To say im on maternity leave not house wife leave

[Cloudyonasunnyday]

Had second child 5 months ago. Becoming increasingly frustrated that I’m very much the default parent / housekeeper (I don’t mind the parenting Element as much as I am on maternity leave) but I seem to be picking up even more house work than before. I feel like I organise absolutely everything from food shops to laundry.

DH wfh and has a lot of downtime which he will spend lazing about / going to the gym etc I think the fact he’s at home and under my feet is half the problem. If he was at the office everyday I would know he cannot physically help so wouldn’t get so annoyed maybe ?

I’ve reached out a few times to him about feeling unsupported and he’s sort of agreed to do more but then nothing…

I think I’ve come to the realisation today that he expects me to take care of the whole house due to being on maternity leave

AIBU to be enraged ?

Stop calling it ‘help’. Domestic labour is not solely your responsibility. You want him to do his share. His doing so is not him ‘helping’ you.

Language is important.

Your job is now the baby. The house is still a shared responsibility.

Disagree.
It is not OP's place to "give him jobs". She is not his manager. They are equal adults.
If she 'gives him a job' that means she has
first noticed the job needs doing,
second decided when it should be done,
and third decided he should be the one to do it.
None of that crap should be taking up her headspace.

The way forward is to agree broad 'areas of responsibility' in the house and let each person manage their own stuff in their own way in their own time.

It’s absolutely relevant that you mention that you are the higher earner, because men weaponise their Very Big, Very Important jobs all the time to get out of doing their share with children and the house. You should get back to your paid job ASAP.

Good call, move all life admin to the weekends, then he can’t say he’s busy working.

DH explicitly said to me ‘there’s no point spending mat leave cleaning. You may as well go back to work and pay for a cleaner if you do that.’ Which is a good way to look at it I think.

My DH worked away during the week when we had DD and he did more domestic stuff than I did!

My job was keeping me and baby alive. Not housekeeping.

You need to nip it in the bud now.

When your DH is wfh, I don’t think you should hold any resentment to him being at home but not helping out - he is at work after all.

When he is not in his working hours everything should be 50-50 parenting / housework AND downtime. You should both get a break each week to do hobbies, see friends, have a bath - whatever. Equal time.

I think not working and being on maternity leave it is fair, especially as baby is a bit older now to pick up housework whilst you’re not working but certainly shouldn’t be doing ALL of the housework and childcare 24/7.

“DH, your penis played a minimal role in bringing DC into the world, and frankly isn’t significant/big enough to excuse you from undertaking at least 50% of the parenting and domestic duties. You’ll be doing it all when I am back at work and travelling, so you’d best get into the routine now so it’s easier for you and DC when that happens.”

Not RTFT but "To be clear though I have always asked for more help and it’s been a persistent issue. Before having the baby of course he promised he would help more (fool me)"

Read that to yourself looking at how you've worded it.
You might as well have written 'Looking after the children and the house is my responsibility but I expect my DH to help without me having to ask. '

Surely, if it means more time all together on weekends it is worth doing some jobs in the week.

Even nannies do other tasks while looking after babies - they do nap or entertain themselves whilst you're doing things around them

Thank you, you’re right

such wonderful advice on here - I’m going to change my mindset !

Your husband wfh so he can do some cleaning, laundry etc. I wfh so I do most of the household tasks.

I agree with you. I don't understand why stay at home mum - encompassing women at home on mat leave - has ended up synonymous with cleaning. Parenting and housekeeping are as different as parenting and librarian.

I don’t want to say he does nothing he will do things when specifically asked but often with resistance.

You need to look at what you've put here.

It's really not acceptable.

He isn't a teenager that needs to be told what to do and then cajoled into doing it.

I wouldnt be able to accept it.

Part of the problem is - from what you've said- he didn't seem tp be doing much before the baby came.

So it's not hard to understand why he isn't doing much now.

As you've said you need to make time for yourself and he needs to step up.

Because if it carries on as it is, I doubt your relationship will stand it.

Even worse that the DH works from home because we all know if it was OP who wfh she would still be the one expected to do all the cleaning!

This was me and my husband when I had our first child last year. We have very different standards and he definitely saw maternity leave as a holiday.

To be fair, between the first newborn days and until she got to about 11/12 months old, there is a lot of spare time when they’re sleeping so much during the day. I was in the shape of my life as I did a workout every morning during naptime (we have a home gym). Then the days were filled with meetings up with friends, baby classes and dog walks. I still had plenty of time to pick up the housework during various naps or while baby played on the floor.

The rub was when I went back to work. We had quite a few rows, but we did a list of chores and he took complete ownership of half. So now if he forgets to do the foodshop, he’s the one who goes out at 7pm to get dinner etc

I don’t think the case is that OP doesn’t want to do anything, rather she resents having to do everything. It’s quite a big difference.

She has a job looking after the baby and older child which is many more hours than 37.5 a week

I had this problem.

I snapped about 3 months into maternity leave and actually wrote a big list of all household tasks (from food shopping and unpacking to cleaning to laundry to sterilising bottles to pet care) and divided them up in a way that felt fair and manageable to me.

I also put together a kind of rota, which was super clear of what tasks I expected him to do in the evening (i.e. the time sensitive ones like walking the dog, helping with bath / bed time) and set a specific period in the evening that was 'my time' and 'his time'. He can choose how to use this time but its finite so it means if he goes to the gym there likely isn't enough time to make himself some elaborate dinner, it's either or.

I really stressed that this was our protected time and if we needed to jig things around I'd need notice for this. None of this: 'I'm working late today or I needed to do X,Y, Z so I assumed the rota didn't count'. And no 'I need to walk the dog' when it's my time to be childfree.

My DP sounds more understanding than yours though. He did have good intentions I think he just thought it would all balance out 'somehow' without us having a proper plan. And it didn't!

The mistake I made though was not including any of the mental load I take on e.g. all childcare admin and comms, ordering and researching things needed as our baby grows up etc.

If he lived on his own with no DW or DC, he'd need to do household tasks like cleaning, cooking, maintenance and bill-paying.

He has children and he should be looking after them too.

The baby-related tasks are yours for the time being because you are on ML, but he should be pulling his weight in the mornings and evenings.

Take responsibility now, @Cloudyonasunnyday , or you'll be going back to work and doing all the parenting and housekeeping.

You are his spouse not his nanny/housekeeper.

Draw up a list of things you would expect him to do without needing to ask.
If he is WFH, I'd be expecting him to be a parent and fellow-housekeeper from 5.45 pm to 8.45 am.

I work from home (currently between jobs) and those are my 'not at work' hours. The 15 minutes either end are for setting up for the day and shutting down for the day. I do a few odd jobs during the day but only if I have to (like dashing to take the washing off the line if it starts raining).

Ick.

Good way to combat the men who want to play golf for 8 hours and think it doesn't count as their downtime.

Give him jobs to do each week before you make a rod for your back.

Agreed.
By the way, I would never, ever keep another adult out of work. Ever. Speaking for myself.