No help, DH self employed, how does everyone do it with baby?

[NurtureGrow]

Hello,

Ive been trying to find a solution for this and not managed. We have a baby under 1 year old.

My husband is starting a business and usually starts work around 6am-6pm. So he can’t help in the morning. He also sometimes works a day on the weekend and has physical training to do for some hours on the other weekend day. I don’t have time to arrange time out on the weekend with others, and I want to spend time with him and our baby.

I am grateful my husband does sometimes cooks us basic evening meals, about 50% of the time.

But I do around
85% cleaning at least
95% maintaining house (fixing things/getting things fixed, improving, making repairs)
95% gardening
100% baby cooking / food prep
50% cooking for our dinner

We have no family help. I’ve probably been able to leave our baby max 4hrs with my mum in 1 year and they were very disrupted, (her coming to ask me things.)

My husband needs time for his business and says in 2 years, it will be clear if it’s working.

In the meantime, I am just not keeping up with everything. How do people cope and do this?? We have a cleaner every 2 weeks for a couple of hours. We can’t afford a babysitter or someone to do the garden.

I’ve thought about buying a chest freezer to try to meal prep for the next 2-4 weeks over 1 day. I’ve also thought about seeing if someone would do a skill exchange, I cook for them, they fix things in our house or garden. I feel there must be a way and I haven’t found it. My husband and I have recently been getting stressed and arguing, I don’t want to live in this way.

I know we all have the same number of hours day. How do people manage / any time saving things etc?

Thank you x

I’m on maternity leave and will go back in a couple of months

I feel there must be ways for me to do better with everything :(

There's 3 issues here, firstly while you're off on mat leave, the division of home labour seems OK. Are you getting the same free time? Zero hours each is the same.

Secondly, do you have an extremely big house, tricky baby or high standards?

Thirdly, once you're in back at work, your H needs to do more.

I found when the kids were young some stuff just wasn’t done as much. We didn’t have a cleaner so the house just wasn’t quite as I’d usually like to keep it.

Decorating for example. My youngest is now 6 and I haven’t repainted the house we moved into 5 years ago… it doesn’t matter.
I know it’s not the best but some stuff you just need to let go of. We don’t have time or capacity to do it.

We’re in the same boat. No help and we both work, just stick to what needs to be done.

I socialise at hobbies sometimes in the evening, at 7pm once DH is back and everyone is fed etc. Might you be able to do this to get some time to yourself?

Why is house and garden maintenance taking up so much of your time? An hour a day should be more than sufficient unless you live in a palace. Ditto cleaning.

Your husband needs to work out time
in his schedule as well

Why does your house need fixing/repairing all the time?
If you have cleaners in every 2 weeks then isn’t it just the high traffic areas that needed cleaning
in the evenings after the dinner is done, what do both you and your husband do?
You can’t afford babysitters? What’s your childcare when you go back to work?

it is a slog when kids arw little and there is no other help. People just “survive” rather than thrive. Do you think your expectations are too high?

How does a typical day look for you OP?

Try to make the most of your mat leave & do fun stuff with your baby.

A long time ago now but my DH worked long hours when DC were young and was out 7-730 most days, traffic dependent. My typical day was something like:

• up at 7, wash, play, eat
• playgroup 930-1130
• home 1130-230. Baby napped, a little laundry & food prep and a sit down for me
• 230-430 meet friends / family at someone's house or park , tea, cake, chat, DC play
• 430-7 tea, bath, stories, bed
• 7-8 dinner with DH, he would then tidy up
• 8-1030 telly then bed

On the weekend DH would run the mower round and change any light bulbs. That was sufficient!

Thank you, we live in a small house.
I guess we get similar zero hours free time, but my husband gets quite a lot of time away, I find this difficult as he chose to make a business in 2 countries. So whilst he says it is for work, it involves him being away quite often. At one point he was away for work every other week for a couple of days.

