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.

This.

This isn't an abstract discussion about 15 year olds developing skills or taking on responsibilities in the home. Because most of us would agree thats a good and positive thing.

This is about a parent relying on a child stepping up to fill the gaps in their own parenting.

Do you need reminding to make some dinner for your children every single day?

And this.

Who is reminding the mum to feed the children?

Maybe the OP's post is completely disingenuous. Maybe the kids asked at 4pm what was for dinner, dad said they could just heat up a frozen pizza when they wanted and the 15 year old refused. Which would make some posters' responses a bit more understandable.

But, either way, the dad shouldn't have gone out at 7pm knowing the 8 year old hadn't eaten. He could have left 15 year old to get over themselves and fed the 8 year old. But he didn't. That's where the parenting fail lies. He went out knowing a young child was unfed.

Unless they eat half an hour before the 8 year olds bedtime every day, then the dad clearly didn't give a shiny shit.

I think it is given that he was at home from 2pm until 7pm and didn't seem to be doing anything else.
If dad was doing the hoovering/ washing / DIY etc then yes it's perfectly reasonable to ask the teen to help out by that doesn't seem to be the case here

It's irrelevant. The Dad asked his 15 year old to do a perfectly reasonable chore. The 15 year old wilfully disobeyed. That's bad behaviour.

Jesus 😂

I think you need to calm down. Your posts come across like you are having a weird day.

She shouldn't need to ask another adult - their father - whether the kids are being fed or not - especially as he was home for a good few hours before her.

Your take is very strange and also misses the point entirely.

Getting ready to go out.... for 5 hours?
I'm sure if he'd for something useful the OP would have mentioned it but OP said he sorted his own stuff out. Didn't appear to do anything for the family

Completely agree with this.

It's a reasonable ask of a 15 yo, regardless of what the Dad was doing.

You're blaming a 15 year old for a useless, selfish man.

Your dh is a prick. Feeding your dc is a very basic part of parenting. Feeding yourself and not your 8yo is unthinkable. Is he trying to punish you for being at work late? I can't see any way this wasn't a deliberate choice, he clearly knew the dc were hungry and he hadn't fed them. Unless he has a significant cognitive issue, he knows his dc need to eat.

Any expectation the 15yo sibling steps into a parenting role so their father is facilitated in failing even the most basic aspects of parenting is totally unreasonable.

Honestly, I'd be absolutely furious. Why the hell did he go off to a leisure activity if he hadn't managed to make a meal for his dc?

I do agree with you, but the nuance is already there IMO:

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 think that tells us everything about the situation at home from OPs perspective (without PP making things up), to me it sounds like he was busy sorting himself out and just didn't think about the kids at all, or purposely left it knowing OP would take care of it when she got back, or he could pass it on to the 15 year old to sort out when he left, any of those scenarios point to the fact he didn't see it as his 'job' to deal with.

I think him leaving it to her is the most probable which is why OP is so annoyed with him, whatever these changes are he needs to get with the program that whoever is in the house with the kids is the one responsible for those kids.

You don't think that if he'd been busy doing stuff for the family it wouldn't have been mentioned? Really?

His bloody 'hobby' better be more important than feeding his hungry child
what an arse to leave the child hungry
i hope you've stopped this nonsense from him

So if dad sat on the sofa from 2pm until 7pm and then went to his hobby for the evening that's OK to ask the teen to do the dinner?
If dad is busy no problem

I bet the 15 yr old didn't go hungry
you need to set some strong rules in this household
15nyr old and dh get set tasks

you cant do every single thing

At first I was skeptical, as frankly this is a sob story our kids would have given at 18yo ‘I wasn’t given any dinner’, yet the cupboard and fridge would have been full of food for them to rectify that 🤨. I used to tell them to contact social services and tell them their woes 🤣.

At 15yo, I’m not too sympathetic. On instances, they just need to fix themselves beans on toast or similar, no harm done and is good for them to do so.

However, on seeing the youngest is 8yo, I am sympathetic. I believe it’s reasonable for the 15yo to sort themselves out, but not to do a meal to feed a range of siblings young in age. Therefore, your DH is a dick and I would have read him the riot act.

What a selfish dick. Smacks of I’m alright jack, fuck the rest of you

I swear people here like to misread.

Who's reading the OP and the follow ups and thinking her 15 year old child is saying 'Mummy I'm hungry'? Clearly those are the words of a younger child who is also in the house - her menitoning her youngest and 'they' also confirms multiple children. Some of you would get stuck in a box without instructions on how to get out.

OP he's a cunt. He's parentifying your oldest to make up for lack of parenting. It's not the 15 year olds job to make tea when Daddy has been home for 5 hours and had plenty of time to do, you know, what parents fucking should.

Quite, the bar people have for their children is so ridiculously low. How on earth will they grow up into functional adults if we consider asking a 15 yo to bung a pizza in the oven to feed themselves and their sibling is unreasonable, and that disobedience is OK.

Dad made a reasonable request. Child disobeyed, Mum parented very poorly. She should have expected that the 15 year old would, without complaint, completed the very reasonable task as asked. Instead, she's teaching the 15 year old it's OK to disobey.

15 year olds should routinely be contributing to reasonable, age appropriate tasks, of which 'please cook a quick dinner for yourself and your sibling' is one.

She might as well be if she's setting the tasks. It's making it her responsibility still.

I never once had to remind my children's dad to feed them if I was out. I might have asked what they'd eaten but never if they'd eaten.

If I didn't leave explicit instructions, they still got fed. And I think he'd have been rightfully offended if I'd tried to remind him.

.

@Cosyblankets there is no rule that says you have to be "busy" with something productive to ask your children to do chores. You all live and contribute to the same home in one way or another, especially when they are older. (However in this situation it does sound like the DH is the one severely lacking in contribution)

Teens should not be treated like Cinderella either though. If dad had plenty of time to make dinner before the children were home he should have done it. To me it sounds like he is one hell of a faffer and a procrastinator - who on earth takes 5hrs to "get ready" for a hobby.

Given we don't now the exact circumstances, this could be perfectly reasonable.

However, knowing it hadn't been done, it wasn't reasonable of him to go out at 7pm knowing the 8 year old hadn't been fed.

Yes. Obviously not every day. But if Mum or Dad ask that the 15 year old make a simple dinner for themself and their sibling from time to time, for any reason whatsoever, that is perfectly OK.

15nyr old and dh get set tasks

I feel sad for people being given this advice, 15 year old, absolutely, they do need to learn about what is expected of them, and probably have set tasks to complete as teenagers are selfish fuckers at the best of times.

But no wife should ever have to set her husband the 'task' of feeding their children in her absence.. it just goes to show how useless and selfish some people are.