The mental load

Mental load - all me
Physical load - evenly split

I hate it really 'so what does X need for school?' I don't know have you asked him - gets huffy

Maybe I just need to stop doing stuff. But then it just won't get done. He's like "I'll do it in my own time" but then weeks pass.

And if you ask, you're "nagging"?

Very easy answer: "would you take this approach to work tasks?"

It's a complete cop out that men use. I mean sure, of course he can do things in his own time, but there's still always a deadline - the point at which the kids' clothes are unwearable or inappropriate, dinner being so late that everyone has eaten 3 sandwiches, teeth falling out because you haven't seen a dentist in 2 years, increased cost of your insurance because no one is shopping around.

Perhaps a good one to hand over is things that have specific deadlines and are kids related - so, for example, we have various things that have to be paid at various times on deadlines that are external (ie no whining that YOU are setting unreasonable/unfair deadlines and you're "not my boss") - clubs, school dinners, dance classes, football subs etc etc. He's welcome to do those in his own time, but if he misses the deadline, he must understand the DC will be the ones missing out.

To be honest, food shop, cooking and clean up is actually quite a big task. I don't particularl ymind doing it, but it's the one area where I think even though DH takes quite a lot on, that one is such a BIG one and it's so bloody relentless that sometimes I feel I shouldn't actually have to do anything else!

[Note, I'm about to go and top up DS' school canteen account and order DD a new t-shirt for her dance class. Because it's never bloody ending so I get it]

If you are doing more of the mental load then he needs to do more of the day to day jobs; cleaning/shopping laundry.
DH and I worked on the basis that we spent an equal amount of time on running the household.

If you think there’s no mental load your partner is probably doing it 😂

Nope. And he's brilliant in all the practical respects.

I've finally thrown down the gauntlet (which he has accepted) and told him that next month he'll have the food shopping budget. With that I expect him to do the weekly shop based on a meal plan for us and 2x dc which takes into account our various working/ school/ childcare schedules.

I'm petrified. But it's the only way he'll understand that there's more to food shopping than actually just buying the food. He's a planner by employment, he can bloody well start doing it at home too.

Of course, and we’ll split the mental load differently as all those things change, we both know that and my husband totally appreciates that and would happily take on more, he tells me that all of the time, he is always offering to do more for us! But for right now mine is VERY minimal, while he does all those other bits it is absolutely even if not more in my favour.

Mine aren't

If you have a baby at the moment, this might feel like a relatively even split. By the time you've packed your kids off to uni, after booking all childcare, activities, remembering where they're meant to be when and making sure they get there, all school applications, parents' evenings, chasing homework, paying school lunches, organising birthday parties, buying all clothes, school uniform, making sure PE kit is washed etc etc etc - you'll find all child related mental load never bloody ends and massively eclipses everything else.

If you have all your insurances on autorenew then you’re being ripped off, might be time to add that to your list😂

If he genuinely sees that this is a problem, then it is fixable. The way to fix it is to agree set rules and responsibilities. So pass off things to him by agreement. Dh has ADHD so I quickly realised that anything that needs regular but ad hoc monitoring was pointless handing off (eg me and the DC turned up for rugby practice on more than one occassion because he hadn't noticed the whatsapp cancelling it). So he now takes on anything that's more longer term (dentists, insurance, DIY, technology, any longer-term bills like insurance, council tax, gas etc etc) and most of the day to day stuff that doesn't require any planning - bulk of the laundry, general daily tidying, dishwasher, bedding (although he doesn't do it often enough), garden, bins, music practice with DD, football practice with DS etc. I still take on a LOT more of the thinking planning - noticing school uniform, liaising with school, clubs, meal planning and cooking etc. But it's okay because all those other things just aren't even on my radar. Completely and totally gone. I couldn't tell you who our broadband provider is or fix our tv, I don't even know what music DD is working on and clearly the only thing I know about DS' football and general fitness is that he's pretty fit and has a whole plan and strategy around this. With the exception of the occasional tidy up of our bedroom so that I can run the robot vacuum, I haven't done any tidying, plumped a cushion or sorted a child's room in years. I unload the dishwasher no more than once a week.

In addition, while I might take on the mental load of a lot of stuff, I do also delegate lots of the doing - I might decide DD needs new dance shoes, DH is probably the one taking her to buy them.

Works for us.

BUT... it didn't get here quickly or easily. took a lot of work and effort.

