IS IT WRONG FOR ME TO WANT DH TO HELP ME WITH THE KIDS AFTER WORK

[Toady]

Please can anyone give me their honest opinions.

We have three children, age 9, 2.7 and 7 months who are obviously hard work, stressful, but good fun. DH and I take it in turns each night and morning to get up so the other one can have a reasonable nights sleep. DH works from 9 - 5.30, and comes home about 6pm. From 6pm - 8pm we are generally tidying up etc and then putting the kids to bed. If all goes well we can actually sit down at 8pm.

I would never arrange to go out earlier than 7.30pm/8pm because it would obviously be hard work for DH to put the kids to bed on his own after a a long day at work, is it wrong of me to expect DH to do the same for me.

Right ummm... think we need to a definition here.

When your DHs say "normal blokes" what they actually mean is "back in the Victorian times..."

So "normal blokes" are actually "victorian blokes".

Oh, and hello Shhhh... Nice to see you

I agree twiglett "your DH is wrong .. it is normal for DH's to come home from work and help with kids and housework .. IMO "

BUT sadly not all blokes are like this. We have in our group, 3 (couples) friends with babies..sadly it's the mums who end up with them 90% of the time. DH & I otoh are the complete opposite and when dh is home the work is shared 50/50 sometimes even less for me to give me a break.

One of the coplues work shifts and most weekends the bloke volunteers for night shifts allowing him chance to sleep during the day so he doesn't have to deal with the baby . If she is working he doesn't think twice about leaving baby with gp's and meeting friends at the pub or match. Not my idea of fairly split.IMO.

Hi uwila..!!

I am glad its not just me, I know his mum did everything for him and his 4 brothers (all 2 years apart ) and his Dad never changed a nappy!

Also his brother works long hours, plays rugby, goes to the gym, goes running, goes to the pub etc and SIL just accepts it, she is absolutely lovely (too lovely ) but she is a bit of a doormat iykwim.

Im glad my DH is not like that, well tbh I would not be with him if he was.

Uwilla - yes we take it in turns having a lie in till 10am at the weekend (yipee) so that is good. Good idea about the 6pm thing once a month, be nice to have a break from the bedtime routine.

my dh gets up with ds and has an hour with him in the morning and then puts him to bed. Because I am with ds all day - I dont mind and appreciate the time to tidy up and dh misses ds nad enjoys that bit of quality time he has with ds. (saying that we only have 1 child so is a lot easier!!!)

so I dont think that it is odd that a man does this (when else during the week would he see ds?) Also Toady - you must work bloody hard with 3 children - 2 being so young! so you you have a long day at work too!!

Yes its bloody hard work but I would rather be at home than at work althogh there is some perks being at work - hour lunchbreak, fag breaks, making a cup of tea when you want to and then being able to drink it without it going cold, have got used to microwaved tea, one cup can last me 2 hours.

At the moment DS1 is out with granny, DD2 is standing in her high chair shouting for her dinner (in oven) and am feeding DS3 one handed out of jar

all's fun in the toady household..!!

It doesn't really bother me to be honest. OH is working away at the moment but I don't expect him to be putting DD to bed every evening he's home. When we live together all the time we'd share it but I'd be perfectly happy to do it alone and I wouldn't expect him to ask permission to go out (like I wouldn't ask him, merely check he's not arranged to do anything).

From your post it sounds as though you don't go out before bedtime because you don't want your DH to have to do it alone. I'm sure he wouldn't mind you going out occasionally before bedtime or even you having a bath or whatever while he's doing it.

Thanks everyone for your input, makes me feel better about everything, kids in bed now big glass of red and about to watch BB who is it going to be - Imogen and Susie I hope.