To think if you work from home, you’ll have interruptions

[Positivelyperfect]

I have a DH wfh and a toddler. I pick the toddler up at around 4, home for 430. DH finishes at 6, which leaves an hour and a half or so of time where DS is constantly trying to get to DH, crying and having tantrums.

DH ‘solution’ to this is take DS out but tbh I really don’t think I should have to do this five days a week!

@busyeatingbiscuits we shall agree to disagree 😬

The fact that DH can return to the office is a major drip. In which case back to office (at least) 3 days a week, one day you take the baby out, and one day he goes to costa or works upstairs quietly.

Or if he’s really anti office the only answer is go upstairs and stick in headphoneS.

It's a basic truism that toddlers and work don't mix, so since you're (very reasonably) prepared to take DS out a couple of times a week, surely the answer is for DH to go into the office for the others - even if it's just for the afternoons?

I know you said he prefers WFH, but it's not as if you'd be expecting him to return to the workplace all the time

Do you know how I feel? I feel that despite working full time, my only existence is really to cook, clean and do childcare.

Now I feel we are getting to the bottom of it and the real reason for why you posted.

The majority of us on here have had young children, juggled housework, work, relationships etc and we all know it’s extremely difficult.
You lose a sense of who you are as a person.
You’ve had a baby in a pandemic which will make things harder too.

It’s 90 minutes a day - that’s not going to make you feel how you’ve said you feel above. So there’s other issues here.

If DH worked in the office how would you feel then?
I’m guessing you’ve not had any experience of it if your DS is only 1.

Do you want a breather away from DH or from DS?
You sound tired and overwhelmed.

Does your DH pull his weight with childcare, cooking, cleaning etc?
Can you financially cope if DH was the one who finished earlier and took on the homemaker role more?

I don’t really see it as a major drip given that restrictions have been eased for some time now, but whatever. Even if his job could only have been done from home, it doesn’t make the reality any less pleasant for me.

People saying that DS is better off in childcare than with me because I can’t go in the kitchen - do you realise how hurtful you are, or do you just not care? I am managing a difficult situation, and I am doing my best.

Could you move to a more suitable house?

I think you and DH need to come up with a compromise which might mean doing different things on different days during the week.

Can DH budge his hours even a little bit so he finishes earlier?

Can he prep dinner on his lunch break 2 times a week? Can you agree on a takeaway once a week or something made at the weekend and frozen so that you both are only doing 2 dinners a week.

On the two days you are doing dinner each week DH will have to understand that you'll be doing your best to coral and distract DS but that will mean there will be extra noise expected and perhaps some TV noise on too. He can work in the bedroom with the door closed on those days.

On the days he has prepped dinner, you can maybe have a little outside time or activity fun with DS as you don't have to prep dinner. Or just focus on a quiet indoor activity with DS.

Maybe once a week DH should use some of the money he is saving by not commuting into the office to hire a couple of hours of a babysitter/mother's helper who can come in and entertain DS while you have time to do the dinner or your own thing?

No @WonderfulYou that is NOT why I posted. Do not start with the condescension please

A stair gate at the bottom of the stairs might help.

It might be good if we could end the thread tbh as I think if I see another five paragraph post advising me on how I should plan my week I might scream which I know is horribly rude but I really am not an idiot and I am quite capable of working this out for myself!

@Outhouse71421

A stair gate at the bottom of the stairs might help.

WE HAVE NO STAIRS!!!!

And what - a mothers help so I can cook the fucking dinner? Seriously???

Right - hide the thread time, MN has seriously lost the plot.

Don't give those posters any more thought at all OP.
Most of us think YANBU and if your DH is not willing to think about some days in the office or moving to the bedroom, then personally I would just go about that 1.5 hours the same as I would if he wasn't there tbh and see what conclusions he comes to himself!

Has your husband actually said you can't go in the kitchen/diner or are you just avoiding it to try to help him out?

@LizzieSiddal

Could you move to a more suitable house?

Or DH could go back to the office

OP quite clearly you should have by now solved the problem by imagining an upstairs to your home whilst using your womanly ways to hand sew an invisibility cloak for your husband and some kind of soundproofing forcefield, whilst simultaneously engaging the services of Mary Poppins for 90 mins a day to inhabit your being in some kind of co-joined twin situation where the other half of you is either doing yoga or knocking up a delicious supper for your hardworking husband (or both at the same time?)

No excuses - your just a failure of a mother/wife/woman for not being able to MANAGE this difficult work conundrum on behalf of your poor husband.

