Should I be happy?

[Cnf1]

So, my DH has become very successful in recent years. He makes £500k per annum for the last 5 years and it's on the up. I'm not someone who cares about material things. I drive a 25-year-old yaris and would happily spend the rest of my life living in our 2-bed house which I owned before I met him.
We've had a child in the last two years. I'm a sahm at the moment but planning on getting back to work ASAP, not for the money but for my mental health.
My AIBU is whether I should be unhappy with my current situation.
He works every hour that God sends but as a result, I'm forced into being a parent and housekeeper 24/7. I never wanted this life but have found myself in it. I instinctively feel that he should be doing housework but it feels unfair on him when he's racing home to spend time with our dd before bedtime and then back on his laptop, working. I find myself cooking, cleaning and entertaining our baby round the clock.
I have become the 1950's housewife which is so far from how I was raised and what I ever wanted. Tbh, he was the one who was desperate to have a child, I was on the fence but I'm madly in love with her now.
I want to go back to work ASAP but my meagre salary as a primary school teacher will mean we actually are at a deficit if I do and all the housework will still come down on me as he's permanently working.
He's self-employed and basically in the midst of creating an incredibly lucrative business so there's no chance of him being able to reduce hours.
I think what I'm asking is whether I should be happy pairing his socks, ironing his shirts and cleaning up everything in the house (including his dinner plate) every evening because he has work to do knowing that he is a great provider?

Pr to his own production company

This must be a wind up. An 18 month old breastfeeding throughout the night? Really?

Hire a live in nanny/housekeeper. Problem solved.

I don't think I'd feel like a skivvy if I was just cleaning up after myself and dd. I think it's harder to get used to cleaning up after your husband when you were raised in a household where there was no hint of the 1950s around. The last thing I ever believed I'd become was my MIL and somehow that's happened. He works so hard that I don't want to make his life any harder. Having said that, this is definitely not what I signed up for and I don't take any pleasure in spending the money.

I wish it was a wind-up.

You don’t need to do all these things after your DD goes to bed, for own surely she can sit and play/entertain herself while you clean the kitchen (even my super active DS’s would do that at that age). You don’t need to Hoover/mop every day, sweeping up crumbs takes 2 mins. A cleaner can do the laundry/ironing. You also can change the breastfeeding through the night, it is for comfort and while it may mean a few hard nights it is for her own good to be able to self soothing at this age. You are putting all of this on yourself, I know to is hard as a newer mum with a lot of information bombarding about child development and social media making you think everyone has spotless homes but we all do the best we can and sometimes that really isn’t close to perfect and that is ok. The best thing I ever did was let go of all this pressure and be ok with just being ok. Guess what, nothing happened. Rats didn’t overrun my house, my kids didn’t end up selling drugs, my husband didn’t care that someone else washed his underwear. Don’t be a martyr, it doesn’t help you or anyone else and will rub off on your child if they sense your anxiety about all of this

Perhaps OP feels she needs to be doing it because she isn't working.
If you don't work, you do all the cooking, cleaning and laundry. You've got time so you should be doing it all yourself right?

Perhaps she feels that paying for someone to do it for her when she can technically do it herself is 'wrong' and frowned upon.

Thank you. That's really helpful to hear.

That's exactly how I feel!

Could you get an au pair when you move to the bigger house, some company might be good aswell

But if it's making you miserable, then paying someone else to do it is the answer.

You can afford it. What is the point of your husband working so hard and making so much money if you're miserable? Surely a miserable mum isn't great for your daughter.

Get a housekeeper Mon - Fri and eat out at the weekends. Enjoy life.

Sounds like you feel like you have to be a martyr and don't deserve to spend money. Maybe get some counselling to explore why that is. That's not a dig btw: I used to be the same. Counselling helped. And you can afford it 😅

That's my plan but it's ages away. House needs serious renovations so it's minimum 9 months away. Having said that, I'd never expect an au pair to clean up after my Dh. That's his responsibility but since he doesn't have the time, I'll take that on.

While having a 500k income sounds amazing on paper, it sounds like your DP has changed the power dynamic and terms of your relationship and you had no say in at all. So I do get where you are coming from.

Yes other posters are correct in that you have opportunities others can dream of, and you can choose to be full time, a sahm and anything in between and that's great but it sounds like by accepting those choices , you are also accepting that you are the one holding the fort while he is barely at home - fine if that was the agreed plan, not so fine if it's not what you signed up for.

Personally i think there is no point earning 500k a year if it doesn't bring some degree of happiness and I don't believe your DP couldn't cut back a bit, or hire someone to help him, and still earn 300 to 400 instead to show you he is an active participant at home also. No amount of hired help is going to fill the gap left by a vacant partner and father & given you say you dont need him to earn as much as he does, I'd be speaking to him about ways he can manage to cut back a bit - the alternative is to buy in help but if he's never there, you'll likely damage your relationship in the long term.

