Alone time, splitting of chores, and looking at stay-at-home mom duties as a 'job'

[pepperbird2]

2 hours ago, clia said:

Honestly, it doesn't seem like that uneven of a split to me when you lay it out:

She:  Takes care of the kid from 7:30 a.m. when the kid wakes up until 6 p.m. when dad gets home.  Then she works weekday evenings and all day on Saturday.  She does the grocery shopping, daily tasks like vacuuming, sweeping, laundry.

Dad:  Gets up at 7:30 a.m., works until 6 p.m.  Cooks dinner and puts the kid to bed each night.  I assume watches the kid when mom is at work on Saturday.  Takes care of finances, mops, takes out garbage (1x a week), cleans the bathroom (1x a week?), fixes things, deep cleans (2x a year?).  

What's happening on Sundays?

I mean, welcome to adulting.  There are some very basic things you can do to give yourselves -- both of you -- some free time.  Hire a babysitter one or two nights a week or on Saturday for a few hours.  Go to the gym in the morning before work, since she's watching the kid then.  Get takeout once or twice a week or make enough food for leftovers so you don't have to cook every single night.  Or even just do "fend for yourself" once or twice a week for dinner or do something really easy for dinner, like sandwiches or something.  You agree to wake up with the kid once or twice a week if she takes bedtime once or twice a week.  (I mean, if she has to do the morning stuff 7 days I week, I don't really see it as that unfair that you have to do evening stuff 7 days a week.)  

I don't know, it kind of seems like you don't really appreciate what she does either, so the problem goes both ways.  

Op,

If you can afford, it, would you consider hiring a cleaning service to help ease the load?

[glows]

It's difficult to rebuild trust once broken. If you did have an affair that's may be a big reason why she's reluctant to see you socialize with anyone else (not fair to you, yes) but unfortunately that's the price you've paid to cheat and stay in the marriage. There are cracks there and sadly those can't be undone. You both may have to see it through the hard way and discover that. Not all couples can recover from something like that and it seems the resentment is bubbling over. There's no point nitpicking and tearing each other apart about domestic issues. The crux is really trust issues and loss of mutual respect.

You don't seem too keen on the marriage so speak to a lawyer independently and see what your options are. 

[basil67]

@Elswyth Thank you for pointing out why I thought the OP had suggested that being a SAHM was easy.   When he said that he didn't think it at all, I started to feel like I imagined it. 

@Fresh-craft  Your update just painted a very different picture of what's going on.  She's got childhood trauma and PPD and you just compounded all that trauma by cheating on her.  Is it any surprise that her behaviour towards you is off?  

While I still believe that both of you have to be pulling their weight until your child is in bed,  I agree that there's likely something huge and ugly which we're not seeing.  

[Wiseman2]

5 hours ago, Fresh-craft said:

Yes, it’s something I’m stating to look into to see what would likely happen.   You still have to write up an official co-parenting agreement, including child support details, and file that with the court for review and to make it an official court order to protect both parties.  

Excellent. At least the real issues are coming to the fore. It never is about chores and bedtimes. Bickering is about long standing resentments and conflicts.

Yes, child support and visitation goes through the courts. More importantly is you need to move out.

Talk to your therapist about coasting along, indecisiveness, cheating and other passive aggressive ways of dealing and which ways are more effective to achieve your goals.

[BaileyB]

19 hours ago, Fresh-craft said:

we have successfully shifted down the bed time already in the last few days even earlier - to being said and done (out of the room) by 9:30pm which sounds late but it is a big improvement, and it already feels like I have a bit of my life back. 

That’s good. Early bedtimes benefit the parents as much as the children.

Here’s the thing, being an adult is hard. Being a parent is hard. It’s morning to night - work, cook, clean, play with the child, sleep, repeat. These preschool years are precious but they are HARD! The only way to get through it is to work together. You need to lighten the load - a cleaning service, nursery school, a babysitter for date night occasionally… If you stay together, you need to decide together that your goal is to be happy and make decisions that support everyone in the family to be happy. It’s not a competition, to see who works the hardest. And, it’s not fair to expect your spouse to pick up the slack while you live your own life (at the gym, etc… I know someone who’s marriage just broke up for exactly this reason). I think you underestimate the fact that you broke her trust and you cheated. It’s mentioned rather casually and easy to miss amidst all your complaints and the blame you place on your partner. If we feel it, you better believe she feels it, so it’s not hard to understand why she is taking her anger and frustration out on you. It sounds, quite honestly, like you haven’t been in a healthy place individually or together for a long time. So, I hope that you find some good counsellors such that whether you stay together or not, you can be happy and healthy people - coparenting and raising your daughter in a stable and loving home/s. 

Edited July 1, 2021 by BaileyB

[Starswillshine]

How long ago was the affair? 

And what have you done to try to help your wife get over this HUGE betrayal? Have been you truthful completely? Has she had to deal with new blows of truth here and there or did you come out and was clean with it all straight away? 

Always amazes me when WS are like. "I cheated, I said I was sorry, can't we get on with it now." Meanwhile BS is still bleeding out and the WS can't understand why they aren't so nice to them. 

[Fresh-craft]

Sorry, I may only tag a few people here, since a lot have jumped in since my last reply.  I really appreciate the insights and help from everyone

@Elswyth - since I have to somewhat limit the scope of my post here, I haven't really told all the little stories I could tell about our past.  If anything, I've tried to skew towards my own transgressions and what I'm accountable for.  If you won't take my word for it, take hers.  She readily and repeatedly admits she has done quite a big portion of the damage to this relationship.  That said, thanks to all your responses, I'm at least beginning to see some of these topics in a different light.  I totally think you all are right, that the bickering is not really about the thing that's actually being bickered about, but the deeper issues.  