@Outhouse71421

A stair gate at the bottom of the stairs might help.

No stairs, and the DH could go back to the office

@wordler

I think you and DH need to come up with a compromise which might mean doing different things on different days during the week.

Can DH budge his hours even a little bit so he finishes earlier?

Can he prep dinner on his lunch break 2 times a week? Can you agree on a takeaway once a week or something made at the weekend and frozen so that you both are only doing 2 dinners a week.

On the two days you are doing dinner each week DH will have to understand that you'll be doing your best to coral and distract DS but that will mean there will be extra noise expected and perhaps some TV noise on too. He can work in the bedroom with the door closed on those days.

On the days he has prepped dinner, you can maybe have a little outside time or activity fun with DS as you don't have to prep dinner. Or just focus on a quiet indoor activity with DS.

Maybe once a week DH should use some of the money he is saving by not commuting into the office to hire a couple of hours of a babysitter/mother's helper who can come in and entertain DS while you have time to do the dinner or your own thing?

Or her DH could go back to the office

Of course you shouldn't be traipsing about with a toddler until 6pm or cooking dinner every night. You need to talk to your DH and find a solution that suits you both. You both work full-time so should be sharing the load.

For example, he could wfh 2 days a week and you could take your DC swimming or out somewhere. The weather should be getting warmer soon so it might be a nice having dedicated 'out of the house' time with your DC. But your DH would have to accept that this is weather-dependant and there might be days when you just don't feel like it.

If you're out of the house with DC, your DH should be cooking dinner. Something quick for the toddler when you come in at 6 (it only takes a few minutes to boil some pasta with veggies) and something for you both later. That should be the payoff for you staying out of the house. You entertain toddler, he cooks. I see no reason why you should have to both tie yourself up in knots keeping a rowdy toddler quiet and organise dinner on top of that after a full day at work. If he wants a 1950s housewife, he needs to pay for one.

The other days your DH could go into the office and you could do dinner since he has additional time commuting.

that is NOT why I posted. Do not start with the condescension please

Wow I was being nice.
You are coming across rude.

I know you don’t want advice or suggestions but it sounds like your relationship is very tit for tat - you won’t cook dinner, let your kid watch TV and don’t want him WFH and he won’t go into a room with a door or go to the office.

I’d probably sort out why this is before anything else.

Your Husband is working from home. Working. It's not a creche. He has a Job to do. This is the trouble with all these people thinking how marvelous it is not being office based. They still have to do their job.

He is unreasonable to expect silence all day

He needs to come up with a compromise like - 1) 1-2 days he goes to a place with Wi-fi and works from 4-6
2) 1-2 days you go out after nursery
3) 1x week ds stays at nursery an extra hour /90 mins
4) he schedules calls while ds is as nursery and does quiet work from 4:30-6. Can he block out conference calls from 4:30-6?
5) he finds out if he can start at 8 and finish at 5 instead etc

Obviously I'm assuming that ds is well enough if he has to go out. Your h needs a plan for days that he's too ill for nursery anyway

@AreWeThereYetMummy

Op it sounds like an impossible situation in a home with no upstairs. I was lucky when I worked from home as I worked upstairs when kids were 11 months and 2 and a half. We were able to put a stair gate up.

Can you possibly move to somewhere with an upstairs? Or just a better lay out?

Its not impossible, her DH can go back to the office.

@TheKeatingFive

Is this actually a parenting website? Have people had toddlers in their homes before? I feel like I'm in a parallel universe here. How on any level can this be reasonable??

It's actually weird at this stage. I'm starting to think that some people are just so wedded to the idea that everyone, everywhere should be able to wfh on their own terms that they've got to the stage of being invested in screwing over toddlers to facilitate that

Yes I have read most of this thread holding my jaw to stop it smacking against the floor.

I have come to the conclusion between this and another WFH thread that WFH is some sacred thing that can never be criticised or the dark office fairies will appear.

I find it interesting that the suggestions for the OP who after all just needs to parent, are things that in any other situation would be heavy criticised on here - sticking in front of the TV for 90mins, strapping them into a highchair, bribing with food, dragging him around a shop etc. All ok now that we can't disturb the poor little man who not only is absolutely working so much harder than the OP also earns so much more. The OP presumably earning pennies fannying around with the press releases. So after a day of doing this, the OP also needs to cook dinner like a good little wife. OP I hope you have his pipe and slippers ready after his day of working very very hard.

The entitlement around WFH is breathtaking.