the issue here.

Sorry your Dp not Op!

I think the reason that people are picking up on you providing food/clothes for when you are not there, is because it adds to the idea that anything DC related is your responsibility. With that as the default it is easy for your DH to feel it is not down to him to be flexible. Why would he need to, you both agree that DS is your responsibility. There needs to be a big shift in both of your attitudes. If you want him to take more responsibility, which he damned well should, you need to step back and allow him to. Alternatively you can carry on as you are, but I'd imagine long term that will cause an awful lot of resentment, especially if you go on to have more DC.

hope against hope that the great provider doesn’t get sick so can’t work as you’ll likely be screwed financially

I think that comment was directed more generally at those women who don't work, or work around their 'more important' husbands jobs on lower pay/hours.

Quite the opposite in our case as we worked out when sorting our insurance that if DH died/got ill/left i'd be financially okay, as benefits would kick in and all of our costs associated with his work would vanish. However, he'd be royally fucked if i died/got ill/left. As his wages would not cover the childcare/cleaner/food prep etc that having me at home provides. Our insurance is more to cover him than me!

I grew up watching my Mum work longer hours and earn more than my Dad, yet she did all the childcare costs and arrangements, all the cleaning and cooking etc. The burden on her was ridiculous while my Dad lived a carefree existence. This was pretty common with all the people i knew as well. I decided then i'd be fucked if i was doing all that - i'd rather be single.

I know the best choice should be to be with someone who does 50% but i've never met one of those men. So I chose the next best thing. A division of labour which is much fairer than the alternatives i had. I am happy with this arrangement and so is DH.

But I would be angry if i was in your situation OP.

I would like DH to be less sensitive about upsetting the apple cart at work and do his bit, so it’s not me having to have that awkward conversation with my boss every bloody time.

He would rather inconvenience you and your work than his boss. That is Not OK. Not at all.

And you out-earn him. If that was reversed, do you think the situation would be different? hint,it wouldn’t, you’d still be expected to be flexible because his job would be more “important”

It’s great to enjoy mothering. I do. It’s great to be organised in the details. But of all the domestic tasks, child-related included, what does your DH “own”? What is the equivalent to your 2 jobs (paid employment and default childcarer) that he takes on to make life equal?

You will resent this more and more if you don’t have the talk and insist on a fairer split. I assure you it is worth sorting it now.

Life changes after you become a parent for both partners. He has equal responsibility for childcare. He needs to understand that and show it in his actions, not pay lip service.

It’s International Women’s Day - good time to have the equality talk, I’d say.

Talk to him when it's not an immediate issue. Tell him his inflexibility is killing your love for him as it's making you feel he dies not value you or your work.

If you earn more than him then there's not even a nominal excuse for this. DH earns loads more than me and I still spit at having to bow down to the alter of The Job.

When I was a SAHM and walking around with pneumonia with 2 kids and no rest because he wouldn't even consider taking time off to help me because he was the earner I snapped (and this issue is now sorted out).

Who has said you're undermining, over controlling or anti-feminist???

If you out earn him then simply tell him that your job is more important for the family and insist he does his 50% of days off etc. I wouldn’t normally advocate that approach but I think in this circumstance it is justified.

I wonder if your out-earning him is part of the reason - as in he is (unacceptably) reacting to that? Some sort of petty retaliation?

OP my friend was in your situation, the higher earner in the relationship but her DH was rigid in that he could not take time off (but he really wanted her to keep earning that nice salary).

10 years on she is divorcing him, the complete lack of thought or care for her & their children has completely eroded her love for him.

Both her career and her mental health have suffered and the divorce is having a detrimental impact on family finances that she is having to bear the greatest burden of (as the higher wage earner). Additionally her husband continues to say that his work is inflexible so can only see the children 1 day a week and never overnight - because of his shifts.

Please address this now, believe me if left the resentment will build & in the meantime your physical and mental energy will be sapped.

This: I would like DH to be less sensitive about upsetting the apple cart at work and do his bit, so it’s not me having to have that awkward conversation with my boss every bloody time.
You mean- I would like my dh not to think my work and my life apart from being a mother matter much less than his, and can always be what’s pushed aside for our children. Because that’s what he thinks.

