To feel 22 hours a week at work is too much?

[EnglishHamlet]

I have 2 DC both in primary school.
1 has diagnosed SEN which requires a lot of input from me, the other has undiagnosed stuff going on which causes a lot of behaviour, mental and emotional input from me.
They both attend primary school full/normal days. They'd actually both benefit emotionally from a reduced timetable but Head Teacher says they don't fit the criteria for that as they're both high functioning. Anyway that's another story.
I work 22 hours a week during school hours.
It really feels like too much. I'm under constant strain and pressure. It's really full on at home and it's really full on at work.
I keep trying to do my best, keep thinking I'm lucky to work 22 hours and not full time hours.
DH works ridiculously long hours. He gets home hours later than his contracted time to finish due to immense workload which is never going to improve.
So I do everything re looking after the DC and everything at home too re domestic stuff.
By the time DH gets home they're fast asleep in bed, I've done all homework with DC, taken them to the park, cooked dinner, bathed them, read stories to them, settled them to sleep, then after their bedtime I've done the housework and tidied up everywhere by myself, put laundry away etc., and this is after having got up at 6am to get DC ready for school, breakfast, packed lunches, taken them to school then gone straight to work straight after drrop off to do a highly demanding job whilst DC are at school then finish and go straight to school to pick DC up. By the time DH walks in at 9pm I'm absolutely frazzled. He walks in and I haven't stopped since 6am. I have 1 day off a week and spend it sorting things out at home, laundry, cleaning, life admin, etc.
Can't reduce hours as we need the money. All the late evenings DH does are unpaid, he gets his salary (middle earner) and is expected to do the job no matter how long that takes, his workload is colossal.
So AIBU to feel like 22 hours a week of work is too much? I feel like I'm being such a princess even asking this question. But I'm burning out!!!
Edited for typos.

what disabilities do your DC have?

See, this is the kind of response managers rely on. Everyone else is doing it so you should too. The gaslighting, the guilt tripping……it’s unacceptable. Appointing yourself personally responsible for all patients is being a martyr. They’re not relying on you, they’re relying on the NHS system to provide care. You are simply one tiny part of that. Allowing yourself to be manipulated into doing all this extra unpaid work is actually doing a massive disservice to yourself, your family AND your patients, because all the time you carry on doing this staffing and working conditions won’t improve and neither will the overall standard of care.

Your DH needs to clock off at 6pm.

If neither of you earns enough for the other not to work (or to work less) then it's not fair for him to never be around to help. He shouldn't being doing those crazy hours without a sufficiently high salary so it sounds like he needs a job where the hours are more in line with pay. Either then he'll be around to help more or will earn enough that you can cut your hours.

But it’s not working for the op, she’s burning out. If they can afford it why not drop her hours? There’s more to life than working working working. And ‘you chose to have children’ 🙄🙄🙄

Like others I think your 22 hours are not the problem, and you working less would not solve the problem in your home. Your husband is working long unpaid hours for a job that doesn't pay well. He can earn similar money for fewer hours in a job that allows him to pull his weight at home, and he should do that.

It’s a lot your not being unreasonable. I recall when DC were young and DH worked long hours often away Mon-Fri I had a temporary reduction in hours to 17.5 worked as 2 days one week, 3 the next, it worked well. Could you consider that for 12 months and see where you are then whilst your DH worked on his employment situation? Also outsource whatever you can, shopping deliveries, clearer, ironing etc etc.

I mean he’s not a failure though is he, because his job allows OP to only work 22 hours and keeps a roof over their heads?

He’s one person probably doing the job of 3 or 4 people, such is the state of the NHS. Maybe he could look for a different job, but I wonder if you’d still be encouraging people to leave the NHS if you were the one lying in a hospital bed, or awaiting life saving surgery, or waiting 10 hours in a&e with a poorly child? If everyone just leaves the NHS we are going to have a much bigger problem on our hands. As excuses go, missing kids bedtime to save someone’s life actually is probably the best one there is.

@EndlessTreadmill I hate to say this too, but it is often the case. Are you sure these very long hours he's actually at work OP ? Because I can't believe they are compulsory

Because losing her salary and doing everything at home so her husband can continue to work unpaid hours while doing nothing at home makes no sense. It is a lose/lose solution.

