Husband walks in from work... what does he do? How do you feel?

[Seenyouontele]

I'll kick off...
My husband walks in from work, he kisses the kids, walks into the kitchen before hovering around me and following me around telling me about his day as I prepare dinner. I keep asking him to not stand infront of particular cupboards as I'm in and out of them. He's oblivious.

The kids are going "mum, mum, mum" but DH continues, in a world of his own... I feel tense and stressed. I feel overloaded by my senses and switch some bright lights off to counterbalance the noise. I feel angry, frustrated, heavy, so heavy. I snap.

He then stops and apologises for "going on," scoops up the children and listens to them for 10 minutes before going for a 20 minute shit.

Meal time arrives and he comes just in time to set the table. The children begin bickering for our attention, DH hasn't noticed as he eats his meal like some sort of ravenous animal, staring out of the window. I suggest DCs take it in turns to speak to us, this goes well. DH is still staring out of the window. I eat my meal without even noticing, I'm eating far too quickly, I feel tense and nauseated as I'm tryingto pay attention to DCs and eat my meal but all I really want is peace. I turn off the lights, switch on the lamp, softer lighting my be what's needed here.

After DCs have finished talking, I breathe a sigh of relief and start to enjoy the first 2 seconds of silence, before DH snaps out of his trance and says loudly, "you'll never guess what X said today? Let me tell you!"

I feel like a sponge.
Everyone offloads on to me.
Who do I offload on to?
I finally begin speaking about my day after dinner and DH starts playing on his phone. I feel used and unheard, unimportant, taken for granted. I tell him, he says "sorry, what were you saying again?" And slides his phone back in his pocket, but I can see his eyes are looking straight past me, he's noticed a parcel with his name on on the work top.

I get angry later on when we're tidying up when he puts something in the wrong place, I overreact, calling him "useless." He calls me "mental" and I start thinking I am too, but deep down, I know the tension in my stomach all started from the moment he walked through that door.

Once every couple of weeks, I get a genuine migraine right after school run, he has to take over for the evening as soon as he walks in and I go to bed for the whole evening. It's like my body just has to rest from the stress of meal times and DH.

I'm not looking for advice on my situation particularly, but I would like to compare my experience of DHs arrival from work with others. My DCs are 7 and 3 for context. I work school hours 3 days a week from home, so I'm always lumbered with this post-school, post-work drain of an evening.

My husband flounces in, yells, "Honey, I'm home', I've bought dinner" and hands me a bunch of flowers. He gets the children to help lay the table, pours me a nice G&T with ice and a slice, hands me a cold compress for my forehead, then after dinner plays board games with the kids before bathing them, putting them to bed,running me a bath and doing the dishes. He never takes long in the bathroom and always keeps it sparkling clean after he uses it. Doesn't every man do this??

@peak2021 as an aside as it’s not relevant to the op, but you do realise that not all occupations can work from home. If the boss says they want you in, what do you propose workers do? It’s literally go in to work or hand your notice in. Many people can not afford this option so have to turn in to work each day.

@Hugoslavia

My husband flounces in, yells, "Honey, I'm home', I've bought dinner" and hands me a bunch of flowers. He gets the children to help lay the table, pours me a nice G&T with ice and a slice, hands me a cold compress for my forehead, then after dinner plays board games with the kids before bathing them, putting them to bed,running me a bath and doing the dishes. He never takes long in the bathroom and always keeps it sparkling clean after he uses it. Doesn't every man do this??

Mine did this, and more!

In my dreams😂💯👍

Sorry if I’ve missed this but when does he come home? Can you feed the dcs before then eat with him, with him participating either cooking or washing up or at least setting the table.

The shutting himself away to watch films is intolerable. There are so many new boxed sets and series now to watch together. We particularly like geopolitical procedural dramas

If he is working in the summer house and spared a journey, even less reason for his behaviour than if he was in an office with nasty colleagues and having to drive on roads with all the potential killers in BMWs and Mercs that are sadly allowed to have a licence.

Bit of a drip feed that he's still in the house OPm

I used to work with a bloke that complained his wife wanted to talk to him the minute he got in from work. I often wondered why he didn't just suggest a few minutes to himself.

I have sensory stuff. Requires a lot of self-care. Sounds like you need to change things around a bit. Work out what will help, tell him.

The whole MN issue of "drip feeding" drives me mad. Nobody can include every single detail of their lives in the OP.

And I also don't think that him being at home on a working day makes much difference anyway.

