SAHM and Spouse WFH

[toolenduso]

I am a SAHM. My husband WFH. Our son is six months old. There are MANY benefits to this setup, and I wouldn’t change it at all! I love that we both get to be so present in our child’s life and each other’s, and I love that we support one another.

Nonetheless I wanted to see how other people are navigating the more nuanced bits.

How do you handle parenting duties, housekeeping, and time for individual recreation when one parent is a SAHM and the working parent WFH? Any tips?

Like, there’s no clear division of it’s 5:30 PM, and I’ve been with the kids all day and you’ve worked all day and now we will divide and conquer… because the working spouse has time to pop downstairs during breaks and spend time with the baby, help with child care, etc.

In our circumstance, my spouse works 70+ hours a week usually, and I’d say 1/3 of that time is spent in meetings.

Also… Do you count working out as recreation or is it more of an essential function, like a step down from eating/bathing/etc. but still in that category? I.e., working out doesn’t count as recreation anymore than having a shower or a meal.

 

[regularguy]

@toolenduso My husband wfh for the first year. In a very small apartment. However, he worked a very standard 9-5, took a 45 min lunch, only had a couple meetings each week. We had a door open/closed system. If his door was open, baby or I could crawl in and say hi or ask him to hold the baby while I switched the laundry, he’d help me carry in the groceries, that sort of thing. If the door was closed, we left him be and I didn’t expect him to come out unless there was a true emergency.

Basically I was on the clock 9-5 for parenting and housekeeping. Whatever I could get done during the day, I could do. Everything else we split up on the weekend so one person could watch the baby and the other person could do the chore. We do have set things that we both do every day (like he unloads the dishwasher every morning, I clean up the kitchen as the day goes on.) He always hung out with the baby while I made dinner listening to a podcast.

I worked out at home during naps. He went to the gym 3-4 times a week. He wakes up early before either of us are awake and is back in time to make us breakfast. That was a big change for him because he used to exercise after work pre-baby. We made that decision when I was pregnant that his exercise is extremely important to him and his mental health but that it can’t get in the way of the family schedule.

 

[lorimidwife]

@regularguy Could’ve written most of this. This is our setup too.

 

[seabiscuit]

@toolenduso My first was a pandemic baby, so my husband was WFH for the first 6 months. And then sent back to the office, and then sent back to WFH during the delta spike and stayed that way for a long time. Then he was on a hybrid schedule until just after our older daughter turned 3.

During the day he’d come down for lunch or if it was an emergency, but otherwise, he was working. When he got off work, childcare and housecare duties were split 50/50, just like they are now that he’s back in the office full time.

Neither of us really work out. It is recreation, something we’d do in our (not-so-copious) free time in the evenings and weekends

 

[iamthankful]

@toolenduso When my baby was that age my husband worked from home full time too (he doesn’t anymore but anyway). Husband would get up with baby in the morning (around 7) and take her for a walk for about 45 minutes while I got up and got ready for the day. I’d make breakfast and then he’d go to work and it would pretty much just be me and baby until 5pm. I’d make and bring him lunch; he’d help me get baby into the car if I went anywhere during the day. At night everything is 50/50 although I always did all the cooking and the majority of the cleaning. Husband always does bedtime routine while I clean the kitchen; these take about the same amount of time, and then we can chill. That was rambly but I hope it helped.

At the time we weren’t working out. Now my husband works out before work and I work out after he gets off work. But when the baby was that young we didn’t have a consistent workout routine.

 

[brucepjr]

@iamthankful This is similar to us.

I do think the working out piece is very difficult for us. If you’re in survival mode, working out feels like a luxury. It’s very hard to provide your partner that time if you’re already struggling. I know a lot of people suggest joining a gym with childcare. That wasn’t an option for me, but in hindsight would have been a good compromise.

 

[iamthankful]

@brucepjr We’re hoping to do that soon but the separation anxiety is so strong right now, my daughter would cry the whole time.

 

[raven00]

@toolenduso My husband would have set hours that he clocked on and off. I wouldn’t ask him for help during those times. If he came in and offered help, it was with the understanding that it’s because he’s having a break, not because he’s going to finish work later than planned.

