to expect DH to do half the cleaning?

[cinnamonbun]

Just a little survey to see how much housework other mums are doing compared to their DHs to (hopefully
) back me up next time my DH and I are arguing about who does what in the house!

I'm on maternity leave at the moment and have a 7 month-old who can be pretty high-maintenance sometimes. We have a one-bed flat. My husband works full-time. On a daily basis I do the shopping, cooking, washing-up and laundry (on top of looking after the baby of course). In the evening I bathe and put DD to bed. What I'm wondering is, AIBU to expect DH to help me clean the house on the weekends? I just don't know how to find the time during the week! What do you think?

I think I'd be slightly aggrieved if I had a SAHP (when I worked full time) who waited for me to get home then insisted we split the housework 50/50. No matter how hard children are to look after you can still shove a wash on, or stack the dishwasher, purely from the fact that you are actually at home. I think staying at home does include doing some housework (not all but at least some) - it's not a sexist attitude, applies to both men or women.

Dh and I work full time so end up fitting the housework/cleaning around work which sometimes is annoying and sometimes we have bursts of productivity! We should get a cleaner but haven't got round to it. He tends to do less cleaning but is good at changing linen, taking out bins and has got a lot better at cooking .

I mean waited for me to get home then insisted we split all the housework 50/50 iyswim (having had none done at all during the week)

Exactly foxinsocks!

I don't think anyone on here is saying that having children is always easy, and I certainly don't know where Earthstar gets the idea from that 7 month olds typically sleep that much during the day because mine certainly didn't!

However, this is the 21st century - people aren't boiling up water in the copper to do the laundry by hand and sweeping all their carpets with a dustpan and brush! Most of these jobs really don't take that long, and it's entirely reasonable that the person at home, if there is one, male or female, does them. Even with 3 pre-schoolers, I managed all the basics while on Maternity Leave. While the baby is small, you can pop them in a sling while you do a bit of housework, and once they get to toddling age there's numerous ways you can involve them in helping. Give them a dustpan to 'sweep' while you hoover, of their own pile of little clothes to 'handwash' or let them stir mixtures while you're cooking. All normal stuff!

If you're both working outside the home, then of course housework should be shared, but if one person is at home, then they should be doing most.

One thing no one has mentioned yet, is probably the most fundamental aspect of going out to work, which is the fact that you are having to meet other people's deadlines and targets. It isn't just being out of the house for 10 hours a day - it's the pressure of delivering, and the more high powered and responsible the job, the more that's the case. That's the reason that when I get home from work now, I need at least 20 mins to sit down and mentally unwind (our children are older now and so can just ignore me!). However hard looking after children is, and yes, physically there were days when I was knackered with 3 pre-schoolers, you never have to meet someone else's targets, or have the pressure of going out to work. At the end of the day, if you have the occasional 'slob' day where you stay in pjs all day and eat sandwiches, no one is going to judge you, least of all your children, who will probably love it now and then.

No wish to paint a negative picture about work - I wouldn't be without my job - but I think sometimes when people give up and stay at home full time, there's a danger of forgetting the realities of working like, and falling into the trap of thinking it's easier than being home all day with children. Unless you have a dead simple no pressure job - which these days is unlikely - it isn't.

I experience the other side of this situation - I work full time and my DH is a SAHD. And you know what - I still feel like I do most of the housework and I resent it. If I ask him to do something, he will (eventually) but he never spontaneously does anything. I honestly think it's just the age old difference between men and women.

thesecondcoming - I hope you don't think I was suggesting being at home is jeremy kyle and vegging - I wasn't. It's hard work.

I'm sorry you're being so hard on yourself and putting yourself under so much pressure, but I don't think it has to be like that. I entirely agree that the lack of money and mental stimulation can be a pressure in itself - and the latter was a key factor in my decision to return to work after maternity leaves. But you're not under the same pressure of expectation as you are when you go out to work. No one is going to give you a written warning or a disciplinary if you aren't somewhere on the dot of 8.45 am, or if you haven't got a report written to meet a deadline, or if you produce a substandard piece of work.

