I'm convinced that my husband TRIES to be an ass. Seriously. Every time I have an obligation at night like when I was on the town's planning board or now that I'm on the MOM's Club executive board, he is magically late getting home.
Then he blames EVERYTHING else besides himself. Traffic was horrible, co-worker gave me a last-minute task to do that had to be done tonight, I had to stay 10 minutes late because I got in 10 minutes late because you didn't wake me up on time this morning, etc. etc.
The excuses are never ending, but the one thing that is consistent is that he NEVER takes responsibility. He never says, yes, I let the time get away from me. Even then, I wouldn't believe him since he can get home on time whenever he wants unless I have to go somewhere.
It doesn't even have to be a meeting or anything of consequence. I used to like to go grocery shopping at night when the store wasn't crowded and I could get what I needed without any trouble. I'd go after dinner and leave him with the kids. Well, pretty soon he started working late on the night I usually went grocery shopping. What's the result? I now have to go in the morning while he and the kids are sleeping OR I can haul the kids with me, but anyone that has 2 young kids knows, that's just not always an option.
I'm really at a loss for an explanation. It's like he doesn't want me to leave him with the kids so he consciously does things to ensure that I can't get the heck out of the house. My MOM's Club obligation is once a month. My planning board obligation was twice a month. The MOM's Club and planning board did not run concurrently - I had a month off from one before I joined the other. Grocery shopping is weekly. It really seems to me like he just doesn't want the burden of taking care of the kids one night a week so I can get out of the house and regain my sanity. Even when I'm home I'm the one that feeds them, gets them ready for bed and tucks them in 90% of the time. The other 10% is when I fall asleep on the couch because I'm just exhausted from being pregnant and having a total of zero time to myself.
Now this is where everyone says oh, but he works all day so he's tired and doesn't want to take care of the kids. Guess what? I work from home and I don't mean that I take care of the kids. I do that too in ADDITION to a job. Sure my hours are a little more flexible than his, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm trying to produce quality work while raising children, keeping the house clean and making sure everyone eats on a daily basis. I don't have the commute, but I have full-time child care, 100% of the housekeeping and 100% of the food prep/food shopping responsibilties. I take the kids to ALL of the doctors appointments - I don't even think my husband has MET their pediatrician. I have gone to all of my prenatal appointments alone. If someone needs to come in to do something I'm the one that has to hire them, meet them, check their work and pay them. My husband has never met the babysitter, whom I've hired a grand total of 2 times when I couldn't bring the kids with me to the doctor and I didn't have another choice.
Basically, my husband gets woken up in the morning (by me), showers in leisure while I get the kids up, gets dressed in clean clothes (washed and put away by me), then heads off to work without packing kids into the car or getting anyone's shoes on but his own. He listens to his podcasts on the way in, then works. Sure work can be frustrating and stressful, but it's a different kind of stress than I have. He works with adults and has adult interaction each and every day. Once a week he goes out to lunch with his friend. When the work day is over (whenever that is - he doesn't have to pick kids up or worry about their schedule), he gets into his car and drives home. Again, he deals with traffic, and I know that's not fun. When he gets home, the kids greet him like he's a rock star and then we sit down and eat dinner. He turns on his show and veges out during the meal, so conversation is pretty much null. After dinner the kids demand his attention and he does his best to ignore them, mostly browsing the internet or watching the rest of the 3 to 4 hour news programs he records during the day. 2 1/2 hours after he gets home it's time for the kids to go to bed. We (sometimes just I) put them to bed and then my husband resumes his internet/television watching. I can talk at him, but getting a coherent response pretty much never happens. Sometime in there I go to bed and he follows in when it's convenient for him. We repeat the process again the next day.
It's a boring, monotonous, unfulfilled life for me. I'm pregnant (not planned, at least not on my part.) and I feel lonely, bored and unappreciated. I've told him as much, but his show was on so he didn't hear me. Now I'm waiting for him to get home late so I can go to my volunteer position and enjoy what little time I get with adults - assuming he gets home in time for me to catch any of it at all.
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