Breadwinner husband feels childcare shouldn’t be equal & wants ‘day off’ for himself

[Pol771]

My husband earns 3x more than me and has old fashioned values. (Men=work, women=deal with child). I’m not a SAHM and never could be, hats off to those wonder women - I can’t hack it and we also can’t afford it. He feels that because he pays the mortgage, bills and most of the food shopping that he is entitled to do less childcare and have days off to himself (where I take DS out to play dates or just generally stay out of the house, so he can do his own thing). Whenever I ask him look after our toddler so I can do something for myself like haircut, or dinner with a friend, he’ll make it out to be an inconvenience and will certainly have a good moan about everything he does for the family and that he ‘gets nothing back’. He doesn’t have a great social life either as we’ve moved somewhere away from his friends.

I’d like another child and he would deep down, but he’s refusing right now because he knows he’ll be ‘stuck’ with even more childcare as I care for a newborn.

I work 4 long days a week, have my son at all other times. I’m either working or looking after my son. I don’t get time to myself. My husband has my son 1/2 day a week (which I’m grateful for as I’m aware many dads don’t do this) and is generally around with us at the weekend.

Question is- am I right I thinking it’s unfair that I get little time to myself, yet that doesn’t seem to matter because “that’s what mums do”? What are other peoples arrangements in similar situations?

I contribute financially to my son, all his classes, pay his nursery fees and so on. All my salary goes on DS. Yet he’s the one who needs more ‘him time’ because he pays out more?

Why would you want to bring another child into this arrangement?

Christ, my husband earns all of the money, gives me a decent wedge of cash as well as paying for everything but wouldn’t consider thinking that the kids are just my responsibility. You’re working four days with seemingly solo responsibility for the children and house. He needs to wake up and join the twenty first century.

What about his relationship with his child? Is that not important?

Don’t have another child with him, your resentment is going to grow from this and you’ll end up telling him to piss off one day, deservedly so.

Urgh, that sort of attitude is a total clit shriveller.

If you end the marriage he’ll find child care will be his issue when he has his child !

Yes, I wouldn't have another child with him. I think you need to sit him down and have a very serious conversation with him about how this relationship is not meeting your needs and that you feel devalued.

Failing that I would maybe try counselling. I couldn't see myself in a relationship where they other party didn't see me as an equal.

@LyricalBlowToTheJaw

Urgh, that sort of attitude is a total clit shriveller.

This has to the funniest comment of the thread!

The only way he gets more time because he earns more, should be if he uses that extra cash to outsource some childcare. But that should benefit you both equally.

Why not have half a weekend day to yourselves? Where you take it in turns to be in sole charge for a few hours? We used to have one weekend lie in each when our dc were young.

My husband thinks the same.

He doesn’t act it out though.

But he thinks it and it’s that sense of entitlement that makes him such a fucking misery to be around. He cooks, he cleans, he looks after the children but he’s so fucking miserable about being an adult and doing his fair share that if it want so tragic and depressing, it would be funny.

He wastes his own life trying to be as maudlin as possible while being an adult just to show how unfair life is.

When in actual fact, I’m not holding a gun to his head. If he’d like to move out and spend his free time drinking and playing games in his pants, he knows where the door is.

In his head, he’s a poor, hard done by little boy who does everything and no one appreciates him and let’s him play his computer games while waiting on him hand and foot while telling the world how wonderful he is when he’s not doing his big, important job .

@FlibbertyGibbitt

If you end the marriage he’ll find child care will be his issue when he has his child !

Or he'll refuse to have the kid for more than a weekend here and there. The courts can't and won't make him share the time equally if he doesn't want it.

It isn't just the parenting that's the problem: it's the finances.

It's astonishing how many people on MN don't have joint accounts. If you are married and have a child/children, it doesn't matter who earns what: it is all family money. There shouldn't be divisions such as "OP pays for everything to do with the child". This kind of financial arrangement reinforces the idea that the child is her responsibility.

If they didn't have a child, she would presumably work f/t, but has compromised on work in order to be around for the child - thereby enabling her husband to work f/t.

That said, I was a SAHM for God knows how long, and did absolutely everything with and for the DC - though that was a while back, now. In the end, I didn't want XH to be involved with us because I regarded it as interference. His job was his priority; I accepted that, which meant he couldn't then come swooping in on the few occasions that he felt like doing so. That's the other down side of one parent expecting the other to do all the parenting: the one who chooses not to be involved can't then choose to involve themself when t hey feel like it.

