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.

The OP also said “Can't reduce hours as we need the money”

Why do people keep saying I'm doing a term time only job??
I've never said this!
I'm mot doing term time only! Where has this come from?
I said I work school hours, meaning I work during the hours my DC are at school.

No because my child with SEN absolutely 100% cannot cope with any after school clubs/care facilities. DC is completely mentally and emotionally drained simply by trying to get through a challenging day at school every day. No way would DC cope with after school care. It would be cruel.

I don’t think most assumed that, a PP wrote they do term time work and so possibly that got mixed in with your post, but it’s fairly irrelevant to the main issues

OP, I have one child with sen and one with emotional/anxiety issues. I’m a single mum and carer for my own mum. It’s bloody exhausting. Working 22 hours is loads. As a fellow sen mum I absolutely get it. Could you apply for dla to help with costs? You are doing a great job btw.

Look into DLA and Carer's Allowance if your children are SEND. It took the edge off needing to work so many hours and I scaled right back. You are doing far too much. Being a SEND parent can be a full time job before you've added in usual parenting on top.

I really think your husband’s hours do have to factor into your question. What he does and doesn’t do is having a huge impact on you and your family life.
I know how crap it is constantly finishing up late worrying about patient safety in the NHS, but particularly if his team is short (I am guessing here) what he is doing is unsustainable and he / both of you will burn out. He’ll be neither use nor ornament to his patients if he ends up unwell.
So for his sake / your sake as a family this needs managing.

If you mapped out all the things your were responsible for work, childcare, where you took on the mental load etc - you’d at least come out fairly equal / if not you’d be doing more. If you’re looking for places to find time / for flex / for places to pick up the slack - finishing far too late everyday is the obvious first place to claw back the most time. Any hours you reduce working, you take a financial and career hit for. And from 22 hours - how many hours could you realistically reduce anyway?

My husband and I had to have a very frank chat and redistribute stuff / set expectations when we had too much on our plates (different things palliative grandma, small child, new significant illness etc) and it did help but it wasn’t easy and we didn’t get it right straight away. Sometimes we have to revisit it, but it’s never as hard as the first time. x

Your DH needs to put his family first. Before his job, before the patients, before the trust, before the NHS, before everything. He needs to come home at a reasonable hour and be a dad. He needs to actually know his kids, not just see them asleep because they won't be kids forever.
He's the one working the ridiculously long hours leaving everything else to you. Leaving you to worry about the house and the school runs and the packed lunches and the kids and the bathtimes and the bloody laundry. While he "worries about patient safety"?? Why isn't he worrying about YOU and getting himself off home or getting a job that's compatible with family life??
You're basically a single parent by the sounds of it. Your part time job isn't the problem. It's your lack of support and your husband's lack of responsibility.

Sounds to me like YOU are completely mentally and emotionally drained trying to get through your days.
Have you asked yourself why you're accepting the cruelty of putting you through this alone?

22 hours is fine.

Your dh needs to stop doing so much unpaid overtime and stop shirking his share of the housework and childcare.

Wow. Hundreds of posts of helpful and insightful advice, comments from NHS insiders with their perspective on the DH’s work options, and these two posts are the only response that you have come up with OP? There is no helping some people.

I don't know what you want in regards to an answer?
I worked full time with three children, single parent, all sen.
Needs must if you need the money.
The 'something has to give' should be your husband pulling his weight but I suspect you don't want to hear that.

@EnglishHamlet what happens to your children when you're at work and they are not at school? Summer hols for example?

I don't know what to say in response to posts saying DH needs to stop working such long hours.
He isn't going to stop.
I've begged him to stop. I've talked and talked and talked about the impact it's having on me. I have told him I can't cope. I have told him our DC get distressed at bedtime because he's not home. He says loads of men don't get home in time for their DC bedtime. He normalises it.
My neighbours exclaim to me regularly "Your DH gets home SO LATE every night! How on earth do you cope?!" Mum friends say it too. I tell him this as a way of backing myself up, and he says "Oh none of them can cope, that's why they're all on antidepressants".
I've argued at him about his hours.
I've cried. I've screamed at him at times. Begging him to stop.
He was a workaholic before we had DC but he promised me he would stop working late hours when we had children. But he hasn't. And not only have we got DC, but we've got DC with SEN and I'm the one holding everything up.
He got back at 7:30pm tonight, I was amazed. Then at 8pm whilst I was putting DC to bed, he announced he was going out with a colleague for a drink and said he'd got back early to be able to get to the pub on time, didn't want to arrive late for colleague. He's still at the pub now, not back.
I honestly don't know what to do.
I'm too numb to make any decisions.

My DM looks after them.
She can't help on a weekly basis.
Only in school holidays.

You know what you should do OP? Don't work less hours. Work more. Work all the hours. Even when your boss tells you you're not even getting paid for your hours, work them anyway. Come home whenever YOU feel like you should stop working. Not when your husband feels it, or your kids, or even your boss, just whenever you want to.
Then he will have no choice but to take on ALL of the childcare and ALL of the housework all by himself because you simply won't be there. You don't need his consent to do this. Just do it.

Seem unreasonable? Because it fucking is. And a man would leave a woman for doing this in a shot.

Who does he think he is doing this to you? It's no different to him fucking off down the pub every night and leaving it to you. It benefits your family in no way at all and it even imposes on your mother. He's normalised it so much that you are actually on here asking if YOU should work less

I think you need to get serious with him. He comes home on time or you leave. Because honestly, what difference would it make at this point if you were single?

And are you SURE he's at work??

He got back at 7:30pm tonight, I was amazed. Then at 8pm whilst I was putting DC to bed

I'm sorry, what? Even when he comes home on time to put his kids to bed, you still have to do it???
What a fucking waster. He doesn't deserve you or those children 😔

Oh God. How did this become a thread about DH work hours. All these replies are making me feel really depressed.

Funnily enough, the bit you've said about he may as well be at the pub, he says to me, when I get angry about what time he gets home, "Look, I'm working! I'm doing a job! I'm not one of those husbands that are down the pub every night! Then you'd have something to complain about!!"

Because, sweetheart, it IS about his work hours.
He's really disrespecting you and being incredibly unfair to you and the kids.
I don't even know you but I feel quite angry on your behalf that he's refused to acknowledge what he's doing to the point where you think it's you that needs to make a change and not him.
It's unfair, it's selfish, it's actually quite abusive and actually .. it's sexist.
Mumsnetters can spot that crap pretty easily and don't hold back.

But he's not earning by working those hours. So he might as well be.
"Look! I'm working!" Only really works when he's bringing the money to the table because of it.

As someone who genuinely works incredibly late hours, I can definitely tell you that it may not just all be work- he may just be piss poor at time management, plus staying late also means you have to do most of the hard graft before he gets home.

I really think he is.
He drinks cans of beer on his way home from work.
I've asked him to stop drinking so much, so now he drinks in secret on his way home. I smell it on his breath when he walks in. I find empty beer cans in his car, and hidden in our garage, and pushed to the back of our cupboards.....he gets home late, drinks on his way home, drinks indoors, then hides them from me every night because I keep asking him to drink less.
I confronted him about this and he said it's my fault for going on at him to drink less. He said if I didn't keep on making him feel bad for drinking then he wouldn't have to do it in secret and hide the empty cans/bottles of beer.

Oh dear Lord 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Are you happy with this man? Does he make you happy or bring anything positive to your life? Answer honestly