To ask dh to help out occasionally when he is wfh

[Desupi]

Dh and I have a 9 month old daughter. We both work from home, me full time, and him 2 days a week and 3 in the office.

We are in the fortunate position to have my mum looking after our daughter most days. We do pay her £300 a month which I understand is not very much in the grand scheme of things.

In my job I am required to control the business phone line and inbox for around 15 hours a week. During the times when I am doing this, or have lots of meetings, I do try and make sure I have my mum on hand, but not always if it is going to be quiet.

My mum lives 12 miles away so getting a baby who hates car rides into the car and driving that far in rush hour with her screaming is quite stressful, so if I CAN avoid having her look after little one I always do that.

My main gripe is that on the days that I decide not to have my mum help out, I do sometimes ask dh if he can watch our daughter for 30 mins if I get an unexpected meeting request or call from someone. He normally has an issue with it and says "I am working, you should have asked your mum to help today!". He does probably have more of an 'important' job than me, but a lot of the time when I walk in the office he has youtube/ a game on his other screen!

Since I returned to work his working week has not changed AT ALL unlike mine. I organised the childcare with my mum for a low price, I take our daughter there, I wfh either WHILST looking after our daughter, or in my parents house with my daughter downstairs where my lunchbreaks are basically used to give my mum a break. We pay 50/50 on bills so its not even like he pays more.

He doesn't get the guilt of not wanting to burn his mum out and not wanting to take the p* with her kindness, and having the stress of taxiing a screaming baby around.

So AIBU to ask him to occasionally step in to care for our daughter every now and then during the week?

Of course he can't be expected to childmind when he is working. Your arrangements are not compatible with doing your jobs. Make changes before you end up losing your jobs,

Both of you don’t sound like low earners , your 9 month old will get some discounted childcare that will cover some hours, you can have your mum do 2 days of full childcare if she wants and you both pay nursery or child minder for the other days. I don’t know how you expect to both be working full time and looking after a 9 month old, one will definitely suffer. Get proper childcare simple

You are massively taking the piss, and making it very difficult for those of us who rely on wfh, and do it conscientiously, because employers see posts like yours and think we're all at it.
Get some proper childcare sorted.

Wfh is to WORK and that apply to both of you. If your mum can’t manage then you find alternative childcare, ie nursery or childminder, and the child goes there for the hours you both work

OP do you work in the public sector?

This can be only explanation for the ‘downtime’.

@Almn0etd please don't. Just had a long day working with stroke survivors after 2 weeks intense high referral rates over the Christmas period and I'm not in the mood. Dp's son who works for an accountancy practice has sent us interesting family history info he's been researching during the day. Thing is, we're all part of the same economy. The accountancy practice has public sector clients and its staff use public services. Trying to divide communities is what idiots and stupid kids do. Be a grown-up.

When I worked in the public sector we got disciplinaries for repeatedly having kids at home during work hours. They were extremely tight on it.

Stop clutching your pearls. Or get off the internet. There’s your solution.

I agree with this. We tried saving on childcare and keeping our daughter home while we both worked and it was a disaster. Now they are in pre school/school it's a lot easier. My partner does in fact help with school runs and with other things if I need him to but it's with a lot of discussion to make sure I am not putting him in a difficult situation with work and vice versa. We don't have family nearby though. Whilst I get OP won't want to put a strain on mum then I think an alternative childcare arrangement should be sought.

You clearly have no idea of what you are commenting on.

I was going to come on and say you are committing fraud if you are working with a baby. However if there really is a job that exists where you are being paid 15 hours a week to look after a baby and your manager is aware and genuinely OK with it, then all I can say is that you have truly landed on your feet.

But you must surely realise that your set up is not the norm and can’t expect your Dh to be doing any childcare. Therefore for the remaining 15 hours when you are manning phones, it’s up to you to decide to either use your mum or get proper childcare in place.

Even when you are wfh, you shouldn't be looking after a child, unless that's what your job is.
Employers expect people who wfh to be working, not looking after their kids, so you should have someone else looking after them. If you are worried about your mum getting burned out by taking care of your child, you should pay someone else to do it, but asking your dh to do it when he's supposed to be working, simply isn't acceptable.

