Any SAHMs / SAHWs out there with husband’s who have decided they are now “working from home?”

[samaya]

Hi, just wondering if anyone else is in this position and how it is it all panning out for you if so?

Personally, I am finding it quite hard work if the truth be known.

DH has been working from home since March last year. I get on really well with him and like him being around HOWEVER...

...he's going nuts and wants to go back to the office and has been doing two days a week for a couple of months now. And this suits me just fine.

He is supposed to be going back to the office permanently later this year which actually I'm sad about and don't want. But I could definitely live with part time at home - he's getting so much more quality time with me and DS and its just nice.

Full time permanently? Nope and Nope. It would drive us BOTH bonkers.

I worked from home permanently and have done for years.

DH has just told me that he won’t be returning to the office.

Oh god.

I’m currently pretending it’s not happening.

As long as you are happy that’s all that matters.

@LaLaLandIsNoFun

Yup. Driving me crazy.

OH is in civil service and everything is highly confidential. Downstairs is completely open plan, including stairs and hallway and we have two bedrooms with no room for any kind of office space. For a year now I’ve basically been living in the bedroom and unable to get on with much. School at home was awful enough without the added issues of no separate downstairs room and no office yup space upstairs. I feel like an uninvited guest in my own home. It has all but broken our relationship. And no end in sight.

I hate to say this, but there's zero chance that most of his calls are secret/top secret - it's really only occasional unless he's top brass in the "Home Office" or "Foreign Office"

If he's suggesting that all his calls require that level of privacy he's utterly taking the piss. Sorry!

I’m not, DH and I are both out to work. My friend however reports that she is very close to murdering her DH who has now been wfh for over a year and is driving her insane.

Both of us now work from home permanently. I've joined a fully-remote team, and he is flexible as to whether he WFH full time or not.

That said, we moved into a house where we have an office each so it's not really a problem. However, I'm due in less than 3 weeks so it'll be interesting having a newborn, a toddler and a DH who WFH 🤷‍♀️

Love him but lots of trivial bickering as I used to have the place to myself. I like to potter around, but can't always do that.

I like my own space, this has been tough.

During first lockdown both me and my husband were at home. I wasn't allowed to work as I was pregnant and the risks to pregnant women weren't known last March. My husband was at home for the same reason.
He went back last July and it was such a relief. I love him but being stuck in the house all day every day was too much. We got on each others nerves a bit and bickered over stupid stuff.
We're both back at work now and it's much better. So slightly different situation but all day every day is a bit too much.

@LaLaLandIsNoFun can he not be in the office? My civil service organisation does have a limited number of desks in the office for people who have a good need for them (mental health being an applicable need) you clearly do not have the space for him to be at home, I'd be getting him to see if there is an office for him to work in.

I bloody love it! He gets up early still so makes all the packed lunches, and works his day so he can do the afternoon pick ups and stick dinner on.

Working great for us.

@HavelockVetinari

Err........ I worked in a company where security clearance was required. Our department was even higher security so no one else in the company could get through the door other than directors.

Don't assume you know everything.

@LaLaLandIsNoFun

Yup. Driving me crazy.

OH is in civil service and everything is highly confidential. Downstairs is completely open plan, including stairs and hallway and we have two bedrooms with no room for any kind of office space. For a year now I’ve basically been living in the bedroom and unable to get on with much. School at home was awful enough without the added issues of no separate downstairs room and no office yup space upstairs. I feel like an uninvited guest in my own home. It has all but broken our relationship. And no end in sight.

Bloody hell, why not get the bed out of one bedroom and put in a desk, so your oh can work in there? It's crazy to live the way you have been living.

Hi there @HavelockVetinari

Where exactly did I say that his conversations had anything to do with national security?

He works within social care.

@tenlittlecygnets

Because we need both bedrooms - for the household occupants to sleep in.

[quote name7852]@LaLaLandIsNoFun can he not be in the office? My civil service organisation does have a limited number of desks in the office for people who have a good need for them (mental health being an applicable need) you clearly do not have the space for him to be at home, I'd be getting him to see if there is an office for him to work in.[/quote]
The office building he was in was closed down early in the pandemic. It has yet to re-open, and the rumour is that it won’t. Most of his colleagues are also still working from home.

DH has been WFH since march 2020 and for my sanity I'm desperate for him to go back to the office, even if it's just a couple of days a week

@LaLaLandIsNoFun during the first lockdown when things were really strict, one of my colleagues worked in his car. He works in the office now (though I have noticed he appears to have a tiny home office too so maybe they sorted something out at home.

Anyway, your DH needs to go back to the office if there is no sensible working space at home (or rent an office outside - they have now reopened and you can get single offices if you can't use a co-working space). But if a job is that confidential, then his employer need to reopen the office. The rule is work from home if you can. If it's that confidential, he can't. Although I find it all a bit offensive that he doesn't trust you to blab!

Oh I had assumed it was national security too. Well it sounds like you need to clear out one of the sheds.

I’m not sure we could afford to rent an office for him - he works for a local authority.

Having had experience of one myself I’m not surprised they give not a shit about their employees nor their employee’s families: they generally dint give a shit at all, about anything, so long as they can avoid accountability.

I don’t know what to say - his office building hasn’t re-opened.

All of you who want your DH out of the house - there are loads of co-working hubs and they are open. Google them and get your respective other halves to investigate. If they are saving money on travel they can afford the fees (and they may well enjoy it too).

garden is tiny new build garden with already....two sheds packed full of his stuff. No room for another shed.

Ok, so he needs to empty out one of the sheds and make that into a home office. Especially if the wfh will become permanent. In fact I'd raise that to start the conversation and say 'we need a new arrangement because you can't expect me to sit upstairs all day for years to come'.

My local authority has hot desks all over the county for remote workers. For example in local libraries (in quiet areas but probably not confidential enough). If the job is really that confidential, the employer needs to step up. Your DH needs to say he cannot work from home anymore so what do they suggest.

@looptheloopinahulahoop

Oh I had assumed it was national security too. Well it sounds like you need to clear out one of the sheds.

He won’t and neither of them would be big enough anyway - they’re very small sheds.

And no, we do not have a spare few hundred pounds to plonk a bigger one in what’s left of our rented garden, or installl a wall bed in our rented house or put partitioning walls in etc - and, it’s a rented property. It’s just take Lyn us over a year for the management company to fix the garden fences that blew down last year.

[quote DontCallMeBaby]@LaLaLandIsNoFun as well as the headphones and privacy screen he needs to develop some fucking empathy and a backbone; accept that it’s your house too, and tell HIS line management that you’re going to be around, and anything he says, you may hear. If it’s confidential to the point of being classified he should be in an office anyway; otherwise they need to either find him office space, or accept the minuscule risk.[/quote]
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