Reality of marriage and kids

Just wondered if anyone can relate and this is hugely normal, or if I’m on my own.

Generally I take the majority of the household and family load - eg food shops, meals, cleaning, washing, school admin, planning etc (the list could go on and on). My husband does his bit but I’d say it’s mostly me that takes the lead. I can kind of get over that as I’m a bit of a control freak anyway, but I just feel under appreciated and a bit….unloved!

He’s never been great with gestures, planning dates etc. It goes as far as a cup of tea in the morning and that’s about it. He’s a bit of a stoic so it’s hugely generous with words either. And I massively resent it. I have for years tbh. Before kids it meant less as we had more time together but now it’s like….I’m doing bloody everything for this family and completely burnt out and I STILL don’t receive much in the way of love and affection. I don’t have huge expectations either, just thought and appreciation in however form would be lovely.

I don’t think he’ll change. It’s been nearly 20 years. Anyone else feel the same?

Note, he’s a wonderful dad and gives all his time to them, does pick ups, playing, bedtime etc. We both earn similar money etc so I’m not a SAHM. This is really about our relationship beyond the running of our family and home.

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Have you ever tried to talk to him about how you feel and what you want and need from him?
This is what I did when I felt distant and alone.

Might be that his love language is different than yours? I can relate to this as my husband sounds more or less like yours but he does show me in other different ways he loves me and appreciates me. There are tests online that we took to see what our love languages are. It opened discussion from different perspective and helped us understand each other better. And it was also something fun to do

Wow 20 years in? I feel like this and I’m only 7 years in.. but I have been telling him straight up how i feel. And we do just give a heads up, I did communicate before and it would end up in arguments cs I didn’t know how to communicate properly. But now we just give eachother heads up or update eachother on how we feel. Definitely talk to him about it more and ask how he feels about it too, you might be surprised to what he tells you..
You’re probably both so caught up in life that sometimes your marriage gets left on the back burner.. it happens to so many of us..
Maybe some alone time would help without working/ kids.
Maybe do some things for him too (of course you probably do already)

Sounds like you guys just aren't a match if it's been 20 years. This is who he is. A great father, but maybe not the best partner for you. I'm 30, so I haven't had a long term relationship of 10+ years, but I've seen from enough women in my family that settling only hurts you

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I'm kinda going to miss it just being the two of us

I'm 19 weeks and I was just thinking how it's going to be quite the change for my husband and I when the time comes (around February). We get along perfectly and I don't have any worries about us transitioning to parenthood.
It's just I'm going to miss snuggling before we sleep through the night. Going out on a whim and take no time to get ready; only putting my shoes on and heading out. Staying out late whenever or driving an hour out to try our luck at the slots. Or going to the bar for dinner and coming back home to watch anime with more brewskis.

But we did plan this and I have zero regrets. We get to start a family and that feels more fulfilling to me than partying with my husband all the time. It'll just be sometimes after my little man doesn't need me as much lol.

I don't regret anything especially with how much support we have. I'm anticipating a big change and I think it's valid I feel that way.

Massive nursery shortage

Anyone else not got a nursery spot? I’ve been on the wait list for a May 27 spot since the beginning of the year and no hope. I’m on 3 wait lists and also childminder wait lists too.

Since the funding came in it’s gone crazy

Please read if you can 🥹🥹

I’d love some opinions please! 😅 I was seeing a guy and we recently fell out, so I told him I’d give him some space. We’re meant to have a weekend together next week, but when I asked whether it was still happening so I could arrange childcare, he responded quite bluntly and gave me an ultimatum. I didn’t engage with it and reiterated that I was giving him space.

It’s now been a week and I need to know whether next weekend is actually happening so I can sort childcare. Would you message him and ask directly, or leave it because he already knows the weekend is meant to be happening and that I need to arrange childcare?

How do you have time for anything?

Babies just turned 4 months. My OH works from home for himself mon-thurs (maybe 6 hours max a day) we have a toddler that goes to nursery tues-thurs and we get help from my MIL on Mondays. And even then, finding the time to clean/eat/wash clothes/walk dogs etc is impossible. How on earth do people do it?

I feel like I'm running on fumes and wanting to strangle my husband at the weekend for not pulling his weight.

1 on 1 time with our 2 year old!

I want to make some one on one time for our 2 year old with mummy and daddy. I’m exclusively breastfeeding our youngest so I can’t spend too long away from him. Looking for recommendations of fun things we can do for some lovely bonding time! We would like to try and make it a weekly thing that we can look forward to 😊

Am I overthinking?

Yesterday evening when getting my 20 months old boy ready for bath, I noticed 2 significant bruises on his lower back towards the bottom. He's been at the nursery all day and didn't have those bruises in the morning before dropping him off.

So of course some alarms start ringing in my head. I took pictures and sent them to the nursery asking what happened and how come I wasn't informed of the incident.

Their response was that nobody saw anything, little one was absolutely fine all day, didn't cry or anything so they're unsure how the bruising occurred. He was involved in normal activities like singing reading playing in the sand etc but nothing particularly stands out.

Tbh he had some small bruises in the past that again had gone unnoticed and their responses were the same.

Now I get that children can sustain accidental injuries and don't want to assume anything bad had happened, but I can't help it, my brain inevitably thinks that.

What would you do in this situation? Would you let it go? Would you escalate it further to ofsted maybe? Or am I simply overreacting?

P.s. little one is happy at the nursery and no longer cries at drop offs or pick ups.