I accidentally voted YANBU oops

However I think it depends very much on your circumstances. My husband is now home based with travel when it’s required. There is an expectation he will be flexible ie go to his named place of work at short notice, extend the time he’s away at short notice or travel abroad. In return they allow him to arrange his work around his or my hospital appointments - we both have long term medical conditions which require a lot of appointments.

We are very lucky for him to be able to work this way now but if we had a young child he wouldn’t be able to take care of them whilst he was working. He has a very responsible job and when he’s in meetings and his office door is closed he can’t be disturbed. When our child was very young I didn’t work as childcare would have cost more than I could earn so I stayed at home and took on the majority of the childcare (we had no family around to help out) as he worked shifts and there was no flexibility then.

I think you need to rethink your current circumstances and look into a better, although more costly, solution.

@Flibberteegibbet - you can change a vote if you want to by clicking on the other option.

Thanks

I wfh either WHILST looking after our daughter, or in my parents house with my daughter downstairs where my lunchbreaks are basically used to give my mum a break. We pay 50/50 on bills so its not even like he pays more

And people wonder why some employers are insisting staff go back into the office to work…

You're supposed to be working, not looking after your child while working for goodness sake.

Edited to add we went back to having employees in full time due to piss taking and having children at home full time.

@Flibberteegibbet having flexibility around working and hospital appointments when you have long term medical conditions should be standard practice in my opinion.

@DaisyDumplings I don't blame you making your staff go back to 100% on site, be it a case of people taking the p*ss or simply being incapable of putting in a proper day's work due to childcare duties, no employer should be expected to pay someone to be working if the employee isn't prepared to actually work the hours they're being paid for!

There are a couple of issues here. Firstly if you are working, you are working; you are not taking care of a child, you are fudging it and it will do you nor your child much good long term. You need a more permanent solution; why not mix it up between paid childcare/nursery and your mum if she wants to do it. Secondly it isn’t reasonable to ask DH to watch baby for half hour here and there while he is supposed to be working, he is working! Thirdly it sounds like the normal pattern where the full responsibility of the child is on you, if you formalise the childcare, maybe you can get DH to do pick ups or drop offs to help out or share what is his 50:50 responsibility as a parent?

I was all ready to say neither you nor your husband should be abusing work but then you explained the situation a little more. Lucky you to have found a job that allows you to work whilst looking after a baby, it probably won’t work as the DC becomes mobile but if everything is getting finalised and your bosses are more than happy then enjoy the moment.
If your husband has time for gaming and social media he does have spare capacity, and looking after his own child should take preference over these practices.
What strikes me the most is his assuming everything is your responsibility child wise. Need child care, that’s up to you OP. Need to get child to your mother, well get in the car OP. So he shields his mother from any childcare whilst telling you to use your mother’s services more if you need help. He earns more but pays the same as you.
If you don’t sort this out now OP he will not miraculously step up in the future. Call him out on it and force him to acknowledge the way he is taking your mum for granted, find out straight away how he is going to step up and become a better father and husband. Decide between you on which nursery/childcare option you will be utilising and act on this now. Better to be on a list and then change a day if necessary.

What are you talking about? I work in the public sector and have no downtime in my job. Neither does anyone I know working in the public sector and working from home looking after a child is a disciplinary offence.

So he earns more but you pay half and do more. And you’re dropping a day- will you still pay half? I’d simply refuse to transfer more than 30% of the bills from now on until he agrees equal personal money and he does more around the house/parenting.

If you were working in an office then you'd not be able to care for your baby during work hours why do you feel it's different working at home? You're being paid to do a job not look after your little one. I think you & your husband need to sit together & sort childcare out for the whole week so you're both not expected to have baby anytime during working hours. If your Mum can't help then spit childcare between her & a Childminder or nursery. At 9mths you may be entitled to funded childcare if in the UK.

YABU to pay your DM £300 to care for your child "most days".

Neither of you should be looking after a 9 month old while working!!! Your baby deserves more than that. They deserve your attention or the attention of a childminder or nursery! Your job requires your attention too!

@BlessedAreTheCheesemakerz , and she works at her DM's house at the same time.

Approx 20 working days in a month, so she's getting office space with on-site childminder for £15 a day.