What are your DH’s normally doing on a Friday and Saturday nights?

[BroughttoyoubyBerocca]

My DH seems to go out every Friday and Saturdays nights and Sunday afternoons. Always to a pub, sometimes/often watching football. I’m lonely, fed up, feeling used tbh.

What are other Dads doing? What can we be doing as a family on a weekend night together that’s fun? Im struggling, he just seems to want to go to work, pub at weekends and leave everything else up to me. He wanted kids, pushed for ttc 2nd before I suggested it.

I can’t see that I would benefit in anyway divorcing yet this feels like either a shit marriage or I married someone who doesn’t actually want family life. If we divorce I’m wise off financially and alone more often.

I’ve tried pointing out to him that the guys that he is drinking with are not happily married family men but seems to fall on deaf ears. Kids are 9 and 11. Both of us work full time, both stressful jobs, I’m the bigger earner, no family living nearby.

That’s very lonely and hard. My kids are the same age, we don’t do anything exciting at all but we are together eg gardening and Netflix or trips to shops

I wouldn’t put up with it if he was out all that time

Dh is either working away or at home. We watch a film on a Friday night and play a game on a Saturday night. 4 of our 5 dc are autistic so we do routine here!

Friday night share a bottle of wine and netflix, Saturday night similar tbh. We don’t have childcare.

Hanging out with me, me and kids, me and friends or his friends (both at home and out the house). Decent balance between the four (more time with me/me and kids than the others tbh).
You sound like two single people.

No my dh never did that really. My dc are teenagers now, but dh and I always mostly socialised together. Solo nights out have always been a rarity for both of us.

You say you pointed out his friends were not happily married, but it doesn't sound like you are either. Every marriage is different so what one family does, wouldn't work for another- but you need yo be happy with the set up and it doesn't sound like you are.
I personally wouldn't find it attractive to have a man that just wants to spend all weekend in the pub, and it's definitely not what I would want to do be doing or my kids doing, so I wouldn't want to be joining him, he would need to be having a family day out/in with us.

We have busy weekends here, visiting family etc, which we don't always do all together. Or days out, jobs in the house.

My DH also works few hours on the weekend nights but he always does, tea time with us, movie/games night then bedtimes before he goes.- he doesn't want our DS to look back and there Just be gaps where dad was, so he makes sure he is there as much as possible - on very little sleep quite often.

Does your DH say why he doesn't want to see you and the kids ?

That is really hard OP. Going out now and then is fine but he need to spend more time with you and his kids

kids ages in our house range from newborn to 9

On weekends we do the usual day stuff parks/soft play/ children's activities that they do weekly/ lunch out/ etc

On Friday or Saturday nights if the weather is nice we do things like

Eat dinner at the park usually from the chip shop

Eat our dinner in the garden

Camp in the garden because I'm too lazy to actually go camping 🤗

Late evening walk

Go to the park and play games like hide and seek or whatever at like 7pm when they should be in bed because it's more exciting for them

Handstand competitions/races in the garden/ obstacle courses

Stone painting but the kids just paint something rude and think it's funny

Forrest walking in the evening and have to find certain things we just get a list up on Google

Bike rides

When the weather is not good

We do home spa night - face masks etc

Takeaway night

Netflix but films that us adults can tolerate too like Harry Potter etc

Game night where everyone picks a game to play can be hide and seek to operation but everyone gets a go

Who can make the best cake/ cookie/ card if there's an occasion coming up/ sometimes do celebrity come dine with me and split into two teams and one makes a dinner and one makes a desert. Be warned the team that makes the dessert always win

Charades which never goes well

Xbox competitions

Let the kids all sleep downstairs together in a tent

These days we go out, kids are adults. At that age Friday was choir practice so no alcohol but kids were out 6-9 so had dinner together. Saturdays family time, sometimes (often) went out for dinner

We spend the weekends at the beach/forests/parks with the kids and dog. We don't drink alcohol but if we did I wouldn't put up with him spending his weekends at a bar! Our kids are 8, 11 & 14. I do have friends whose husbands go out at the weekends with their mates but they take turns and the wives go out some weekends too. I enjoy spending our weekends together and doing family things but I understand some couples like having nights out. But your partner is going overboard and there is no balance. He should be spending some time with his family as well, he's not a single lad anymore x

He is taking the piss, obviously.

Life with young children can be monotonous, I suspect most of the replies here will be a variation of cooking a nice dinner or sticking a film on Netflix. There is no way in hell I’d be working all week, playing mum and dad all weekend and then be writing up an activity calendar to make sure my DH was engaged in family life. Anyway, parading yourself around like a peacock to prove you’re worth your husbands free time sounds like a pretty unsustainable way to live.

You say you wouldn’t be better off divorcing, but how are you better off staying in the marriage?