Maintenance takes time because things break and I don’t have time to do it. My husband says he can’t see it and doesn’t know what to do. The front wall a few bricks are now loose (mortar) and dangerous, shower handle is broken, toilet seat broken, back door step broken, bath panel broken etc.

I don’t get any time for gardening. It’s very messy. I barely get time to cook. @RimTimTagiDim i wish it could take 1hr a day! Maybe I need to dedicate 1hr to this… it’s just all building up… @Noshadowsinthedark yes, I wish we could decorate, especially our babies room. But don’t have the time.

What will happen when you go to work? Will baby go to childcare?
are you planning to work full time?
it’s reasonable you do more as you are off work but your dh should pull his weight when he is not working.

In terms of house I would stick to basic level cleaning - tidy, pots and laundry daily. Then cleaner can dust/ clean bathrooms . Then just hoover weekly and charge beds.
id do bare minimum for garden.
Try to make sure you both get a bit of free time to relax each week, does your dh ever have baby solo? Do you do bedtime together or take it in turns? Is baby a good sleeper, do they nap?

When you return to work your dh will need to do more, he doesn’t just get a free pass because of work.

Personally,

I didn’t do any gardening and the garden was a mess

we ate quick and easy food or stuff I could sling in the slow cooker in the morning

the house got dirty.

bluntly, it isn’t possible. Either you buy in help, dh does it or it doesn’t get done.

Sorry if this is an annoying question but what it is you feel you’re not keeping up with, specifically? You have cleaners so the house can’t be in too bad a state, batch cooking is a very good idea indeed and I’m sure your children are happy and healthy, so I’m stuck on what specifically the issue is.

That is not to say, however, that I don’t understand how bloody brutal it is when you’re on your own (but not quite!). My husband is also self employed (as am I, same business but I do just one day a week in the office… with the v young kids in tow 😅) and at the moment is gone by 7:30am and doesn’t get home til gone 10pm every night. One day off in the last three weeks, so it’s every morning, every mealtime, every bathtime, every bedtime… it’s tough. I have to let some things go.

My priorities are happy kids having fun experiences, relatively healthy food (batch cooking and slow cooker both very handy!) and a semi tolerable level of cleanliness in my house (you have a cleaner so that’s a bonus!). DIY and repairs fall a little by the wayside (although we don’t seem to have quite so much going on as you?) and if they NEED doing, I hire a handyman, free time is a distant memory (but I remind myself often this isn’t forever and I’ll be soon bereft without my babies 🙃), the gardening, although it PAINS me as I was incredibly garden proud before, is a jungle, a wildflower haven, if you will… you just have to accept you cannot do it all, all by yourself.

@Chewbecca thank you, it’s kind of like that, without the clear structure and I do struggle to keep up making plans to go out, but I try as much as possible.

@Truetoself yes, I guess I’m trying to ‘thrive’ rather than ‘survive’ I don’t like not being able to improve anything, whilst things just get worse in the house..

”in 2 years it’ll be clear if it is working”

Not a chance I’d be letting this happen. He needs to get a real job. He can take a 2 year sabbatical to see if he can run a business, when it is better for the family.

If he’s working 6am-6pm, that still leaves evenings for him to help out around the house. You are also working 6am-6pm and beyond, and you manage it. Don’t let anyone gaslight you in believing because you are on mat leave, all the man has to do is go out and earn money.

His weekend physical training can take a back seat. Point out he can do just as much physical work by doing the garden and the housework.

Essentially he has already checked out of family life. Don’t be grateful for the crumbs of him cooking half the time, it’s the least he can do.

What does your day look like? Some of those jobs are doable with a baby, and some aren't.
I don't clean for an hour a day, don't have a cleaner either. Do a couple of hours on the weekend and a wipe round in the evening.

What's baby's routine?

When your husband says he can't see it, what does he mean? Like he literally can't see a broken toilet seat?