My dh once said, after a few drinks years ago, that his career mattered more to us. It was probably the closest I’ve come to asking him to leave, as it was I told him I couldn’t make him contribute to our family time and effort wise but I could free up as much of his time as I could, and I would do that by not spending any time with him for social/ fun reasons so he could do the family admin we needed, and because I didn’t want to spend any time with that guy.

Think of it this way, OP. If your job suddenly became completely inflexible - no covering childcare emergencies ad hoc ever (as per your DH’s attitude) - then what would the short-term family solution to that be? (ie not long-term changing jobs etc)

Would you
a) give up your higher-paying job and live off your DH’s salary?
b) get DH to give up his lower-paying job and live off your salary?

Work is important to your DH’s identity, clearly. So I assume he wouldn’t want to give it up. But if you use up all your goodwill at work & they insist you work your contracted time rigidly, or you get a new manager/promotion so the flexibility isn’t there any more, or you have another child and the potential for disruption is 50% greater, what then?

It’s in his interests to protect your flexibility by asking fir flexibility himself.

inseoir I was putting comments such as "spoon feeding him is you agreeing that he’s less capable and therefore less responsible", "Do you think there is a bit of control on your part in this?" and referring me to the Feminists chat forum into my own words.

PoppyFleur the picture that you paint is my absolute worst nightmare - useful to see it on paper, so thank you.

*Mookatron" you're absolutely right, the time to talk about this is when the heat is off, not right now. I am stinging because I am having an operation tomorrow, which I scheduled around DH's shift roster so that he can do the CM run in the morning, but then my 'recovery time' over the weekend involves looking after DS solo, as DH will be at work

'inseoir I was putting comments such as "spoon feeding him is you agreeing that he’s less capable and therefore less responsible", "Do you think there is a bit of control on your part in this?" and referring me to the Feminists chat forum into my own words.'

In that case you put a very negative interpretation on people trying to understand/trying to help you to understand. What I would interpret from those questions and comments was that people were trying to see where your behaviour was coming from, what the motivation is. The reference to the feminist board was about the facilitate husbands thread, which is totally relevant to your situation. The fact that it's on the feminist board is neither here nor there - it discusses what you're dealing with in great detail and could be very useful to you.

The operation thing is awful by the way. Basically, no matter what happens, you will never be a priority.

His self-image as "the reliable guy at work who's always in" is obviously important to him, you need to think about what ELSE is important to him in his self-image that he is not actually achieving because you are picking up all the slack.

What would happen if you said to him "well, we'll have to ask my mum/your mum/a childminder to look after DS for the next two days because his daddy doesnt want to look after him while I'm on bedrest. Could you ask your mum today if she can have him?" in a matter-of-fact "this is what the plan has to be" way.

"We should start looking at nanny/au pair costs. My career is starting to really take off and I cant be available for every appointment and sick day that DS needs. Since you are not interested in helping to cover these, we'll have to get outside help in. It'll be expensive but you're not leaving the family with any other choice".

Its not that he CANT look after him, he's choosing not to.
I do think that your prep for daddy-day is somewhat adding to the attitude though that YOU are responsible for all DS's care. You are doing prep that you would do if a child-minder etc came in and it sends the message that all these things are your actual JOB. Its the equivalent of the teacher leaving lesson plans for the substitute teacher where their actual job is just to make sure the children all stay alive until their REAL teacher comes back.

Nosquirrels makes a very salient point OP. For some reason you as a family are prioritising the career of the lower earner. That has a lot of backfiring potential. Looking in, it doesn't seem very sensible.

If one of your jobs has to be prioritised, and frankly I don't think one person doing all the accommodating is usually a good idea anyway, but if it does then why would it be the lower earner? It's also true, take it from someone this has happened to, that your flexibility can be more precarious than you think. You may be in a workplace where all this is set in stone, but if it's not, and you're reliant on having an understanding manager and good WFH policies etc... those can evaporate more quickly than you might think.

Your DH is behaving worse than you in this respect, but I think you do need to take some responsibility for how this situation has come about.

Inseoir I don't mean to be negative, but I did feel that things were rocketing off on a bit of a tangent. That said, I see the point about sharing responsibilities more generally, it's a valid one. And I also appreciate people taking the time to contribute to the conversation even if their observations are a bit painful.

beetlejizz I think you do need to take some responsibility for how this situation has come about is absolutely accurate. I have been too proud for too long, feeling like I should never need to ask for help. I have created the impression that "I've got this" when in reality, I could do with some support. But I guess that's why I have posted this.