Anyone else feel that being a dad and sole breadwinner is a lousy deal?

[SpareWheel]

DW and I are SITCOMs (single income, two children, oppressive mortgage). I work crazy hours and race back work half-done to see the kids a little bit before bedtime then try to finish off work and fall into bed. At the risk of sounding like a whinger, I feel like I'm becoming a crap employee, crap husband and a crap father all in one - surely I'm not the only one...

Bowlby who is usually cited studied children taken from both parents and placed in homes. It's the same effect we all know children suffer where both parents die or they are sent to live with strangers during WWII or shipped back to boarding school from India here aged 6 not to see a parent for a year. Terrible consequences for most children but those studies are wrongly applied to children of working parents.

Why do I think women should work? Because they should be contributing taxes to the country, showing their children a woman's role is not in subservience to men cleaning shopping cooking and serving but instead leading the nation etc. because couples get on better where they have similar lives and interesting; because children are better off when there is more money around to fund schools fees and opportunities for them and to pay a cleaner so their mother can play with them not scrub floors ... because work is fun and for me leaving the children was a huge relief (at home is boring domestic slavery I can't imagine any man or woman actually wanting to do) and seeing them again lovely too when you get home from work. For those mothers who really hate the separateion and fathers too then may be you won't damage the child by being home but don't assume stay at home motherhood gives you some kind of halo.

Instead consider it might damage as much as benefit the child and then if you do it from choice fine but never do it because you think children benefit.

slimmerjim - I'm talking about people with children at school. What do they do all day?

Xenia has had a hard life so she bangs this particular drum unceasingly .. and its getting so borrrring

yes we all know you believe mothers who don't work are scum of the earth .. but do give it a rest Xenia

I don't think its Xenia who should give it a rest, I think it's Manuka. How offensive to claim that working parents are wantonly causing psychological damage to their children? And claiming not to judge when you've just made a statement to that effect is just covering your own back.

FWIW my mother worked - as have most mothers throughout history and across the world given SAHM and dad in the office is a very recent and Western innovation - and I don't have any problems forming relationships. Ridiculous.

My daughters have been loved and looked after and supported by their childminder, that's for sure.

I have to say I don't think just lecturing the poor bloke on how he should move and/or be Poor But Happy is the right tactic. I would hate to have no financial security. And if you live in London most mortgages are damn oppressive. And oddly enough 'just move then' is not terribly constructive for a lot of us.

Well, I only suggested changing his situation because I did and it worked for me.

I do think the fact he's so miserable he's posting about it means he wants to think about ways out of his situation. And I know about London mortgages...

I didn't mean you, Edam, I meant some of the more berating posts below.

Changing situations, definitely, I personally would recommend.

We all have to work or make sacrifices.

I don't feel sorry for men who go out to work (unless theyre in a job they dont like in which case only they can make the choice to change jobs so i can only have a certain amount of sympathy)

In our personal situation we both work, Im a cm and he's in IT one day I hope he earns enough money for us to not worry so much about money and hopefully i can relax the hours i work without worrying how we will pay the bills. He definately doesnt have all the stress of money worries.

He's still home by 6.30pm everyday and doesnt work weekends (very occasionally he does and yesterday he went to a corporate football match so was out most of the day for that which will do his career some good i hope) He can never book a day off without having to do some stuff on his laptop or answer his phone this is a small price to pay for being home by 6.30 everyday sometimes earlier.

I don't want to change his work life although in a year or two i will expect him to earn more money so we can not be so stressed and pay off more debt's.

I wish my work situation would change and i could work more hours whilst still being with my children. That would be the ideal solution for us at the moment but you can't pluck customers out of thin air.

I wasn't feeling got at, particularly, just that it is worth thinking about not staying in what has become a trap. Because I was sure I was stuck but took the risk of trying another option (mainly because I had helpful friends and got some life coaching, tbh, which sounds v. flaky but having an outsider asking you 'why not' makes you really think rather than just coming up with excuses.

I completely agree. I made that big jump some years before having children - in fact I was deeply unhappy about the fact it didn't look as if I'd have children, and I felt I might as well take 'advantage' of that fact - and have never, once, regretted it.

sparewheel, who sorts out the finances and ensures the bills are paid? do you share it equally or not?

I ask this because IME this is another burden, especially if money is tight. It is also a reality check. Is your partner under the impression that any wages of hers contribution would not make much difference to finances?

If you are struggling to pay that massive mortagage and you are the one balancing the books, it can be a source of huge stress and take up lots of brain space, which will impact on your ability to be a good employee and parent. And make you personally unhappy as well, of course. (I have to disagree with frayedknots view of this).

