£67,031.92 is a frightening number indeed....

Treadingonplaymobil

Courgette!!!! It’s lovely to be back, to be honest.

All of you have made me feel so welcome again here, it’s nice to have this extra bit of support through the separation, and a sense check for XH’s behaviour. And, eventually, help figuring out the financial side too, which is rather the point of being here.   

At the airport as I type. SO EXCITED. Hopefully won’t break my leg (winter sports holiday).

Honeysucklelou2

Have a great time TOPM!

Isitdoable

Have a great time away!

I think unfortunately until you get the house situation sorted, these are very difficult situations to resolve.  I would insist he brings his own food for himself and the kids on his long stint, and I would also do separate presents.

Onebrokelady

The thing is your XH has the time to play board games at the weekends because you are still doing the lions share of the work, if you weren't having to provide food for two households you would also have time to play

This does remind of my youngest daughter when I split with my partner,I made the mistake of asking her who she would rather live with and she said me ,I asked her why and she said she would miss her bed 😂😂😂 ( we had bought her a cabin bed before the split and she loved it so much )

Hope you have a lovely time on your holiday 😊

Sea_Shell

Hope you're having a wonderful time.

Once you both have separate Mum's house and Dad's house, you can bet that the DC's will still come back from Dad's with a bag full of dirty washing!!!    Unless they are able to have duplicate staples in each place (underwear, socks, t-shirts, trousers, dresses, nightwear), which stay there, get washed and ironed there.   

armchairexpert

Hey TOPM! I don't think I've said welcome back, because I'm 100% a lurker these days, but welcome back!
Do the separate presents. You're going to find the other things very very hard to shift until you have separate residences, so take the victories you can for now. Although it should also be possible to push some of the cooking/planning back onto him if the schedule has shifted (are you doing 5:2:2:5? That's a really good set up if you can swing it, highly recommend), at least for those longer stretches.

Verbatim

Can't you tell him to bring food for him and the dc as otherwise it's all coming from your budget?

Verbatim

Hi Armchair,
How are you? And the dog? Nice to see you again. 

armchairexpert

Hi! I'm very good, but I accepted that I was never going to convert my household to frugality and was making us all miserable trying to do so, so now I just lurk. It's fine: my business is going well enough that we're doing well, I just have to take a deep breath every time Husband arrives home with "a few snacks he just picked up from the supermarket" i.e., every day.
(Not to hijack, TOPM!)

Humdinger1

Is anyone else logging in,  excited for updates from TOPM?