Husband stressed by me working FT

[ThatsNotMyPinkUnicorn]

My husband isn’t a bad man at all. He’s kind, certainly generous, supportive and patient.

But I do think we’ve fallen into some bad habits. To give a bit of a back story, I had a run of bad luck job-wise when we met, and to cut a long story short I ended up taking a temporary teaching post where I got treated like shit on a shoe. It was pretty horrible tbh but covid and lockdown then being in third trimester meant I only actually physically worked there for a few weeks. Since I ended up off work for such a long time I did more or less everything in the house, and when I had our baby this continued.

With hindsight I should have made him step up more as he’s had a very cosseted life! He’s not a bad lazy man but he’s been WFH since the start of the pandemic, this has added a layer of stress for me as throughout my maternity I felt a bit like I was in the way and under his feet. He would have the baby for a couple of hours before starting work while I caught up on sleep but that’s more or less it, he’s not had to do night wakings or really had the baby alone for long periods. In contrast, I’ve had the baby out and about every day, gone to baby classes, long walks, met friends, had a lovely maternity leave in many ways but it’s not been quiet and chilled.

So one other thing that’s relevant here is when I had our baby I wanted to be a role model and I lost a large amount of weight. This gave me confidence and I got my dream job back in spring, to start in September. But since starting it its come as a shock to him. He constantly complains he’s tired and isn’t getting much work done because he’s tired, the baby was sent home ill from nursery and this fell on him. He said to me ‘can’t you look for something part time’. I do want part time work but I can’t just get it like that, the plan is to have another baby and go back part time after that but we do need to try to get through this year.

It is hard as we’ve no support at all. I lost my mum and my dad young and his live two hours away and aren’t all that interested (they dote on his brothers kids but that’s another problem!) so it comes down to him or me.

It is frustrating. I come in and laundry is everywhere and the dishwasher isn’t emptied. I honestly think he’s not had to do this stuff for so long he’s forgotten.

How can I get things back on a more fair and equal footing?

Time to adjust, open communication about what you both need and can do to work like a team - and outsourcing all the jobs you can and can afford (eg cleaning).

Sorry to be a bit blunt but both parents working full time with a small child in time childcare is highly unlikely to be anything other than pretty shit for all of you. Unless you use the money to outsource everything at home there simply isn’t enough time in the day to work your hours, spend any quality time with your child and stay on top of everything domestic to the extent you would like.

I’m not really sure what your solution is to be honest other than get a cleaner and outsource anything you can. You can’t expect your husband to do housework while he’s working from home. Bother my DH and I WFH and we’re working constantly because our jobs are demanding. I might occasionally chuck stuff in the dishwasher while the kettle boils but that’s the extent of it. Both of you working full time means all that crap is for the evenings and weekends and I think you’re being unrealistic to expect otherwise really.

Your title should read "intimidated" rather than "stressed" OP.

I hope things improve for you.

Not necessarily a bad attitude (don't think i said it was) but certainly what he's used to.

You've had lots of suggestions upthread about sitting down and working out a plan. You can do this non-confrontationally and in a way that looks at ways to make it work together. It sounds sensible to do this sooner rather than later. Were you looking for more specific examples of how to word this conversation, or rotas or similar? Or something else?

I spent eleven months at home with DH working from home. I don’t expect him to give the kitchen or the bathroom a deep clean.

However I do know he has time to turn on the tumble drier, quickly hang some clothes up, empty the dishwasher. They are the sort of things I am talking about.

@ThatsNotMyPinkUnicorn

I think the first part of your post is right *@Palavah* but I don’t think there’s a case here of a deeply entrenched bad attitude. I think it is just a big adjustment. Ultimately it was always going to be a challenge with us both doing full time work and demanding jobs at that. And we both need to be supportive of the other.

@Ragwort what is the correct answer to someone asking why you want another child, then?

I’m pretty upset, actually. I started the thread hoping to get advice onto how to help transition as a family. Instead, I’ve been told I shouldn’t have another baby at all and I sound like a child wanting more toys for wanting one? That’s not a supportive or helpful reply. I suspect no matter what I say though the thread will be about how I shouldn’t have another child (at my age not rushing into it isn’t really possible.)

