AIBU to ask husband not to take job that would make me solely responsible for childcare during the working week?

[Veganornotvegan]

My husband and I both work full time 5 days per week Monday to Friday, typical office hours. We both do a combination of in office and WFH (average 2 days in office / 3 days WFH per week) but exact days vary week by week depending on our diaries. Both of our offices are approx 20 minutes away.

Our toddler son is in nursery approx 10 minutes away.

We currently split drop offs and pick ups between us 50/50 (I typically do pick ups, he typically does drop offs) but we communicate daily on this if we want to swap for any reason and this works well for us.

My husband wants to take a job which would be a little extra money (not significantly more, and whilst we are not rich by any stretch, we are comfortable (and not in the middle class way where comfortable means rich! Just comfortable)) but accepting the job would mean he would be out of the house 7.30am until 7pm every day. These longer hours would mean that I would have to do all nursery drop offs and pick ups, as well as all dinners, and bedtime prep for our toddler (which we currently split). I would also have to do all kids sick days as I would be significantly closer to the nursery than my husband, so it wouldn’t be fair to expect our child to wait 90 minutes to be picked up by dad, when I am 10 minutes away (nursery is in between our house and my office, so whether I’m WFH or in the office I’m still only 10 minutes away.).

WIBU to ask my husband not to accept this new job? As a household we would walk away with only a little extra money, which arguably we don’t need, but I would have to take on more of the childcare responsibilities. My husband isn’t unhappy with his current job, he’s just bored, and this new one would be more interesting for him.

Oh for goodness sake, I was clearly speaking figuratively and not literally. I am from a single parent home, literally and not figuratively, I am well aware of the differences. I trust you speak only literally, at all times?

I disagree. I don't think £400 is significant when you dont need the money as such.

He should be the one ashamed of wanting to spend less time with his child and wife for a bit more money that is not actually needed as such.

If he is bored tell him to find a hobby couple times of week so he has something to be 'excited about'🙄

For a LOT more money? It’s kind of worth it, but your H would miss seeing his child all week.

for a little bit more? No. Not at all

he needs to hold out to get something that is right for him in terms of career AND family balance

otherwise he’ll find his kid barely knows him, his wife is resentful and EVERYONE is exhausted on the weekends…. That way marital trouble lies.

With his massive commute etc etc… what happens when you’re ill? Would he just go in hours late? Or expect you to look after your child AND be ill at the same time?

Ah come on, this is not a protected term, and OP qualified it very clearly, indicating it was pretty much just a comparison.
(Had she said ‘widow’ it might have had a tinge of insensitivity, certainly)

Perhaps one would think twice about using the term were the post an editorial in a serious newspaper but we are among friends here, in tone.

I think you are lovely to be agonising over it as the reality is your husband can’t meet his responsibilities as a father and accept the job. It’s unfair for you to have to WFT and double duty parenting

And this is where my husband and I might have a different definition of what “a lot more money” means. I’m happy with what we have, my husband wants to earn more (but I think for ‘status’ as opposed to need, which is a whole other thing!)

Assuming the extra money is shared, it needs to be a joint decision: is it worth the extra hassle (you doing the extra childcare and him doing more hours / losing WFH).
For us I would say yes for 1k a month (after tax) but not less.

underestimating how boring a long commute with no WFH options can get.

Agree. Not to mention it's tiring.

Life is short and the commute is long. It's far more important to consider the entire family's wellbeing and a sensible work/life balance. I think this arrangement could lead to some real resentment in the long run. Unless he can negotiate some WFH or late starts he should wait for a more suitable job to come along.

Don't mind the pedantic single-parent gatekeepers. I actually suspect they scan all threads of this nature just to see if the married OP will dare to mention the phrase "solo parent" so they have a place to vent all their pent up emotional rage. It's the bean soup theory where a blogger posted a recipe for bean soup and was inundated with angry comments by people who didn't like beans.

What you describe is indeed being a single parent during the week. It's been my life since DD was in nursery and it's not for the weak. DH works a medical job involving patients, appointments, surgery etc so changing work hours or jumping in for emergencies is essentially impossible. He's out of the house before we wake up (Mon-Fri) and comes home at dinnertime, often later. If I need him to do one school run, I need to give 6-8weeks advance notice so he can block out an hour's slot on his schedule.

The one thing you have to come to terms with is that you won't be able to work full-time. It's logistically impossible. If the entire household (admin, errands, cooking, cleaning, kids illnesses, school stuff) falls on one person then you need flexibility during work hours. I'm self employed so that was the only possible arrangement but the actual hours I can work are only 50-70% of what I used to do.

You have to decide if it's worth giving up your salary for the minimal gain that your husband gets in his job. You need to reduce your days at work or even look for a different job that's more flexible. Otherwise it's borderline madness to attempt 5 days full time around childcare.

