That two parents working doesn’t work

[Itsmyshadow]

We have 3 DCs aged 8, 4 and 1. DH works full time. I have recently returned from mat leave doing 4 days per week. On my day off I have DC4 and DC1 at home and a large part of that is taken up with swimming lessons.

I feel like I’m failing at everything to be honest. House is a state, am not on top of my work, kids in nursery and after school club for long hours, and don’t even get me started on the amount of after school sporting activities DC1 does which don’t really fit with going to work.

DH is a great dad, does his fair share with the kids, does 50% of the school / nursery runs, and most of DC1’s after school sporting stuff (whilst I have the younger two). He could pull his weight a bit more with the housework but gets off his bottom when I huff and puff / nag, and does all of the DIY and garden. Like most women I carry the mental load, doing all the school, nursery, medical admin etc.

I feel like I need to do a real half arsed job of my work on my wfh days to keep on top of the washing / house / kid admin / kid homework (saw a thread on here the other day about that), but workload / conscience won’t let me do that, and that doesn’t solve for the fact that DC1 has football at 5:30 on a Tuesday or hockey at 6pm on a Wednesday and if I finish at 5pm and I’m in the office, those timings don’t work.

We have a cleaner and a robot vacuum, but I still can’t keep on top of all the crap all around the house (paintings from nursery, party bag loot, paper admin that needs addressing, magazines etc), and feel like the kids get given toys / grow out of clothes much faster than I can get sort through the old ones. Result is a massive mess of a playroom that I keep getting half through sorting before the kids mess it up again and there’s nowhere for everything to go.

Don’t talk to me about TOMM or similar. I’m not lacking motivation or direction. I spend hours per week washing and putting away clothes, batch cooking, sorting through piles of stuff, firefighting cleaning tasks (usually when something mouldy is discovered or someone has spilt something somewhere), but no sooner is something done it’s a complete mess again.

So those of you who work a lot of hours and have young kids. How are you managing? Do you spend hours every evening cooking and cleaning (how do you find the energy if so?), and how to you manage the demands of kids after school activities / social lives?

Bringing things back to the op, it sounds like the mental load bit is key. Could you schedule a family meeting after dinner every Sunday night where you sit down with the calendar, talk about what everyone in the family has on this week and put jobs on a to do list together and then delegate them together? This is how we share the mental load. It makes it very clear when they other person is having an easy time and makes the mental load much more transparent. Through the week we add to a dedicated whatsapp group chat if we think of anything that needs doing. I.e this week so far I've put on that the car headlight needs replacing, so in the meeting we will decide who is going to do that when

We also have a table of chores which we made a colour coded to whose job it is. DP hoovers and mops on mon, I do bins recycling tues, dh weeds the garden weds (Any gardening beyond this is deemed a hobby...), and i batch cook weds, i do bathroom friday. Whoever doesnt do bedtime that day does the daily chores like laundry away, wipe kitchen, sweep. It is a bit relentless but we both work part time, it doesn't feel fair to me at the moment as I changed my hours to get home in time for bedtime but dp doesn't so he's put on a flexible working request to finish early one day which could mean he works on satyrday mornings to make up for it but that will make things less stressful

Not checked out- that would mean have nothing to do with it? Getting home late a few days a week doesn’t mean checked out? But yes, it does mean not present for a half the week, and passing the child raising largely to someone else- me in our case.
In our case all the child organisation was left to me but at weekends and weeknights when the kids were up DH was completely there and present for all children.
what’s so wrong with that?
If I had wanted to swap and had earned enough we could have done it the other way around but we didn’t want to.

@Magnoliafarm This sounds like my dream set up and were we both not already enmeshed, you’d be my dream wife. The colour coded chart sounds like something we could use – DP has ADHD so needs a visual system otherwise suddenly there’s a towel wash when I least expect it but no tomatoes in the shop.