@ThatsNotMyPinkUnicorn going back to work is always a difficult tine that requires everyone to readjust. I'm about to go back after DC4 and it is just as much of a shock to all of us as it was with DC1.

You're doing the right thing to tell him he needs to pull his weight. He needs to do this regardless of you working FT or PT. A rota or cleaner sound like they could work, but start by talking to him calmly and explaining how you feel.

Ignore posters telling you not to have another child. That's a deeply personal decision and it's none of their fucking business.

So he wants you to go part time so he doesn’t have to do so much around the house? If you are going part time I’d imagine it was to care for the child. So he’ll still have to do his fair share of house work. Tell him welcome to being an adult, time to suck it up. You aren’t his mum. Don’t do all the house work for him, you’ll end up hating him for it and ruining your relationship

Thanks @Hibiscusroses, it is simply that he needs to adapt. I’ve been used to broken nights and then going out during the day, he hasn’t. It took me a while to get used to it, and I think he’s in that place now.

OP, you will get a LOT of robust answers on here because posters have seen how these scenarios play out. Men who don't step up when a baby is born rarely change, in a few years when you have two under three and he's abdicated all responsibility for domestics you will be back here again.

Going part time because you want to is one thing. Going part time because your husband wants you to be his personal maid and nanny to his children is not.

Don’t have a second child until you’re sure he’s going to pull his weight with the first.

Get a cleaner.

I wfh I start around 7/7.30 and I finished around 5.30. I am well paid, but I work hard. I don’t get time to do household tasks during the day and if the dishwasher needs emptied the dishes are left in the sink til I finish.

My lunch I take as a break and some downtime (I usually take 20 minutes).

Sure, robust is fine. You will never cope and don’t have another baby (you sound like a child wanting a toy) is not fine.

I don’t think for one moment he wants me to be his personal maid. He just doesn’t think. He doesn’t get through as many clothes as I do so doesn’t think about laundry. He hasn’t had the baby out alone much so doesn’t think about packing bags and what baby will need. And he needs to as it isn’t fair for me to always do it. It isn’t a deeply entrenched refusal. He just doesn’t know. And I should have made him, before now, which I can now see.

Maybe think about hiring a cleaner twice a week if you go for the second child, it will relieve bait of stress from both of you.

I agree that you going back to work FT when you have been carrying the load is an adjustment. I have had two children, some years apart, with two different men, and in both cases, it was not an adjustment we survived.

First husband decided to go off with someone else who when they had DC was a stay at home mum.

Second husband just put his job first and expected me to somehow meet all his needs whilst working FT and looking after the house. In other words, he wanted to stay a bachelor really and just do the fun dad bits to show off how great a dad he was/is. That is still how he parents ten years later.

Clearly, I did not choose husbands very well.

Which is not a very helpful post, except to say hopefully you can navigate this better than me.

Yeah Doggie that’s you.

As I’ve said I have spent 11 months at home with dh. I know full well he has ample time in a day to keep on top of a couple of things. Trust me.

WFH is not some sort of blanket covering all jobs. They are different, just like WOTH jobs are. A bus driver and a bank manager both WOTH but in hugely different roles.

MN can't magically make your husband compassionate and change his entenched selfishness. Some men don't change, and lots of us have experienced that hence our perspective and focus is about making sure the woman is protecting herself fincancially for the long- term. It's coming from a place of kindness. Why can't you just speak to him and make a plan?

Yes you want another dc.
But do your dc want to be brought up by grumbling, resentful parents?
Strange how that's not even considered.

But it’s not just about whether he physically has time. I physically have time, but my head is in work mode and mentally I just don’t do house stuff in the day. The washing is out on in the am and hung up after work. The dishwasher is emptied after work if I put it on after I have my breakfast and the dishes are stuck in the sink during the day.

I WFH at the moment as a single parent. I don’t have time to do dishes, laundry etc because I am so busy cramming my work into when the children are out the house! The issue is about how you divide up stuff when you are both not working, regardless of who is working where, and how you cope with days your DC is off nursery sick.