Time to sit down and have a talk. Let him know you aren’t prepared to spend your life like this. If you see no change, you have your answer.

People show you who they are OP, listen when they do.

Mine is putting the kids to bed then cooking us dinner and then we watch TV together.

He is always here. He is doing a shift swap to work weekends soon and I will miss him during the day BUT the benefit in school holidays for childcare costs etc is something we are looking forward to.

Looking over a 6 - 8 week period of weekend activities this is what we do and some are obviously more frequent than others.

• London visit to family
• dog walk to playground
• go swimming
• go to friends cafe in local quaint Market town then walk and playground
• movie night at home/cinema trip
• Sunday roast at DMs
• soft play
• sleepover night- me or DH put the spare mattress in our DDs shared bedroom and have a pretend sleepover
• seeing friends for walks and playground time

Over the space of the last two weeks he has been out ten or eleven nights. He's usually out twice a week at gigs or whatever, but is really taking the piss these past two weeks. I feel like giving him the "you treat this house like a hotel" speech but would feel like a nagging mother. And I wouldn't want him to stop anyway, it's much nicer without him.

At home.with me and ds 10

Either out at work or home with us. Usually we will have dinner as a family and watch tv on Fri/Sat nights if he's not out working.

Usually at home, we both work part time, so we probably have more non-child weekenda compared to a lot of parents as we both have two week days with them, so we can afford to sacrifice a few weekends here and there. We spend a similar amount of time on hobbies and friends that don’t involve our children, but most weekends and evenings are spent as a family.

At that age
Out of the three nights we would usually have:
1 family nights
1 night I go out next he does
Or go out together (and do a babysitting swap)

now we go out 2 of the 3 nights as kids teenagers

He wanted kids, pushed for ttc 2nd before I suggested it.

Why? If he's out or drunk or hungover every night of the weekend he can't like his kids or you very much. I'd divorce him personally. But nice things we do a a family:

Walk the dog
Mooch around the shops
Go to the beach/lake/forest
Stuff in town like a garden or museum or whatever
Find a box set/binge. We're currently having Buffy Sunday as a family
Play a game
Do a jigsaw (I know, but we like it)
Project like patchwork, candles, art; whatever crafty
Go on holiday together and write a joint journal. Afterwards we collect the receipts, look at the pictures etc.
Listen to the kids' weird ideas (see patchwork above )

But don't play with pick-me dance with the pub. He should want to be home, not be there because you're laying on entertainment.

Cooking together, talking together, reading books together or watching TV together. We are always together, 24/7 and that is exactly how we like it

Wow that is really not ok. My children all are adults now, but when they were young my partner going out on the weekend was not common. We both wanted to do nice activities with the children and enjoy family time.

Infrequently she would go out with friends whilst I’d stay home with the children and vice versa. But we always cleared that with each other and it was never a common occurrence. It’s not about controlling anyone but if you choose to have children then you have to commit to being a parent. It’s not fair on you or the children that their dad isn’t pulling his weight or spending time with you all away from work.

It sounds like you have unfortunately ended up with a certain type of bloke who values sport and alcohol over quality time with his family.

If you have mentioned this to him and there has been no improvement, what are your next steps?

Thank you for your replies. Last night was yet another night of watching half a film (due to length, 2nd half later) with DC before doing bedtime, enjoying making popcorn with them, playing with our pets but also trying not to quietly seethe. The “I will be back in time to watch a programme with you” didn’t happen as I was in bed at 1030pm and up early today, I didn’t want to start watching something that late.

If we broke up I would be spending every night alone, rather than weekend nights with a sprinkling of midweek. I’m too tired and fat to even think about dating, also would want to prioritise my DC and pets.

I’m starting to suspect that he just thinks that this is what people do, he hasn’t got any school friend Dad friends, the guys he meets up mostly either have grown up kids/no kids and not a single of them have a wife and kids at home. Hence me asking what other DH’s do, thank you again for your replies.

WinkyTinky I hear you, I’m sorry that you are having such a shit time. That would really piss me off but I imagine my DH would likely behave the same.

We have 2 young DC and limited childcare so we are always home Friday and Saturday night either having pizza and movie night with the kids or chilling with Netflix or a game.

However even when our children are older I doubt we'd go to the pub every weekend. We used to be very sociable before, but that's part of the sacrifice you make when you become a parent and it sounds like your DH isn't happy to give that up, which isn't fair on you.

My cousin does this, works away from
Home during the week, comes home Friday night, gets ready and goes to the pub leaving his wife with their 3 boys and 2 dogs. If there's a football game, boxing match he's always out the house. It's definitely not something I would put up with. My uncle (his dad) was the same so maybe it's a learnt behaviour?

Depends. Usually either in with me or out with me.

Occasionally one of us will be out on our own or away for the weekend.