DH refusing to look after the kids whilst working from home!

[Beckyboo8]

It’s half term and we both work from home in senior management jobs! DH is in the bedroom working from home and is refusing to have the kids in the room while he’s working and he’s refusing to help look after them during his working hours! So I’m having to work from home at the dining table while having to look after 3 going children with SEN! I feel like I’m going insane already and it’s only Monday! AIBU to think DH should also help look after the kids whilst working from home?

I can’t put my children in a holiday club because of their SEN! The last holiday club they were in wouldn’t have them because they couldn’t manage their autism and their meltdowns.

Then either

You give up work so your job will be looking after the children
Or
He gives up work so his job will be looking after the children
Or
You both go p/t and take turns
Or
You pay someone else to childmind while you're both working
Or
You split up and then choose one of the above options anyway

Which would you each prefer from those options?

Either of you childminding while also working - or supposedly - is NOT an option. You are both being paid to work, not look after your children.
At the moment you're taking the piss and should be sacked frankly.

He doesn't get to just refuse. You have to have a serious conversation about this and if he won't budge, consider what this means about your marriage. In the meantime, encourage the kids to use the whole house, including his space. Personally, I'd install a lock on the office door and make sure I got in there first, or go out, so he had a day of the reality for a day so he agreed half was better.

OP I know you feel you have no choice, but FYI I would fire you for this if I found out. So unless you have permission, be careful

Why do yous not use annual leave?

Definitely.

Do you have set hours? Can you work in shifts or in the evening while DH takes the kids?

What childcare arrangements do you normally make in the holidays?

Hmm. I'm not convinced this isn't a reverse, or wind up.

If you are a 'senior manager' then perhaps you ought to have 'managed' this situation, or your husband, or both. Oh, and senior managers don't usually use so many exclamation marks (!)

You both need to use your AL for caring for the children. Taking it in turns will help cover a lot of the school holidays.

You need to find other solutions for any additional school holidays - maybe friends/family/nannies/childminders/unpaid childcare time off.

If he refuses to work with you, then I think you should tell him you’re going to get divorced and he can have the kids 50:50 and mean it.

It’s really unfair on your employers for either of you to be expected to do childcare whilst working.

If you’re having to handle it today, I suggest you leave the house and work in a coffee shop tomorrow and let him know what it’s like.

Your husband doesn’t want to pull his weight and neither of you should be working whilst doing childcare, especially for high needs children. I can see this must be so difficult for you but now is the time to go nuclear on DH.

Yes, I noticed that.

Are there any childcare providers nearby who could fit you in during school holidays? Ours has a lot of children off through the holidays as a lot are teachers& teaching assistants or just general parents who take time off during these periods. The unit actually advertises summer spaces due to a lot being taken out for the summer so I'm sure they could cater during mid term too.

Or maybe try some reliable teens, even for part of the day. Nice way for them to make some extra cash as they are also off. Do any of your neighbous or friends have teenage daughters?

If the OP is to be believed they're both in senior management.

Unpaid leave, a nanny, share the burden and use your annual leave. There are so many solutions but you are both choosing to hope it will all be fine and potentially endangering your jobs.
This will only get worse until the kids can safely entertain themselves or you just let them become screen zombies. So make a decision as a couple on what has to give.

Go work in a cafe. I'd be fuming if any of my team were doing childcare whilst we are paying them.

This is why companies are bringing people back - people are taking advantage. At my work, the parents tell me the after school clubs are shutting down as people flex WFH around the kids when they should be working.

OP none of that helps you as your DH sees this as your job to sort out. I don’t know what to say to that other than it would be a deal breaker for me personally. When I saw similar with fellow mums, these couples usually had other issues and long term divorced, especially as the kids got independent and the husbands were still useless.

In the meantime can you consider

• family help
• nanny
• au pair
• Reciprocal play dates?

Can you afford (from joint income) to have someone come in and look after them (at least fur a few hours). WFH and looking after DC at same time is not okay. What does he do with annual leave @Beckyboo8

School holidays are the least of your worries, OP. Your marriage is in the pits. Why do you accept this?

I have had similar issues - I have 3 children and younger 2 especially my son was sent home and not allowed back to multiple holiday camps, he escaped from one!

I had to leave my job take a big pay cut to work at their school to make everything work (although still difficult its less impossible) I hope you are able to have more success, before then I would pay a couple of local babysitters to entertain them at my house while I worked so they could cover for the times I needed to be on calls and meetings and I would be there when needed, and I would catch up on the rest of my work through the night when everyone was asleep. One thing I found that actually worked well was to work from a soft play for part of the day while paying for local babysitter / student to watch them or play with them, id get a lot done if there was good wifi, and it was a lot less chaotic than trying to keep them at home all day.

My partner is a builder so couldn't work from home and we needed the 2 incomes. Now I work at the school the holiday club at the school where we know the staff very well is fine for them to go to 90% of the time, but the staff know I am on hand if needed to pick them up.

You aren't being unreasonable in that this is an issue for both you and your husband to find a solution to though - the deal I had with my partner is that if it had been a difficult day and needed to get a lot done in the evening when he was finished work he would do dinner washing up and the stuff that needed to be done at home so I could get my work finished.

You have no right to be annoyed. He is working ans you should be too. Your employer is the one that should be cross with you for not having planned ahead.

if you have no AL t take, take time off unpaid if you aren’t prepared to arrange care for them

Your husband is right as he's being paid to work. Employers take a dim view of this.

You are also being paid to work so you need to sit down with him and have a proper discussion.
What would you do if neither of you wfh?

If OP can manage to work whilst looking after the children, then their needs are not so great that they need a super expensive specialist carer. Maybe a LSA from school might be able to help? With 3 children, holiday clubs are not cheap anyway.

You're both being paid to work not to look after children.

So, what's his solution then? If he doesn't want to work and do childcare, who does he think can have them?

@Beckyboo8 What is each of your annual leave allowances per year in weeks?

Pre Covid when homeworking wasn't' such a big thing, every working couple faced this challenge. But more extreme as we had to go into the office.

You have to arrange childcare. Clubs might not be possible but you need to pay a babysitter or a nanny to look after them. It's not possible to work and look after kids at the same time - regardless of whether your partner is helping.

It's expensive, but it's not optional.

Your DH is being very unreasonable for not working with you to find a solution ... but looking after kids while working is NOT a solution.

You both need to use your annual leave, and possibly some unpaid parental leave to cover the shortfall.

I would also consider whether your job roles would allow you to ask for some flex during school holidays. For example, could one of you log on early, then take a long lunchbreak, log off early and then work back the extended lunch break hours after the kids go to bed? The other could then do a half day by working during the long lunch break and between 4-6pm. A day of childcare covered with only half a day of annual leave. You could also ask to compress your hours into some longer days so you could each have a day off per week having done 5 days across 4.

Ultimately it's not your employers problem that you can't get childcare, so you shouldn't be letting it affect your work. The money saved on holiday club can help fund unpaid leave, or you could get a nanny service?