@Starswillshine - it was 3 years ago, and wasn't an affair, but a one-time with a prostitute.  I do think what you and others have said rings true.  All of this probably really stems from her feelings on the infidelity that are unresolved.  I did try and work things out in couples therapy with her for about 2 years after, every week.  Maybe I didn't do enough and brushed it off too casually.  At the time, I felt like she wasn't giving the chance to make amends.  One therapist told her, "at some point, you do need to work to release it from your mind, and forgive him for it. You simply can't continue with the topic feeling unresolved."  This is not to absolve myself from responsibility, but I was having a hard time figuring out how to really convince her I was sorry in a way that satisfied her.  Somewhat recently, she asked if she could put a tracker app on my phone, but I refused since I didn't like the idea in general.  Maybe I will consider allowing it for a limited time period if it will help rebuild trust.  

I think I need to use the therapist to get even more clear on my own true feelings and hang-ups and decide what it will take to make me happy, what I want essentially.  I've already fallen into the trap of fantasizing what it would be like to be "free" again, because life at home with her seems so miserable much of the time.  And then, I can try and find out from my gf what the equivalent is for her, and try and unearth what exactly it is that I can do, in concrete terms, that will satisfy her.  Perhaps it will not be something that is possible, but I don't want to make any decisions without putting work into those avenues first.  

It's so hard at this point to look into what now feels like the distant past, rewinding past all the hundreds of negative interactions, and try and remember what she used to be like, that she used to be sweet to me and affectionate.  I have to give that version of her a chance to come back again.  I need to do my part and repair what is broken in a way that is "all-in" as someone said.  It can't be a half-assed effort.  I know I can't wait for her to figure it out for us - it's going to have to be me. 

[Els]

On 7/2/2021 at 7:58 AM, Fresh-craft said:

@Elswyth - since I have to somewhat limit the scope of my post here, I haven't really told all the little stories I could tell about our past.  If anything, I've tried to skew towards my own transgressions and what I'm accountable for.  If you won't take my word for it, take hers.  She readily and repeatedly admits she has done quite a big portion of the damage to this relationship.  That said, thanks to all your responses, I'm at least beginning to see some of these topics in a different light.  I totally think you all are right, that the bickering is not really about the thing that's actually being bickered about, but the deeper issues.  

FWIW, I agree that it's possible she has a part to play in it too. If she's telling you, for instance, that bringing in the majority of the income equates to "nothing", then that's not great in my book. What I'm trying to say is that it sounds to me like you two are in a vicious cycle. You treat her with disrespect and lack of gratitude, she treats you with disrespect and lack of gratitude. Compounded by your cheating, there seems to be a huge gnarly knot that is beyond our pay grade, you need MC if you want to have any hope of sorting it out.

Speaking of which, sorry if you mentioned it and I forgot, it's been a while - are you doing MC together? If not, why not? I get that you're not actually legally married, but if you have a child together and are currently living together, that pretty much ties your lives together inextricably, much like a marriage does. So MC would still be suitable AFAIK.

[Fresh-craft]

On 7/4/2021 at 11:21 AM, Elswyth said:

FWIW, I agree that it's possible she has a part to play in it too. If she's telling you, for instance, that bringing in the majority of the income equates to "nothing", then that's not great in my book. What I'm trying to say is that it sounds to me like you two are in a vicious cycle. You treat her with disrespect and lack of gratitude, she treats you with disrespect and lack of gratitude. Compounded by your cheating, there seems to be a huge gnarly knot that is beyond our pay grade, you need MC if you want to have any hope of sorting it out.

Speaking of which, sorry if you mentioned it and I forgot, it's been a while - are you doing MC together? If not, why not? I get that you're not actually legally married, but if you have a child together and are currently living together, that pretty much ties your lives together inextricably, much like a marriage does. So MC would still be suitable AFAIK.

@Elswyth- thanks for the reply.  Yup, I think you are right on the vicious cycle thing.  How to break it is the question.  I know, it was a very long thread.  Yes, we actually did quite a long stint of couple's therapy together (which I believe is the same as MC).  It was really not accomplishing much.  After the first therapist, which I felt was awful, we went to another for quite a while whom I thought was way more fair and balanced.  However, therapists are not supposed to act as like some sort of courtroom judge (and this one did not take any sides as she's supposed to).  Yet, my main issue with why that never went anywhere was that my GF pretty much just used those sessions as a sounding board for complaining about me and saying how awful I was.  She would start crying and then basically tell a story of some fight in that past week where, in my opinion, she grossly misrepresented the framing and context of the story she was telling.  This is why I said before that she doesn't play fair.  I made a good faith effort to go into those sessions with an open mind for months and months and I feel like she misused that time to try and get some kind of validation from the therapist (which never came).  

Like, that's my main issue with her.  There's always something that's going to make her mad at me and lash out.  If it doesn't exist, she invents it.  Don't you think she should be able to tell me in clear, concrete terms what it would take to make her happy with me/us again?  When asked just that point blank, she can never seem to do that.  I'm willing to work to make it better....but what am I supposed to be doing exactly?  When I ask her just that, she clams up.  This is why I feel she is being emotionally abusive towards me.  In fact, I was realizing yesterday that my whole disposition for each and every day hinges on however she seems to be feeling that day.  Yes, I cheated.  Yes, it's a very big deal.  But, don't you think she has to hold up her end of being genuine in trying to solve the problems?