To hate having to work after the kids have gone to bed

[polexiaaphrodesia]

Another evening of putting the DC (5&2) to bed and then logging back on to my work laptop to finish off a load of work I havent managed to get done during the day because I finish at 5pm to do the school and nursery run.

It's hot, I'm tired and I thoroughly resent DH who does the school drop off in the morning for DS, gets to his desk for 8.45am, pops out of his office for dinner at 6.30pm and then like a bloody meerkat dives back into his office to work until all the bathtime and general getting kids to bed fuckery is over. And then announces he's off to the gym as he's finished work for the day while I log back on.

I take DD to nursery for 8am, get home at 8.10am then work until 5.15pm when I pick up both kids, bring them home, make dinner, bath, bed etc then back at the bloody laptop again. We are both fairly senior in our roles and working over contracted hours is considered par for the course but I am getting very annoyed that he only has to do 1/4 of the school and nursery runs, gets to do his work in one uninterrupted chunk, gets dinner made for him and then misses bedtime as he's working.

It's the same for every bloody man in my team as well - they all have someone at home picking up the slack so don't have to work late into the evenings and do nice stuff for them like cycling or going to the gym etc. Just me and all the other mums in my team online at 8.30pm doing the "mum shift" trying to keep our careers alive.

Sorry, rant over. I know I need to speak to DH who will start going on about his promotion for the good of the family and how it means he needs needing to be on calls at 6pm so can't get the kids but flexible working isn't really as great as everyone makes out for women. We're flexing but we're online at night while the men are having their down time.

Firstly what's shit is there are workplaces that have this expectation staff will routinely work XX hours of unpaid overtime. I know that's 'how it is' in finance and you like your job, but it's totally shit because (as you've seen) it distinctly disadvantages women and enhances the careers of men who have a wife to take care of all the life shit. Senior managers and the chief exec where I work wouldn't dream of working regularly in the evenings - on occasion, yes, but it's absolutely frowned upon and time off in lieu is expected.

Your dh's attitude stinks, but you already know this. Why can't he alternate with you who puts the kids to bed and take turns in working after the kids are in bed? When do you get to go to the gym? What about your mental and physical health?

You are both being pushovers.

I'm in a senior well paid role and DH and I both used to work silly hours like this. We had an epiphany in our 30s after kids arrived that actually, you do not need to do this. So we stopped, and you know what? Nothing had changed. We focus on quality not quantity, prioritise effectively, manage expectations, and as a result are both still doing well in our careers despite not working long hours.

I think YABU. You admit you both do over your contracted hours, you’re just doing more ‘over your contracted hours’. The solution is to do less 🙄 My view is that your employer has ‘bought’ XXX amount of your time and by giving them more, you are effectively taking a pay cut in your hourly rate. Seriously, don’t do it and then whine.

After the morning I've had I'd be grateful for someone 'just' doing the school drop off 😔

OP reading back your posts and the responses, I do hope that you can indeed look to address the work expectations/practices as well as your husband’s idiocy. You say yourself that he is working long hours because he is not good at delegation etc, but you yourself are saying it is impossible to get everything done between 8.10 and 5.15. You say that everyone is expected to do 9-10 hours a day, and that the men in your organisation work 8-6. On your basic hours you are doing 8 hours a day.

Now, before I go on I should be clear-I work in an industry which is notorious for very long hours, and is very time-critical and client-driven so even the senior managers are sometimes not in control of their workloads. We all get paid very well indeed and everyone’s contract says that they must work whatever hours are necessary to perform the job- there are no “contracted hours” as such. I suspect yours is similar, so I do understand.

HOWEVER. Even our managers do not want a culture that means that people are working late every evening as a matter of course, and they would not be laughing behind the back of a part time worker who was actually doing a full time job in 5 days and getting paid 20% less. They would be open to finding a solution, as long as the employee was prepared to go over and above when business need genuinely required it. The problem is that you can get entrenched in that long hours, everything is urgent culture and stop seeing what is really urgent and what is not.

Tell me, how are these “9-10 hours” measured? Do people submit timesheets, or is it output-based? Is it possible the men are faffing about during their 8 to 6 - is that one less hour and 15 minutes you do during the day really resulting in you having to work SEVERAL extra hours EVERY evening? Or are you beating yourself up for not getting something finished when your own expectations of yourself are unrealistic? Who sets your deadlines? Can you get some training in managing expectations? Find out what the men do if they have not finished something by 6pm? I bet they just say “I’ll deliver that tomorrow morning”. Talk to your manager about the 5 days in 4 situation that has arisen. Or are you afraid to be honest because you fear it makes you look weak? Are you struggling to keep up because your technical skills fell by the wayside during mat leave? Do you have clients/colleagues in the US who want to speak to you in the evening, or ones in Asia who will want your work product on their desks at the start of their working day? In short, really really analyse why your working practices have become what they are, question everything and make some brave changes. As I said in my previous post, you could arrange one single evening for late working uninterrupted each week to allow for the reality of working in this sort of job, but draw the line at doing it on the other three. Even a few hours at the weekend every now and again to catch up in peace is better than late working every single night.

Good luck.

I only work three days per week but end up working at least two out of three evenings and doing stuff on my non-working days (while feeling guilty for ignoring my DD) too. For all the people saying just finish at 5 - some jobs just don’t work like that

We are well paid and expected to work the extra hours where needed. On the flip side, I earn more working three days than many people do working full-time

The is a contradiction. ^
Sometimes people are so caught up in the cycle of work, they don’t see the full picture.
Firstly you don’t ‘only’ work three days a week. You are being paid for working more than three days a week because you do work more than three days a week.
You are being ‘well paid’ for three days a week because in reality you are working at least four days a week or more.

If people are logging on at night and at weekends, please stop saying you work ‘part time’. You don’t!