I think your setup sounds very hard OP and appreciate its your own hours you want to focus on but I think you risk loosing yourself more and becoming more miserable if you give up work.

While you can ofcourse rest at home its actually quite difficult to fit a lot in during school hours as you have to be back there at pickup again, I spent some time not working and I could maybe have a trip into town or fit an exercise class in but I didn't know anyone else who wasn't working so there was no social interaction. Your work is currently giving you adult social interaction which, given how little you see of your husband, is going to really dwindle unless you make a huge effort to put yourself out there.

Don't get yourself into a situation where you run around ragged for kids and husband and loose yourself.

Your husband should be reviewing his work situation for his own mental wellbeing as well as that of the family, he may as well not live with you at the moment.

Yes, exactly.

@Mrsttcno1 there's no debate to be had. The man is failing his wife by driving her to the brink of a breakdown, and is not a parent.
The NHS woes are for the government to solve. (Or not, since people keep voting in tories)

The failure of the NHS is not on the shoulders of the workers. It is on the shoulders of those who run it.

And come on…….staying late everyday to ‘save someone’s life’ is just a total lie. That is so ridiculously rare an occurrence it would barely happen once every few months. Except in the clinical areas with very or unstable / unpredictable patients like ITU, surgery, A&E and pre-hospital care. Even then it wouldn’t be an everyday occurrence. The truth is, there isn’t much that truly can’t wait for the next person on duty but don’t let that get in the way of you showing off your halo. 🙄

It’s true that professionals, healthcare and otherwise, have certain personal professional obligations and they can be disciplined for failing to protect patients to the objective standard expected of a person in that role with that experience. “I had to go home” is not an acceptable justification. So, for example, a doctor who noticed a symptom that required immediate surgery could not just ignore it and go home because he had to collect his kids from school. A nurse could not walk out the door hearing a monitor alarm going off unless they were sure that someone else was responding to it. But cases like that do not happen every day till 9pm, week in, week out.

I'm sorry OP but I think YABU.

Firstly, your DH needs to step up to help with some childcare and domestic chores.

I appreciate its very difficult. DH and I BOTH work full time in full on roles. We split domestic stuff approx 50:50. It's a constant juggle of prioritising, organising, homework, laundry, play dates, school projects, times tables plus work work work.

Frankly I'd be laughing if I only had to work 22 hours per week during term time.

I'm sorry if that seems unhelpful, but many of us don't have the luxury of only working part time / term time. It is a struggle and I have to take medication for stress and anxiety, partly as a result of this.

Yes but that poster is saying she is unreasonable because she ‘chose to have children’ and essentially she’s lucky because others have it worse. But that’s not the point is it - it’s not a race to the bottom. This current lifestyle isn’t working for the op and something needs to change. If that means reducing her hours to take some pressure off, then that’s what needs to be done (although I had missed the part about the husband, change is clearly needed there too).

Do you have children with disabilities?

We cross-posted @PostItInABook ! Strong agree.

Do you have children with disabilities?

@thinkfast, i think your comment IS rather unhelpful. You say you both work full time so your kids must go into some afterschool childcare. The op stated her kids have SN do this may not be an option and it sounds like it's very full on for her when she is caring for them at home. She is not laughing that she works 22 hours.

Op I think something has to give here. You say dh cannot work less but this sounds like a lot of late working got a job which is not amazing pay. If he really cannot work less, is it not an option for you to stop working? Could you cut back on anything of are things already tight.

Her reducing her hours is not a good solution. It totally fails to address the actual problem, which is her husband's job.

I have worked in the NHS for over 20 years. I’m fully aware of what the different standards say. Re. your examples - A dr noticing a symptom requiring surgery should hand it over to the next person on duty. That’s what shift handovers are for. A ‘monitor going off’ is so vague as to be meaningless. Many don’t usually require immediate intervention. Possibly different if in ITU or similar. But not a regular occurrence that would require several hours unpaid OT everyday.

I know. I am agreeing with you! I just said so?

I posted before your last post. Apologies.