DH Family rallying around helping him with kids while I go away

[travelle]

I work full time, so does my DH. He has a physical job, which sees him out of the house 6 days a week.

I have work from home computer based job. I automatically do nursery drop offs, all dinners, wake ups, all washing, most house stuff etc. I'm just there more to do it.

I have dinner alone with my kids and do bed time alone, plus wake ups, plus getting them ready etc. I do all of that alone. It's tough. My family don't live nearby.

I find the after work dinner time and bed time the hardest and loneliest part of my day. My DH doesn't get home until they're both asleep.

DH family lives around the corner. His parents work really hard and are not around, ever at that kind of time to come around and keep us company. His siblings work from home, but don't come round often during the week. More on weekends. Which I really appreciate because I'm also alone one day every weekend.

In any case, I'm going away on a business trip and everyone is rallying around and can't wait to come and help him out. I kind of wish he just did it alone. To see what it's like and what my life is like. He never gives me much credit. It's always about him being tired and me having to make sure he's taken care of. I just wish he was actually just left to do it alone. But of course, they'll all be here to help him. Yet, it's something I'm expected to do, every day on my own. Seems unfair.

Well, I think the problem is you don't seem to have any friends - you keep talking about the pia inlaws who are still living in the 1950s and busy with their own lives and don't seem to like you.

Give yourself a shake - get the cleaner in more often. Decide if racing around doing a job AND running the home/DCs is worth it - stuff 'supporting' your selfish dick of a DH. What DO you want to do?

Give up work? Change your job/ get second cleaner/ get babysitters so you can go out in the evenings or at the weekend and take up sport(s) /hobby/s / speak to a divorce solicitor (how much money would you be left with if you separated)/ make sure you ahve a good pension/ Study for new career?

I know you don't think you have time but I think you need to decide what YOU want in life and go for it.

Things are not very balanced in your household.

What you put in -
Him: big job, very intense job, works long hours.
You: regular job, do everything for the kids and house, health condition.

Considerations made for your situation:
Him: rarely or never has to do anything for the house or kids. Gets to sleep in every single weekend. Doesn't help with the kids even when you have a vomiting bug. If you are out of town, his entire family descends upon him to ensure he doesn't have to do any extra work.
You: once a week housekeeper. Hello Fresh (you still have to cook it, right?). Anything else? Nope, that's about it.

What you give -
Him: money and lots and lots of complaining about your inadequacies. Never gives you emotional support. Complains if you do a sport outside of the house 1 day per week.
You: emotional support. Let him sleep in on weekends. Make sure pretty much everything is done regarding house and kids so all his time away from work is downtime.

In general, your downtime should be equal. If you are taking downtime during the workday, that certainly counts. If you are cutting into your sleep or have to look after sick kids without support, you should subtract that from your downtime. Do you see what I mean?

So if his week is:
leave house 7 am, arrive home 9 pm, 2 hours free then bed at 11 pm
weekend: all weekend free except take Bob to soccer 1.5 hours on Saturday at noon.

And your week is:
wake up with kids 6 am, work/takecareofkids/laundry/dinner/tidy/putkidstobed, EXCEPT: go to gym 1-2 pm;
Tidy kitchen 9-10 pm, then relax 10-11 pm, bed at 11 pm
(your weekday downtime is the same but you're using an hour of it in the middle of the day for the gym;)
weekend: wake up with kids 6 am each of Saturday and Sunday, take care of kids all weekend.

Then you have similar amounts of weekday downtime, but he actually has 2 more days per week of downtime than you do because he has his weekends to recover. So you need to highlight and rectify that, if you see what I mean.

I know you say it would be great if you had company from his family, but they are also negging you anytime you don't live up to their (likely imagined) history of never having help, and they expect you to do a lot more than him. So I am not convinced they are actually all that supportive to you. My in-laws are similar and, to be frank, at some point I realized their "help" was making my life worse, because any time I needed help it would come with so much criticism and self-righteousness about how I was a failed wife and my dh was so good to put up with my laziness and incompetence. Meanwhile, I hadn't had a holiday or even a night away from my kids in literally years, while my husband was going on hobby trips with his buddies several times per year, sleeping in on weekends, getting coddled by them every time we visited them, while they fawned over what a great dad he was and how he needed the rest. When they came to "help" me, I always felt horrible after they left. I realized in retrospect that, actually, they were just loyal to him. I only mattered insofar as I was of benefit to him, and to them. They didn't really care about me at all, it was just something I told myself because, like you, my family didn't live near enough to help me, and it's hard to make all those sacrifices for husband and kids when you feel unsupported and unseen.

