SAHP-FI but bored and dissatisfied. Any advice?

[naners]

TL;DR: SAHP-FI but bored and dissatisfied. Any advice?

The longer version:
40F, married with 2 little kids (DS 5, DD 3). Longtime follower of MMM; recently sorta-FIREed in order to move our family internationally back to my home town. DH is still working and doesn’t want to RE any time soon. The internet retirement police wouldn’t consider me RE but my income isn’t needed and we are very secure financially.

I always dreamed of FIRE but I’m not enjoying the reality of my post-work life. In fact I’m one of the five people who ticked the negative outcomes on the post-FIRE poll! DS is in school 9-3 and DD goes to daycare 4 days a week. Even so, I feel like all I have time to do is cook, clean, and shop for everyone, then it’s time to pick up the kids and get through the whole dinner/bath/bedtime routine. When I was working full time we outsourced a lot of the domestic work and split the rest pretty equally. Now it’s mostly on me; I don't especially mind the work but I do find it boring. It’s also pretty isolating and adult conversation is lacking (besides DH who works from home, but there is only so much new stuff we have to talk about).

Writing this out makes me realize just how unhappy I am with my current situation. On the other hand, I do remember the stress of two careers and two kids. Anyone have advice?

[deborah]

FIRE doesn’t mean that all the household work devolves to one person. SAHP doesn’t either - and never has. This can be rather tricky because society tends to assume that it does.

You need conversations to work out the future household workload distribution.

Why did you retire? I assume that there were things you wanted to do. Set aside blocks of time for those things in your future household workload distribution plan - perhaps three days a week when both kids are away. One of the problems with being a woman, and at home all day, is that you see all the things that need doing, and probably subconsciously expect that you have to be doing them - make sure that you don’t during your blocked out time.

[SwordGuy]

Renegotiate an equitable distribution of household chores.   If your spouse voluntarily chooses to work when neither of you need to, that's their "fun" time.  It shouldn't mean you get less fun time because they're chooosing 40+ hours a week of it.

Then go find something you want to do and do it.   Hire out those items that interfere with what you want to do.   Depending on the amount of fluff in your FI budget, that may mean you need to work some to afford it.  Hopefully, you don't.

[herbgeek]

Little kids are a grind, no way around it.  They make constant messes.  They need constant repetition to pick up their toys, don't hit your sister, yes you have to take a bath today.    Its a phase.  Its drudgery sometimes.  Its boring and often not very satisfying,   Nothing to do with FIRE, a lot to do with the stage of life you are in.  Make sure you do fun stuff for you else all of your time will be filled with maintenance.

[Moustachienne]

As they say, "work expands to fill the time available" and that goes for unpaid work as well.  It's a funny thing about human nature and how we will make time for "work" i.e. what we need to do or think we need to do, but have great difficulty making time for "play" i.e. the things we want to do.  Cracking this is the great opportunity and adventure of FIRE, and of life, really.

Here's a Design Your Life thread from 2019 with lots of good recommendations from folks about how they are discovering their values and dreams and, the important bit, structuring their time to make sure they act on them.
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/throw-down-the-gauntlet/design-your-life!/msg2258261/#msg2258261

[Loren Ver]

Hmm, it doesn't sound like you retired, but just took up a full time job as a nanny and house keeper.  It also sounds like you don't like your job as a nanny and house keeper.  On MMM we generally advise people to find a different job if they don't like the one they have.  Or at least chance it enough so that it is bearable. 

Now part of this is age of kids, they grow out of this stage of life (so I am told).  But if you use to outsource the parts you really don't like and were happier, why don't you outsource?  Or as stated above, redistribute?

Or go get a job you like better and rebalance, then FIRE again once the kids are older and you figure out how to not be the do everything person. 

Loren

[Villanelle]

It sounds like you might find additional satisfaction with something in between.  Find a part time job and outsource some of the home labor, while continuing to do some of it yourself.  Even if the net change to the finances is $0, or slightly negative, who cares? 

[Morning Glory]

Can you downsize or simplify at all? I found the housework so much easier after getting  rid of a bunch  of stuff and moving to a smaller place. Likewise you can cancel any commitments you do not truly enjoy to make time for things you want to do.