In saying that, I would use it to my advantage to leave the house while one or more children were asleep. He didn’t have to do anything other than be around if something happened. If they woke early he might give them lunch but continue working.

When he clocks off (on time) we divvy up needs like exercise and rest etc. I also make sure I rest during nap time so I’m not a complete banshee.

I would also suggest that 70 hours a week is not a sustainable work load (for him or you) and may need to be reevaluated

 

[peopleperson9503]

@toolenduso My husband works from home.

I’m also 38 weeks pregnant so I need a bit of extra help at the moment. My LO is 19 months old.

Normally he will do overnights with our daughter, and get up for the day with her. He will take his breaks together and occupy her for an hour during the day. I will look after her and all the cooking/cleaning throughout the day.

Then when he finishes at 4.30, he occupies her while I finish cooking dinner, we eat together.

Mainly it’s him who does bath time and bed time while I finish washing up/tidying up for the day, but it’s somewhat shared since I’ll help get her into PJs, mix up bottles etc. Once she’s in bed we both have the evening to relax and we share any wakes/crying until we go to sleep.

My daughter generally will sleep from 6pm-5am and if she wakes overnight it’s normally only once. It works well for us. It’ll no doubt be chaos once this baby arrives but I imagine it’ll be more of a divide and conquer at that point.

 

[anonyme]

@toolenduso Husband and I have both been either WFH or on maternity/paternity leave since December 2019. (We are currently both working 4-day weeks from home so I'm not a true SAHM, but I lurk here because there are lots of useful tips and ideas!). We have two daughters, 1.5 and 3.5, who both attend 15 hours of daycare/preschool per week.

What works for us is to treat both paid work and childcare work as equal... regardless of who has been at their computer all day and who has been with the kids all day, at 6pm we each put one kid to bed and then divide the chores as evenly as possible. We do this by having a whiteboard with everything that needs done each night written in permanent marker with checkboxes: when you finish putting your kid to bed you start on a chore, then check it off with whiteboard marker and move on to the next one, and so on until the list is done. Some nights I might end up doing more chores because husband's bedtime routine took longer, or vice-versa, but it means that the 'mental load' of remembering what needs to be done and what's already been completed, etc., is taken by the whiteboard rather than any one person's brain. Chores usually get done by around 8pm, and then we have approx. 2 hours to relax/shower/catch up on work before adult bedtime.

Similarly on weekends, we divide the weekend into four sessions (Sat AM, Sat PM, Sun AM, Sun PM) and each person does two sessions with the kids and two sessions doing other things (sometimes this is cleaning or yard work, sometimes it's relaxing or doing something enjoyable).

We've managed to get around the working-out issue by incorporating the kids into our exercise -- I run with Mme. 3.5 and Mlle. 1.5 in a double running buggy, and husband cycles them around to various places on a cargo bike, both of which are very good exercise. But if we weren't doing that, I'm afraid we would probably have to subtract workout time from our recreation times, as there wouldn't otherwise be room for it in our schedule.

 

[theholycelt]

@toolenduso Regarding working out - as long as you also get time to work out then it’s an essential function. If he doesn’t give you time to work out, then it’s recreation.

In our house it’s an essential function. Both of us let ourselves go after my second was born so we are trying to get our lives back together now.

 

[erujeje2]

@toolenduso We ended up dividing the week into "nights off". On Monday and Wednesday, at around 6ish, I get to go off and take a break for a few hours, till around 8 or 9, when we both do bedtime duties. On Tuesday and Friday, my husband gets the same evening time off. On Thursday, we either team up on chores, watch a movie together as a family, etc. We feel like that keeps it balanced and fair, without having to try to keep track of things or decide "who is more tired" etc. We do family activities, play groups, or see friends on weekends.

 

[juns]

@toolenduso My husband wfh frequently, and I just treat every day the same as if he were heading to the office. He can pop out when he wants (although to be honest this usually causes more problems than it does help), but I try to go about my day as if he’s not there. It is very hard sometimes because I want to check in to see if he can join us for a walk or trip to the park or something, but more often than not when I try to arrange that it ends up that we wait on him and the activity doesn’t happen at all. It’s hard to balance because he does get free time, but it’s unpredictable and I’m already working around my toddler’s nap and eating schedule.

