DH won't keep kids at home

[WaitingForTheTsunami]

I'm pretty sure IANBU but have no idea how to resolve the situation, grateful for any ideas.

I'm a doctor in a specialty that is VERY involved in the current crisis. I am currently on maternity leave with DS2, and due to return in 2 weeks. Initially I will be working 3 days a week but expect that I'll be asked to increase to FT soon. I may even be asked to move out and live in accommodation nearer work to limit risk to my family/repeated isolations due to poorly kids/reduce commute between shifts safely.
Under ordinary circumstances, both DSs should have been attending nursery, and DH would have been doing the drop-offs/pick ups as it's near his work (I have a long commute and work long shifts so can't do it).

DH is not a keyworker. He works full time in academia in a subject which can almost entirely be done WFH (as he frequently does) but cannot be easily done while looking after kids - need to be able to concentrate for long periods to read papers, do statistics etc. He wants to continue to send the boys to nursery because he can't work at home while looking after them. Nursery seem to be happy to keep them based on just me being a keyworker, they haven't asked about him - in many ways it would have made the situation easier if they had refused to take them!. I would really prefer him to keep them home, as plenty of families are having to find a way to manage around this situation and it would be safest for everyone to do so. I'm not particularly worried about them catching it (in fact think we may have just had it - coming to the end of 2 weeks of feverish, coughing isolation) but about minimising spread as far as we can.

I've tried pointing out the government advice, the medical advice, appealing in as many ways as I can, but he wants to continue to send them to nursery unless it's legally or physically impossible. Ultimately as he is going to be responsible for them while I'm off to work, it has to be his decision and his responsibility so I can't force him. What can I do to persuade him?!

Your kids should be at home.

Tell him to suck it up and deal. He can't prioritize his non key worker job over their actual lives.

I work in a field that is highly male dominated and am on coference calls daily with plenty of men that are working around caring for kids either because their partners are key workers or both are trying to work from home. This includes both people in very senior roles and also highly technical roles requiring concentration fwiw.

These aren't super-woke men either tbh - just people that recognise that current situation requires compromise. It helps IMO that my employer has explicitly and repeatedly stated that this is what they expect with home working at this time. Is your DH's employer being similarly supportive?

I’m an NHS key worker, DH isn’t (academic), DC at home with him. Simple! Although to be fair we are in Scotland and both parents have to be key workers to get childcare places.

Won’t things get more fucked by putting others at risk even your own kids potentially passing it onto other kids in the nursery who then pass it on to other family members?

@AnotherEmma that's another reason I'm less happy actually - our regular nursery is closed (temporarily) and they've been merged with another branch of the same chain in our town. They aren't allowing parents into the rooms for handover any more so we would literally be passing them in at the door to mostly strangers, as not many of our regular nursery's staff have moved over. We have no idea how many other kids there are or what their parents do.

Thankfully our immediate family are all healthy. Our parents less so, but we haven't seen them for several weeks and they are following the isolation rules for the elderly. We have all been in isolation for 2 weeks after DS2 had a fever and cough, and I subsequently had a very similar illness, and now DS1 seems to have it. So they can't go at all till next Friday anyway, by which time the situation may have changed yet again.

It has been suggested that staff with young children move out and live in hospital accommodation to avoid both taking the virus home and having to isolate repeatedly if their kids get symptoms. Haven't decided yet if I want to go down that route, it would be very hard.

@Amazemae on an overall level, yes. But if DH ends up in a MH crisis and can't look after the boys so I have to take time off work to look after all of them, that's not exactly a brilliant option for us as a family. That's why I have to play it carefully and let him make the decision rather than bully him.

he gets very stressed when trying to juggle too much - has had to have time off sick previously when he's basically just fallen in a heap after a big deadline.

Oh bless. I bet you’ve never been able to allow yourself this luxury have you? I wonder how he’d manage if he couldn’t rely on you to hold it all together while he languishes in his heap?

