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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Avatar for rollmops2009
iVillage Member
Registered: 02-24-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 11:46am
Do what? Dd has 2 grandmas. The one grandma babysat exactly once 17 years ago for a few hours. The other did take dd for several weeks once, but otherwise nada. We have no other family close enough to help with the kid or anything else for that matter. Nobody paid for our wedding, or gave us a down payment on a house or paid for our educations.

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

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

Oscar Wilde

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-15-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 11:46am
So sad. My dd just slept over a friends house last night and we called twice to see if everything was alright. Even my gf's dd slept over 2 nights in a row a few weeks ago and she called a few times. It is called being a concerned and involved parent. Too many parents are ready to just let their kids go, not deal with the things that come along with parenting. They try and make it "easy" on themselves. The poor children are the ones suffering. No child NEEDS to know how to do adult things at the age of 7 or even 11. Raising children does not have to be done all at once, it takes many years, if done correctly. And no, they probably will not know how to do everything when they turn 18. I see no reason why it is horrible for them to figure things out when they are older. I truly feel it is better that they are able to be a kid and know that their parents were loving and involved in their lives enough to do things for them WHILE teaching them.
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-15-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 11:49am

Depression is just one thing, anxiety medication is another. Sooo many people are being "diagnosed" as depressed or anxious these days. Why? Life IS stressful and it seems everyone wants it to be "easy" so they go and get medicine.


Are some people TRULY depressed, of course. Should others just "suck it up" and deal with life, YES.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-13-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 11:52am

Interesting double standard you've got here. You can make judgments about the mother and her sleep habits, but not the father and his lack of parental involvment? From your post 681.

"It's not the point that the parents are just home. The mother in this story seems not to be very involved in the children's lives (from the information we are given from the father). If the father works 10-12 hours, that would mean he would get home from 12am-2am. Even if she stays awake until he gets home, she could get 5-6 hours of sleep to wake up for the elementary school children. And..she could go back to sleep if she felt like since the 11 month old sleeps later."

Can't the father, who doesn't not see his school age children all week, by his own admission, get 5 or 6hrs sleep and wake up for them? Why is the mother's situation deserving of debate but not the father's?

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-10-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:13pm

Hover was YOUR word, not mine.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-15-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:16pm
Depression, anxiety medication.
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-10-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:18pm
Are you saying that a mother not calling her child while child is on a sleepover means that mother is not a concerned or involved parent?
Avatar for rollmops2009
iVillage Member
Registered: 02-24-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:23pm
What about adderall or ritalin for kids? Also just a crutch?

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

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

Oscar Wilde

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-15-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:26pm

I feel like people on these threads (not you, just musing here) are in a contest about how quickly their kids can turn into mini-adults. (My kid was capable of walking through 2-ft snow drifts for 2 miles at age 7 to get himself to school! Mine was driving himself to preschool at age 2! and so on.... ;)) They're still kids after all.


A.MEN!!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-15-2009
In reply to: daddy_gil
Sat, 03-06-2010 - 12:29pm
Ok, that's great but what does those things have to do with raising children and getting support from family and friends?

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