Parents with DPs - how much time do you get together?

[MoonbeamsGlittering]

We have two kids (aged 6 and 2) and both work full-time, so I know that I shouldn't expect to get lots of time together with all of that going on. However, I realised recently that we were probably only getting about 1 hour per week (split into 10 minutes here, 20 minutes there) when we were spending time together without the kids. My wife tends to go to bed (to go to sleep) at the same time as the kids and wants to sleep for 9 or 10 hours. It makes it very hard to get any time with her.

I've mentioned this and she has tried to have lunch with me once per week and maybe have a bit more time in the evening, but it seems like she feels that I am asking for a bit much. I realised that I don't know how much time other parents of young kids get to spend together. Any input is very welcome!

My question is, more than half of what?
Also "invite her to let me take the kids". What?? Why wouldn't you just .... take over without needing her to.invite you to...?

You're so obviously avoiding talking about the hard graft of parenting that women do: laundry, cleaning, bed changing, shopping, endless thinking and planning. I don't think you even know it needs to be done.

Sorry but nobody here will give you a medal for deigning to spend time with your own children.

@UntilYourNextHairBrainedScheme I don't just mean that I'm doing 60% with the kids. I mean that I'm doing 60% of total kid/house time. I invite her to choose which of us does what. Yes, sometimes she does choose that I go to the park and she does some kind of house chore (and then hopefully gets to rest as well.) I'm probably doing far more than 60% of literal kid-time, and perhaps less than half of cleaning and food-related things, but I think that she is choosing to structure things in that way.

It feels like we're debating a bit whether I'm really doing enough to help, but it feels like I'm doing as much as she'll let me (because she doesn't want to feel like she's doing much less than her share) so really my question was more about whether she was right that most couples with young kids hardly ever see each other.

@Grimsknee I mean 60% of total time doing house/kid stuff. Let's say in one day I do 5.5 hours of watching kids and 0.5 hours of admin/laundry/shopping/clearing up, and she does 3 hours of watching kids and 1 hour of admin/shopping/clearing up. Then my total is 6 hours and her total is 4 hours.

Virtually every day starts with me watching the kids from the moment they get up until she says that she'd like to watch them, so I didn't mean that I only watch them when she asks me to.

"0.5 hours of admin/laundry/shopping/clearing up,"

If your wife does all that in half an hour please send her my way.

Again, you're deluding yourself about the division of labour.

@MoonbeamsGlittering Hi op I will just answer your question which was are most couples with young children like this and for me the answer is no they aren't . We would put our children to bed and have a few hours together on the evening watching telly and talking even when they were babies and we didn't get much sleep we still made sure to spend time together once they were asleep

I don’t know why you’re getting such a hard time, OP. It does sound like you’re trying to make her life easier, and trying to do an equal share of the jobs.

You do a hell of a lot more than my dp, that’s for sure. With him I do sometimes feel like I have nothing left for him after everything is done (I’m a teacher so I have work to do in the evenings as well as other things to run a household with four children) and I feel guilty for just wanting to be left on my own. Perhaps if he did more, I wouldn’t feel like this. He is improving though.

@Grimsknee I'm not sure whether you're misunderstanding me on purpose. I said that maybe I do 0.5 hours and my wife does 1 hour of that stuff, per day. That's 1.5 hours per day total between us. Then I do 5.5 hours of kids and she does 3 hours.

Sorry i meant 1 hour. Still an achievement!

@BrutusMcDogface Thanks - I think I must have phrased something badly in one of my earlier posts, plus I guess there's an assumption that virtually no men actually do more than their fair share, so any man who thinks he does more than half must be deluded. I think if you asked my wife, she would agree that I've been doing considerably more than half in recent times. She thanks me for it. But she still thinks I've got an unrealistic idea of how much time we might spend together.

@MoonbeamsGlittering what happens if you ask her to stay up with you and she doesn't get 10 hours

@Tittyfilarious81 Thanks for your reply. So you actually chose to spend more time together even when it meant you didn't get enough sleep? I guess we've tended to prioritise getting sleep and then see how much time is left.

@Tittyfilarious81 If I think about it, she says that she's tired a lot, even if she does seem to get lots of sleep, so if I've asked her to stay up and then next day she says she's tired then I feel guilty for having asked. I'm finding it hard to balance asking for what I'd like versus not being another demand on her time.

Sorry you're getting such a tough time here OP. You sound like you're really trying to lighten her burden and I get your dilemma about telling her you feel rejected vs. not wanting to sound demanding. There is definitely something off...I have a history of thyroid issues and the biggest symptom for me was sheer fatigue. No amount of sleep was ever enough for me and I would be so tired ALL the time. Is there any way you can push for her to consider seeing the GP?

We both worked full time and had a cleaner for many years when DS was small. We still had time for each other. You are being heavily questioned as to the exact nature of household stuff because it is often seen as the sole reason of a marriage breakdown because men tend to not pull their weight.

Has she always needed this much sleep?