Why on earth would he have a mental crisis because of having to do extra childcare?! As long as he adjusts and reduces his working hours, he should be fine.

"We have no idea how many other kids there are or what their parents do."
We asked our nursery for this information as it was a factor in our decision. We didn't ask for job titles of all the parents just whether any are frontline HCPs.

@AlexaAmbidextra bingo. But that's a challenge for another time.

@AnotherEmma - not because of the childcare itself, because he would really struggle with the conflicting demands and stress of (lack of) work. I'll suggest again he talks to them about options.

The way you talk about him suggests that you mother / manage him a bit.

Lots of men are very good at strategic helplessness, it suits them to let a woman pick up the pieces.

I think that's an abuse of the keyworker system. Just about everyone who still has a job is now struggling to do it from home. He is in the same position as many. How many people is he happy to die to make things easier for him? Would he sacrifice his own family like this or just others?

He would struggle with the conflicting demands and lack of work he was able to do?

Does he put work above his children and you? You are needed and play an extremely important role with your work. His work doesn’t come anywhere near what you will be doing in the current crisis. He sounds blinkered and selfish.

If he can't cope with parenting and work then maybe he should take some leave? A few weeks AL and then unpaid parental leave?

I’m an academic: every singe one of my colleagues has kids at home. Thins involves research, meeting deadlines, teaching students remotely on Zoom and Panopto. Even those academic colleagues with key worker partners have kept kids at home.

I'm astonished at all these 'men' who can do big, demanding jobs ... but insist that they can't watch their own children or cope at home without being given specific instructions.

Learned helplessness ... or just can't be arsed to pull their weight at home.

To be clear, I think he would be perfectly capable of looking after the kids at home. What he can't do is handle doing that and trying to work, even though plenty of people are doing just that. Or won't even try, which is what annoys me most.

I do mother him, I know. I hate that it's developed into this over the years but it's not going to be fixed overnight either.

Work will have to fit around looking after the children, the same as for the vast majority of parents. He is not in any unusual positions and needs to act in responsible ways like everyone else. If he's not a key worker his work can wait if needed can't it?

Why won’t he even try? Has he not had a day since the children were born where he had to juggle everything? If so, why not?

Not a good idea to have any more children with him.

@Amazemae not since DS2 was born, because I've been on mat leave so have always been around and co-ordinating things. He's had them both for the occasional day with no problems, but not while also trying to work. That can't be terribly unusual?

Don't worry, there will be no more children!

If he can't work and look after them then surely the obvious thing is he needs to reduce his work?

He needs to understand now that your role as a doctor is vital and his most important job right now is to take care of the children and house so you can go to work.

In all of this is he supporting how hard things will be for you? It can be hard enough going back to work after Mat leave but you are going back to work in the frontline during a pandemic. If he is overly reliant on you for the mental load (which reading between the lines it sounds like he is) then he may assume that you are the strong one and be a bit too focussed on himself at times. Could simply saying to him that you are worried and need his support work? That it would take some of your worries away if you knew your children were at least home and safe with him? You will be focussed on your job which is a national priority at the moment and the stress that comes with that, you are the one that’s going to be needing emotional support when you come home! I can understand why you are worried about going through that and coming home to him being unable to cope and trying to lean on you even more.

I think he needs to contact his employer and explain your role and that with young children he is going to have to make adjustments to what he can do and when. I think employers originally have been taken by surprise with this and so maybe their expectations initially have been too high of what is achievable working at home with young children.

Could he perhaps set aside some time in the evenings that he can schedule to work when either you are home or when the kids go to bed in addition to whatever he manages during the day with the kids? Or he works the days you have off? Do you know any of his colleagues and what they are doing?

It's going to really worry other nursery parents and staff if your children are there are they perceive an increased risk of infection because of your job.

I think he needs to push back at his employer for a bit of flexibility and reduced expectations during this time.

Very good points from OPTIMUMMY