Here we go again..............

You are married so income is mostly family money, and effort is mostly family effort. Add your incomes together, divide by two, calculate everything that is spent jointly (costs for your child and everything for the home i.e. food and utilities) and subtract that from the total. Divide what is left by two - that's how much you have each or to save. Similarly with childcare and home related work, you work one day less so should reasonably expect to do all childcare and home stuff on that one day, but other childcare and home stuff for the rest of the week should be divided by 2. Assert yourself and stop being a 1950's wife.

The man is an idiot!
I was at home with the kids for a couple of years before a small part time job, DH worked full time in a very demanding job. He did his full share of housework and childcare and had even less time to himself than I did. Not once did he complain- it’s called being a grown up.

Whatever you do, I'd be trying hard to ensure the children don't grow up thinking this is 'normal'... and risk repeating the behaviours in their own relationships in later life.

@LyricalBlowToTheJaw

Urgh, that sort of attitude is a total clit shriveller.

I’d wondered what had happened to mine!!!!

;)

@TotallyWipedout that’s the one thing my husband isn’t a petulant prick about.

From when we were engaged and moved i together, we had a joint account. All money is OUR money, regardless of who earns what.

I can never get my head around people who don’t have a joint account or who are married but “put in” money for this and that.

If you are a team, you are a team. Everything should be shared.

Yes, he looks after our son so I can work on that day. And you’re right, he gets frustrated that on his days off from work, he’s still here helping with childcare. I totally get that, but my point is- so am I! I’m always here too, but that doesn’t seem to matter as much.

He’s convinced you that he’s amazing by doing the bare minimum. Most men do a lot more that it sounds like he does.

Ooh, get this sorted before you even think of anymore.

On the face of it, the man sounds like a dick, but charitably, perhaps he’s just unhappy/absorbed some terrible ideas from his parents.

However, you are a team and labour has to be shared. Fair enough you do more w children and house if you work less, but overall it has to be even. So work out what would be fair and negotiate with him.

Not wishing to be dramatic, but there are a lot of warning signs here OP. He does appear to be selfish, sexist and checking out of family life. He isn’t a great dad if he doesn’t put in the hours. Don’t have anymore kids till you resolve this.

@Theredjellybean

I still can't work out when he is looking after d's half a day? If it is when op is at work, then fair enough, you should both be able to have time off, but is its when op is at home, and he is around with them all weekend, when exactly is he getting time off? It all sounds a bit muddled, and perhaps a clearer picture would help. I wonder if he is around at weekends, but op does everything for d's because that is just how it has evolved? But as dh is present in the house he feels he never has time off?

My above message was responding to this- sorry! (Yes he looks after our son on that day so I can work) which I’m grateful for

He sounds like a misogynist dick. That being said, I understand the need for “me time”. Can you sort it so you both have a half day of”me time”?

@Pol771

Yes, he looks after our son so I can work on that day. And you’re right, he gets frustrated that on his days off from work, he’s still here helping with childcare. I totally get that, but my point is- so am I! I’m always here too, but that doesn’t seem to matter as much.

'helping?' HELPING??

No, he is not HELPING with childcare.
He is parenting his own child which is what he's SUPPOSED to do!
Christ

he gets frustrated that on his days off from work, he’s still here helping with childcare

He’s a parent.
It’s parenting, not childcare.
The child is, after all, always there, living with him, because he’s his son, his family, his dependent.

I guess he’d have dedicated child free days if you were divorced with 50-50 care.

I find it quite sad and depressing that he doesn't seem to love his child and want to spend time with them building a good relationship.

He sees them as a chore and something to begrudge.

That is you bottom line, why does he feel this way?

@Onthefloor2

I’m sorry but I think all the previous posters have missed that you put nothing towards the cost of living, mortgage and bills, and only pay for your son.

So I think your husband is right, if your not financially contributing half towards costs, I can see why he is reluctant to be pulled in and contribute more.

It’s not 50/50. Don’t have another child with him, find a better job so you can pay half the bills and a new guy who is happy for you to do that with.

It's HIS son too that she's paying for everything for, including childcare, so she can work to pay for THEIR sons needs & childcare.

Him paying the mortgage & food etc just makes him feel like 'the Big Man'. It's utterly ridiculous.

It's THEIR son, why isn't he wanting to spend time looking after him, not just doing the fun bits while the OP does all the grunt work? He's treating her like a housekeeper/nanny.