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: 03-27-2000
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:47pm
I used to have just one big hamper when the kids were younger. It was a PITA doing laundry b/c I'd have to dump everything out, pull out all the darks, throw them in a basket and bring them downstairs. But then I'd have two more piles of sorted dirty laundry laying on my bedroom floor until I was able to throw the next load in. This way, everything is pre-sorted and when one of the hamper bags is full, I know it's time to do that load. Plus, it's nice not having to sort "dirty" laundry - kind of gross. I've found that laundry is much less time consuming now, but of course, I have two more people in my family than you, so I have more laundry to begin with!
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:48pm

I totally agree....


PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2000
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:49pm
Why couldn't you keep the sorter where you currently keep one of your hampers?
Avatar for mommy2amani
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:52pm


I was thinking the exact same thing.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:53pm

Well I didn't say it was impossible as a general statement, it was specific to a situation.

PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-22-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:54pm

Well sugar, five kids, god bless ya~ :)


iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2000
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:55pm
I have four kids but there is no way I have three loads of laundry per day! I do have a large capacity front loader so I can fit quite a bit of laundry in the machine, but as long as I stay on top of it, I have a load maybe once a day or every other day depending on the season. Winter clothes are bulkier!
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:55pm

I'm really getting the impression that my children were extremely low maintenance in this department when they were young.

PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 12:57pm

That's kinda why I asked for examples a few times from you....none of those were even on my radar...didn't even occur to me to consider them.


PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-15-2006
In reply to: daddy_gil
Thu, 03-11-2010 - 1:02pm
i thought you said you could and sometimes do sit down with students with dx and requests for accomdations and put them in place for them.

 

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