Also! I have to say, strong routines help me massively. So every evening, I do a half hour of cleaning/tidying before sitting down, I do at least one load of washing (washed, dried and put away) every day, dishwasher runs at least once a day… if I don’t stick rigidly to doing these things, they simply do not get done and the wheels fall off the wagon swiftly!

@Hercisback1 Yes he literally can’t see the broken toilet seat.

The problem with a cleaner a couple of hours twice a month is by later than day or the day after it is messy again, because my husband will come in and leave it messy. I feel like I can’t cope… because I leave it clean and it isn’t again. And I’ve said how important it is to me. I just never expected to not share division at home. He says he needs time for the business.

im amazed some people only need 1hr for cleaning, how do you do it!

Sorry I can’t reply to all, as need to race now before the baby wakes, but I’m grateful for any suggestions. I feel like there is a way to be more organised probably and then crack it..

@Hercisback1 I think it doesn’t help our house is small, so I can’t leave a pile of things anywhere.. ie after each meal I need to clean/ wash/ put away

When you go back to work, which childcare will you use, is it a nursery?

I found as I had to pay for nursery for my 3 days a week I worked even if I was on leave, I’d sometimes book a day leave at get stuff done. I got 5 weeks pr to 15 days plus bank holidays. So I held 6 days (2 weeks) for family time off (in practice we only had one week away together), 6 days in case the baby was sick and couldn’t go to nursery (in practice only needed this 2 times as he kept helpfully being sick on my non-work days) and then budgeted the rest as mental health breaks for myself. Remembered booking a day off to go to the tip with a pile of crap I’d been meaning to sort out for a year.

if you will be going back to work in a couple of months, is there any budget in your family finances to book one morning a week in the childcare you’ll be using when you work to give you some breathing room between now and then?

Oh seen your last post, you have the problem of a DH who is adding to the work load, not sharing it. He absolutely can clean up after himself.

Few marriages survive once a woman works out her life would be easier as a single parent than still married to him. Careful asking yourself that question.

With regards to not seeing repairs.. I’ll literally say the back door step is broken (bits are falling off, damp is likely to get in.) he won’t know what I’m talking about. We’ll go and stand and stare at it together and he still won’t know and I’ll have to explain what is wrong.

The same when a roof tile was falling off (I sorted that quite quickly.) He also says he can’t see the dirt. He likes it when clean, but doesn’t know how I do it. I’ve shown him many times. The thing is, he is a very decent man, emotionally tuned it, but this makes much more work for me.. and I’m just not managing well with it

@FancyBiscuitsLevel That’s a good idea with childcare. I will be going back to work 4 days a week full time. Maybe I can use the childcare vouchers / funded childcare before starting back at work for a few slots before going back to work.. not sure if that’s allowed.. 🤔

@NurtureGrow he does see it he just doesn’t care. He is running a business which is successful so he is perfectly capable of doing so he just lets you step in

cleaning isn’t hard we can train kids to do it

i think yiu need to have a long hard chat

This is the issue. You DH needs to put more effort in at home, even if that means reducing working on his businesses by an hour a day.

Presumably you are taking care of baby 24/7? I have a four month old and most days I literally can’t put him down, he just screams. If I put him in a sling, he screams and thrashes. It’s not as simple as “wife is at home, wife can do the cleaning.” Often babies simply won’t let you! You may also (like me) still be recovering and feeling very physically weak, and extremely sleep deprived. So, again, it’s not like you are sitting around at home in the same physical health you were prior to having a baby, and twiddling your thumbs!

My DH works full time, then does the majority of the cooking and cleaning the kitchen. I try to clean the rest of the house (with varying success) throughout the week, and cooking when I finally get the chance to use two hands!! We both do laundry as it piles up.

Then at weekends DH will look after baby and toddler so I can do the DIY (I am the DIYer, he does the meals!).

I don’t think it’s such an issue that he can’t see the need for repairs, but he DOES need to recognise that he isn’t seeing what’s in front of him and he needs to trust you when you say something needs doing, and then to work as an equal partnership with you to get it done. It’s all about teamwork!