When you're at home, there may be occasions when you feel you aren't doing a great job, everything's a muddle, and that other people do it better (though to be honest I think parenting is a bit like that whether you're home or working!). But the point I was making is that no one else is judging you, least of all your children. You are still the best mum in the world to them, whether you're in your pj's still at 4 o'clock, and whether you burn the fishfingers! Probably the greatest responsibility of going out to work is that it isn't like that. Yes, you may get the odd coffee break, and can even go to the loo unaccompanied! But the pressure to earn a living, and carry the responsibility of doing paid work should not be underestimated. I would have felt I was being very unreasonable if I'd expected my DH to do half of everything at home while he was the only one earning the full wage and I was on ML.

I think most posters talk about a bigger house and more than one child.
In OP's case is one baby and 1 bed flat. No multiple floors, no stairs, no second or third bathroom! One bed flat!

I think they are both BU if they argue about hoovering and dusting one bed flat. And 'daily shopping' for two people? I think you just need to get a bit more organised.

For mummywoowoo and curlyhairedassassin who didn't understand my post her is more explanantion!
Baby sleep requirements
here

The average baby between 6 and 12 months requires 14 hours sleep. Obviously individual babies may need a bit more or a bit less. Presumably your baby will be asleep when you get your 7 hours sleep. Therefore in a 24 hour period, there will be 10 hours when you and your baby are both awake. During this time you could focus mainly on playing with the baby rather than on housework.

That leaves a further 7 hours each day when you are awake and your baby is asleep and needs no attention from you. Which hours these are depends on your baby's routine and on when you choose to go to bed yourself. As an example you may have 1.5 hours in the morning (naptime) and 1.5 hours in the afternoon (naptime) and 4 hours after your baby has gone to bed but before you go to bed. If you use the daytime nap times (in this example 3 hours in total) to do your cleaning, laundry, online shop and cooking then this should be enough to complete the chores for the day and the 4 hours in the evening is your own free time to watch TV, chat to DH, mumsnet or whatever.

If you prefer to take free time during the day then you can do the housework in the evening - you make your own choices as suits you best, but the point is that you have 4 hours of free time to take in evening or the daytime because the chores simply don't take up 7 hours a day for a couple and a baby in a 1 bed flat. If you think they do take 7 hours then why not list them with time estimates because it seems weird to me that it could possibly stretch to 7 hours of chores a day?

Just rofling at the idea of a baby sleeping 7 hours during the day. Neither of mine slept seven hours in a full 24 hours when they were 7 months!
And even if they did sleep 7 hours a day, how the hell can anyone find enough housework EVERY DAY to fill 3 hours Earthstar? We have a cleaner once a fortnight who does three hours and she does a proper clean on the whole, 3 storey house in that time.
I remain bemused as to how much housework other people think is essential.

I do most of the housework but when he comes home from work, everything is split 50/50

Earthstar - what the 'average' baby does, statisically, isn't really very useful because babies often don't conform to any particular pattern! And once you have more than one, their day time naps don't always coincide despite your best attempts!!

I worked for months to try to get my youngest two to coincide at least a bit, and then just as I was getting there, my youngest gave up all daytime sleeps at 12 months! I kid you not! Never had a day time nap again - even if his 2 yr old sister did!

I do agree though, that it's easier and fairer for whoever is home to do most of the household stuff. I can't believe the big deal some people make over housework. It's not that hard!

My 4 month old has 3x20mn naps in the day time. She also catnaps during feeds (and hates it if I do anything else while feeding because it keeps her awake, so no chance to do anything while feeding. She feeds for 20 mn roughly once every two or three hours. So she is sleeping 1 hour in the daytime, feeding 20mn every three hours from 8 till 10 ie roughly 2.5 hours during the day. That's 1 hour total downtime but in 20 mn chunks, and 2.5 hours where I cannot move from the sofa. The rest of the time, she is awake and needing entertaining. At this age you cant just hand them a dustpan and brush and let them "help". I am working full-time from home and frankly I would go nuts if I didn't have my au pair to help with her and my cleaning lady for 4 hours a week.