Would it be weird to ask to see your chore chart

YABU
So many families got kids whose (both) parents work.
What are you doing that your can stop doing?
Why isn't your husband taking his fate share of chores? Duties don't finish with kids.

There’s nothing wrong with that. What’s wrong with a woman passing the child raising largely to someone else, like trained professionals? Then being there for weekends and weeknights, when the kids are still up. Completely there and present.

Because in my opinion, a young child is best with their mum or dad (or perhaps grandparent) for the vast majority of the week. The same person every day. Someone who loves them unconditionally and who plans be there throughout their lives long term.

My opinion is and always had been One parent for the kids- one to work. It doesn’t matter which way round!

Your opinion.

Other opinions and choices are completely valid.

We chose to both work and both parent. Equally.

@YeCannaeChangeTheLawsOfPhysics exactly this. It's a matter of opinion. We all have one and that's fine. Let's not disparage opinions that do not tally with our own.

I'd need to take a week OFF work to post all the things wrong with your laughable and ludicrous posts.

Why make this into a SAHM vs WOHM thing? I think both are valid choices, not saying being a SAHM isn’t valuable but I grew up with both parents working and it set a great example for me. It meant my dad was just as hands on with childcare and housework (but to be fair not so much mental load) as my mum. My family life wasn’t perfect by any means but I had a lovely childhood and my parents working wasn’t a disadvantage- we had a nice home, holidayed every year, had day trips on weekends, money for school trips etc and I was grateful for those things.

We’re doing the same with our daughter, she sees that both mum and dad can work, both mum and dad can be the carer, plus she’s getting time with other children in childcare which she enjoys and gets different experiences there than we provide at home. She’s only 1 year old, I expect if you asked her in a couple of years if she would just want mum around all the time she’d probably say yes, but that’s not necessarily what’s best for her, or me, or us as a family.

I wouldn’t say it’s even passing the child raising.

Nursery care for my son but they don’t raise him.

We make sure he’s somewhere safe when we’re at work
We provide for him financially
We stay awake with him at night when he’s poorly and crying for me/his dad, funnily enough not his keyworker
We think about and plan for his future, again not his keyworker
He’ll have different keyworkers and teachers throughout his life but we’ll be part of his life growing up forever (and of course when he’s an adult) because we’re his parents and we without a doubt raise him.

Raising is decision making
choosing who looks after your child when a parent is not covering those hours , school , ethos religion or non etc , diet, weekend activities. Etc

I think it really depends on how long a child is in a nursery and what age they are.

Friends of ours always had a nanny from 6 months and both parents world be out by 7.30am and not back until 6/7pm (or later very often if our with clients etc). At the weekends they didn't let the baby nap because that was 'their family time.' They would just go out for lunch and wonder why the baby was so cranky. By 4pm the baby would be beside himself because he was out of the routine the nanny had them in during the week. Often either or both patents would be overseas too. This continued with the second child. I wouldn't say the parents were not raising the children (because financially providing is obviously part of parenting) but they were not doing much of the actual hands-on parenting. Far less than normal. I saw what the nanny did, day in day out - all the little things. By the time the third child came along, it was unsustainable, so the DH became a SAHD (but kept the nanny on) because she just couldn't do the homework and all the driving around / pick -ups etc and be across school liaisons and homework. Fast forward 15 years. The kids are lovely. One is absolutely fine - he has no issues at all. The second DS has a serious mental health issue that developed very suddenly at 15 and the psychiatrist told them it was because of insecure attachment issues. The other one is generally fine, but has also had some issues as a teen (won't stay away from home or go on school trips) and the psychologists have also put it down to insecure attachment. The mum said that she didn't prioritise the early years because she always said didn't see the point as "they don't remember it anyway.' But now she sees how insecure / disorganised attachment patterns are internalised and MAY manifest later in ways you may not expect.