I’m so glad I don’t live with another adult because if they were getting at me for the way I work during the day and telling me I should do laundry and dishwasher I’d be telling them to leave.

It is an adjustment for the both of you, and you need to make sure that he’s doing an equal share of house stuff NOW before you have another baby.

But telling him to do the dishwasher or hang up washing during his working day isn’t fair. If he was WOH he couldn’t do that. So put the dishwasher on in the morning even if it isn’t full. Buy more spoons so you always have some. Get a cleaner.

Neither of us are grumbling or resentful.

Dh made a few comments, to me, out of earshot of the baby (who wouldn’t have understood anyway of course) that he was worried about taking time off and he felt stressed with the work he had to catch up on and was tired.

I told him I’d take baby out for the day this weekend to let him catch up but nicely pointed out I’d need to do some work too, and what could we realistically do, which is when he said well, can’t you look for something part time.the answer is yes but not yet and he knew this.

That really isn’t the awful environment you’re making it out to be.

If you’re not grumbling, why did you post here?

Your getting a hard time here OP. I know exactly how you feel. I feel into same pattern and it is just adjusting when you go back to work and honestly in the beginning I did have to treat my husband like a child and explicitly say today it's your turn do x and x. Over a few weeks he started doing without needing prompting. Yes mumsnrt tell me i should leave because he doesn't think. Yes I do have to remind him of some simple chores. I also stopped doing his washing that became his own responsibility. My DH does shifts and i found it too hard trying to cook and do bedtime on my own so when he is off during the week he will do some meal prep of things we can heat up. Or I just eat with toddler before bed and DH has to make his own meal after shift if he hasn't helped preped during previous days off. You will need to be prepared for a few weeks of stepping back, accepting things may he done differently or not at all until it impacts him... and he may realise it takes two to run a household fairly. We did get a gardener and I am considering a cleaner for deep cleans e..g cleaning bathrooms, wiping skirting boards, front of cupboards as we keep on top of the main day to day stuff.

No one is doing that Doggie. But it is hardly fair that it is all falling on me, is it. Or perhaps you think it is.

I don’t think unfortunately this will be a helpful thread, I do remember when MN was great for these sorts of things which is why I asked, but it does seem to have turned into an attack on all sides,

Wrong to work FT

Wrong to work PT

Wrong for someone WFH to empty a dishwasher

Wrong to want another baby

Wrong to - ?

So thanks for some responses.

Thanks, Lego

You're certainly not being unreasonable for expecting your husband to take on a fair share of the domestic and child-related load. And I do agree with you that it would probably have been better if things had been more equal all the way through as you're now finding yourself in a sort of "no good deed goes unpunished" situation where you kindly took on a greater share when you could (even though he could have as well!) and are now finding he's got used to it and is resisting change when you can't.

However, I do think your expectations of what he should be doing at home while WFH are a bit unreasonable. I wouldn't really expect any chores to be done during the working day (I've done a lot of working from home and would have resented being told by anyone that I should use my five/ten minute break from the screen to do chores rather than make a cuppa and have a bit of a stretch, the same as they would expect of someone in an office) but I would expect him to be contributing before work, after work and over night.

I'm a SAHP and even I sometimes don't manage to empty the dishwasher during the day - we're doing some big projects at home so if I have a chunk of time available I tend to dedicate it to those and don't allow the time to get eaten into by "five minute jobs" like the dishwasher (the problem being there are only so many five minute amounts available in the day). If I only get bits and pieces of time to do jobs then I tend to things that aren't so run of the mill, precisely because my husband can easily empty the dishwasher while I'm doing bedtime but would struggle more to do the online shopping order because I'm the one who writes the meal plan, for example.

When my husband comes home he tends to take over with the children while I run around doing the things I couldn't manage during the day. Then I do bedtime while he starts dinner, after which he washes up and I usually hang the laundry then. Currently he does the overnight wakes and I do the early mornings (he's in bed right now). In the mornings we split getting the kids ready around us both showering and eating breakfast.

So yes, it sounds like he needs to step up but I'd focus on expecting stuff to be done around working hours.