How to help partner who works from home and can't switch off

LegacyUser

I think you should set up a shared family google calendar - not one on the kitchen wall, he's never going to look at that. Put your personal appointments into it - yoga class etc. Include travel time in that so that the calendar shows you as unavailable from the time you need to leave the house. And your return travel time too - so that you are clearly shown as unavailable for say 2 hours when attending a 1 hour yoga class. Set it up so that you both get reminders 10 minutes beforehand. He gets 10 mins grace, and then you bring the kids into his office, and close the door and walk away. No excuses, no conference calls, no 'but I have to finish x'. You need to be consistent on this. And this stops the passive waiting.

But - and I think this is key - make your 'you time' arrangements outside of his official working hours. Given how he has trouble separating himself from his work, he needs structure in order to achieve this - if you book 'time out' for you during the working day, that just allows him to justify even more work outside of official working hours so that he can 'make up the time'. Not sure how you can best work around 'family tasks' during working hours, like dropping off the car to the garage.

I think you're going to have to accept that he isn't the kind of person who will be doing household/family things during the (official) working day though. I wouldn't expect him for breakfast or lunch. Just as if he was in his workplace, and chose to eat at his desk, well that's what he's going to do when he works from home. So personally, I'd write that one off. I wouldn't be making lunch for him either though - I'd be keeping a reasonably stocked fridge with stuff to make sandwiches, and he could reheat leftovers if he wanted to. Or make enough of whatever you're having and just put it in the fridge for him. 

I think a 'finishing up' time for him must be agreed. With enough time to have food with his family, and for him to put the kids to bed half of the time. So both of your working days finish at the same time, and any tasks after that time are evenly split. Maybe he could sneak in 2 hours work while you go to yoga though! And at weekends, you get a lie in one morning. Which is not him working, and letting the kids be around you when you're in bed. He has to take them downstairs and be with them. If he goes into his office on your lie in day, bring the kids in to him and close the door. And on his lie in morning, if he chooses to work, well so be it. Not ideal, eventually he will get overtired and stressed, but you can't fix everything at once.

It sounds really petty, but until he gets into a better routine, then I would add up his work & gym time meticulously. You don't have to throw that in his face, but say he was getting out for 4 gym sessions and you weren't getting out on your own - that's clearly not fair, and having the knowledge of the time split might encourage you to go something about it! I think you need a weekly catch up without kids or husband with friends/family too. It sounds like your world has become very small right now, which is probably adding to your frustration. And maybe you need to get a regular babysitter so that you two get some time together - I don't remember reading anything like that in your post/replies.

Diziet

They are not helpless (and if they are, it won't take them long to learn if it's either cook or starvation :-) ).

Go do your thing, it will be better and healthier for everyone!

WittyName1

Noodle1 wrote: »

The other thing is my personality is very like my husbands. I have overworked in jobs also, basically ending up being totally taken advantage of because of my work ethic. But I'd never let that happen to me again.

This bit of your previous post stood out to me....as you are currently being taken advantage of because of your work ethic...by your own husband.

Stop enabling him. Go into his office at 6pm or whenever and tell him you are leaving the house now to go to yoga...and just go. He's hardly going to sit in the office and leave the kids to fend for themselves.
You are completely enabling him by waiting around for him to leave his office to allow you to go.
Stop letting him control your life.

Sorry for being harsh. I really feel for you but you have to help yourself too. You can only change yourself and not him.

Noodle1

WittyName1 wrote: »

This bit of your previous post stood out to me....as you are currently being taken advantage of because of your work ethic...by your own husband.

Stop enabling him. Go into his office at 6pm or whenever and tell him you are leaving the house now to go to yoga...and just go. He's hardly going to sit in the office and leave the kids to fend for themselves.
You are completely enabling him by waiting around for him to leave his office to allow you to go.
Stop letting him control your life.

Sorry for being harsh. I really feel for you but you have to help yourself too. You can only change yourself and not him.

Omg. Never thought of it like that at all. Can't believe I never thought of that. I am overworking and here I am saying I'm not going to be taken advantage of. Oh god it's so true. Jesus I'm a right fool I swear 😣

You're not being harsh, you're just saying the truth. And it's something that I have never spotted myself so I'm really glad you said it. Need the truth or I'll never get out of this cycle.

amtc

I know you have small children and your husband works from home, which appears to be in a rural location. Do you not find this unbelievably claustrophobic?! I would lose the plot. You need to go out, mix, and that means both of you as well. So he's in an office for x hours and you're homemaking for x hours. And all you see is each other? Recipe for disaster. There's a reason I live on my own!

Noodle1

amtc wrote: »

I know you have small children and your husband works from home, which appears to be in a rural location. Do you not find this unbelievably claustrophobic?! I would lose the plot. You need to go out, mix, and that means both of you as well. So he's in an office for x hours and you're homemaking for x hours. And all you see is each other? Recipe for disaster. There's a reason I live on my own!

Yes!!! Very claustrophobic sometimes hahaha. But we actually are the best of friends underneath all this issue.....thankfully I suppose as this would definitely split us up otherwise. I'd love to be on my own sometimes but it never happens. The kids are all really big talkers too, they all just talk and talk and talk....and all at the same time too all day long. And follow me around all day haha. Somedays my head is gone hahahaha. Maybe I'm more patient than I give myself credit for though...on the upside

Noodle1

I’m not sure if any of you that have me advice on here will see this. I came across this old post and I re-read it. I am shocked at how accepting I was of this situation at the time amd how much I blamed on my situation and didn’t look at my own behaviour and how it contributed to this situation.

I want to say thanks to everyone on here for the advice. It was what I needed to change things. 5 years on and still working from home. Steel tech shed out the back. Fixed more manageable working hours with a lunch break in the middle of the day. No more doing everybody else’s work for them.

I had to seriously threaten leaving him to get him to change. Then I went to see someone amazing for over a year. I’m a much more assertive person now even though it took a few years of hard work on myself. And we are much more equal in our relationship. He found this very difficult at the beginning but there was no going back. My relationships have also improved with other adult family members who also took me for granted and I didn’t realize it. I found out that I am a complete people pleaser to the absolute detriment of myself (well used to be anyway). I now work very hard on including myself and my feelings when I am deciding to do something. I have 3 absolutely wonderful kids that are growing up to be so kind yet they are assertive and know their own feelings and value them.

The most important part of all of this is that as a couple we have a hugely improved relationship. Also as a family we are in a much better place.

I think the reason that I wanted to post is that after I re-read the post and comments I realized it looked as though my situation was hopeless. It wasn’t, I just didn’t believe at the time that I could change things. But I changed a lot. I’m not the same person that I was back then. Luckily, my husband was eventually willing to listen and to change also. As an interesting extra point, he is still doing the same job, still as productive if not more so but doing it in a reasonable working week. He is more sure of himself and is no longer desperate for the approval of his peers. We look forward to spending time together in the evenings and do so as many evenings as we can.

So thank you to everyone here for the kind works and advice, it really got me on the right track. To anyone else in similar situations, it is so worth going to see somebody that can help. And if you don’t like the first person, try someone else, will be so worth it when you find someone to talk to that is the right fit for you.