AIBU about going back to work

[OtheHalf]

I am the higher earner in our relationship. OH has been part time 3 days per week since I had our children.
I was always of the understanding that they'd increase their hours when the kids went to school. Children are now in high school but OH is enjoying PT working.
It drives me furious because I feel I get little value in return for their non working days, cooking, washing and some light touch housework. FT I still do ironing, DIY, gardening, vacuuming, dusting etc. So my feeling b is that OH should get off their arse and contribute more.
Anyone with me?

In your situation I’d do 4 days each or 5 days each. Cuz if the part timer isn’t pulling their weight at home then it’ll cause resentment.

We’re all different - for me a partner still working part-time for no good reason would not be acceptable, regardless of their sex. If they were ill or older than me and transitioning to semi-retirement maybe, but anything else would make me very resentful.

I absolutely see your point of view. I was just pointing out that on Mumsnet it seems to be fine for women to work part time yet it's not often looked at the same way if a man does. In any case if someone is at home more they should surely be taking on more of the home demands, regardless of sex.

Your OH should be doing more, no question. They do part time hours with kids at high school, and their partner doing loads of chores = easy life. Doesn’t matter which sex either of you are btw. They should be working full time, or maybe you could both do eg 4 days.

I don’t see why both parents not working full time with teenagers

What does he say is his reason for not working FT or not doing household chores? You need to stop doing them & enabling his lazy ass !

I've kept to 4 days even though DS is now 17. But I do majority of housework and am an only DC with elderly DPs who live an hour away.

I have said to DH that I'd absolutely support him if he wanted to go down to 4 days, but he doesn't. Also he earns a lot as a contractor, if that changes then I would go full time for the last few years of my career.

In your situation the DP should definitely go up to at least 4 days and take on the lions share of household chores. Also look at pensions for the future.

I wouldn't mind if they were working less hours, if they used that time to the benefit of the family eg did all the chores so the rest of you can chill all weekend. So I think the choices are

You drop your hours so you can rest more, and you all make standard of living sacrifices

They do more hours at work and you use the extra money to pay for outsourcing some of the jobs they don't do

They step up and actually use their time off to do chores so that you have equal down time

You leave and stop feeling like you're being sponged off (if your kids are teens you could always wait a few more years so you don't pay maintenance or have to pay hum housing costs for children)

Why is everyone assuming the partner is a male? OP could be male and the partner could be female.

The OP said since I had our children.

How is this different to 3 full days?

3 x 8 hour days
5 x 5 hour days

Barely any difference and actually more full on than 3 full days in my experience.

The issue does seem to come down to division of labour. You need to sit down and address this together, you shouldn't be doing so much that you're spending so much at night and weekends of they are sitting down relaxing. I did 3 days but did basically all the kid admin household stuff and partner did very little in hindsight. Kids got a bit older and I went full time, I did want to though. But the expectation should now be we both do shared chores etc but I definitely ended up doing about 80% and end up resentful until we addressed it and came up with a shared plan