Goodness mine is very different. Dh gets home early and comes and talks to teen ds's and me, all of us. Or he arrives with huge shopping bags. He does jobs. I sit. Then I make dinner. Then we sit and watch tv, and check our phones, and chat, for 2/3 hours before going to bed.

@B1rthis

Tomorrow you could do this: Tell the children that when their father comes home, he's going to be making dinner with them so they need to look in the cupboards at what they like. You hear your DH engine and you put your coat on. As soon as he opens the door "oh, the children have been so looking forward to telling you about THEIR day!" And walk out. Get in the car and say "I'll be back soon" and take a drive to a supermarket, where there's no signal in the shop. Buy non-perishable items and take the long route home. Don't arrive back until at least 8pm. Go into his hobby room, and try out his hobbies. Leave him with his children. Have a bath and a glass of wine. If he dares to come in and ruin this, just talk at him about your trip to the supermarket.

This is a really great suggestion.

OP, he sounds selfish, lazy and self absorbed.

Your marriage is on the way to being over, and I certainly wouldn't blame you.

Your headed is melted and I remember it well.
However my husband was hands on the minute he came in the door, and hr has a very high pressured job.
I certainly don't think it was always easy for him after a hectic day, but he did it.

He seems utterly consumed by himself and is avoiding any real parenting.

It's not working for you because he is just so absolutely unaware of what is in front of him.

You need to ruthlessly make things less comfortable for him by doing nothing for him, and absolutely insist he parents his children in the evenings as suggest by @B1rthis.

I think he needs to be shown clearly how serious this is.

He sounds very very juvenile.

OP, tell your partner how you feel overwhelmed without being accusational. Maybe he can't read your mind.
On the other hand you sound very annoyed with your life and somehow think he is using you.. Get a job, pay for a cleaner and childcare. It might improve how you feel about the situation

Your DHsou da like my abisive ex to be honest.

I too felt comeoletey overwhelmed and overloaded snd was expected to be offloaded into. He would also disappear to the bathroom, complain about his step son, pop to the neighbours (for an hour at a time) etc etc etc. I ended up having a breakdown. I lost my children.

Just to add, OP, that before I realised I was autistic, my relationship was suffering from the fact that my DP didn't entirely understand my reactions to things (and I didn't either so I couldn't explain or negotiate with him) and I didn't really understand why being a family had to be so bloody difficult and blamed him for a lot of that, and we did go through a bad patch, which coincided with the kids being small and needy, which is a difficult time anyway. Being diagnosed helped a lot, because it was clearer what was to do with personality or was a choice, and what was actually unavoidable and had to be managed somehow. It also helped us identify the actual sources of difficulty and find solutions to them, instead of getting bogged down in a general sense of non-copingness, which led effortlessly to a sense of grievance. We understand each other much better now and have an immeasurably better relationship.

Edit: I've just seen your later post @Seenyouontele. We suspected one of our sons is autistic, and I did a lot of reading to try and understand it. It was how I found MN actually, and I found here a lot of material about how autism presents differently in women and older people, and it was like a lightbulb moment for me. I read Aspergirls by Rudy Simone (there are masses of books about autism in women now but that was about all I could find then) and it felt like she'd been spying on me it was so acutely relevant. I talked to my GP, who is one of the good guys, and he referred me to a neuropsychologist for diagnosis. My son and I were diagnosed about the same time in the end. With retrospect, there's a lot of it in the family, but it was always dismissed as being introverted/intolerant/fixed/hysterical because it wasn't understood properly.

If you want to chat by PM, I'm very happy to go into more detail off the thread.

I would say I sometimes have days like yours.. especially when it's my day off and DH has been at work all day. Sometimes i feel overwhelmed by responsibility, chores., work etc etc and I haven't got anything left to give my husband at the end of the day.
But we also have days where DH comes in and takes over, cooks tea for us all and sorts out the kids for bedtime etc.
I work 13 hour shifts and on those days my husband has to do everything for himself, the kids and a full days work and perhaps he feels a bit resentful if it's been a long day and he's stressed out.
What I'm trying to say is we probably all feel like this some days, but if he's really this oblivious and unhelpful all the time then you need to sit down and talk to him about it and redefine your roles within the family - tell him he needs to share the mental load.

@Seenyouontele

B1rthis Your ideas work perfectly, I already know this because I did it, just before Christmas. For a few weeks, he had his set evenings with DCs and I had mine. I stopped washing all his clothes too. I felt a LOT better. Then Christmas happened, we had a generally nice Christmas together and we've slipped back into this routine again. Although the separate evenings didn't stop over Christmas. It's sad, but I think you're right, I maybe have to demand that we go back to separate times with DCs. I would eat with them alone most evenings and DH would eat upstairs (I still made a meal for him) and I felt a lot lighter.

