Anonymous wrote:I feel you. My DH is wfh in a small guest room on the main level of our very small house. This room also has our only extra closet where we store toilet paper, soap, the vacuum, etc. Not only can I hear his bellowing work voice in every room in the house, but to get anything extra that I might need for our house to function during the day, I need to wait for a break in his video calls or silently commando crawl under the on-camera part of the room.

He works with a west coast team and a London team, so my house feels occupied by his work from early in the morning until the kids’ bedtime except for a long lunch during which he prowls around and makes messes. I hate it. He’s going back 2x/week in the fall but he used to travel 80% and I’m going crazy. I just want one morning where I can do a quick noisy vacuum before I leave for work and come back to a clean house, or one evening alone when I can eat cheese and crackers and watch TV without feeling watched or having to listen to his pounding typing.

I won’t even mention the extra groceries every week for lunch, the abandoned breakfast dishes and coffee mugs that fill the counters, or the way he’s stolen every functioning pen in the house and disappeared them under the stack of random printouts coating his desk.

Did his office pay for his lunch every day prepandemic?

I feel you. My DH is wfh in a small guest room on the main level of our very small house. This room also has our only extra closet where we store toilet paper, soap, the vacuum, etc. Not only can I hear his bellowing work voice in every room in the house, but to get anything extra that I might need for our house to function during the day, I need to wait for a break in his video calls or silently commando crawl under the on-camera part of the room.

He works with a west coast team and a London team, so my house feels occupied by his work from early in the morning until the kids’ bedtime except for a long lunch during which he prowls around and makes messes. I hate it. He’s going back 2x/week in the fall but he used to travel 80% and I’m going crazy. I just want one morning where I can do a quick noisy vacuum before I leave for work and come back to a clean house, or one evening alone when I can eat cheese and crackers and watch TV without feeling watched or having to listen to his pounding typing.

I won’t even mention the extra groceries every week for lunch, the abandoned breakfast dishes and coffee mugs that fill the counters, or the way he’s stolen every functioning pen in the house and disappeared them under the stack of random printouts coating his desk.

Your husband sounds like a jerk. There was a point in time where I worked in my bedroom in a small apartment in Manhattan and we had a toddler, a nanny, two dogs, and my husband all in the apartment at various times. I never shushed anyone. You work with what you have.

In terms of meal prep - I meal plan and order everything in advance (amazon prime --> WF delivery or just go to the store). My husband and I are always on the same page about what we are eating and my eldest daughter (who is 25 months) knows the schedule too. Don't let your husband hold up dinner! If he wants to provide input than run the meal schedule by him every Saturday: "Hey honeybunney, this is what I am planning for the week - Sun though next Sat. Let me know if you want to make any changes. I'm ordering groceries in 2 hours. If you're too busy, this is what we'll be eating. K, thanks."

If he doesn't want to provide input before you order the groceries than just order the groceries and go with it! You are not his maid. You are his spouse.

Just live your life in your home and make noise normally. If he protests, tell him to go back to the office or rent an office. Your home is for home life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn’t a WFH problem. This is a communication problem. If you can’t figure out how to talk with him and set some guidelines around what are appropriate expectations at home (quiet at 1pm while on a work call is fine; expecting silence at 5pm isn’t), then you have some serious challenges ahead of you. Hoping this will resolve itself by him going back to the office isn’t a viable plan. Step up and be a grown-up. Talk to your spouse and figure this out.

OP here … very true. Just venting mostly. Honestly even if he chills out with his attitude, hearing banker bros calls on speaker constantly sucks. It goes both ways.

Then you talk with him about it: “I’m tired of feeling like a visitor in my own home. If you’re going to continue to work from home, here’s what I need:
-you use headphones. No one wants to hear both ends of your business calls.
-no shushing or other admonishments to be quiet after 5pm
-your door stays closed
-dinner is at 6:30 (or whatever time). If you’re not available to join us or weigh in on a food order, that’s on you.
-on these nights, you’re responsible for planning dinner:

All of this. Quit making it so easy for him to make you feel like a visitor in your own home (although your DH sounds quite self-absorbed).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This isn’t a WFH problem. This is a communication problem. If you can’t figure out how to talk with him and set some guidelines around what are appropriate expectations at home (quiet at 1pm while on a work call is fine; expecting silence at 5pm isn’t), then you have some serious challenges ahead of you. Hoping this will resolve itself by him going back to the office isn’t a viable plan. Step up and be a grown-up. Talk to your spouse and figure this out.