As pp have said, if this was a short term plan to earn as much as possible in a couple of years it could be more tolerable.

But no amount of earnings would allow my partner to leave his plate for me to move & it sounds like this is what you need to speak to him about, how his basic level of respect has changed since he became a higher earner.

I'm not worried about spending money, I just get no joy from it. Never have tbh. I often say to Dh "what's the point in all this money?" His answer is that it's this or him being unemployed which would be stressful so I just grin and bear it. It's not what either of us wanted but it's the better of two evils, I guess.

Surely he would pay for childminder and cleaner? He lives in the house, eats, wears clothes and has a child doesn’t he? You could pay towards this but your incomes are not equal.

Who says though? Has your DH said this to you? Is he expecting this of you?
Does he resent you for having more 'time off' so expects you to be somehow punished for it by doing all the housework?

If not, then clearly this is an expectation you've put on yourself. If you were not working and living off benefits even though you are physically and mentally able to work, but choose not to, then fair enough, some kind of societal god might be looking down on you.

You're not. You have plenty of money, and assuming your DH is happy for you to spend it on cleaners, gardeners, then why not allow yourself the privilege of that and enjoy time with your toddler?

Stop confusing 'shoulds' with having no choice. Just because loads of people do everything themselves doesn't make that the standard you have to live up to. You're not automatically considered 'lazy' or a lesser human being by hiring a housekeeper.
Would you describe a lottery winner as lazy for quitting their job and enjoying the money? No, you'd tell them to bloody enjoy themselves.

We talked about him hiring people to relieve the load, which he did, but then the work ramped up even more. The companies he works with want him and only him on site during production. He is really valued and I'm very proud of him. It doesn't help my situation, however.

My DP used to work abroad and I hated going back to work with trying to fit everything in. If you are finding things stressful now I think adding in work won't be good. I guess you don't get any time for yourself at the moment so maybe start with hiring cleaner/housekeeper to remove those jobs that you hate doing and occasional childminder/babysitter to give you some free time and then you might feel better and better able to decide about going back to work

Thank you. It's things like his plate, toothpaste on the mirror, skidmarks in the toilet, mud tracked into the house etc. that just kills me. When I bring it up, he's apologetic but says he hasn't a moment to be thinking about things and promises to do better. I feel it's too mean to harass him about these things when he's either working or minding our baby during every waking minute. He literally doesn't have a moment to himself.

I’m finding your responses quite tedious. You seem determined to be miserable. You’re in an insanely privileged position. Get your husband told on tidying up after himself - that’s your only issue as far as I can see.

mother guilt - we all have this. You’re not unique. Go back to work part/time - as a teacher you get the holidays. Working is not just about the money, you will likely be happier with the mental stimulation. Stop the hand wringing and just get on with your life.

Fair enough. Didn't mean to be tedious but I can see how it is probably coming across.

Maybe you do that if you live in the 1950s. I don't work outside the home and I certainly do not do all the cooking, cleaning and laundry. I take care of our children at home while my partner works. I clean up any mess we make during the day but that is all. When he's home, it's 50/50 for everything including parenting. If he was working so many hours that I couldn't cope and felt overwhelmed to the point it was affecting my mental health, as it seems to be doing to the OP, he would just have to find a way to cut back and contribute more to the household tasks and parenting. Women do have a choice not to do these things or take on everything. Like some (apparently most) men do.

I've only read the first three pages, so I've probably missed a lot of information.

I'm a care worker on minimum wage.
I absolutely adore my job, which is why I've done it for over 30 years.

I acknowledge that this is not the point of the thread - but, how the fuck have we got to a point of folk earning half a million quid a year?
What are they doing?

I earn roughly £25k a year, looking after elderly people at home to the very best of my ability. I think my role is important but, unfortunately, it's definitely not valued.

What job brings in £500k a year?

Sorry to ask, but this is a parallel universe to me.

That's just plain laziness and totally disrespectful to you. So he works long hours. Big deal. He's a slob and needs to do better. Stop feeling sorry for him and like you have to be grateful for the man with his big important job bringing the cash in so you have the "luxury" of being a SAHM. He's treating you like a maid. You have the money so hire the help and go back to work for your own sake. And tell him to clean his own bloody plate and shit off the toilet.

But neither of them need to do do housework.

In the 1950s lots of people had help if they could afford it. Before WW1 they even had cooks, gardeners and housekeepers.

That's true. I personally would definitely pay for people to do it all for me if I could afford it 😂

But he needs to pull his socks up and stop being such a disgusting lazy pig with the little things that he just leaves at his arse for her to clean up for him.