@MoonbeamsGlittering yes we did because we thought it was important for us not to forget about being a couple , kids were the priority during the day and then once they were in bed we were and still are each other's priority even if we are knackered . May I suggest that you ask your wife for just 1 hour a night starting off ,so when kids are in bed you have 1 hour together then she can go to bed just as a compromise so she still gets plenty of sleep but you also get time with her too .

@ButWeWereOnaBreak She's said that she's had check-ups and they've said that she doesn't have any kind of issue like that. I think she would be annoyed if I pushed for her to get it checked again. She thinks that it's normal for parents to be knackered. I guess a lot of parents are knackered, but I'm not, which is why I'd hoped that I could take on even more and then she would be less tired, but I'm not sure whether it's actually working.

@LucentBlade Before kids I think she was aiming for 8 hours of sleep, maybe sometimes 9. Now it seems like 9 or 10. There's always been a difference between us (I'm fine on 6 or 7 hours) but it seems like the gap has widened.

@Tittyfilarious81 Thank you for your suggestion. I did ask yesterday if we could have more time together and she seemed annoyed that I was asking (we've recently moved from about 1 hour a week to 2 or 3 hours a week, but I asked again because it still seems like a lot less than I had hoped for) so I'm worried that if I asked for 1 hour a night (which would be 7 hours a week!) she would say that I had crazy expectations.

If you asked my lovely hands on dh the devide in labor he'd say the same as you. I have tried to explain it time and time again but he literally cannot get it. He dosnt mean it l, he's a nice man who works hard for the family and me but he has no idea the mental exhaustion of the mental load. He does more morning childcare than me yes but he does literally that. Looks after the kids. When I come down I look after the children, while cleaning the kitchen, then getting this uniform ready, while remembering that x child needs this and y child has this club and school need this and that and we have dentist tomorrow and then there is a load of washing sitting wet in the washer and the cat needs feeding and after that I need to send an email about x child and while doing all this x child needs the potty and y needs a drink and the drink has spilt and oh don't forget grannies present and friend at school coming for tea but is veggie so I need to nip to supermarket as we have nothing in, il clean the table for said tea but there is a broken toy so il fix that and then oh wait x child is calling me and by the time I have finally cleaned the table there is 20 bits of plastic crap to put away but by the time I get up to put this away dc room needs cleaning and on and on and on....dh looks after the kids as in he plays with them and feeds them and keeps them alive but I actually 'look after the kids'.

I'm exhausted by 7pm I could fall asleep on a washing line.

I think this is your problem.

Your wife may be choosing and cherry picking her chores but I believe its because she feels she has no choice. I'd choose to just go to the park with my kids but dh wouldn't see half the things that needed doing so id end up with them as well.

I should forget this if i were you.

There are so many feminist nutcases on Mumsnet that you will never get a fair hearing if you have a penis.

He's already said that he does his fair share - change the attitude.

I accept that some people here are saying "listen, man, maybe you think you do more than half, but some men just don't know all the stuff that needs doing". I can check in with my wife again about this in case she feels like actually I should be doing more of other things and whether that would help. She tells me that I'm doing more than half, and that it's helping to give her more time, but I will always accept that it is possible that there's some task that I'm not so aware of and maybe even she isn't aware that it's taking up another chunk of her time.

@MoonbeamsGlittering it's not a crazy expectation for 1 hour a night it's not alot at all . Talk to your wife and tell her how you feel ,that you want time with her because you love her and she's your wife not because you just don't want her going to bed or because you don't want to be on your own . Just reading back through your posts ,and please correct me if I'm wrong it does sound like she prefers to be in her own quite a bit so that's why she chooses the stay home and do stuff instead of going to the park . Just something to consider physically there may be nothing that causes her to be so tired but I had a very good friend who liked to sleep alot and eventually it was diagnosed as depression and I would never have known she masked it so well and was ignoring it herself . I'm not in any way saying it's that it's just something to think about .

Fair enough op maybe you really are doing your fair share.

If you can honestly name your children's friends, the last time they had a play date, the last time they had an appointment at the dentist and doctor etc, you can honestly say you see what needs doing in the home and do it without being asked then the alternative is your wife has checked out of the relationship or is just a person who needs more sleep then most to function. Its up to you to decide if your happy with this or its a deal breaker to you.

You could try arranging a weekend away or a romantic night together if you haven't already.

But im just a feminist nutcase so what do I know.

@Tittyfilarious81 You're right, she is someone who likes having a fair bit of time to herself. If she said "I do want more time with you but I do also need some nights just on my own" then maybe we could try to come to a compromise. I think I was just taken aback yesterday because her response seemed more like "you're asking for more than most reasonable parents would expect to get" and I realised that I wasn't sure how most people do things in their relationships in this kind of situation, so I thought I would ask. Thanks for all of your feedback.

@Arren12 Let's make a deal and agree that you're not a feminist nutcase and I'm not a lazy clueless man! But as for my original question: how much time do you end up spending with your DH? And does he realise how tired you are at 7pm?