Managing change in chores etc from mat leave to FT work.. what works?!

[Bizzyone]

Hoping to learn from peoples experience here!

Baby 1 due soon and I will be on mat leave for 12mths. Until this both myself and DP work full time and chores have been shared equally up to now (admittedly with him doing more of the maintenace type DIY stuff and me more laundry/cooking etc but all other chores like cleaning, shopping and dog walking split evenly)

I guess Im wanting to hear how other people split tasks 1) whilst one partner is on parental

God sorry phone is messing up!

1. while one parent on parental leave and
2. managing the transition back to both working FT after that... eg any difficulties people have had going back?

Sorry for split thread!!!

It will change throughout your leave if your baby / life is like ours.

First few weeks - he did EVERYTHING apart from feed the baby as we really struggled with BF and it took up so much time

After that - he did me breakfast, made me a sandwich in the fridge and did a lot of cleaning / tidying as house was a disaster zone. I would usually manage to get most of dinner / shopping done.

About 6 months - I was in the swing of things a bit more so took on more of the cleaning etc

I then went back part time and it took another 5 years and another baby before we got anything like back to equal chores.

Husband did most housework, most cat care and all cooking except my lunch. I tried to do all the laundry (including cloth nappies) and I got mine and baby's lunch, always tidied up after us in the day and on second mat leave did all school runs and homework help for oldest child whilst I was off. I breastfed both of mine and co-slept so did more of the childcare in the early months even when he wasn't at work. He did what he could though like nappy changing and baths.

Both working full-time was fine with one child. After the second though (plus some extra caring of an older relative) it is quite busy so I am trying to go 3 days a week.

Newborns take up so much time (especially from mum) so my husband had to start doing way more than his fair share of housework when the baby arrived. I could do maybe a load of laundry or some other small task each day. As the baby got older, I did what I could during the day, depending on how much time I got while baby napped. The rest of the housework we split in the evenings/weekends.

Now that we have a second baby, neither of us ever have any time to do anything (I am constantly with the baby, he's got the toddler) so we are both trying to cram in the most urgent task whenever we can. It's hard enough just feeding and bathing everyone (ourselves included) let alone doing chores 😅

If it is 50:50 now, how does that work? If you’re the kind of people who see a job and do it, it will probably be seamless. You might pick up more on leave or you might have a hard day OH picks it up when they’re back from work and it doesn’t have to be a big deal.

If you have to rota chores or delegate, that might be a harder task.

Similar to previous posters, initially on may leave initially DH did everything, then as the baby got older I did more. When I went back to work, there was definitely a period of readjustment as DH had to do more. As well as the existing chores, you have new ones at that point - lots more clothes to wash, sorting out stuff they've outgrown / getting bigger stuff, possibly admin / sorting stuff for the next day at childcare.

What I found harder to get back to a more equal split was I took over more of the admin side while on mat leave with DC1 as I had more time and DH has always found a lot of that sort of stuff quite stressful. 7.5 years and 2 more DC on and I'm still doing most of it...

Bit of a mix really! Cooking we have set days due to working hours, laundry I often do on my WFH day, he always does the bins and kitchen/hoovering/mopping we both do before bed each night (german shepherd means it's daily task that!), dog walk is whoever isnt cooking... I guess it sounds regimented but its not set in stone we are both pretty good at picking up slack and doing what needs doing as and when..

I guess Ive naively assumed Ill be doing more while on mat leave and don't want him getting used to it as I'll then be going back to FT work, but sounds like it will all be bit chaotic once baby arrives etc so guess we just roll with the punches as and when it happens?! 😅