Hi - I'm the dh of an ex-MNer, have namechanged to protect her identity although I don't think she posts on here anymore.
I'm incredibly unhappy at the moment, mainly because of my job which is slowly driving me mad. I work very long hours and feel like I spend a lot of time stuck in traffic getting to and from work. The people I work with are just not my type of people (think very sales-oriented, high male ego types and you're halfway there) and I struggle to identify with them at all. The desk I work at is little more than a small shelf and there's no natural daylight coming into the office. Yesterday a whole load of shelves (which had been screwed into plasterboard) came down. Luckily no-one was hurt but they very easily could have been.
Before anyone says anything about health and safety, or proper working conditions, I have to tell you that these things just don't matter to my employers. There have been a couple of times when other people have spoken up about various issues and the next day they are just gone. No notice, no warning, they just get disappeared. And yes, I'm sure all these people could take the bosses to a tribunal, but I can't run the risk of losing my job and going through a lengthy tribunal (which even if I win there is no guarantee I will get any money out of the company!) when I have a mortgage to pay and a family to support.
We have 1 ds together, who is 2, and another baby due on Monday - but who has been threatening to come for the past couple of weeks! We thought she was going to turn up on Tuesday - dw was getting very regular and painful contractions but not dilating at all. I went back to work on Wednesday when it became clear that things weren't happening.
Wednesday was also my dw's birthday. In all the kerfuffle over whether the new baby was going to come, I didn't do anything for it. My dw was very upset by this but didn't really say anything at the time. I ordered her a present off Amazon (which was stuff she'd given me a list for - so not exactly a surprise for her!) which came today but she hasn''t even opened it.
Today she's been really upset - she made the point that her work colleagues made more of an effort over her birthday than I did. They sent her a card and an NHS form (which I can only assume is an in-joke of some description!) and she made the point that it wouldn't have taken me much effort to get ds to scribble on a piece of paper and write "Happy Birthday" on the top. She was really upset and crying. I know some of that is going to be hormones - she's nearly 40 weeks pregnant, after all, but I do feel very bad that I didn't do anything. I got her some flowers yesterday but because I'd had such a bad day at work it didn't quite come out the way I'd planned and she told me she felt like I'd just chucked them at her and then been in a grump all evening (which is not entirely inaccurate).
The thing is, I know she's right and I feel like I'm failing my whole family by not being more happy when I'm at home - but I'm so miserable generally I just don't have the energy spare to be jolly happy daddy/husband. I love my family dearly and I want to be better - I just don't know how.