Does anyone else hate weekends since becoming a SAHM?

[SlinkyB]

I'm fine during the week - dh and ds1 (4.5) go to work and school, leaving me and 20mo ds2 to it.

But on the weekends it seems everyone just wants to chill out or have fun...ie, trash the house I've spent the week trying to keep clean and tidy! I end up hating it because I spend all my time nagging everyone (we have 15yo dss every other week) to pick up after themselves. Otherwise, Monday comes round I'm left to clean it all up.

It's really getting me down; when I worked, I'd look forward to weekends.

I look forward to them because DH is generally here at least one of the 2 days to look after DS.

But then DS is only 4 months so his mess is contained.

I can see how that would be upsetting. But also mess and toys and fun etc are part of family life! :)

Surely everyone should be helping tidy by the end of each day? 4 year old can tidy own toys, 15 year old tidy his stuff, Dh help
Tidy whole house in general, so here's not much left to do mon- fri

No. I love the weekends. We don't stay in the house and that means there isn't more mess. We go out and have fun and I have DH to help with the kids so it's less work than during the week. I have noticed week days are more fun now than they used to be. I don't get that Sunday evening dread any more.

Yip me! I have a nice routine set during the week and at the weekends it goes out the window. I'm really lazy at the weekend as I feel everyone else in the house is lazing around so I will too. I also hate when DH comes in from work during the week and says "oh I'm off tomorrow"

I do too but for different reasons.

My DH wants to stay near the house, pottering and doing house jobs because he works long hours and he wants quiet weekends. But my life is like that everyday so I feel like I never get a break.

Yes. I also hate holidays for the same reasons. I don't get to have time off.

I'm not a sahm anymore but I understand what you mean! I loved having dh at home but also it completely ruined mine and dds carefully planned routine!

Dh is a sahd now and I'm trying to be so cautious not to ruin the routine he has created.

I love the weekends.

I get a lie in, we cook together, potter about, see friends or family some of the time or just do our own thing.

Everyone should be helping to keep on top of things, not just lazing around because it is their 'day off' and leaving you to do everything.

Yes, similar. Like BDH says, I laze round more as everyone else is, and everyone else is not particularly good at seeing mess and tidying it up, so it all ends up getting chaotic and enraging me quite often.

Also DP works away in the week so it is a bit of a celebration that he's home and he resents doing anything house-y with the little time he has here. we do have a nice time doing family fun stuff but often its a bit hectic for me and I just want to get on top of washing and read the paper and quiet stuff.

I don't get a lie in and I do all the cooking unless we go out, so bit jealous of Alibabs style weekend!

yep - me too, I feel like I need a cattle prod for DH and DS. Dropping clothes, not using the bin and the dishwasher is alien to them. I have started nagging and then going out, it is working. I use to hate Monday's as it took me hrs to recover the house.

I love them. We are busy with dcs's activities mainly, lots of chilling too. Dh cooks and I get a lie in or nap.oh and dh takes over the washing too.

Bloody and esme I can totally relate! My dh works long hours during the week, and is often on-call during the weekend too. Fri night he was up working til 1.30am. He just wants to laze around the house he's not been in all week, whereas I'm sick of the sight of it (and three boys don't really want to be cooped up for two days).

We try to strike a balance between going out and staying in. It's difficult juggling the differing wants and needs of a toddler, a 4yo and a teen sometimes.

Ah yes, in an ideal world the 4yo would pick up after himself, but he often doesn't and it's a real battle every time. He's just started school and is shattered, and I don't want to spend the time I have with him now constantly on his back to tidy toys.

I'm wondering if the people with quiet, idyllic weekends only have one child? Or a dh who works Mon-Fri and is happy to help? That's what our weekends were like back when I was on mat leave with ds1 We now live in a busy 4-bed, 2-bath house with two/three kids, and sadly it doesn't run itself two days out of seven.

I do always get a lie-in til 9am on a Sunday with a cuppa brought to me, so I guess I shouldn't really complain!

I have 4 dcs, 3 bathrooms, 4 bedrooms, its a tip especially at weekends. Dh cooks, does laundry and dw at weekend. We share thechildcare. He works long hours m-f in the city and does nothing at home during the week.

Oh wow, you do have your hands full then shutup. Maybe I should just lower my tidy/cleanliness standards then, but that always gets me down.

Looks like I'll just continue to be a boring nag all weekend, with the hope that one day one of the boys will voluntarily roll their sleeves up and chip in to keep their house nice and tidy .

Yep lowering sysndards if you can bear it or get everyone doing jobs for an hour or two

I used to have a friend, they only had one dc, and on weekends they'd get a nanny round at 8am to pick him up and take to the park whilst they got up in a relaxed fashion, went to read the papers in the pub over breakfast and then got a nicely tired out DS delivered back to them at 11 or so.

That's a relaxed weekend! (I would just feel weird doing that I'm afraid, but I was quite impressed. Maybe some kind of child swap with friends would be a good idea though, if I actually had any friends I could do that with...)

Reading this made me want to come at it from another angle. Because I was wondering if this was really about the levels of mess and the choice of activity, or if that was a proxy for you not feeling that what you do is noticed, let alone appreciated? And that your need for a weekend change of pace has been overlooked because it never gets a turn - it's always your DH's needs that take priority?

Sorry if I'm reading too much in to this. But it does seem as if you are close to resenting it all (possibly with good grounds). Can you book a sitter, leave the house with DH and really talk to each other about the assumptions that have crept in to how things are done in your family, and what else you might like to try?

I'm retired now, but when I was a SAHM I did find the weekends potentially difficult. My DH would have happily just chilled at home but, much as I loved being at home with the DCs, I wanted to do something different at the weekend. Luckily my DH was happy to go along with whatever plans I wanted to make, so we usually visited friends or family or had visitors to us.

Hi AuntieStella, thank you so much for your thoughts. You're right; perhaps I do get to the point where I resent doing chores 7 days a week especially when I'm pre-menstrual like last weekend.

DH is always saying thanks for the things I do. I guess I'm just settling into a new routine after ds1 has just started school. I'm loving Mon-Fri just me and the toddler. We potter and go to groups, and I can keep on top of the housework and even do some long-arm jobs whilst he naps. We're content (he's loving having me all to himself!). Then the weekend comes and it's all turned upside down.

Think I'll ask dh if I can start having an hour or two "off" on a Sat morning, where I can walk to the library or go to a cafe alone and recharge my batteries. To be fair, I do regularly meet up with friends (every six weeks or so) child-free.

SevenOh can't believe your friends used to do that! Quite a nice idea actually, tho I too would find it weird paying for a nanny.

Its what you make it op.