I want to stop resenting my husband for how much he works. But I can’t! What should I do?

[Pinkduckyellowduck]

I have three kids. My husband works from 7am in the morning until 8pm every night. I work two days a week. But I manage everything there is to do with the house and our kids during the week. He takes over on the weekend (playing with the kids, anyway - he doesn’t touch the cleaning or washing etc, and resents it when I ask him to). But I am sick and tired of feeling alone! I never signed up to be a housewife, but I am one.

He’s a great dad when he’s around. Lately, though, I actually hate him. He comes home and I can hardly look at him.

We’ve talked about how much I dislike our balance so many times. He always promises to do what he can to change things, but nothing ever, ever changes. I bother to talking to him about anything now. I KNOW he can’t help his working hours. That’s his job. It’s well-paid but we’re constantly on the edge of being broke and can’t afford for him to work less.

I’m just not sure where the joy is in our relationship. Two weeks ago, we got a babysitter and just bickered all evening. I don’t like him anymore and I don’t know why. I think it’s because he’s made me into a housewife - and I never wanted to be one. I buy everyone’s clothes, I cook all the food, I do all the cleaning and all the washing, I do the school runs, I do every single piece of life admin there is.

I don’t know why I’m posting. I have no one in real life to tell, I suppose. And maybe venting?! But hoping that someone has been through the same and come out the other side?!

I fantasise about leaving him, because if we split the custody of the kids 50/50, then he’d actually have to participate more than just playing with them during the weekend.

But it's interesting that on the thread the other night where female op was complaining her dp didn't support her in regularly working until 10 at night, everyone was telling her to leave her dp because he wasn't on her side.

I'm sorry your message is conflicted. On one hand you want him to work less, on the other you say you're both cash strapped. What exactly is it you wish him to do?

And no one made you into a housewife. You must have known the situation before having kids and agreed to drop your hours.

I get you're unhappy but blaming him for a situation you proactively agreed to, taking no personal responsibility and wanting him to change something but needing the money is not ok.

Well you don't have to be a housewife. Work five days a week and hour someone to do the house work.

** I think it’s because he’s made me into a housewife - and I never wanted to be one

This is how I feel. I work 4 days a week yet still fulfil that role. DH works long hours yet without being well paid.

I hear you.

It sounds like he needs to find another job, or change his attitude to his current job. I work full time but I prioritise seeing my children so always leave on time and do flexi time to start and finish early. My manager is a woman and she also does the same - as a team manager there's no need to be there before the first person arrives and after the last person leaves. That's just wasting your own free time and giving work more of your time for free.

If he's being paid 9-5 he should work 9-5 because otherwise he's devaluing himself and reducing his own hourly rate.

Not sure if it's true but I heard somewhere that in Germany people who work late are seen as a bit incompetent because they can't fit their work into their working day. I take this approach.

Unless he's working for himself, why give so many extra hours for free?

What do you think he'd do or say if you gave him an ultimatum.....? Be home more, help around the house or it's over?

Pinkduck I agree that you need him to have some inkling that change is needed and be willing to do it for any kind of efforts to build your relationship again to work. It’s sounds like your DH doesn’t have that.

I think you’re right about how it’s come about- how his parent’s were. My DH’s folks were the same. However he knew his mum was often very unhappy- she was on anti-depressants for a while when he was a young teen.

When I started getting unhappy he did manage to connect the dots (with a bit of prompting). Is there anything in his family background like that that you could make the link to?

Matilda I knew a couple where they took option 3. He had a heart scare in his late 40s and she said “You won’t make 55 if you go on like this”.

He finally listened, quit his job (they did have enough money for that- he was a partner in one of the big 4 and selling out his share pretty much set them up once they downsized house). He took up exercise, started eating healthily instead of endless flights, hotel food and business dinners.

I’ve seen other people change gear after big life events like the loss of a parent.

But I don’t think waiting for a health scare or a bereavement to make him wake up is exactly ideal.

What about if you worked more so your financial situation was less precarious and required him to be home several afternoons a week to do all you do now? My dh and I both work full time (normally, I’m on mat leave now). The past year though I worked away 3 days a week with a long commute so I left the house at about 5:30am and wasn’t home til 7:30pm. No one would dare have called me a bad mum for that, but because we both worked full time I stilly had to pull my weight at home. I cooked dinner and did the school run the other 2 days a week, did much of the kids washing, food shopping and meal planning. Your dh should be pulling his weight in the evenings after he gets home, can still hang up or put away washing, help with meal planning, washing dishes, food shopping, entertaining kids in evenings and weekends. But if you work more then it creates more possibilities for a less demanding career for him and evens out the responsibilities so it’s not all on you because you’re at home.

