My husband uses the lamest excuse to avoid dad duties on weekends

"Do I have a right to be upset?" the frustrated mum asks. Does your partner use this 'excuse', too?

Our new advice column is by Sydney dad, Paul McKeon, who offers readers a dad's take on parenting.

 

This week's reader asks Paul:

How would you feel if your husband has been building a shed outside for three months?

All weekend, every weekend. That's his excuse to disappear.

Sometimes you're struggling with the kids and he would be hearing all the screaming and chaos but he still continues to work on the shed and not see if you need a hand.

Do I have a right to be upset? His response is he's working on the shed for us... but when us mums want to do something, we can't do it without still parenting or a heap of co-ordination.

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The pendulum has swung too far

I feel like we’ve had this conversation in my household too. I think most couples in Australia start from the position that raising kids is a shared, 50:50, responsibility but, now and then it can feel like the pendulum has swung too far one way or another.

Three months is quite a lot of time to be spending on your average, garden-variety shed; that is, unless it’s being hewn from solid rock, the lumber is having to be hauled by bullock train from the nearest mountain or your last name is Gaudi.

But, personally, I can clearly remember spending a lot of time in our little backyard doing amateur landscaping during COVID in an attempt to get away from the horrors of home-schooling. A trip to Bunnings, even with a mask on, felt like a holiday to Shangri-la!

I think I can even recall telling my wife “I’m doing this for you and the kids!”

Image: iStock

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"It's an unfair imbalance - sorry, darling"

There’s no question that, even in 2024, more than half a century after the birth of the gender equality movement, women still do the majority the work of raising children in most household—at least in heterosexual couples.

That’s backed by research from the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2022 which said: “On average, females spent 4 hours and 31 minutes a day doing unpaid work. Males spent over an hour less on these activities, averaging 3 hours and 12 minutes a day.”

“Unpaid work” in the study included domestic duties like housework, food and drink preparation and shopping, as well as childcare, adult care and volunteering activities. These are averages, of course, so there were men doing a lot more and a lot less.

All of which is to say, few blokes can objectively put their hands up and say they are pulling their weight parenting-wise. I know I can’t (though having twins often forces you to get closer to 50:50). That’s not great and it’s not fair on our partners (sorry, darling).

"From a man and dad's view..."

But, as the saying goes, everyone needs a hobby. Another survey, one by the Australian Men’s Shed Association in 2022, found the number of members of Men’s Sheds in the country had grown by more than a quarter in the five years since 2017.

The Department of Health and Aged Care says Men’s Sheds can improve the health and wellbeing of their members by giving them a safe place to make friends, share meaningful activities, talk, and access health information and resources.

Whether those benefits also apply to one man and one shed is just a guess, of course.

But maybe the secret is to send him inside and get on the tools yourself for a while. What’s good for the goose is presumably good for the gander.

Or send one of the kids out there to 'help' him. I think that's the fastest way to get the shed done.

Originally published as My husband uses the lamest excuse to avoid dad duties on weekends