[mspym]

It sounds like it's all landing on your plate "because it's not like you are doing anything else" - not that this has necessarily been *said* but that now that you have no other "legit" claims on your time, this (strongly modelled and gendered) behaviour pattern is emerging, without it ever being explicitly discussed or agreed.

So step one could talking to your husband about how it needs to be more balanced, two find other things to claim some of your time and energy so you don't get sucked back into the pattern, three find outlets for adult interaction outside of your household. That last one could be combined with number two. Four is not stepping up and taking over when your husband tests the boundaries of the agreement. It helps when you have blocked out time in the schedule where you are not at hand and cannot take over.

[former player]

Cleaning is easy and relatively cheap to outsource. It also has the lowest "you're a bad SAHP if you do this" appearances score.  So if your financial security runs to getting a cleaner I'd do that.  (I know, very anti-mustachian.  But the easiest part of a routine that is making you unhappy to change.)

My parents used to schedule one evening out a week separate from us kids and each other to go to evening classes - woodworking, French, pottery, dressmaking, you get the idea.  A bit of adult time with like-minded people away from the house plus a useful skill learned or improved.  And in your case a big advantage of scheduling something like this in the evening would be that DH would have to go through the whole dinner/bath/bedtime routine with the kids once a week, which would be good for him and good for his relationship with the kids as well as making clear to him that your job looking after them is no picnic.

[boarder42]

Seems like your core issue is more human interaction.  You just moved to a new area internationally so this makes sense.  Id focus on building friendships in the community. Maybe find some clubs for activities you like and find people who don't work every day. Even so having just retired I'm most thankful for our strong network of friends all living in the same community. One of the main things you see when you look at communities around the world who live the longest is a strong layer of in person socialization in the culture. In addition to diet and other things.

Having just FIREd both my wife and I with young kids in a similar daycare situation to yourself I find it's important to have this community around. I know I'm going to someone's house or having someone over every weekend. Maybe 2x.

[Dreamer40]

I’m in your same situation with one major exception: I have two little dogs instead of two kids. And it’s a great life! Without kids, I’m able to do all the housework in one morning a week. I love cooking elaborate healthy meals and baking bread. The dogs are a bit of work (vet and grooming appointments, daily poop), but they make up for it by being wonderful companions instead of being exhausting children. I spend all the extra time chatting with friends daily, helping care for my young niece and nephew a few hours a week, caring for an extensive garden, reading a ton of good books, and doing stuff for extended family. My limited childcare work is by far the most draining and boring part of my week, even though I love those kids.

I don’t say all that to make you feel bad, but to emphasize that the key challenge in your life right now is probably the children, not FIRE. Your evenings will be filled the bedtime routine regardless of your work situation. Maybe things could feel better by focusing on finding ways to make the childcare simpler and more rewarding. And I agree with everyone that you need to find a way to split the housecleaning with your partner or outsource it. Like he could be in charge of vacuuming and dishes. Something that needs to happen often that you will never need to think about again. Otherwise you’re unfairly saddled with handling all the crap.

[beekayworld]

Maybe things could feel better by focusing on finding ways to make the childcare simpler and more rewarding.

I love all of the suggestions.  This quote from Dreamer40 made me think of taking kids to the park. 

It's good for both you and the kids to be outside.  They get to tire themselves out.  In addition, they won't be making messes in the house. They will rearrange rocks or leaves in the park and you just leave it behind when you head home.  You could do that every day.

If you pack a picnic of sandwiches, applesauce, carrot sticks and peanut butter, call that dinner and eat it at the park. Just throw away the remnants and you don't have any post-dinner kitchen cleanup (and the meal prep will be less messy than actually cooking.). You could do that once or twice a week.  (Your husband could join you.)

[naners]

OP here: thanks everyone! In some ways folks pointed out the obvious: I need less housework, more adult interaction, and something else to fill my time. Simple, but not easy, right? The "adult interaction" part is probably the trickiest one as we moved not long ago and I don't find it easy to make friends at the best of times. But I will get to work on it. Thanks again all - it's been a long time since I visited the MMM forums and it's just as great as I remember.