If your spouse had a job where they were partially in charge of their own schedule (some meetings/tasks are scheduled for them, but there is also unstructured time every day where they didn’t even need to be in the office) would you expect them to occasionally come home early, like for a birthday, anniversary, beginning of a holiday, kids birthday, mother/father’s day, etc.? My spouse has never spontaneously come home early, without being asked, for any reason or occasion. The only time they would is if I called them and begged them to, to help me out, which I try not to do because historically, that would make them mad. They do take holidays with our family. And they do find time a few times a week to leave work in their unstructured time to go to the gym. Forgot to say: they do come home early one day a week to take kids to an activity; it’s an activity that they are also into. Key here is that I am a stay at home primary care giver parent, and some of the only time I ever get a break from continuous childcare use when my spouse is at home.
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The man has a full time job that he is trying to keep mostly regular hours for, while still taking some time to exercise and take the kids.
Assuming they’re helping out ~50% while they’re at home, that sounds extremely reasonable.
“unstructured” time isn’t the same as “free” time.
If you are so overwhelmed with being a SAHP, certainly look into some other options, that maybe include you going back to work, but I’m not seeing anything particularly terrible about what’s going on here.
*>> The only time they would is if I called them and begged them to, to help me out, which I try not to do because historically, that would make them mad.*
Why would they get mad at you for needing or wanting them or their help?
So gym is a priority but their own marriage is not?
This doesn’t sound like a healthy marriage at all.
I understand taking time off for emergency or illness in the family or appointment. I also understand taking planned vacation/PTO time to spend time with a family. Randomly leaving work to hang out or celebrate birthdays isn’t typical.
If you want them to take days off ask them to plan let’s say two weeks from now take Friday off. Not random.
Why don’t you two hire a babysitter and go on a date. On the weekend. That’s what people typically do. Or go somewhere on the weekend all together with kids. Not leaving work randomly to come home to hang out
As a SAHP myself, I see your point here, and tbh I don’t see you being unreasonable, so for me birthdays, anniversaries are important and when there’s a celebration of the kids birthday etc I will forewarn my husband, say 3 weeks in advance, that we have a child’s party and I need help and I’d like you to be present so if you need to book time off, do it now. For our wedding anniversary for example, we will celebrate the weekend of when he’s typically off. I do think it’s important for all people in the relationship to appreciate each other. So if I’m the one cooking, cleaning, washing and raising our kids for the most part. Then my husband should make an effort to help out a little when he’s home and then maybe we all do a family activity at the weekends, or if I am meeting a friend for coffee etc he will mind the kids and so on. My husband is amazing for what it’s worth, he’s a good dad and a good husband but like that he can forget sometimes that I need some time, so we work on it all the time. Your husband sounds like he’s doing a good job of providing but obviously is a little selfish in taking time off to do the gym cos he can and it suits him, and not choosing to spend some of that free time with the family. I think all that’s needed here is balance, and he certainly has no right becoming angry if you’re asking him to please come home and take the load off you seeing as his job allows for him to finish early some days etc. It’s important for him to have some downtime, which it sounds like he gets, it’s important to me that me and my husband each have downtime also, so his hobby is cars and engines lol so he gets time for that, I say nothing, I don’t complain, but when I say, ok I’m going to get my hair done and have a coffee with a friend after, I expect no arguments on his part because I will always schedule it when he’s not working. Perhaps, it’s worth sitting down and explaining your thoughts, maybe you already have, but maybe try again, and try to come to an agreement that ye both are entitled to downtime and help etc so suggest let’s make a note of how best to approach it. If you ask him to clear his timetable maybe every 2nd week? I don’t know how your husbands work is so this is just a thought. I wish you luck and I hope you can come to some kind of balance where both people are happy