Revert to this.

OP WORKS 3 DAYS A WEEK and clearly juggles the two children.

Despite WFH he is completely unavailable.

OP, he is clearly taking the piss.

I feel sad reading this because it is exactly what my relationship was like. We are separated now. Basically once DC came along I was "mummy", as the OP says everyone off-loaded to me and I was never heard.

I'm so envious of people describing a true partnership at home. I had to stage manage everything house or child related. A role that didn't suit me.

It must be great to feel like a unit. Good for adults and children alike.

he apologised for 'going on' when he tried to chat about his day? Poor love. He sounds nice and you sound depressed - speak to your GP.

Before I returned to work from maternity DP would arrive home, pick up DS, chat/ play with him, give me a kiss. Then he takes DS to the bedroom and plays and usually puts a Mr tumble on for DS while he changes into home clothes etc. I’ll sometimes go in and chat or sometimes finish jobs etc. Then one of us will cook and one play with DS. Then we eat together with DS and all catch up.

Generally it’s nice and I enjoy him coming back.

Evening wise after dinner one us baths DS while the other clears up / sorts everything out and then we read books with DS together then DP says goodnight to DS and I do bedtime (DS is breastfed still).

He works shifts and I hate the evenings he’s not there as it’s lonely when DS is asleep and it’s just me, although I get chance to chill / watch what I want etc and I get some time off in the morning.

Now were both working full time DS is desperate for me when we get in so DP cooks while I catch up with DS then he does bath and bedtime together until I feed DS to sleep.

Of course we sometimes have stressful evenings just like you, but it’s not always.

DH is wfh. He used to come downstairs are standing in the kitchen wittering on while I tried to juggle the kids (aged 4, 1) and getting in the way while I was trying to dish up. I spoke to him about this and he changed. Now he comes downstairs and keeps the kids out of the kitchen, get them to tidy up the playroom if needed and keeps them out of the way until I tell him it’s time for him to wash the kids hands.

Can you maybe start dinner before he comes home? Some one pot/slow cooker meals? Then you could sit and listen, concentrate and share with each other for 15mins or so. Then ask him to amuse children while you dish up?

Maybe he goes to the other room in evening because he senses you want to be left alone?

Shake up the routine a bit and see? I haven't got a partner so everything is on me. When the children were young craving time alone was constant so I understand that need to be left alone a while.

Those who don't have someone who talks at them rather than to them just won't understand the difference. You have my sympathy op I have someone similar in my life, in my case though I do know there is an end date coming up so it's a grin and bear it. It's completely bad manners and appalling behaviour. My time isn't important, I'm at their beck and call everytime they need to off load. The getting in the way in the kitchen when I'd already started cooking is so fucking annoying and disrespectful.

My worst time was when DH was working in London. He got home on Friday night and it was all go, Saturday was nice and Sunday was the build up to him going back and usually ended up with some sort of disagreement or full on row. I hated it.

If I get home first DH comes in gives me a kiss, usually picks DS up gives him a kiss asks how my day was, we usually chat a bit about what DS did at nursery or with my mum, then we'll both talk about work or whatever has happened that day, what's been on the news etc, while playing/messing about with DS. I then start on dinner for us (DS eats earlier) and he takes DS up for a bath and bed while I tidy round if DS has been at home with DM while we've been out at work. Then we eat dinner together, chat about whatever, sometimes listen to a podcast while we eat and chat about that, DH clears the table and loads the plates into the dishwasher (I put the pots in as I dish up) then we watch TV for a while or both read and then go to bed, mostly at the same time but not always if one of us doesn't have work the next day and wants to stay up a bit later. All pretty routine and boring I'm afraid. Sometimes I'll do bath and bed and DH will clean/tidy and put dinner on but mainly of it's just something to go in the oven or reheating batch meals and cooking some rice/jackets etc, he's not much of a cook. We both work full time over 4 days so we both have DS one day in the week. I do have to ask him to turn it down a bit sometimes as he can be quite loud after work and in all honesty I think his hearing is going a bit......

It sounds like you've fallen out of love with him and drifted apart. I can't wait for my DH to come home.

I wonder if this is situational and how people have been bought up. As I'm of you mum was a house wife and did everything you may tend to do this out of habit. Where as a full time working parent may not have time to do all the chores?...

But ultimately I think if you dread someone coming to your home I'd change this.. especially as it's your husband. For both your sanity's