Frustrated Dad

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-09-2009
Frustrated Dad
2943
Wed, 09-09-2009 - 3:28am
I really need some opinions on my situation. I am a 30 year old dad with 3 children. I work 10-12 hrs a day 5 days a week and every other Saturday. I am pretty much a homebody, the only time I really go out is on Sundays during football season to watch the games. I do what i need to in order to support my wife and kids. But I am at wits end with my wife and need some help.
My wifes day is as follows. She wakes up any where from 10am - noon (which means 2 of our children (11 and 7) wake up feed themselves and walk to school) at which point she will got downstairs to the kitchen to light a cigarette and call her sister or best friend. During the 1/2hr to an hour that she is on the phone she will make (for herself)and drink about 3 cups of coffee. At around noon when the baby wakes up (11 months) she'll feed him change his diaper and set him on the floor and mostly ignore him as she calls her mother. Usually around 12:30 she'll head out to do errands leaving me with the baby until 1:30 when she'll get home so I can rush out to work where I'm 20 minutes away from and need to be in by 2.
Heres the thing i have no problem being the sole financial gainer in the house hold but I expect certain things. I guess thats the reason for this post to find out if my expectation are to lofty. I expect her to get up in the morning with the children make them breakfast help them pick out cloths make sure they have their homework and send them off to school( I would even help in the morning but i got sick of waking up in the morning while shes still sleeping when i was the one at work last night). I would like breakfast every once in a while made when i wake up i don't expect it but it would be nice. I would like the baby up before 11am I just don't think he should be sleeping that long. i expect laundry the be cleaned, folded and put away! The laundry in our house gets washed and dried them it usually ends up on the dining room table for half the day then it makes its way over to the living room where its folded and left on the couch for a day or two (is it to much to ask to have it put away). I expect the house clean! Cleaning the kitchen for her consist of of doing the dishes and mopping the floor! Cabinets, frig, counters, stove maybe once a month. Cleaning the dinning room consist of her wiping the table and vacuuming one area of the carpet. Bathroom, living room are cleaned in the same manner and the children's room and bedroom upstairs can go months without cleaning! I expect lunch made before i got to work! No breakfast and lunch not even a packed lunch/diner!I expect a home cooked diner for my children! Not pizza, macaroni or canned spaghetti!!! Is this to much to ask? i expect diner when I get home, real food not something she sends me on yoville or farmtown, which she's on until 2am!! DO I EXPECT TO MUCH? I thought these where to things a stay at home mom did? Are my expectations to old school? I need answers I feel like I'm being taken advantage of and I don't know how much longer I can last.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 10-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:28pm

Okay, im gonna wrap this up in one post, instead of responding to every post. Bottom line we just have different perspectives on "preventing"

Avatar for mom34101
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:31pm
Yes, I'm saying it's hot enough to burn them. Or let's say your 5-year-old starts to step out in front of traffic while you're standing right there. Or let's talk about locks for cabinets or doors to keep kids from getting into dangerous cleaners or medicines. There all sorts of ways in which parents supervise kids and/or physically prevent them from making mistakes until we trust they're old enough to do it for themselves.
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:36pm

You did have a two year old child

Avatar for mom34101
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:37pm
Yes, it's silly to insist a parent wouldn't stop a kid from burning his hand on a stove.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-22-2005
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:47pm
I'm wondering if maybe it's time to point out the difference between primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention?














iVillage Member
Registered: 10-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:50pm
i noticed that to, so I tried to expalin that agian and agian and agian but still got the disagreement
Avatar for mom34101
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:51pm

Yes, that is interesting. My then-12-yr-old was also criticized for thinking it was okay to step outside her school at 5 p.m. to see if the bus was there yet, but now I'm hearing that 7-yr-olds can be expected to get themselves to school on their own every morning.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:51pm

I totally agree that there are many examples of things you would not let your child learn the danger from through experience (running into the street, drinking poisons etc).

But I was replying to your question of:

"You wouldn't physically stop a 2-yr-old from putting his hand on a hot stove?"

There was nothing in the question about it being hot enough to actually burn them. So I do not think that it would automatically fall under the category of something I would not let them learn through experience. Hot is just a word until they experience what hot is so I may let them experience the sensation of hot when it is not a danger to try to teach them to avoid it. I do not think that I put my toddlers hands on the hot side of the oven but I did put their hand close enough to it to feel the sensation of the heat to explain to them what hot was. They learned that hot was not something they wanted to touch,

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:56pm
EXACTLY
Avatar for rollmops2009
iVillage Member
Registered: 02-24-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Wed, 03-10-2010 - 1:56pm
Yep, I did the same, while saying the word "hot" very clearly. After a few times of that, all I had to do to get the kid to pull her hand back was say, "no, hot." After a short time of that, she avoided it on her own. Because I was alone her at dinner cooking time, I had to teach her basic kitchen safety early. I couldn't cook and watch her like hawk at the same time.

~o~ ...^^^... ~o~

America had often been discovered before Columbus, but it had always been hushed up.

Oscar Wilde

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