Also, my husband is not at all helpful during workdays and, at best, probably a bit of a nuisance. And yet, I hate the days he has to go into the office. There’s just something about having another adult around even if you barely interact.

 

[alearose]

@toolenduso Why does he work 70 hours? That’s a lot. My husband works from home, but he only works 30-40 hours a week. So, my first recommendation would be trying to see if he can have more boundaries around his personal time and cut back the outside work hours. My husband chooses a time every day when he is done (usually between 5 and 6 pm); I ask him around 4 or 5 when he will be done and we go from there.

 

[ezzeking]

@toolenduso My husband WFH, and I am a SAHM. Working out is treated as recreation/personal time. I work out during the day when baby naps most day so realistically it typically doesn’t come up in our internal calculus of things any way.

The way we do things is that at 5:30pm barring anything pressing my husband stops working and takes over with our son while I go cook dinner. This is a pretty hard and fast rule. If he has more stuff he wants to work on, he is free to do that after baby has gone to bed at night but baby is his responsibility at 5:30pm as I need to start cooking dinner so we can get baby to bed on time and he is a stage 5 clinger so it’s hard to cook and watch him at the same time.

Husband does most of the bedtime routine and then I nurse baby to sleep.

We typically watch an episode or two together and then do our nightly chores. Husband does the dishes while I vacuum, mop, and reset the playroom. Whoever gets done first wiped down the counters and cleans out the high chair.

I do most household laundry but husband does his own. I do that mostly during the day during naps.

On the weekends we do other necessary house cleaning like cleaning the bathrooms, addressing clutter, dusting etc and just split it up evenly.

Generally, my husband does not help me with the baby during the day. He pops in for a minute to say hi a couple of times a day and we often go on a walk with baby and our dogs on his lunch break. But generally speaking unless something unusual is going on, he doesn’t help with household things during the workday, then we do the hard stop at 5:30 and split household and childcare work pretty 50/50 from there.

 

[taznq15]

@toolenduso With your first baby I think it’s reasonable to expect help on breaks because you’re new to this. You should communicate your specific needs and do what works for your family.

Fwiw, i’ll just describe our sitch —husband handles a TON in the morning because I’m not a morning person and I expect him to equally co-parent from 5:30-bedtime. Other than that, I treat it as my full-time gig from 8:30-5:30. He goes in like 3 times a week and I have our older kid in camp or preschool for 3 hrs/day. I get a complete 3 hr break via a babysitter twice a week in the afternoons. We have the house cleaned professionally biweekly. We have an insulated garage and we renovated it ourselves into a comfortable workspace for him, so we are all free to make whatever noises we want all day. He is totally separated and the kids can’t get to him.

Edit: as to working out —essential function! We have gym equipment (full weight rack and treadmill) and we communicate how to make it work for both of us! The science is so clear that exercise is important. I prioritize him because he sits at a desk but if I don’t end up doing some kind of uphill stroller push because of rain he will 100% arrange his time so I work out and shower.

 

[mijuk95]

@toolenduso I (SAHM) don’t ask my husband (WFH) to do any domestic labor from 9-5. One exception is if he really can’t concentrate and isn’t able to get work done he needs to come out and help.

If he wants to work past 5 he has to give me a heads up.

I usually don’t do anything during my daughter’s nap. So that’s a 1.5 hour break. Usually I do housework with her or after she goes to sleep at night with my husband.

After he’s off at 5 we do a 50-50 split (unless he’s working late)

Eta

-in my opinion working out is recreational unless you’re the one asking him to do it.

-my daughter is mostly sleeping through the night so that’s not really labor intensive anymore

-my husband has a diagnosed sleeping problem so I do mornings on my own and he gives me a break in the evenings to compensate.

 

[joshua371]

@toolenduso I do all the childcare and house care until he is done for the day around 6:00. We trade off on dishes/getting kids ready for bath. He does some house projects during the weekends or lunch breaks and sometimes runs errands. Recreation time is when kids are asleep. Occasionally we go out separately with friends in the evenings and trade off on that. I work my exercise in during the day. We basically treat ut like he is away during the day when he is working but occasionally if I need to make an appt or there’s a hiccup in our schedule he can step away to watch the kids which is great. But meetings definitely dictate his day and available time.