Why is he motivated to take that job?

He’s also saying you’ll never be able to do anything after work. No going to a colleague’s leaving drink, no taking up an early evening yoga class on a Tuesday. Straight home via nursery for you, what’s for dinner?

Ultimately I would guess you, your career, your wellbeing and potentially your relationship would suffer unless you want to pick up pretty much all the delmstic load. It’s amazing how these things can shift permanently a relationship where family responsibilities started kind of equal, to one partner knowing nothing much about what is going on because it’s their wife’s department. I’m so tired of seeing how many of my friends’ husbands seem to think this is entirely fine to say as well … ‘oh x does all of that’. Now we are all parenting teenagers I see many women friends totally ground down by all the responsibilities they are shouldering. I wouid guess it’s better to ensure this doesn’t happen to you now otherwise everything will become permanently and totally your responsibility. You’ll need to be clear that what you both agreed was that you would see what the offer was before you decided. From your viewpoint the offer isn’t good enough if it’s 5 days a week long hours in the office.

I had this situation with my now exh. It was grossly unfair, he checked out of family life, alienated himself from his own kids and basically only thought about his own needs. You are not being unreasonable.

Of course he shouldn’t do this. There’s a real
assumption that you would naturally pick up the slack which is inherently selfish and thoughtless. It isn’t even as if it’s a massive pay rise or promotion either so just makes no sense all round.

Are you prepared to pushback and say no this doesn’t work for you then and you cannot and will not take on the responsibility, sacrifice your career because you are always the one in charge for this job?

You need to ask him how he will manage his childcare commitments with the new hours so the move doesn't negatively impact you, because you don't want to cover for him.
He will no doubt say that your child will have to be longer in nursery. You'll then be faced with a choice of covering or your child doing the longer days. Which is a very familiar scenario in families where one parent (usually the father) thinks their job is more important than childcare.
Its rubbish, but when one parent would be prepared to put themselves before their child, the other has no realistic choice but to pick up the slack so the child doesn't suffer.
I'd think a lot less of my partner if he put me in that position though.

It may seem like semantics but I would not pitch it to him as 'asking him not to take the job'. It let's him off the hook and makes childcare your responsibility. Fight this attitude!
I'd simply ask him how he is going to manage the pick ups each day in his new role and how he will manage if the children are sick? I'd make it clear I would not be picking up the slack as I work full time too and then leave it to him to decide if he is able to take the job given his childcare commitments.
If he goes on about the extra money, I'd say if that is an issue for him, I'll look for a better paying job too - I assume I can look upto 90 mins away and full time in the office too right?

YANBU absolutely.

DH and I worked hard to both get the flexibility around kids in our jobs and we are agreed that only a very significant pay increase would get (either of) us to even think about changing if the flexibility was to reduce.

3 hours a day commuting would soon put a big hole in that extra cash. And your husband might well regret losing so much time with his child. There are a lot of downsides to his plan, but I don’t see many upsides.

My DH has an interview next week where if he got the job it would potentially mess up his childcare portion. It’s £900 extra a month but we’ve still decided to decline if it’s not compatible with the family.

I’m surprised your husband is even considering it without first telling you how he is sorting the childcare.

@Veganornotvegan you haven’t said.
What does your dh say when you point out he wouldn’t see his toddler 5 days a week? That he’d become a part time dad, worse than the 50/50 fathers can (should?) get when you get divorced.
Im nit suggesting divorce as such btw. But if seeing your child only 2 days a week is considered very little by most (decent) parents, I’m wondering why he is choosing to opt to be in that situation.
Has he thought about it and the impact it will have on his relationship with his child (let alone with you…..)?

And that longer commute may well eat up that small increase in salary via fuel costs, car maintenance costs, insurance costs which will go up if his annual mileage is going up, etc Plus he may eat out more if he's not working from home occasionally. All while dumping his share of the childcare running, sick days, and after school duties on you.

Is there a set up which works for you eg he negotiates 2 WFH days (on which he does pick up and drop off and is 'sick cover' parent) and an early finish on a Friday so he is still doing half the pickup/drop offs? He has nothing to lose by asking, at least!

Even if you don't need it for current bills/spending, that's a significant amount that could be invested to top up pensions, saved for uni, whatever.

If it doesn't work for your family, it doesn't work, but for others reading, the immediate spending value of the money is nothing compared to its potential growth over time, which is exponential. It will be worth a lot more than five thousand a year when retirement comes around.

I know it's easy to say "we aren't going to sacrifice now to ensure a well-funded retirement" or "we just want a simple retirement anyway" but believe me, when 60 or 65 rolls round and you no longer have the option of earning/saving more, hindsight is cruel. Sometimes it's worth it to suck it up now for future security.