Romanticising ’Family’ / Evening Routines

actually i think he is being unreasonable too. if you hate the crazy dinner hour then i think he should consider going to the gym at least half an hour later even. Do you know his gym partner? is he married or have kids? maybe you could talk to him or his partner to see if they could arrange a slightly later time.

Ok so I would sit down with him & make a plan. You get the same amount of time away (if you want) & he does the child/house stuff or he he drop some sport or changes his times.

If he want to go to the gym 3 days a week fine...but he goes when it suits everyone, like after baby goes to bed or in the morning & his training buddy will have to get over it.

He has to be aware that children & wife/partner changes things. Do it now while you only have 1 child.

I had this warped view on things before I got married, I wanted it to be like perfect..I would cook, clean house, look after kids all day long & everything would be rosie, but factor in work, money, wants, needs, kids it did not work. We all work well together but it has not been what you see on tv & I think my mum made it look easy or that's my memories.

We don't sweet the small stuff, I am a SAHM at the moment so I do all the kids & house stuff, if it gets too much I call in DH. We don't go out much, more home bodies now with 3 kids, DH does not do sports but does game/study/ on-call for work & has odd hrs sometimes. I also like to watch a few programs on TV that DH does not like..our life works for us so I would suggest find a happy medium for you both, no one plan works for all.

I hope you guys can sort out a compromise, it does sound like he needs to be a bit more reasonable about it....but hey he is a male after all!

As a side note I am jealous of anyone who has help with the dinner/bedtime routine, my DH is home 2/7 nights a week and I have always done it all

Yeah.... that would piss me off too. For all the reasons you listed.

We have always had dinner as a family. Dinnertime around 6pm and then shower/bath and bed around 7pm for Jude.

TBH I rely heavily on DP being around during that time. I can and will do it myself when he is not around - no worries at all. But I would not want to do it everyday of the week - and would become a bit resentful if I did have to.

This past week or two he has been the one to come in from work and cook dinner as I've been a bit worn out. A lot of the days in the past week he has come in from work(dairy farmer) and cooked breakfast in the mornings as well. It's all swings and roundabouts though - I usually do breakfast and I will often take the boys away for a night or two so that he can have a night without the dinner/bedtime rush and just some time to relax. And a bit more of the dinnertime/bedtime rush falls to me during busier times such as calving though he still does help out.

Re hobbies. DP is a mountain biker and I'm a horse rider. When I go riding though - I usually have my horse with family so they can look after the boys for a bit. When he goes riding, I have to look after the boys but I usually get a semi-sleep in (used to be a full sleep in when it was just Jude but now Willem wants feeding so DP looks after Jude) on weekends DP has off work.

It's all about compromise really.

um, why does he have to go to the gym 3 times a week if he is doing such a physical job?

I would ask him to drop a session, or as others have suggested, go once your toddler is in bed.

Good luck

Reading all of these posts has made me aware of how hectic family life is for us these days. My partner has been away for 5 weeks now and we have another 2 to go, so I have been doing it solo, ugh. When he is home tho I hate it when he goes out! Will be interesting to see how we go when he has a new 9-5 job.

Im in a similar position with my DH playing footy on the weekends and training every tues and thurs. I ofund the only way to make it work for us is to lump the week nights and go along and watch the footy on the sat. It makes a for nice day out (fingers crossed the weather agrees) and a chance for me to talk to other people who arnt mums or co- workers. I dont go to the gym or really do much for myself these days, I only seem to look after our little miss each day or work which sometimes leaves me stressed and grumpy for him to come homw to. Although you will most likely find that he does miss spending time with your son (my DH sometimes comes home and miss is having a sleep then he goes to training and comes home at 8-8.30pm and she is back in bed). Perhaps asking for a compromise of 2 nights a week at the gym and one arvo at footy. and then the social match they always seem to have needs to be cut to a minimum as weekends should be family time. and make sure that you and DH get atleast one night alone together a fortnight- even if its just a movie at home snuggling on the couch. good luck

Thanks everyone so much for all your replies.

I have come to realise that perhaps I am being a bit unrealistic in my expectations of what we as a family are supposed to be like HOWEVER I will still continue to campaign for what I think is important but those things I guess will be more flexible as our family changes.

On the night I originally posted my problem, I'd already sat down with him and we talked about my reasoning behind not wanting him take so much time away from home. Although at the time he was resistant (which is why I came in here and asked the question) I think he's actually had a think about it and is - and I hate to use this phrase - coming 'round to my way of thinking.

TBH, I think it was the complete resistance that was pissing me off the most. The arrogance that "he was doing it and that was that" attitude was what was making me more angry.

ANYWAY, tonight he said that he's going to go to the gym twice a week and at least once on the weekend. Him making an effort is a HUGE deal and perhaps was the only thing I really needed.

We also spent some time together as a couple on Friday night which I didn't realise but was craving that too. And that also helped.

All that aside, I would never stop him from his gym or his football (which BTW is 'soccer') because it's what he loves to do, DS and I do go and watch him play when the weather is good because it's also important to us that he see's us being active.

Some of the fixes:
- Be more prepared (Thanks Bizzy - I needed to hear that)
- Have dinner as early as possible so that we can get DS into bed by 8pm, then DH goes to the gym later
- More 'Date' nights

PS: It literally only takes him 10 minutes because he gets him up, dresses him (sometimes while he's still asleep) and puts him in the car (breakfast at Nana and GDads, and they have nappies and clothes there for him)

ETA: That he is a bloody awesome Dad when he's with our DS and I love that about him.

Edited by MrsH