Anyway, your maternity leave is not your husband's chance to not do any housework. It's your time to spend in a 1-1 with your baby. He's being an arsehole unreasonable. He makes the mess as well and should be taking his part in cleaning it up.

clemette I agree with you that 3 hours should be plenty to do the housework per day - I am just trying to illustrate why I think it is suprising that the OP doesn't have time to get it done in the week.

Even if the OP has an unusually low sleeping baby then the baby will still sleep 10.4 hours according to the evidence cited in my previous post so it seems very odd that your babies slept less than 7 hours in 24 hours clemette? Do you and dh need very little sleep too?!!

If the OP's baby only sleeps 10.4 hours then there will be under 7 hours of time when the baby is asleep and the mother is awake, unless the monther sleeps less then 7 hours IYSWIM. The longest sleeping babies sleep over 18 hours a day however. OP, how many hours in total does your baby sleep?

Sadly, both Dh and I would LIKE ten hours sleep a day. We GET five. You can't actually make a child stay asleep (how many do you have by the way?) In fact, I would go so far as to say that if a 7 month old was sleeping seven hours during the day then they weren't having enough awake time to eat/develop properly. In all my time working with babies I have yet to meet one that fits your description.

It's by the by really, because it assumes that when a baby is asleep then the mother should be doing some form of housework. What the mother should be doing is sleeping (to recover from night feeds), eating and having a bit of a break. If employment law states that paid workers need to have frequent rest times, then so do unpaid mothers.

Ok, just to clarify: My DD takes 2-3 naps everyday, totalling about 2-3 hours. 7 days a week I:

do the shopping (yes, everyday)
tidy and clean the kitchen
do the dishwasher
do the laundry
make purees for DD
cook lunch & dinner
give DD a bath and put her to bed
& obviously play with her & take her for a walk

As I said before, she tends to be need quite a lot of attention so I rarely manage to do anything for more than 5-10 minutes without having to attend to her. This is why I leave hoovering, dusting and cleaning the bathroom for the weekend (yes even though it's only a 1 bed-flat). Our DD is a very bad night-time sleeper and I still BF her every 3 hours and she wakes up inbetween as well (might start another thread for advice about that) so I do feel I need a break during the day to cope with the sleep deprivation.I don't mind doing all the other chores every day of the week and let DH rest when he comes home from work. BUT I don't think it's fair that I should on top of this have to do the hoovering, bathroom and dusting on the weekend.

Earthstar, you are making me laugh. These "4 hours after your baby has gone to bed but before you go to bed" are all for chores, are they? Cooking and eating an evneing meal could fall in the "chores" category I suppose, although I don't see the time it takes to eat a meal with my husband and chat over a glass of wine as a chore! But where do we fit in showers and baths for ourselves? Uninterrupted phone calls to friends and family once the baby is asleep? Or god forbid - reading a newspaper!!! Or sex, FGS! All that has to be fitted around the extreme likelihood of resettling a 7 month old at least a couple of times since they were first put to bed, taking up to half an hour at a time potentially.

For me, my babies could only be classed as being asleep in bed properly at about 7.30 or 8pm if we were lucky, then it was time to finish the tea off, eat it, have a general tidy up, do the other things I've already mentioned above (not the sex bit every day, like, LOL!), and by that time it was gone 10pm. A late enough bedtime for any adult who knows they are probably going to have to get up in the night once or twice, and up early in the morning too.

I just can't work out your timings, Earthstar. They just don't seem based on real life and actual families.

Anyway....

But curlyhairedassassin the actual timings in the example don't matter, the main point is that there are 7 hours in every 24 when your baby will be asleep and you will be awake, and you can do what ever you choose to do with that time, and there should be plenty of time for housework, eating a meal with your dh, having a shower, having sex, whatever you like. If you choose to do your housework in the evening then you have more time for other stuff earlier in the day. If you do your housework earlier in the day then you have time to yourself in the evening.