Maybe you should reduce contact with your in-laws, actually. Just receive less of this "we never had any help, you shouldn't either, but your husband should, because the poor guy is married to shi%%y you." You'll be amazed how much better life is when you don't have those words constantly ringing in your ears.

And, maybe start letting your husband know that it's not YOU who are not measuring up because the house is sometimes messy. You work AND look after the house and kids while he just looks after himself. Maybe let him know HE is the one not measuring up because he is treating you like a servant or an employee rather than a beloved wife, and because he's using up all the family downtime on himself which is utterly selfish.

Your husband and children are lucky to have you.

I habe a few mum friends where I live. But not very close. I have old friends I barely see.

My in laws don't like me because I have stood up for myself a couple of times and enforced some boundaries and they couldn't handle it and I'm a witch.

I go to a gym/ sports clubI and have met people there. My H resents me as he has absolutely nothing aside from work, as he has no time and just one day off a week. Where apparently I'm nagging him to do stuff with his kids. It's a tough situation.

Money wouldn't be an issue. I'm just trying to keep my family together and hoping things will get a bit easier when the kids grow a bit.

Well, normally things get much easier as children become independent.

OMG DO NOT GIVE UP WORK. I'm not psychic but I'm going to take a wild guess this man is not the type to share fairly if you ever divorce in the future. You need to look after your financial stability!!!

Instead, I suggest you hire in more help, lots more. It actually is pretty normal when men have "big jobs" that the wife hires in some help, otherwise the bitterness can get to be a lot. Also, the clock keeps on ticking: if your youth passes you by while you struggle along with your chronic illness, overtaxing yourself to avoid his criticism that family resources (money, time) spent on your rest/health/happiness are a spendthrift waste (whereas he neeeeeeeds his rest), you'll get old and have cr@p health and you'll have missed your chance to enjoy your healthy years or to prepare your body for your aging years. Ask me how I know!

What help should I get ? I feel like I have quite a bit already.

He has one day off a week and the second day at the weekend I'm on my own with the kids. I would love to sometimes not have to drag myself and both kids downstairs in the morning and just have a rest.

I don't want to give up work. Work is easier than looking after a 1 year old all day. Work is when I get to rest.

A couple options - get the cleaner in more often, babysitter one night per week so you can go out with your friends or start up that sport again.

I did. try a sitter a few times and also once when my mum came over and it was a bit difficult. My three year old really misses me at bedtime.

I'm away now and she's really struggling at bed time. I wanted to wait until they're a bit older perhaps. I have major mum guilt because she's literally like ' mummy where are you ? ' the whole night. She also wakes in the night and comes to find me. Not ideal. But I have definitely tried.

Does he want to spend time with you and his family?
As a family what makes you a happy family unit?
What is your vision for the future what are your hopes for your children?
What are your dreams as a family?
Where do you want to be later when your children leave the nest?

Do you talk to your husband about any of the above?

I would stop trying to make his life easier. Just do the basics and leave the rest. If he complains about how you cook and do other stuff just don't do it for him any more.

@travelle

I think the time has come to ask yourself if you're better off with him, or without him. He certainly doesn't seem to add anything to your life in a positive way, but certainly detracts from it.

You're carrying a huge load of resentment and that's a heavy burden. Seems to me if you were a 'true' single parent your load would only decrease (mentally and physically) plus you'd hopefully get some respite during his periods of child access.

He's not going to change and his family backs up his beliefs that he is not only 'doing his share' but is actually 'hard done by'.

Ops wellbeing is important too!

He can be critical about the stuff I make/ how I do his laundry / whether the house is clean enough etc

My favourite response to this sort of nonsense is "feel free". Don't like the way the house is - feel free to run the vacuum round don't like the way you do his laundry - oh OK sorry hadn't realised, probably best I leave it in the basket for you to do the way you like it; don't like the food for dinner - OK I'll not make it again but suggest that you make it on Sunday the way you like it for all of us to eat etc etc. Two can play at that game just see each and every criticism not as a crisicism but as a way to offload that particular task.

Why on earth or you putting up with this shite, OP? Seriously. Not the incredible workload you have taken on - it seems that you have both decided he will work a 6 day, full-on week. Personally I would revisit that. It isn't doing your marriage any good. But why are you putting up with the lack of affection, lack of caring, constant criticism, lack of any appreciation?

