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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Wanting the house back to myself

284 replies

Estherpologist · 30/03/2021 22:35

I get that lockdown has meant so many people have had to work from home, and the kids couldn't go to school, but having been the one who gave up their career to be the full time parent, and being the one who hasn't had the luxury of being able to leave the office at the end of the day and go home from their workplace, because home has been my workplace for 12yrs, am I being unreasonable for wanting the house back to myself during the day? Now that the kids are back at school (holidays notwithstanding) am I being unreasonable to be just a bit at the announcement "I'm probably going to work from home from now on"?

OP posts:
rosegoldivy · 31/03/2021 09:31

Nope, I get it. Totally get it.
When my DH is home he fucks our routine. For no other reason than he's here and it puts me out of sync.
And when he was furloughed I honestly could get the rage with him just fuckin breathing. I am not designed to spend 24/7 with my husband 🤣 love him dearly but if I had to hear him slurp yet another bowl of fuckin Coco pops I would have divorced him.
Never been happier than when he went back to work full time. I honestly feel like both of us will agree that our relationship has improved drastically since he went back.

Hankunamatata · 31/03/2021 09:51

Friends brought the husband a garden building and turned it into an office with mini kitchen. She says its bliss and he enjoys it as it's like going to work

Peacocking · 31/03/2021 09:59

Living with someone that WFH is hard. I work out of the house (shifts). When I'm home there's nowhere I feel comfortable or relaxed. If the dogs bark I'm leaping on them. If I watch TV its headphones. If I walk around I'm hissed at to walk quieter as the sound travels through the house when he's on the phone. I make food or drinks I'm closing doors behind me and trying not to clink dishes or make noise or let the kettle or the toilet flush be heard. It's miserable. It's not him being unpleasant, he's trying to do a job and sound professional. But it's fucking awful for the other person/people in the house.

weightedblanketlove · 31/03/2021 10:01

I get this. There is something very peaceful about being the only one in the house and I too Can get way more done I an hour by myself. I'm having to work around DH teaching with hoovering/ putting our really noisy washing machine on etc and I also feel I less able to relax. I feel like I should be doing something- which he wouldn't expect me to.

The upside is on my work days I can ask him to pick up the kids. Takes a huge amount of stress out of commuting.

Seeline · 31/03/2021 10:04

YANBU

Same here. Was a SAHM for 11 years then started freelancing from home. Have done that for 9 years now.

I've had a whole year of DH WFH and 2 teens who were Y11/Y13 for most of it so just hanging around trying to fill the time that should have been exams and then a summer of post-exam fun.

DH has a lot of zoom meetings. He also can only work in complete silence. Gone are my singing out loud washing up sessions, my listening to the radio whilst pottering round, my practising my music for my choir. I also miss just leaving the house - I feel I have to account for my movements now. Even if popping to the shops I feel obliged to let DH know I'm going.

Hopefully he will be returning to the office at some point, although I don't think it will be on a full-time basis.

ShipshapeShore · 31/03/2021 10:04

I know what you mean. Tidying and hoovering etc seems so much easier when there's no one else there under my feet! I like everyone out of the way now and then so I can sort the house out properly.

SwedishK · 31/03/2021 10:07

I totally sympathise with you OP.

I'm used to working from home, have been doing that for years, but now DH is also working from home and it's disturbing me so much. Mainly because I am used to working in a quiet home, and now I have had more than a year of listening to hours and hours of his zoom calls which does not interest me in the slightest. It's mentally draining for me. I can understand that others might be OK with it, but I'm getting increasingly frustrating.

It's not because I don't think we have equal rights to the house, it's just because he is so much more noisy than I am and I don't have the option to work from an external office, as there is none. I can't wait until he goes back to full-time work in the office.

katmarie · 31/03/2021 10:13

I get you op, dh has gone back to work today and the house is empty for the first time in ages, and I can actually focus. I love him dearly but it's nice to have my routine back.

activitythree · 31/03/2021 10:15

I think I misread this last night. You are not working from home at all, you just call it your 'workplace' ?

Hadjab · 31/03/2021 10:21

@HalfShrunkMoreToGo

It's one of the things I miss the most, and I never had much time in the house by myself but I have literally not been alone in the house for a year.

If DH isn't here then DD is or the other way round. I don't really know why I miss it as it's not like there's any illicit activity I'd like to be able to do, but I think it's just having absolute knowledge I could sit down with a coffee and book and KNOW that no one would run downstairs to ask me a question, or suddenly need to tell me they need a wee, or decide it's immediately imperative that I watch them do something.

This! I’m at home with my three kids, oldest daughter’s partner and my gorgeous 7 month old grandson. Lockdown hasn’t been all that bad in that we’ve been able to spend all this time together as a family, but bloody hell, the inability to be in a room without pretty much everyone being in it five minutes later is wearing thin now. They were all out yesterday, and it was utter bliss.
Triffid1 · 31/03/2021 10:24

I totally get this. I have always WFH and DH is freelancer doing bulk of childcare. But usually I'm out meeting clients a lot, or go to work in shared spaces some of the time so he isn't getting much time at home alone (although I try to be out of the house with the kids for a couple of hours a week to give him a break) and I am getting zero and frankly, it's killing us. He's started being out for work again this week and it's lovely for me.

billy1966 · 31/03/2021 10:32

Absolutely get it and have lots of friends who feel EXACTLY the same.