I disagree and actually that’s a bit insulting to those who actually do the care, hands on part.
Raising involves every adult who has taught, guided, instructed, modelled behaviour over a significant time frame. So very much childminders, nursery, pre schools (if at them for a significant time) and even school teachers. Although school teachers more in the education sense.
The people who care for very young children on a daily basis are assisting in raising them - they are not robots programmed to copy and follow you in every word and deed. They are passing on their own care style, attitudes, words, voice, tone, behaviours, view of the world to the child in every interaction. The child learns from them how the world works, how to treat others, what to he scared of and not scared of, when we use a calm voice or not, how to be soothed, how to react in an unexpected even such as falling over or another child hitting.
If your child is being cared for by someone else, you are entrusting them with all this and it most definitely counts as raising because these learned behaviours will stay with them a life time subconsciously.

Exactly this. Anyone who has studied early years wouldn’t fail to agree. 0-5 is the most important development stage and sets the stage for the rest of that persons life in many ways.
Issues arise many many years later if stability, security and attachment is not sufficient in these years.
I sometimes do wonder how people fail to make the connection.

But that dismisses what else is involved in raising a child.

Nursery don’t provide for my baby financially
Nursery don’t think about or plan his future
If he’s poorly at nursery, they call me or his dad
If he’s awake at night, I don’t call his keyworker because she doesn’t raise him, we do.

Yes exactly- You are both raising him- the lion share will be you, but whosever has him in the day will have a significant hand in raising him too

They provide care for him when we’re at work but no, they don’t raise him.

YANBU.

I must admit I find things extremely full on and exhausting too. I have 3DC as well, though mine are older - 15, 12 and 10. DH and I work full time. He has a 4 on, 4 off pattern of long days, though generally picks up extra. Technically I work 8:30-5, though also regularly end up doing long days/extra shifts. Some weeks I might have one day off. Most of the time I’m having to catch up on documentation at home, as there hasn’t been enough time in the day seeing patients/supporting colleagues/answering questions/doing referrals. I’m the only one that can drive too out of me and DH.

Sometimes I am just so knackered that I can’t think straight, and days off I just want to collapse and rest but I can’t because life. Some people work part time, and it does seem to be such a better work/life balance, but we can’t afford for me or DH to do that. We pick up the additional hours because we need to. We are due to move house in a matter of weeks, so it’s definitely not a possibility to drop hours. On our “basic” salaries with no additional hours we are fine within the budgets we’ve worked out, but will need the extra as DC require more things etc. I don’t know what the answer is, but can only sympathise.

Providing care is helping to raise him. More than you think in the 0-5 bracket.
It takes a village to raise a child as the saying goes!

I disagree. Without all of the other responsibilities, they are providing care but not raising.

A baby does not have an awareness of financial provision or the future. They can't even feel separation anxiety until about 7 months because they don't have a concept of you as 'other' to them. When it hits them, it can be quite a shock.

@Citrines your example is essentially an illustration of utterly dysfunctional parenting. No wonder those children ended up with issues.

Is it representative of how most couples who both work parent? Absolutely not.

Of course they don’t, they’re babies. Lack of awareness doesn’t make something untrue.

It's hard to say really because none of us have the full picture.

I dont know how much you and DH are making and how much you are spending on childcare in order to make that salary possible. I dont know what your lifestyle is like and how you prioritise your spending. I dont know how much you love your job or how much attaining your level of seniority in your profession depends on you being full time forever.

Personally I'd rather drop down my hours down at work and cut out things like weekly meals out, holidays abroad and new clothing. I think I would find the extra time to get my shit together more fulfilling than all of those things put together. My husband would also probably like me better day to day as I'd be less stressed! Our home environment might look less grand, but it would be a calmer home. I am however, under no illusions that you may not have the option to cut down because you are simply working so hard just for the roof on your head, good food on the table and the bare necessities just about covered, as so many are. 💗

You can always pick up more hours once kids are older and all 3 are at school.

This is just what i would have to do in order to cope with 3 kids of that age group, work and do all that clubs running about. There is no judgement 💗