OP here … very true. Just venting mostly. Honestly even if he chills out with his attitude, hearing banker bros calls on speaker constantly sucks. It goes both ways.

Then you talk with him about it: “I’m tired of feeling like a visitor in my own home. If you’re going to continue to work from home, here’s what I need:
-you use headphones. No one wants to hear both ends of your business calls.
-no shushing or other admonishments to be quiet after 5pm
-your door stays closed
-dinner is at 6:30 (or whatever time). If you’re not available to join us or weigh in on a food order, that’s on you.
-on these nights, you’re responsible for planning dinner:

Honestly, I'd just tell him you feel like a visitor in your own home, the pandemic is basically over so you will be living a normal life at home after 5pm from now on.

My husband can be a pain in the ass and would be hugely pissy about this, and I'd still do it with no regrets.

Anonymous wrote:This isn’t a WFH problem. This is a communication problem. If you can’t figure out how to talk with him and set some guidelines around what are appropriate expectations at home (quiet at 1pm while on a work call is fine; expecting silence at 5pm isn’t), then you have some serious challenges ahead of you. Hoping this will resolve itself by him going back to the office isn’t a viable plan. Step up and be a grown-up. Talk to your spouse and figure this out.

OP here … very true. Just venting mostly. Honestly even if he chills out with his attitude, hearing banker bros calls on speaker constantly sucks. It goes both ways.

This isn’t a WFH problem. This is a communication problem. If you can’t figure out how to talk with him and set some guidelines around what are appropriate expectations at home (quiet at 1pm while on a work call is fine; expecting silence at 5pm isn’t), then you have some serious challenges ahead of you. Hoping this will resolve itself by him going back to the office isn’t a viable plan. Step up and be a grown-up. Talk to your spouse and figure this out.

That wouldn’t fly in my house. I’d be cooking or ordering exactly what I (or my kids) want to eat, and making an appropriate amount of noise.

He needs to consider his family’s needs, too.

Anonymous wrote:Have you considered interacting with him like you would if he was still at work? Text him 'Hey honey what do you think about barbecue for dinner?'

Maybe if I could hack into his work IM system🤣

Have you considered interacting with him like you would if he was still at work? Text him 'Hey honey what do you think about barbecue for dinner?'

Anonymous wrote:Wtf. You are enabling this. You’re waiting for his input on what to cook for dinner and are scared to ask? Then don’t ask. Cut whatever you want, eat it, out away he leftovers, and when he comes out of his office, tell him you already ate, that you didn’t want to disturb him, and there are leftovers in the fridge.

Or you and dd go get takeout for yourselves or lead him to fend for himself.

Waiting on him to weigh in on takeout… but yeah I’m done waiting.

Wtf. You are enabling this. You’re waiting for his input on what to cook for dinner and are scared to ask? Then don’t ask. Cut whatever you want, eat it, out away he leftovers, and when he comes out of his office, tell him you already ate, that you didn’t want to disturb him, and there are leftovers in the fridge.

Or you and dd go get takeout for yourselves or lead him to fend for himself.

DH is still full time WFH. I’m in the office most days, WFH maybe 1x a week. I cannot wait till he has to go back into an office, for a variety of reasons, but mostly because I come home and he’s still working pretty much always and will shush us (me and DD) to tell us to be quiet and we gets so pissy at the smallest interruption. He has an office with a door that is not on our main level so it’s not like we can possibly be annoying him that much. I want my house back!!! Plus he’s alwayssssss here. I feel like a visitor in my own house. I’m beyond over it. It’s 6:30 on a Friday and we are waiting on him to decide what to do for dinner because I can’t ask him without him getting pissy. And he’s shushed our DD for basically existing. Dude we live here too.

And he claims to never want to go into the office again. Luckily it sounds like they are going to go hybrid in September. Can’t happen soon enough.

Anyone else feel this way? I don’t feel like I hear this perspective on WFH often.