Do you enjoy the job you do two days a week? If you do, could you increase that (or another job) and pay a cleaner to do all the mundane cleaning/washing/ironing etc? Pay a childminder for nursery pick up and after school. That money should come out of the household account - not your wages. But you'd feel less of a housewife and more 'yourself'.
Also tell your husband to be home by 6pm on a couple of specific nights because you have a class/night out/gym.
Do a 360 here - this isn't what you signed up to. Rock him out of this complacency.

Why should be it his responsibility to change. They have three children, each one would have been a decision point for both of them, her having equal if not more say, she also willingly reduced her hours to care for them, a decision that had to be made before she proceeded with each pregnancy.

Now she doesn't like it, says he made her a housewife and he should change?

Eh no, she's a grown up, she should take some personal responsibility for her decisions and change her life accordingly. Increase to five days a week, find a different job, but she should do it. She's the one now unhappy with her decisions.

my DH works those hours including a commute into London. We also have 3 very young kids. Doing all the housework and school stuff yourself is rubbish. But I work and use my salary to help pay for help... a cleaner, we send ironing out etc. Other ways we cope are batch cooking so there’s always a meal in the freezer etc.
I don’t resent my DH - he’s fab with the kids, always plans fun weekends and reads to them before bed each night.
What exactly do you want your DH to do? If his working hours are a dealbreaker then tell him so and see if he can work less.
But maybe you could change this situation yourself... you don’t want to be a housewife so don’t be one! Work more, use some of the cash to pay for help.. get somebody to come in who does the laundry/changes beds/empties the dishwasher.. whatever you need. Is that an option? I’m not sure what your job is

OP - you said that you work two days - and dislike doing everything at home.
If you picked up more working days - that’ll force him to take more of s role in the other, non-Disney dad activities.
No?

ChristmasTablecloth - that poster didn't have any dc. Massive difference.

But they were planning to have dc. And actually I don't think it is that massive a difference. If you are someone's partner you generally want to spend some time with them in the same way that any children might want to.

It depends If his work changed since having the last kid fair enough, not fair enough if she knew this was the deal...

If you're always on the brink of being broke I don't see how he can work less.

I also think that, if he's working 13hr days, it's fair enough that you do the housework and childcare during the week.

I do think he should do more on the weekend.

But really, if you don't like the drudgery, work full time and the household finances should be able to stretch to childcare, a cleaner, an ironing service.

If you both worked full time outside the home he wouldn't be able to avoid doing 50% of what was left.

Of course it makes a massive amount of difference, Christmas!

The enormous amount of work that children bring with them is falling totally on the shoulders of the op!

So hold on, you work 2 days a week and he 5 days and you do 100% of the childcare and housework? With this mix his income isn't enough to support your family?!?

I'd go back to FT and tell him you will stop working and be a housewife once he earns enough. Until then he needs to get with the program and share the burden of childcare and housework.

The enormous amount of work that children bring with them is falling totally on the shoulders of the op

Well of course it is. He's doing 13 hour days, she works two a week, the question is how this occurred. No one has three kids by accident and it's a surprise to find themselves working two days a week,

Having a cleaner for 3, 4 or 10 hours per week doesn't really make a dent in the domestic work required to keep a family of 5 ticking over. If your husband never empties the dishwasher, changes a bed, organises a child's birthday party, books a family holiday, goes to parent's evening, accompanies a dental appointment, does bed-time reading, books Scouts or music lessons, does an online shop, books the ironer, changes the towels, finds school holiday childcare, organises playdates or any of the other hundreds of jobs women just pick up - then that is shit. Even a live-in housekeeper wouldn't really cover it properly on the whole.

Assuming the OP means he leaves home at 7am and returns at 8pm I doubt he's working 13 hours a day, possibly 11, what about weekends, he's does sod all then either.

christmas I agree it's more than what a cleaner can do. It's also not healthy for DC to grow up in an environment where one parent does everything in the home while also working 2 days a week.

I wouldn't put up with this for 5 minutes. He thinks he has it made.

I think he needs to do a little bit more... but not that much more. He should probably empty the dishwasher or take out the bins or something in the evening and do a bit more washing and cleaning on weekends. But he is working long days and OP is at home. I think that the real solution lies in figuring out whether it would be viable for OP to work more.

But as the wife of someone who is rarely home before 10pm, I am sympathetic. It's not the most fun way to live.

so he works from 7 till 8pm presume he get his tea when he comes in take him to 8.30 then you want him to start cleaning washing and ironing . them he must be up for work at 6ish .think weekends are the key you need to share jobs then. In out house the person at home does everything 1 of you is working in the home and 1 of you going out to work