If you partner is not involved in bill paying and is ignorant of where the money goes, I think you are having a rough deal. At the very least, can your partner take a big share in sorting out monthly finances? A worry shared is a worry halved, as they say.

When my ds1 was a toddler, I was the only breadwinner and also the only one to sort out the bills. It caused me untold sleepless nights. I had two jobs, one from mon- fri, another (running a market stall) at weekends.

Crunch time arrived when:
I woke up tired every morning and frequently forgot what job I was meant to be doing until I had checked the date.

I was at my stall one day and had a panic attack and heart pains and couldn't move for 10 minutes.

My husband phoned me at work from the park where he was enjoying an afternoon with our son, along with a preditory single female acquaintance of mine (who also happened to be trying to start an affair with him).

In my case, I had a solution. True, we lived in London, but it was possible for us to move to a cheaper part of London, reduce our mortgage and release some equity in our house.

If this is an option open to you, and you have reached breaking point, take it, is my advice.

Edam- I wasn't claiming not to judge! I said I was aware it was wrong for me to judge! Because yes I was judging!!

slimmerjim's story: "a former close friend who's like me a sahm used to insist her dh came home "to help get xxx to bed" if they were going out together for the evening...so the poor guy would trot home to the suburbs to read their toddler a bedtime story, then off they'd go to a restaurant or whatever, often near his central london place of work...bonkers."

I've never experienced anything like this, as DW and I have always brought in about half the dosh each and everything has always been equal, including house and garden work (before children too). But it strikes me that some blokes are pretty henpecked if they actually let their DWs get away with stuff like this. Why didn't he say, "NO, I am NOT going back into bloody London tonight! I earn the bloody money, let ME make the decisions!"

UD: I'd say it was more about logistics than about who earned what. Because WOHPs only get by, usually, on the labour of someone based within the home, whether that is paid support or a so-called 'non-earning' parent whose labour makes possible the capital brought in by the other.

Oh, and if my (male) partner, who now - but didn't always - earns more than me dared to cite his earning power as part of a decision I'd bop him one. I never, ever, did this when I earned more than him and I would be flabberbloodyghasted if he tried it with me.

Oh, OK Manuka, so you are judging but feeling bad about it? Hmmm. Guess that's better than out and out smug judging.

motherinferior - I know, I was being provocative again! I still think he could stick up for himself a bit more. if you earn ALL the money it's a bit much to be pushed around like that.

In the time when I wasn't working and DW was, if I'd tried anything like that I'd have got told to shove it!

(And if a partner told me he was in charge because he earned the money he wouldn't be a partner for much longer. I never dreamt of saying anythign like that to dh when I was the bigger earner.)

Couples work out for themselves how they deal with those issues but without doubt in many marriage if the wife or husband is earning huge amounts that does have an impact on the power balance between them which is one reason it's better if like marries like and you keep your similarities in earnings, work etc. rather than do what in effect amounts to rocking a small rowing boat of a marriage by one opting out of earning at all and the other earning a lot.

I would never 'smug judge' anymore because I've learned I'm just as much a c**t as everyone else!!! I more 'angry judge' which is no doubt just as bad!!!
This is a very heated debate. If you want a laugh to cool down check out the hilarious video link I found! HERE!

DH slightly resented the fact that I could change from being a full time worker to a part time worker when DCs were born. He would then have liked the possibility of being able to do the same if he had wanted. I resented the fact that I was being shunted into less responsible work (nice little part time job syndrome). Now I work practically full time and longer hours than him for about half his pay. He has capitalised on his professional experience and does only the type of work he wants and can disappear from work to sit on committees of the middling great and good. There's no perfect formula - unless you don't want DCs at all (which we both think would have been very sad).

I was the breadwinner for a bit and yes the pressure got me down, but Dh was ill so that was that. Now he is whilst I study, and when I qualify he will be off to university whilst I earn. It can work as an exchange thing, if you're creative. Whilst at Uni he will properly set up the little business he's been fiddling with for a few years now, and get out of the job he's in as most people in it die early from heart attacks (often in the office- that says enough really).

Its about being creative I think and making bargains. just because one aprtner gives at one point doesn't have to mean that'll always be the way.

Yes, picking up on Lilymaid's point, I have at times deeply resented the fact that my hours have been more circumscribed than my partner's. I very, very, rarely do work-related evening stuff and I've been away for work precisely twice since DD1 was born over six years ago. Which annoys me.