To be fuming that DH has spent the whole day on his laptop?

[MamaOnTheCoast]

DH has spent the whole day on his laptop “working” in his home office and he hasn’t even seen me and the DC all day! He was up at 5am (the kids woke up at 6am) and he is still in his home office “working” now so we haven’t seen him all day! He even refused Christmas dinner as he said he was “too busy working”. DH does a senior office based job and he wasn’t meant to be working at all over Christmas but he is saying he apparently has to work today “because it’s urgent”! It’s Christmas Day and we haven’t seen him all day and DH can’t see the problem with this! The kids are really upset about it too! AIBU to be livid with DH over this? DH literally doesn’t see the problem but I’m fuming and the kids are upset too!

OP hasn’t said what he does - mediocre middle management is your reading, and not something we can base a conclusion on. Besides, even small, local companies are vulnerable to hacks.

I doubt it’s an affair tbh, he’d be trying much harder to cover it up.

He’s your husband. I would take it as read that as far as it goes, he is telling the truth - he believes he has to work and it’s important. However, I don’t think much excuses not providing an explanation and a prediction of when it will be over at the very least - and tbh I would expect him to build in an hour at the Christmas dinner table including total attention to you all as an absolute minimum.

My first move would have been to pull the main fuse out of the electricity box for two minutes and then put it back in.

That's is properly shit of him

He’s lying op. No one in there right mind would be on a teams call and if they were on Christmas Day and urgent you certainly wouldn’t mind a dad stopping to interact with there dc so something is wrong op.

Fuming reading this what with it being Christmas today.
OP do you want to PM me his mobile number and I'll speak to him. I'll stay calm and won't mention Mumsnet but he needs a right speaking to the bastard

You could go nuclear and turn off the wi-fi 🤷‍♀️

Unless he is intercepting a meteorite I would be reading him the riot act.

This completely depends on what organisation he works for and what his role is.

Does he work for an organisation that supplies infrastructure or handles emergencies? Local authority, emergency service, utility company, Highways Agency, public transport etc?

Both DP and I have had office jobs which came with a risk of needing to work from home on Christmas Day and although we were lucky and never had to for more than an hour or so, it was perfectly possible that one of us might have had to work all day.

We would obviously have told our families why we were working though.

Does he have a deadline on 31 December? I have been joking about working on Xmas day since October but luckily I hit my target on 23rd. If I hadn't I may have had to work over the Xmas period but I certainly wouldn't HAVE to have worked on Xmas day and nobody else would ha move been working obviously. It sounds more like he wanted to check out of Xmas. He must know you know he's not really working so he's takin g you for a mug too.

Extremely weird. Did he give you any warning that he wouldn’t be available today when there were 4 dc for whom you needed to maintain expectations? Sounds really odd.

This is horrid. I’m really sorry. Four little ones on your own is not what you were planning I’m sure. With zero notice, I can’t imagine I would be able to get past this. My husband has checked out of stocking time several times over the years (he is a malingerer) and I’ve found it hard to get over that TBH. Is this typical behaviour for your your partner? Is he normally on your team?
I really hope he steps up I hope you have been able to give your foster babies some joy today.

Hmmm. Possibly he's avoiding interacting with foster children ? Doesn't want to get too involved? Are they with you long term?

I grew up with Foster children. It could be hard and upsetting at times. But he's agreed to it all I'm sure so he should talk about his feelings.

Is he in some bother? And trying to desperately sort it out? Has he invested in something and realised its a scam?

Also without knowing what his job is, it does seem odd to be working all day.

He isn't working
and that wasn't a teams meeting with a colleague.

Who is the foster parent you or both of you ?
as it may end up that you need to inform Social Services that your marriage has fallen apart and they may depending on circumstances need to place the children elsewhere - unless it is a relatives children you are fostering.

To the people on here defending the husband - OK, he has some rare important job where he genuinely has to work all day. But, in this case, wouldn't a normal husband explain, apologise, have a couple of minutes' chat with the kids and tell them how sorry he is and that he will make up? Not act like an entitled dick and push poor OP out of the room?

He doesn't want to be around foster children and you and is hiding in there doing some shit like gaming, watching porn, chatting to whoever, whatever. He checked out so its time for him to leave.

I’d have pulled the plug and turned the WiFi off. DH was a work abolish but even he didn’t work on Christmas Day.

I really hope this is bullshit.

If he’s senior, perhaps the company is on the edge of bankruptcy. I can’t think of any other reason there would be people working in Christmas Day. Has he mentioned anything about work being in trouble?

Unscheduled?

What’s his job? And what is your relationship like generally? (Because it doesn’t sound like one that’s based on good communication.)

I personally doubt that he has spent a whole day locked up in his room without going to the toilet, having a cup of coffee or three or eating anything, so I think the OP knows more than she lets on, she just wants to vent.

But as someone in a middle management, not rare or important job, I've been involved in 2 emergency situations in the past few years, that required all nighters over the weekend - big incidents that were on the news on both sides of the ocean. The shit hits the fan a lot, people just forget quickly when it doesn't affect them.

So whilst I'm not defending the husband, as I've got no idea what he's doing, I object to people automatically labelling him an arsehole just because nothing could possibly require an office worker to work over Christmas.

Was it a joint idea to foster that many children? Is he fully on board with this lifestyle? Doesn’t sound like it.

Not his children and he is obviously not wanting to spend time with them at all.

He's avoiding you all. Affair or online addiction porn, gambling something.