Husband expects me to do so many out of school activities

[Flopberry]

I have a 4 & 6 year old and current time table is;

monday acting class for both in our local area, an hour later my son has football out of our area and leaves a lot of hanging about as not enough time to go home.

tuesday - football for my son, meaning I’m driving home to go back out of town

Friday - tennis in local area this is fine (for both)

Saturday - football out of town and then dancing (dancing for both)

sunday - park run out of our area

I messaged him and spoke today about how I need to drop something as I’m going into my final
year of nursing and I work bank shifts too, I simply can’t cope anymore. But instead of any compassion he’s asked me to now take my son to golf lessons on Thursday evenings (6 week course) I should point out that most of these activities are on during the summer holidays.

he’s making me feel like I want my own children to miss out. Of course I don’t, I’m just so mentally drained.

so am I being unreasonable to say no the golf (not that I have much of a choice, I most likely will be forced)

If you were my daughter, I would want to punch his lights out!

That's mad. Golf lessons? At 6?!!!!

So pipe back, but it's OK because daddy will.

Seriously that is far too much for kids that age!!! When do they actually just get to be kids?

That's a mad schedule and I say that as a single working mum of a teenager who is massively involved in a competition sport that she does 6 days per week. But at the age of 4-6 she just did it once per week and chilled at home after school most of the time or maybe did a bit of swimming on a weekend in addition to that. It didn't harm her development or sports ambitions in any way.

Is he trying to sabotage your study?

Drop the activities, focus on your study, get a good job, then leave this awful man

Forced? Not allowed?

This is not normal.

And your DC must be exhausted. They're little. Let them be children.Let them have fun. Let them have time to relax at home.

If he starts huffing and puffing, leave the room. Someone may buy you tickets for a guilt trip, you don't have to accept them.

I need to google but I am pretty sure over scheduling children of that age for organized activities is a really bad idea as they become tired, have no chance to exercise their imaginations by coming up with games and activities on their own, have reduced chances to play with other friends and develop social skills, and have little resilience for being on their own and being bored.

Sounds like he is trying to kill your degree off and it is as controlling as fuck.

In the nicest possible way - Wake up

Weekend activities need to be on him if he misses out on that particular joy Monday to Friday. Any guilt trips with the kids "daddy's turn, fairs fair and he never gets to see you do x"

As for the rest, weed some out starting with the most inconvenient

You mean he does laundry. If he's helping that suggests he doesn't have equal responsibility for it. You work too.

Far too many activities. My kids go to school, do their homework then at weekends we might go swimming, go roller skating etc.

There is NO need for little kids to do clubs every night.

I would die on this hill. It’s bad for kids, it doesn’t work for you and he won’t do any of the work then wants to guilt trip you about not doing more. NO WAY. Just no.

Who made him the boss?

YABU for saying you're not allowed. That's ridiculous. Whatever guilt trip he tries you need to be stronger and tell him to fuck himself.

Would your kids even miss the activities if you missed one or 2 evenings a week? It's a lot of time in the car/out of the house.
prioritise the ones they enjoy the most and give him the weekend ferrying about.
turn it around "I'm sure daddy would love to see how you get on at parkrun since he misses all your weekday activities etc"

DH doesn’t finish work till 6:30-7:00 so I decide what after school activities DS does. If DH wanted a specific hobby, he’d ask me first to see what I thought/if it would fit. At 6, DS does football once a week, with a match when in season on a Sunday, swimming once a week which happens to be football night too so all done in one go, and an after school science club. We need the other evenings free for homework, reading and spellings plus fun things like a friend coming for tea or just being a six year old and playing out with his friends (supervised obviously!). When do your children have downtime? Do they even want to do these activities? If a guilt trip was laid on me, I’d explain that mummy already does a lot with you and we can’t do everything, aren’t we lucky to be able to have lots of hobbies already?

He sounds like an unsupportive prick. Just decide for yourself what you are willing to take the kids to, and stick to that. Don't let him dictate to you. If he tries to guilt you in to it, just ignore him, or ask him how he's going to facilitate this, as you are not willing to.

Your children do an insane amount of clubs for their age, they need time to just be kids. Most children at that age do perhaps one or two things a week, at most. Many do nothing at all, and that's equally fine.

He’s trying to sabotage your degree.
that’s an insane after curricular activity for a stay at home mum let alone someone studying a full time nursing course.
the fact he doesn’t know his shifts until the day before is ominous.

You can have a very good career in community nursing if that’s what you want. It is no longer 9-5 however, gp practices are 8-630. You need to start thinking about how your life is panning out now. Under current conditions you aren’t going to be able to work.

4 and 6? That's insane. When do they, you know, play? Kids need downtime, they need space to learn how to create their own entertainment.

Those kids need to do less, not take up golf!

It's a ridiculous schedule for such young children. I'm all for developing them and keeping them curious, active and busy but this is too much for them and for you as it is.

My DC are teens and dont for many activities but one of them clashes with a sports club I enjoyed. For years DH didn't get home early enough to do any drop offs and I had to miss my own club. Then I noticed he was always home without fail for his own sport, which started no later, and I decided that wasn't fair (he's SE so can mostly dictate his hours) It took (and still does take) a lot of reminders every week bur I just keep saying "remember you need to take DD to her class at x "
The other day he was making plans with someone for that day of the week and I butted in, and said "oh remember your home early that eve to take DD"

It does sound like he's trying to sabotage you. You have the opportunity of a great career here, don't let him take that away from you. He sounds controlling and insidiously abusive.

And yes, it sounds like wants you to be a SAHM and housewife.

Bet he wants you to earn money too though and will express resentment at your not doing so.

Bet he isn't paying into a pension for you.

I predict you ending upon very rocky financial ground.

You need to decide what you want form life, for yourself and what you believe is important for your DCs. Then stand up for that.

My 9yo does Brownies during the week and swimming lessons at the weekend. That's enough activities. Just ask the kids which ones they want to stop doing and stop doing them. He's not there anyway so he can't do anything about whether or not you go other than whinge and you can tell him to stop that.

He can’t force you to do anything - let him kick off - he seems he’ll bent on these clubs - why?

This isn’t an equal partnership if you can’t say no to him stealing your time.

He wants golf he takes him
Say no
They are 4 and 6
Or he arranges and pays au pair or nanny to take them

DH's work came first. He paid for all the activities. He didn't get involved in their schedules. He let me organise their stuff, because he trusted me. At 4-6 I can barely remember, except it was pretty full on.