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.

You need to keep adding the words 'at my expense' or 'at our family's expense' to his desire to earn a bit more on paper.

'DH, you want to earn more at my expense. Literally. As this will require me to be doing all the childcare logistics which will likely impact my own job performance.'

'DH, you feeling happier at your job will be at my expense, as I will be unhappier due to you dumping all your half of the shared responsibilities onto me.'

'DH, you wanting to take this job will come at our family's expense in terms of time together at home where we normally eat together and have family time.'

Another example of men being completely selfish. Now you have no option but to suck it up and be exhausted or tell him he shouldn’t take it. If you do the latter he’ll likely be miserable about it and blame you. Basically he has put you in a position where you can’t win! Imagine if you did the same thing?

If it were me I would probably say that if he takes the job then you may have to ask to reduce your hours at work so you don’t have complete burn out. Hopefully his small pay increase would bridge the gap if you were to drop a day at work?

I would say no.
Phrase it as how will he manage childcare, then wait for his response.
Obviously he thinks you will do it op.
Don’t underestimate how many relationships break down.
The vast majority of children today come from broken homes or are in blended families.
To put it bluntly, if this is your eldest child, the likelihood of you and your oh being together until your dying day is slim,
You must protect your finances.
Yes right now all money is family money but if you do split up ( hopefully you won’t) then what will your earning potential be?
I really wish I hadn’t taken a hit for my ex h to be the main breadwinner. We were married a very long time too.
Many divorced mothers find themselves in this unfavourable position.

He's essentially expecting you to take over most of the household and childcare duties because he's bored.

There's a bigger conversation to be had here. It's not just about this job.

I'd point him to this thread...

What he's asking isn't fair on the OP. At all.

The other thing with childcare cover for sickness, is, even if he says he'll do 50:50, what's the chances of him doing that in the first 6 months/year, as he'll be new and wanting to make a good impression. And by the time is he is established, the norm will be you covering it all....

It's really not unreasonable to pushback at it being you actually dealing with all the negatives the job brings

OK - but him taking this job absolutely limits OP’s career opportunities and makes her job less secure if she is always the default parent.

That needs to be considered also

ETA if he can leverage this offer to a 5-10% pay rise where he is then even better all round

You are a team. Changes in his employment effect your whole family. Of course you are not unreasonable to point out the negatives for the family. Same as if it were the other way around.

There’s no way I would agree to this. Also, being out of the house for 12 hours a day isn’t going to be fun for him either! I doubt it will cure his boredom.

I would ask him if he would do the same for you. I doubt most men would even consider this.

Maybe it's not just the job he is bored with.
It doesn't make sense to have such a long commute for a little extra money and dump all the childcare on the mother.

Hard no from me.

It sounds like he puts a high value on "money" but a low value on "family time".

Working week 33% more, money 20% more, doesn't make financial sense.

Money 20% more, family time 80% less, your workload 80% more? It's very sad if that's what he genuinely wants.

Is he happy to sacrifice you and his kids to be less "bored"??

Having not even read this thread, my husband and I had a similar discussion on our lunchtime walk today. We both work from home mainly and go into the office a couple of days per week. Child aged 4. We agreed that he would only ever be able to take a job five days a week in the office, if it paid so much more that I could say spread three days work across five and we’d still have enough money. Even then I would be getting the raw end of the deal as I’d be doing all of the after school tantrums , sick days, et cetera.

So unless he’s earning about a grand more, I say it would be a no. I think him just being a bit bored isn’t good enough for reason. You should go back to the company and says he has to do two days a week at home and if they can’t fulfil this, then he can’t take the job.

This would be a complete and utter NO, for me. It's a total lifestyle change for all of you and your child loses stuff that has been proven to be beneficial, like family meal times.

No, no, no.

he should not take it. 20% raise for him and basically an excuse to check out from parenting and domestic work. While you do it all, because you're there anyway and it makes sense. and what about school pick up later, staying home when DC is ill, all you? You will resent it and your own career will suffer.

Yep.

Do make sure you force him to spell out exactly how he imagines this is going to work OP.

It’s not an extra £5k, it’s more than that, but without being gauche about money, we truly don’t need any extra than we have. We are incredibly lucky.

That’s why this is difficult decision, because it’s about more than money and the value we place on the intangibles, and seemingly my husband and I place different values on those things.

I don't think you need to tie yourself into knots over this. It's clearly not an option from your point of view, and as you have the luxury of not needing the extra money then that's the end of the discussion.

"DH this will hugely negatively impact on our family life and on me and the children personally and so it's not a goer. You cannot take this job "

If he went ahead I would divorce and he could cope with 50/50.

He should absolutely not take this job without serious discussion and reflection on what it means for family life and more importantly on your relationship. It's a massive ask for you to go from 50-50 on daily household responsibilities to 90-10. Massive.

Nevermind long-term impact to your own career (and sanity) if you are the default for all handling, planning around and time off for emergencies, sick days, teacher meetings, school plays, doctors appointments, etc, etc, etc. I speak from experience. At this point, I don't know if our relationship can recover.

If he wants to look for jobs further from home, he needs to negotiate compressed hours, a shorter week, WFH etc. If this job can't offer any of that, it's not the right job and he should turn it down.

Yeah it’d be a hard no from me at this stage of the game. You’ll be running round like a headless chicken and he’ll come home “exhausted from his super long day”.

If he’s bored, he can get a hobby.

YANBU, I’m sure if it was the other way around he wouldn’t be happy doing all the pick ups etc.

you said you would be basically like a single parent. You wouldn’t and it’s a crass thing to say, clearly you don’t see that which is also really crass, so just carry on as you are then.

Hard disagree. It’s about as tasteful as claiming to be like a disabled person cos you sometimes get cramp. It’s a world apart and as a single parent I have had to listen to various coupled up people claiming to be “doing the single parent thing” many times over the years, to me it’s cringe.

I'd point out to him that you would be better off divorced in this scenario. Genuinely.

I would not be ok with it.

Maybe it was more the done thing in the 80s?
My Dad had to work the longer hours with further commute to bring in the better wage. As a result, my mum did the bulk of the childcare in the week.

I’m not sure why you are getting cross with me. It was very common situation when I grew up.

I guess it’s different now.

From your comments, I cannot see what value it will actually add to the family by him taking this new role.

It will, however, mean he is less involved at home.