My husband loves Saturday and sunday mornings when he gets up early and has downstairs to himself while his lazy family sleep on.😁

museumum · 31/03/2021 10:36

If my dh chose to wfh forever we’d need another room so I could be somewhere he’s not going to stomp into at any moment while. I love him dearly but my living space is not a work kitchen / break room!
I want to be able to read, or do yoga without interruption.
(I normally wfh and also hate sharing my office)

whatswithtodaytoday · 31/03/2021 10:38

Yes, I get that. I used to work from home once or twice a week and I loved having the house my myself. I really, really miss it. Now my partner is here all the time, in the same room because we don't have anywhere else for us to work.

I do think all being well, we'll both be back in the office a couple of days a week from the autumn (or maybe next spring, depending on variants).

GintyMcGinty · 31/03/2021 10:39

My husband worked from home pre-pandemic and resents having to share the house with me currently working from home.

He hates the fact that I now like and would like to work some or most of the time from home. We have more than enough space.

He wants me to go back to the office.

Firenight · 31/03/2021 10:40

OMG yes. Having to account for leaving the house does my head in. It's like a military operation and I now have a husband and at least one child guiltily me about it, even if I manage to make the escape a shop run or other chore. I feel trapped.

user20211 · 31/03/2021 10:41

I totally get it. I'm a SAHM to preschoolers and I dream of the day I get the house to myself... except now DH is WFH permanently so I'll never be truly alone 😭

Original poster
Estherpologist · 31/03/2021 10:41

@activitythree

I think I misread this last night. You are not working from home at all, you just call it your 'workplace' ?
The house is my office for two reasons: because, for me, being the home maker is a job, and because the freelance work I do is almost exclusively and necessarily done at home.
OP posts:
DeepfriedPizza · 31/03/2021 10:41

I work part time from home and DH is now working full time from home. On my two days off I could get housework done in peace and sit and have a cuppa. Now I have to ask him when he’s on calls so I can Hoover etc. He went into the office last month one day and it was glorious.

RunHobbitRun · 31/03/2021 10:42

YANBU I've started eyeing up people with motor homes on their driveways with envy...not because I want to go touring, but just because I'm craving the ability to just be alone for a few hours that doesn't require me trekking the same paths over and over. I can imagine locking myself in one for a morning or afternoon now and again just for solitude.

I'm also missing the solitude of WFH alone, there's always someone here.

I love my family dearly, but I'll never take moments of solitude for granted ever again!

Hoppinggreen · 31/03/2021 10:44

I have always wfh so during lockdown it’s been a bit “different”
I am glad DH has been here, he has got much more involved with things such as cooking, homework, dog walking etc etc, and I would like it if he could at least wfh a few days a week
BUT I would also like it if he was in the office a couple of days a week too, I wouldn’t really do anything different but I do like being alone

Ohdoleavemealone · 31/03/2021 10:52

I get it OP. Sometimes we just need some space from others and that was your space.
I was really looking forward to having FRidays to myself when my daughter started school but thanks to COVID my DH now works from home.

I do as I please mostly but it isn't the same.

LindaEllen · 31/03/2021 10:54

I know what you mean, but at the same time it's a bit unfair to expect your husband to go to work if there's an easier and more convenient option.

It's about making it work for both of you, though. For example I wouldn't be happy if he was working in the kitchen meaning I couldn't make any noise, but if there's a spare room he can work in, it wouldn't bother me at all.

broadstrokes · 31/03/2021 10:56

@DeepfriedPizza

I work part time from home and DH is now working full time from home. On my two days off I could get housework done in peace and sit and have a cuppa. Now I have to ask him when he’s on calls so I can Hoover etc. He went into the office last month one day and it was glorious.
I could have written this! I'm so fed up of having to creep around so the dogs don't bark while my DH is on Zoom calls.
nokidshere · 31/03/2021 10:58

I get it. I'm alone for a couple of hours right now. It's bliss. I'm sick of running commentary's on other peoples days. I just don't need to know what everyone is doing all the time. DH is 'attentive' to the point of being ridiculous. If he asks me if he can get me anything one more time I might just scream. And even worse, when I say no he says 'are you sure' grrrrr. I don't need to know that he is going to the loo, putting the kettle on, just doing (whatever). I don't want to know. If I tell him that he looks hurt and says 'I'm only trying to help' 🙄

I just want an hour or so with no noise, no chatter, no clattering about.

It's just not normal really. We have been married for almost 40yrs and have never spent so much time together. He can't sit still for 5 minutes which has never been a problem when he's at work from 7-6 every weekday but, omg, it's bloody irritating when we are in the same place 24/7.

I would never actively encourage wfh

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