The first time my husband criticised how I did the laundry would be a memorable day in our lives. He would never have forgotten my reaction.

Stop expecting sympathy from your inlaws. You won't get it. Maybe say to them "says a lot that it takes 3 of you to replace me doesn't it' but it won't change anything.

Sit your husband down and tell him he will be juggling 50/50 childcare if he doesn't realise he is killing your marriage with his lack of appreciation. Marriage isn't a zero sum game. He can be tired and overworked and so can you. He needs to appreciate what you do and thank you for it. He doesn't lose anything by this. Right now he seems to think your relationship is a battle field where if he says "thanks love, you do such a great job with the kids" he loses something. Honestly, this will kill the relationship eventually.

If you are away and your husband is at work and family are looking after the children I don’t understand how they are helping him? Surely they are helping you both?

I don’t think you’re going to get an company to do the evenings/bedtime routines because as you’ve found people prefer to be in their own home on an evening unless they are out socialising. Watching you do a bedtime routine would not be classed as an excising socialising event.

I think the bigger picture here is that you have no time for yourself and a complete overhaul of yours and your husbands working patterns needs to be made. Do you both really need to work full time, why does your husband have to be out of the house for 12+ hours 6 days a week? Can he/you reduce your hours or find different jobs. This would allow you both time to do your own thing, spend time together as a couple and take it in turns to do wake ups/bedtime routine. Seriously if both carry on working as you are you won’t have a marriage/family unit.

I appreciate a change that big is going to take time to put in place.

So for now, hire a babysitter one night a week and go out and enjoy yourself, find a hobby, take yourself to the cinema/for a walk/shopping etc. And your husband needs to do wake up/bedtime on his current day off.

It sounds exactly like farming to me.

Only thing throwing me is the day off and the commute.

But still absolutely possible if e.g. he is a contract milker or something... or working on his parent's farm which is why they also work very very hard...?

I've just had a flashback to my MIL coming round to find my XH ironing his shirts, whereupon she said 'Doesn't SHE iron?'

I was sitting breastfeeding our then-ten day old third child. I did EVERYTHING in the house, he just didn't like the way I did his shirts.

God, I don't miss that family at all.

And the shitty attitudes about it being woman's work to keep house are absolutely through farming families like Blackpool through rock.

I would have been the same as you op until dh started working form home and I started working out of the house. You don't know what the order of things is or how they're done-didn't know the kids hated certain things they used to like etc. If he's there at certain times of the day he can do more to help, if he's out of the house and can't physically help due to his job of course it's ok that if he mentioned it was going to be difficult/ interesting his family would jump in to help! The fact they're excited by it means they were probably craving contact-I'd simply say 'do you want to pop over during the week to see the kids' whenever you're there too. Sounds like a nice weekend for the kids, hope you have a nice break op

Sounds like a nice weekend for the kids, hope you have a nice break op

With responses like this you have my utmost sympathy @travelle . Its shit trying to work, look after the dc, run the home etc etc. Life became easier when I divorced because there wasn't the feeling of being constantly let down and that I didn't matter.

I actually try to make his life easier
then you must STOP IMMEDIATELY
Stop giving your time & energy when you get nothing in return!
Focus on you and the kids, if he complains just make vague soothing noises but do nothing and then COMPLETELY forget about whatever it was he was going on about!

Agree completely!!

I'm really sorry that's how it was for you

How did that make you feel?

Why do you want this for me?

Would you also want it for your DD or GC?

This is how I deal with older women and competitive suffering

With responses like this you have my utmost sympathy @travelle . Its shit trying to work, look after the dc, run the home etc etc.
Why is my response shit? My dh has to do the same- he wfh a lot and I work out of the house so I physically am not there to do the stuff that has to be done? It doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it being done! And her children will have a fun weekend as it’s different to what they’re used to? And I told her to have a nice time away? I don’t travel for work but a lot of my friends do and it’s valid to say hope you have a good time? Where is the shit response here?

I have a few memories of when my mum stayed in hospital with my youngest Dsis who had whooping cough (Dsis was exclusively BFed).

My dad was the family cook anyway, so we all ate fine, but I remember having to turn my knickers inside out to rewear as the laundry got out of control until he figured out how the machine worked!

If it's a question of work hours and needing someone to look after the kids, and while there his mum washes the dishes they use that's one thing, if his mum or whoever is also scrubbing his skid marks out the toilet and making him lunch for the next day it's another.