Husband unhappy about doing anything

[Marg01]

I wad fortunate enough to be a SAHM; my husband earns enough to not require a second income.
I’ve became bored of being a SAHM and studied a course a few years ago and last year this led me to create my own business.

The business has taken up a significant amount of my time and DH has become rather aggrieved that some of the domestic chores have fallen to him.

The course was well suited to our schedule and we increased the our cleaner’s hours so there wasn’t any imposition on my husband. However, the business is an entirely different beast, which means DH has to sometimes do his share of the cooking, cleaning and childcare. Occasionally, he will have to run the household on either a Saturday or a Sunday and he isn’t happy at all about doing this. He feels his financial contribution mitigates the need to handle the more mundane aspect of family life.

The business has yet to turn a profit but it’s still early days and , I see this as an investment in my and our future, and I am still doing more than him at home.

I’ve told him that I expect his fully support, just like I’ve supported him throughout his career and raising his children, which has raised some eyebrows in my friendship circle.

a few friends have commented that I am being unfair on him.

@faerietales I do partly agree that yes that would be the main consensus , although I do feel sorry for OP who is trying to do something positive -

I think the thing here isn’t that it’s wrong but more ‘wrong time’ for this kind of business that is mainly evenings and weekends leaving the guy with little down time too - thing is if it picked up even more the chances are it would be even more evenings and weekends- it’s the kind of thing that works well with over 12s. I do disagree with others that it would be different if it was paid- I don’t think it would in a couple who I don’t feel are short of money . I think it’s about ‘me time’ and doing women’s stuff- not money . Certainly wasn’t the main issue in my experience of a job that had shifts. My exH Moaned non stop because it limited his social time.

when people tend to do shifts with young children ( even paid) it’s usually because they need the money - it’s a bugger on anyone’s ‘me’ time if constantly on opposing shifts and is virtually always done for the money - so if the money isn’t needed and they aren’t in profit anyway - the guy probably feels it’s rather pointless- he won’t be looking at it from an angle of ‘building something up’ because clearly he isn’t that supportive of anything that interferes with his me time

Where is your business plan? If I were your husband, I wouldn’t support this unless it had a plan and a timeframe. 2 years to become profitable is enough, otherwise it’s a hobby. But also, in your husbands place, I’d say find a career plan that isn’t weekend focussed so we can have a family life, I think you owe your family that.

So no business plan then? What is a slow burn exactly? Is there a date by which you will meet objectives or accept the idea is not viable? Is this just a build my profile and profits will come deal? Being a photographer is not the same as having a photography business.

We have a lot of photographers around here who do shoots and sell their work - absolutely none of them could survive on that income alone. They either have another source of income (second job, pension, savings, inheritance) or just do it as a hobby or side hustle, and any sales are a bonus.

It's almost impossible to make decent money - especially nowadays when almost everyone has a decent camera in their pocket.

I think the thing here isn’t that it’s wrong but more ‘wrong time’ for this kind of business

The right time being between 1885 and 2005.

@GreenIsMyFavoriteColour ha ha- you are right there in a practical sense!!! I did mean wrong time for the family but yes both apply

Or arrange your working hours around school hours, not evenings and weekends? The benefits of being self-employed.

Then they need to be earning actual money to compensate for their partner’s drop in income, to accommodate the new arrangement. You cannot expect employers to agree to employees working less for the same money. Household expenses aren’t magically less and starting a business requires investment.

He could easily replace her with a nanny and a housekeeper to be honest. OP finding a job that pays enough to pay the bills and fund her non profit making business would be more challenging.

Easily replace her?! With a Nanny and a Housekeeper?! How rude!

Do you have any idea how much a 24/7 Nanny Housekeeper would cost? Because he doesn’t want to do any childcare or cooking or cleaning so needs someone full full time.

Again the nastiness to the OP on this thread is outrageous. All the time women treat other women this way we don’t need blokes to bring us down. We are doing it all by our selves.

You've made up the bit about him not wanting to any of the childcare. The OP said he did do it.

Neither of them wants to do the cleaning, so nothing will change there.

There's no need for a 24/7 housekeeper and nanny and it's ridiculous to say so. He might have to pay for additional support but he'll be far more able to replace the work she did than she'll be able be able to replicate the provision she's enjoyed.

So her ability to have a career outside the home must be second to his unless she earns the same? And if not she still has to work and do most of the domestic labour?

Sounds shit.

Yes. Economic reality is hard.

No, she just needs to fit her new career around the person who is supporting the entire family off of their income.

This kind of scenario is exactly why so many women are warned against taking years out of the workplace to raise children.

I have doubts about the viability of this business with no outlay for equipment there no overheads it should be in profit
OP says it’s photography so if it’s
Wedding you’d make money
portraits. You’d make money

going to venues taking photos then displaying them for people to buy ( dying trade as everyone always had camera in there phone now )

all I can think is OP is going round doing random shoots then putting pictures online to sell if this is the case with kids at school and cleaner cleaning the house she should have complete flexibility to pick her hours to suit family life better
we’re very short on details to tell if her DH is being unreasonable not supporting her business because to be honest it does sound like a hobby pipe dream

I personally don’t believe in blindly supporting someone just because of their biological sex 🤷‍♀️

Some of the views on here are gob smacking!1 What happened to supporting each others ambitions in a PARTNERSHIP!!

Being in a partnership doesn’t mean blindly supporting the other person regardless of the impact it has on you 🙈

No it doesn't. But it also doesn't mean not working together to support each other with future ambitions etc within mutual responsibilities for the partnership, the joint children etc. The point is there is a need to work together to find compromises that mitigate impact where possible and sometimes putting up with impact for a while in order to support one's partner.

But is it a genuine ambition that actually has longevity or is it a passion project that may make a bit of money one day?

They’re very different and I’ll be honest, if DH wanted to start a business that clearly had no legs, I’m not sure I’d be particularly keen to put up with much long-term impact, especially if he had all day during the week free to work on said business too.

@Madamum18 I posted earlier about how transactional a lot of relationships are these days. A lot of people will get a nasty shock if a partner can’t work for health reasons or their children’s serious health issues at some point or can’t get a suitable job , despite desparately wanting one - I do question the OPs timing in a role that is both a bit of a dying art and the fact the hours are awkward with a young family - but I do think asking him to step up for 6 months and for her to give it a bash isn’t the end of the world - people comment on the finances but the chances are they aren’t affected at all as she wasn’t earning anyway - him coming home earlier a few nights may mean he’s home at 6pm not 7.30 or he may have flexibility in his role ( and not lose money at all) as he gets home and then can do a bit of work at home. As you say it involves partnership - and clearly this chap sees anything domestic as wife’s work - yes he does bring home the family income but when was that written that this makes the wife effectively a full time domestic servant - do I think it would be better if she found a calling with more family friendly hours- ? Yep , but it is what it is and the least he can do is give it 6 months- if it isn’t turning a profit after that with quite a low entry barrier then I do think she needs to ‘think again’ if it’s affecting her marriage

Exactly Crikeyalmighty. That is the point in a partnership. And things like the 6 months is a reasonable compromise on both sides.

I am just coming to say “his share of childcare” is called “parenting”.

@Crikeyalmighty but he has been helping out - we don’t know for how long but OP does say the business takes up a lot of her time - to the extent that he comes home from work early to accommodate it even though it’s not actually turning a profit. It’s not as though he’s point blank refusing altogether - it just sounds like he’s getting fed up with it now.