Low earning husband who does not want to share any housework or parenting duties
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Anonymous
The amount does matter because it makes more financial sense for the lower-earning spouse to go P/T and pick up more of the housework. Here, DH is the lower earning spouse and yet she's the one who went PT. If DH respected her, he would have considered going P/T and flipping duties. OP said at one point that he's basically treating her as a servant. Just because a woman works PT, doesn't mean that they should have no free time, and that they should be on the clock all the time. Yes, she should be doing more of the housework, but not all of it. That said, OP, I think your plan to resume counseling is good. You need to get organized and specifically delineate all duties, but with DH's entitled attitude, you're going to need help getting him to play ball. |
Anonymous
+1 |
Anonymous
I'm kind of in the same boat too. My husband and I only have one son, he makes about $65K base and about $10-15 on top of that in freelance work, so not great for this area. I make $105K base and about $10K in annual bonus, again, not bad but not great for this area. My husband travels quite a bit for work, so that takes him away from home frequently, and he insists on doing volunteer work that takes him out of town for at least 2 weekends a year, and about 5 full weekends where he is home but out of the house from 8-6 the entire weekend, and almost every Monday evening. He drops our son off at day care 3 days a week, but that is pretty much the extent of his contributions at home. I take care of everything else for our son, do all of the housework and prepare all of the meals for the entire family. Its frustrating because I feel like work and his volunteering are non-negotiables and ALWAYS come first. I cut my finger badly on a recent federal holiday when I was home with our son, and I had to go to the emergency room, and he told me "ok well I get off work at x time, I can meet you at the hospital if you are still there." I had to get my brother in law to come with me to the hospital while my sister watched our son. He didn't even consider coming immediately to make sure I was ok, or to care for our son. It very frustrating. Sometimes I feel very alone in this marriage. |
Anonymous
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OP, I'm so sorry you are going through this. Counseling can only help fix what is fixable, and it can even help you figure out if things are fixable. But of course it can't magically salvage what is beyond repair.
In either case, you clearly need a break, even if it's a short one to have a chance to get your own head together and get some rest. If he won't step up to make this happen, are their friends or relatives who could take the kids for a sleepover so you can check yourself into a hotel for a night or two by yourself? (Don't stay home - that doesn't sound like a great recharge at this point.) In the meantime, cut time where you can. Eg if dishes are an issue, buy as much prepared stuff as you can and eat from disposables. Let him figure his own brown bag lunch out. And if you haven't said it this plainly yet, tell him that it's bad enough that you're not sure you can stay if it continues. And have measurable specifics in mind that you need to see in order to get things back on track. "I need you to fold and put away all of the laundry" or "Could you please give the kids their baths" instead of "you need to help more." If he can't get it together, I can't see how divorcing and getting your own household would create any more work than you already have, and it would be on your own terms instead of being dropped on you. Either way, good luck. |
Anonymous
Forget the counseling, that only works when someone is open to it and wants to make a change. I would sock money away. How about not doing his laundry or his cooking. At least make him responsible for many of his own things. Have you tried that? |
Anonymous
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You make the bed you lie in. Divorce is not an option, particularly over housework.
Just be sure you aren't nagging him at home or correcting the things he actually does do. Nothing persuades a man NOT to do housework faster than a wife who instructs him on the way to do it. If you don't like the way he folds the laundry, prepares food, makes the bed or whatever, just keep quiet. Unless your DH is a beta, then consider turning your marriage into a Dom/sub "woman-led" kinda thing and get it over with. |
Anonymous
| Low earning WOHMs are the worst! |
Anonymous
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Stop doing stuff for him. Don't wash his clothes or cook his meals. Even when I did wash my husband clothes afterward I would dump them in a pile right in front of his dresser to make him put them up. I also give my husband tasks I know he does well, like he loves to cook and I'll ask him to load the dishwasher. He'll also help the kids with folding and putting their clothes away.
Leave your husband by himself with the kids more often. Find an activity you can do after work or on the weekend and make it clear that he'll need to watch the kids. |
Anonymous
| honestly, I would just leave town for a week and let him deal with everything. (are the kids old enough to be somewhat self sufficient?). And let him know that unless he steps up, this will be his life 50% of the time, only in a smaller, crappier home. |
Anonymous
He isn't the lower earning spouse by much. Her full potential is 85K. Also, he might not have the option to go PT. I'm not convinced one person needs to half their income just to pick up the kids anyway. Or, maybe OP wanted to be the PT worker and is just mad he doesn't earn enough? Anyway, your argument is what she was arguing. She said because he doesn't make the dollars she wants him to make, she should work PT while he does house work and works full time. In any case, the situation is what it is. As long as OP works PT for whatever reason she should do more (but not all) of the work. |
Anonymous
Please do. It seems to me that you should do more counseling (maybe give it six months or so?) before moving on to separation, which is the next step. |
Anonymous
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actually, my read is that OP would like to work full time, and/or save more money in other ways (moving, brown-bagging lunch, etc) but her husband is not on board with sharing any household or childcare duties at all, so she is stuck both with all the housework/childwork and her regular work, plus not making the money she is making. She is frustrated that he neither respects the work she does at home or will agree to financial goals that she sees are important. Sounds like he is just fine where he is.
Seems to me there are a couple things that would equalize: they both work full time, they divide childcare in half, more or less, and put a bit more income toward cleaning and they agree on a budget OR, she continues to work part time, and does proportionally more, but not all, of the home/child care work, and he agrees to cut back in other areas, so that they can meet shared financial goals. In terms of working part time and having 3 kids,it seems that the fairest thing is that the number of hours spend on child care and housework is tallied up; the part time parent takes on the number of hours worked less than the spouse (10, for example, if s/he works 30 instead of partner's 40 hours), and the remaining hours is divided in half. so let's say that on a given week, there are 6 hours/day per weekday devoted to child care, meal prep, bedtimes/baths, shopping, bills, etc. That's 30 hours per week. One parent works 10 hours less than the other, so the split would be 20 for the part time parent and 10 for the fulltime parent. So for the fulltime parent, that could be doing one hour every morning (all drop offs), and one hour every evening (all dishes, tidying and making lunches). Of course, the weekends can be a place where instead of dividing 50/50 one parent makes up for doing a lot less during the week by taking on a lot more. |
Anonymous
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Get a female roommate. Divorce him now.
Or, Just control what you can control. Give him the bills to pay you KNOW he will pay. Do what you want about your work schedule. Don't do the chores that don't HAVE to get done. Don't do his chores. Use paper plates and cups. I agree with the "on strike" poster. |
Anonymous
This person expressed my thoughts well. |
Anonymous
| DTMFA. |