My friend needs to buy more childcare - how I can help her see this?

[CanIHelpMyFriend]

I've namechanged for this as I would hate anyone to identify my friend.

Background is that my friend's DH is a super high-earning overachiever. They are quite old parents of two primary-aged boys, one of whom has quite significant SN. My friend is a SAHM with a lot on her plate (for reasons I don't want to go into for reasons of identification) and absolutely no family support whatsoever. Both she and her DH are demanding types, both on themselves and on others, with very high standards in everything. I think they made some sort of pact not to ever have a nanny; she manages a large and very glamorous home, with lots of entertaining (including long-stay guests) with the help of a PT Filipina. She and her DH are currently at breaking point, both accusing the other of not being helpful or supportive enough. Her DH cannot cut back at work for another three months (and even then it won't be significant). He is well into his 50s and often goes to bed at 3am, gets up at 6am etc. He needs to rest more, and he needs to stop expecting his DW to pick up all the pieces all the time (and she does, brilliantly, but is at the end of her tether) and not complain that she isn't available enough. She needs time off for herself, and for him.

I have hinted that she needs to accept that she needs more help with her children so that she and her DH get a break for even half a day at the weekend, and she makes lots of excuses. She finds it very hard to let her children go - neither of them have ever slept away from home without their parents. But I fear that her marriage is at stake, and her DH's health is definitely in need of care. What can I say to persuade her that she and her DH don't have to be there every single second of the day for their DCs?

naturalbaby - I did say that one of her two children has SN, that she has a lots of long-stay house guests (frequently her DH's large family, from another continent that she both expects, and her DH expects her, to entertain to very high standards) and a DH who is totally overburdened at work and who therefore cannot (a) help out at all at home (b) would like - but doesn't get - extra nurturing from his DW himself.

i did read that, and nearly added a paragraph about how i worked with a family with a severely disabled child in similar circumstances. the child was nearly 18 by the time they recognised they needed help and support by allowing the SN child to have some time away so the couple could spend time together and with their other dc.

what i meant was, as other posters have said, if your friend has school aged kids then unless she is home schooling them she has a few hours a day when they are both out the house at school but it doesn't sound like she does get any time without the kids?

She doesn't get more than three-hour stretches without children, and she has a lot to accomplish in the time she has available. Though she manages her day during the week (albeit without any slack) and achieves a great deal - her issue is much more around the weekends and evenings, when her DH seems to think she should be able to stretch to getting out of bed to make him a hot meal when he gets in at 11pm and to being in several places at one time on a Saturday or Sunday.

well then it's down to her and her husband. if she wants to carry on pandering to her husbnad the way she is then so be it but if she's really at the end of her tether then she needs to be brutally honest with him. i went through a phase of telling my dh i absolutely cannot cope with things the way they are, something has to change or i will have a breakdown. so i dealt with it and made some changes.

from what you've said about her dh it doesn't sound like he'd take too kindly to his dw's friend telling him he's running his wife into the ground. i would be v.v.v careful about getting involved in their relationship issues.

OP, I still have very little sympathy. In the current climate there are people living hand to mouth, many of those with Dcs who have SN. Tough titty if your DF and her H have high standards, they will get over it. Or do something about it.

My DH very long hours, I have 3 children, 2 at school and 1 at home. I have my toddler in nursery for some of the week and low standards. We very rarley have nights out, time for ourselves at the weekends, we haven't been away for a weekend for 3.5 years, thats life, we are a lot better off than some.

No-one was asking for any sympathy! But, since you are so unsympathetic, do you extend your ill will to the people who will lose their livelihood if my friend's DH keels over and dies from stress and his company folds are as undeserving as the two of them?

"In the current climate" we need all the business leaders we can get (and their support systems).

OP, would I be right in thinking you're not in the UK, (apologies if you've already stated that or otherwise)and that the lifestyle you're speaking about your friends having is a bit off the UK radar? ) If this is the case, is this why the husband isn't in favour of additional childcare, because it wouldn't be of the "hands on" type we're used to in the UK?

If I've got it wrong, then I'll shut up!

One of the oddest things is that the husband is from a culture where there is a lot of domestic help for well-off families and came himself from a family where there was a nanny per child and lots of servants! I don't know whether it is a sort of reaction against this that is driving the issue of refusing to employ more childcarers. Though I think it may inform his deep-seated feeling that as a man he has a right to be served at home night and day...

Get over yourself OP.

This has actually made me quite cross. What a non-issue.

Why are you so worried about his attitudes? Yours are terrible.