Child responsibilities.. Should dinner be made or even started when the first parent gets home from work?

[Playinwithfire]

Last night I get home, it was around 7.30 and my youngest said mummy I'm hungry. I was confused DH had been home since 2pm and sorted HIS stuff and then he headed off to his hobby. I checked to see if they had enough dinner, then the child says we didn't get any dinner! I'm furious...

There has been a few changes and I have been very understanding that DH is trying to adjust. However, for f"*k sake... I feel like I need to still manage everything and ensure things get done. I'm asked a 100 questions daily. An I snapped last night...

I just don't get how you can go off to a hobby knowing that your children still haven't eaten however, you've made sure all the stuff he had to do was priority and very much completed.

I thought this too. A father who spent any quality time with his child would prioritise feeding them. Who doesn't know children need feeding?!

I do agree that the father is at fault in this situation though. Delegation of tasks in a family should be organised well in advance, not at the last moment by a self absorbed man only interested in himself and his hobby.

Your husband is a lazy, selfish sexist, neglectful parent who can't be bothered to feed his own kids.

That's your reality.

Your 15 year old is going to have to learn to cook some basic meals. Look for things like dump dinners, sheet pan dinners, teach them knife skills and the basics of cooking.

Start batch cooking. Make extra when you cook and freeze it.

Pro tip: Not for the dad. He can feed his own face by himself. He sounds selfish enough to eat the kids' food.

Your husband is clearly an arse, there's no question he should have sorted dinner.

But also, at 8, your youngest is too young to be left without a responsible babysitter. Obviously your 15 year old doesn't fit this description if he didn't cook after being told to feed them. Was he being paid or otherwise compensated for looking after his siblings?

The 15 year old could cook for themselves and the others if they wanted to buy surely even 7pm is too late for the younger ones? Besides that your DH is the parent, why couldn't he make a meal for his DC like the rest of us do?

I would be furious. I couldn't imagine my two being hungry.

I stand by my response and it would be the same if the OP was a man ranting about his wife who didn't cook and left to go to her hobby.

That question should be asked of the parent who went out leaving the 15 year old in charge. Not the one who arrived to the shit show after all working all day.

You seem to be missing the point of the OP's post entirely. Are you Dad?

This Dad was home for 5 hours dicking around - not looking after his kids, not doing chores, dicking around.

I had chores including cooking from younger than 15. There are multiple ways to do it, and produce children who adult well.

But failing to adult yourself and then expecting your 15 year old to pick up the pieces (because you forgot or didn't want to) isn't the right way imo.

In so many other ways and scenarios it's not wrong to ask for the chore, but you're ignoring everything but the ask and refusal - you're not accounting the scenario outside of that.

@theemmadilemma agree the context is everything here

If dad for example had been doing some essential plumbing repair and time got away from him and he asked 15yo to get dinner on for the younger kids I would have a very different view of the situation.

I'm glad you think the fact your DH is useless and selfish is funny. 🙄

It's perfectly reasonable for a parent (either) to delegate an age appropriate chore (which this is) to a 15 year old. It's perfectly reasonable for a parent (either) to have down time (or 'dicking around time' as you call it.)

Parent =/= servant. At 15, child should be contributing in small, age appropriate ways to the family workload. This is a perfect example of a reasonable, age appropriate ask. Child disobediently refused. That's not OK.

But asked for too late and on the way out the door.

@mrsm43s but it is perfectly unreasonable for any parent to forget to consider that their child may need to eat (regardless of who is doing the cooking) until 1hr before bedtime and they are immediately leaving the house.

The teen could absolutly be asked to make dinner.

The father should not have forgotten about it entirely until he had no time to complete the task and had to push it off to his older child.

Parents are allowed down time, and I don't believe that children should always come first and we as parents should martyr ourselves. Basic needs of our children should be met in a timely manner, whether the father cooked it or not the task should have been assigned and completed WAY before he was leaving the house at 7pm.

Ok so you are Dad.

Because you're still missing the point and ignoring that I said it was a reasonable ask.

But not from a man who cannot apparently cope with adulting himself... to quote OP:

There has been a few changes and I have been very understanding that DH is trying to adjust. However, for f"k sake... I feel like I need to still manage everything and ensure things get done. I'm asked a 100 questions daily. *

This is not a man who is adulting or pulling his weight at all. No wonder his son doesn't think he should either? Not setting a blinding example is he?

Now, if his Mum asks him to, while she relaxes after she gets home from a long day. 0 issues. Or Dad gets home from a long day and 15yo is asked, 0 issues.

But children picking up the pieces for the adult who can't adult, na.

Your Husband is a Twat! I’d be furious that he neglected the Children and couldn’t even be bothered to feed them, instead putting the onus on the 15 year old.

@mrsm43s My 15 year was not be disobedient! He too had things to do. Therefore it falls to H to do his duty, simple as. Passing off H responsibility to the 15 year old because he thought his hobby was more important is not ok! You try and dictate it any way you like DH was at fault not the 15 year old.

@Playinwithfire did your children tell your DH at any point that they were hungry or did they wait for you?

If that is the case on top of a big chat with DH you need to start impressing on them that they have two parents and can go to DH for anything they would go to you for. (not blaming the kids just incase anyone wants to jump down my throat) But if the household views mum as default parent the children are old enough to be told it's not going to work like that anymore!

You're all at fault - particularly the parents. You should have a plan for the week when it comes to who's in, who's out, who's doing what. This is a communication breakdown. And yes, if both parents have commitments then the contingency would be saying "DS, neither of us are here at dinner time, can you heat up the casserole, fry the sausages, make a sandwich."

I fear this might be like my DBro and SIL. They both dawdled getting home from work so that neither had responsibility for feeding the kids. The poor nanny, due to finish at 6, was often still there at 7 scanning the empty fridge trying too feed three hungry, tired children.

Both parents are responsible for having a plan and sticking to it.

It must be really nice to be able to release yourself from your parental mental load so much so that you can spend 5 hours getting ready for your hobby, feed yourself, and as an afterthought as you swan out the door—tell someone else to feed your offspring, My mind is always going 100mph with the mental load—I’d love to have the luxury to disassociate from my responsibilities like this.

I don’t have children but even I’m not this useless.

Is OP married to Paul from BBC’s Motherland (Julia’s husband)?

I don't think a grown man should need to be specifically instructed to feed his kids if it's meal time and he is the only adult present. That is literally the key duty of a parent. It doesn't need a "plan" worked out with the other parent, plans can fail anyway.
Is he punishing you for going back to work or something?

You think a father needs to be 'reminded' that if the OP isn't home by dinner time then he needs to feed his children? That unless reminded he will not notice her absence, the time or his children's need to eat? Do you really think men are that incapable?

Gosh there are some harsh comments on this one! I usually love the variety of responses for making me see things differently, but I feel like OP is copping a lot of unfair flack here, and the husband is being let off by some who want to pin the blame on a 15yo whose Dad didn't bother to feed him and his siblings before swanning off and leaving the mess to OP, who got home late from work.

No way a 15-year old should be held responsible by his father for doing the exact same thing the father did! In fact, the 15yo had other things he needed to do (lots of homework at that age) whereas the father was just doing something he WANTED to do.

OP's DH is angry at the son for showing up what a crap dad he's been here. He's deflecting his guilt to someone else. What an arse.