The whole point is that being at home with a 7 month old baby should allow for getting all of the housework done whilst the baby is asleep and for several hours of non-housework whilst the baby is asleep each day as well.

I hsven't said that you should be doing chores for 4 hours after your baby goes to bed - au contraire, I think 3 hours is more than enough on chores each day and if done earlier in the day there is no need to do them after the baby is asleep, surely?

If your baby won't settle then you will be spending time with him from your 10 hours of "baby awake" time and will still have 14 hours of baby asleep time to sleep yourself and then spend as you choose. OK you can't make robust plans always about the exact timing of your "baby asleep" time - I am not claiming that, but you will still get all of the time in total.

By the time DH gets home from work, I am frazzled. Not from housework, but from melodramatic DD and clingy DS!!! I don't want DH to do the cooking, cleaning, dusting, hoovering.... I want him to LOOK AFTER THE KIDS BEFORE I GO MAD!!!!!!!

So, I am more than happy to do the vast majority of the housework (which I try to do in the week if possible). In fact cooking the dinner in the evening without DS trying to open all the kitchen cupboards, and without DD trying to 'help', is just heavenly.

Whilst I am cooking away I can hear DH playing with the DCs, who are so happy to see him after he has been at work all day. Everyone is a winner IMHO!!!

Would still like to know how many children you have Earthstar. Your above post doesn't really acknowledge the fact that MANY babies don't sleep for 14 hours in 24. I know I am being pernickety (sp?) but when babies are over tired and not settling this is time when they "should" be asleep so counts in their sleep time.
I know this doesn't really help OP, but I shall now try to imagine life with a sleeping child and still work out how much I could get done.
Wake and milk feed/wash dress baby 6-7am. Breakfast and play with baby 7-9. While baby naps get showered, dressed, make-up on, have cup of tea, bung load in washer. 9-10.30.
Outing 10.30-12.
Home to cook lunch, give to baby and clean up chaos of kitchen floor 12-1.
Settle baby for nap 1-1.30, baby naps 1.30-3 during which time mum eats/phones energy company, sits down for half an hour, hangs washing out to dry and puts another load on.
3-6 Play/tea/more play with baby.
6-7 Bath and bedtime.
7-8 Cook and eat dinner.
8-9 Watch TV whilst ironing/ have some sort of "me" time.

All hypothetical of course (OP says she has a baby who doens't like to be put down/left and I had two of those) but still can't see the three hours of chore time...? haven't even considered trying to fit sex in!

I work part time and have in the past been a SAHM. I believe that if you are a SAHM then your job is to be a mum not a cleaner. I devote all my time to providing quality play/experiences for my children. In fact, if I ever do decide to do chore during the day, I feel guily as this was not the point to me being at home with the children. I do clean when the children are in bed/weekends. What my DH and I usually do is both clean the whole house together for 2 hours sunday morning (say between 8am and 10am, leaving the rest of the day free for family activities). Obviously we need to hoover/clean the kitchen etc during the week but this is done when the children are in bed. They go to bed at 6.30 - we can have the chores done by 7 if we both do them together. So we share the housework 50/50.

earthstar- where would you fit in several hours of housework and other stuff if you had my baby? (whose routine is in my last post). Just wondering. The only way I can do several hours housework and other stuff each day with my 4 month old is by having several other pairs of capable hands to help me.

I'm thinking you must be a man, actually.

Keresley- I really don't see why you need to feel guilty about doing chores when your DCs are awake. That's life. They presumably have toys (and each other) to play with, so why do they need your undivided attention all the time? I think it is a good thing to encourage your DCs to play on their own, for say 30 minutes each day, whilst you get one big chore done (clean bathroom, dust, hoover). And if they are old enough they can help IMO. My DD loves helping to clean (maybe a little bit too much as I regularly fidn that the tumble dryer has been switched on with 10 wet wipes inside, or that the TV has been wiped with a wet flannel!

Obv I got things very wrong.

sex with DS

ewwww obviously meant sex with DH

classic!!!