Am I missing something where if you WFH, that actually means you’re supposed to be with your children too?
I rarely WFH but decided to this PM as I needed to work later and had a long Teams meeting planned. I’m similar to a Probation Officer but not - I manage a caseload in a supportive capacity and have to keep in touch via phone calls, face to face. Every contact or action about them needs to be documented that day and there’s set timescales for amount of contacts and when they need to be done.
DH often WFH but his job is so relaxed with no major timescales or responsibilities. We do have a home office.
We have 2 children who do a mix of childcare and FIL looking after them in our home (mainly because he has a dog not trusted around the children).
Today I had a safeguarding type meeting at 3pm and it went on for a couple of hours - heavy stuff for a late afternoon. DH was at home, FIL was looking after the children. DH was also downstairs with them but then decided to bring DS upstairs which started him off crying for me, knowing I was in the office. He allowed him for a prolonged period, to stand at the door of the office, crying loudly which was so difficult for me in terms of trying to concentrate but also just wanting to go to him, whilst just asking and asking him to come with him, without just taking some action.
It got to 4:30 and DH told his FIL he could leave. Meeting didn’t finish until 5pm but I still had a few calls I’d arranged as one can’t speak until late.
DH then started berating me for the time the meeting had been scheduled for and how long it had gone on for, sending me WhatsApp’s which continued in person. I didn’t arrange the meeting but had to attend.
He then had a go at me for not finishing work to allow him to make the children some tea. I explained I hadn’t had chance for a dinner break today so could take my 30 mins so he could get them something sorted if he was really that stressed about it and then I could quickly finish up and be done for bath/bedtime routine. He wasn’t happy that I wanted to go ‘back’ to work as such and proceeded to tell me I was prioritising work over the children and I wasn’t being a competent parent by choosing to sit upstairs (doing my job?!)
I wouldn’t be a competent parent by NOT doing my job and putting that at risk.
When I tried to go back upstairs to make the call (someone I’ve been stressed about for weeks anyway and today was a chance to sort it out), he then purposely opened the stair gate so DS would come upstairs and sat in the office with me. Not appropriate or professional on either side of the coin to have a phone call with him there.
I asked DH to come and bring him back downstairs to which, he eventually did after asking him countless times, so DS started crying and then DH started shouting up the stairs something about that being the result and had a go about me working late.
So, in short, he made that much of a scene that I ended up having to log off without making the call.
I’ve since tried to discuss with him how hurtful his comments were and how I can’t just not do my job but he’s adamant he’s right and made out I was just having a jolly up, hiding from them all doing nothing. I’ve tried to explain that WFH means still being at work but he isn’t pleased the onus is on him to have made their tea and when do I ever think to finish early to sort them out (I rarely ever work late).
He also then decided to bring up yesterday as I logged off around 1pm to attend DS’s graduation. He wasn’t happy that when we got home, I then logged back on to do more work and couldn’t seem to understand that I was making up the time I hadn’t done.
Am I missing something here? I’m not really happy with him for many reasons at the moment but this is just something that’s really annoyed me.