Well said @pinkmagnolias

If people just worked out how many hours they actually do per week then calculated their rate per hour instead of being ‘well paid for 3 days per week’ then it would put it into perspective, and just maybe, they’d realise they’re being short changed.

Especially if they’re doing skilled work that would normally attract x £/h.

This doesn’t just belong with mother’s who work pt though; lots of people I know get paid a salary then do over contracted hours. We joked that our director is probably on minimum wage because he does turn off, even if you message at midnight he’ll answer.

Doesn’t *

I've stopped working more than my contracted hours unless it's a genuine one off emergency or a busy period (when I'll normally take back time in lieu when things are quieter). I simply tell my manager I can't do any more. I work efficiently during my work hours and don't feel guilty.
IME the problem persists because the work gets done and no one in higher level management engages too much thought to work out how this has happened. If a job routinely requires you to work 10 hours a day, then it should be advertised as such. Not advertised as 7.5 with "an expectation" that you work 10.

@HaveringWavering, how do jobs like that reconcile "work all the hours needed" with "working part time"? I mean there comes a point where you have to be able to say these hours are reasonable, these are not. There must be rules.

Tell him if he earns so much more than you .1 /Cleaner 2/takeouts a couple of times a week 3/weekends you do less 4 /Go nuclear and tell him you are going to be a SAHM and watch his little face fall!

[quote KeflavikAirport]@HaveringWavering, how do jobs like that reconcile "work all the hours needed" with "working part time"? I mean there comes a point where you have to be able to say these hours are reasonable, these are not. There must be rules.[/quote]
This is a very standard clause in many professional contracts. You are contracted for 24 hours, but can be required to do up to 48 in case of business need, without it counting as overtime.

I am yet to see a case in my career where an employee asked for reduced hours (say from 5 days to 3 days), and the management actually went on and sourced resource to cover the remaining 2 days.
No, in all cases it meant that the person had to find ways to do their 5 days workload in 3.

Agreeing to part-time? Of course, we are a flexible employer and want our employees to have a great work-life balance, everyone is happier then!
Hmm, two mothers from the team returned on 3 days instead of 5 after maternity... Should we hire 0.8 FTE to balance it out? Nah, let's see how it goes and think about it in a year.

I would try and reach a compromise where he refuses calls after 1730/1800 2-3 days a week. I work somewhere where it’s accepted that even regular internal meetings might finish at 6pm or even 7pm (and occasional emergency ones go much later into the evening or if you’re working with North America) but even the most senior people have the ability to say no if it’s 5 days a week. He just needs to communicate his boundaries. Sounds like he’s using these meetings as an excuse to get out of the witching hour/bed time. Unfortunately he won’t admit that though so you just need to go in a very non confrontational way and say it’s not working for you, you’re burning out, which days can he start to have these boundaries? Also can he do more before school, much less common to have regular meetings before 9am.

YANBU and I’m angry on your behalf OP. My DH and I have kids the same age and both WFH, me 4 days, him full time. We split the school and nursery runs 50/50. We split bedtimes too, each putting one child to bed each night (we also take it in turns alternating each night as the 5 year old is much easier than the 2 year old). It’s called a partnership/co-parenting and it’s what your “D”H is hugely lacking.

Call me a featherbedded public sector softy, but why the fuck do people agree to do 24 hours unpaid overtime? Why would you sign a contract like that?

I mean I guess people who work in the finance sector are unlikely to be keen students of the Marxist theory of labor, but come on that is so exploitative!

Finance here too and a busy husband.
Point out to yours that this is for a short time, and long term with tax benefits of two slightly lower wages, you will both end up benefiting.
Cut out / cut down all the other life admin:
Log out the kids wh apps groups
Cash as birthday presents
Give the school your husbands’ details and remove your own
Put yourself first. No one else will.

I agree with you , it’s almost as if we women fought for equality to only work full times split all bills and still do all the house and child care …. Bizarre!

Why should she cut her and her kids social lives rather than respect reasonable boundaries at work?

Unfortunately this is the modern day set up for many women that I know anyway, work pay bills do all the childcare and all the house work! Honestly think that the old way of men work women stay at home worked better in that at least women were able to be with their children and not exhausted from doing it all!!!

@KeflavikAirport

Call me a featherbedded public sector softy, but why the fuck do people agree to do 24 hours unpaid overtime? Why would you sign a contract like that?

It is not compulsory, there's always an option of not to accept the job and do something else. When I was employed, I did it because everyone needed to eat, be housed and be warm. My profession does not have a public sector equivalent.

Could you split it up? 3 evenings a week you do bath snd bed and he's allowed to go out to gym, chill do whatever? 2 nights a week he does bath snd bed and you get to go out to gym, go on a walk, work on so you're not working so late? If he knows he is in charge say a Tuesday and a Thursday he needs to schedule his work around that so he can log off early those 2 nights. If he's not done his work those days then he'll need to logon again after bath snd bed at 8pm like you do?

This is where I think flexible working back fires for women

Totally agree with this.

There’s not much point in engaging with the people saying you should just work your hours. Many industries simply don’t work like this. It is how it is.

Your husband needs to step up though. He must see how unfair it is and he’s being a total dick to use money as a justification. Sit down and agree a timetable with him. And stick to it.

Sure. But how did we get to a point where people in the private sector are expected to work such insane hours? Rhetorical question, I know how we got there. But it's crazy. OP needs to put boundaries in place with her DH AND her job and she should not be penalised for doing so either way.

she should not be penalised for doing so either way.

It’s all very well saying that, but neither she nor you have any power to ensure she won’t be penalised.

And I do think most people in demanding private sector jobs could push back and manage time better to some degree. But logging off at 5pm every just isn’t the slightest bit realistic.