Metal load in our house is generally me, partly because it's my character and I'm an over thinker and he's super chilled and laid back. If I say to him the car needs booking in for MOT or kids need dentist's appointments then he'll do it, he just won't think of it. He does a lot more of the physical stuff than me, washing, tidying, running around with clubs etc so I feel it's even in ways.

Anything that can be automated is automated in this household.

But yeah, I'd say an even split.

We make reference lists for tasks that we can check, so tasks don't belong to one person or another per se.

We also have a strict rule of "who does it, decides it" - i.e. no correcting for how something "should" be done.

He's much much better at remembering family birthdays than I am. I'm much better at blasting through tasks, he's better when attention to detail is needed. So we decide what approach is needed, and let that person take the lead.

Big pile of laundry? Me. Small pile that needs handling delicately? Him.

DH sorts the utility bills
DC dentist appointments
MOT and service for the car.
I do everything else. Even car insurance, it wouldn't occur to him to look for a better deal so I do it.
I make sure DS has school uniform and shoes in the right size.
Arrange doctor and optician appointments for the kids
Attend endless meetings with various professionals about DS and chase up review dates
He would claim responsibility for DDs kickboxing class. Fair enough he takes her but I pay for the lessons, insurance and uniform.
I do Christmas and birthday stuff but I don't mind that.
I do meal planning and shopping.

Put stuff in a shared calendar clearly indicating who is going to do which task on which date. Just as you would at work. There’s no point just expecting each of you to remember what has to be done and then getting frustrated when it doesn’t get done. If you did that at work, you’d be (sensibly) told to liaise with your colleague and get stuff in diaries.

I don’t think I even have a mental load, which I suppose means things must be pretty equal - but as much as anything I don’t really think of stuff that has to be done once a year / every three years like taking my car for an MOT or remortgaging the house as a particularly heavy load.

We split everything between us, so whoever has more time when something needs to be done will do it.

This is a massively depressing read for me; I do nearly all the mental load and the physical side too 🫠🫠 I often do the typical “man jobs” as well, like putting the bins in / out, mowing the grass etc. He does do all the tip runs and sorts House / car insurance, but like others have said, this is an annual thing, often on auto renew

Yeah we are pretty even here.

Dentist we all go together and book the next appointment after we finish that check up - no mental load at all!

Doctors - I do mine, he does his and child

Pets - food and litter is set up on monthly delivery, no mental load (he cleans litter)

Finance - I do the mortgage and notify about any new deals on interest rates for savings. No real mental load as it happens once every 5yrs! Again utilities are once a year or every 18m so no real mental load there.

Holidays - we plan together

Nursery - we both receive notifications, husband packs a bag for the whole week, I drop off, he picks up

Clothes - we do our own, tend to do an online shop for child in bulk

Christmas/birthdays - I do my family, he does his, both do child (we buy a stash of cards so the only mental load for birthdays is a calendar reminder and whoever is walking by the post box)

Food/household - online shop, household goods on repeat order. I cook, he washes up

We have a cleaner once a week so neither of us clean. Both do laundry, probably him more than me (even though I mostly wfh!).

I don’t really feel like we have a lot of ‘mental load’ things. Most things we set a reminder, or it’s on repeat order, or it’s something that comes around once a year.

Physical load, is quite evenly split, my husband does all cooking & we share cleaning & looking after our child.
Mental load he's not great at and I haven't had much luck improving it.

Though he did pick up a letter I'd opened and left on the counter about my road tax and paid it for me, sooo baby steps lol
I do ask him to organise some stuff for the house/cars.
Would love to have a better split but I think partly I might be a bit of a control freak about it; like I ask him to sort the MOTs for our cars, then I can't help texting to check he's done it, which he normally has but I can't cross it off my list until I know he's done it.

We have I’d say a 80/20 in our household. Dh does 80 %of the housework and admin etc I do the rest

Neither of us work due to dc with SEN / medical and because I do more of the night care he does the majority of the day to day things

I know! They are probably on autorenew!

I'd expect you to be sorting your own medical/dental stuff why is that on the list??

So basically you are doing way more 😂😂😂. Almost all of his admin tasks come up once a year at most lol.

That was cathartic!

No and it drives me nuts.

My DH is not selfish but his mental load would have you think otherwise.

We’re having an extension built currently and all of the heavy lifting in terms of organising stuff with the builders, choosing what radiators/doors/bathroom we have, has fallen to me, but you bet your bottom dollar he’s remembered to make sure there’s a plug on the wall for the Tv, and looked into new TVs and broadband providers to make sure our new extension is covered.

DH does 95% of the cooking and the food shopping, but who do you think sends him ideas for meals that the DC will like, and who remembers to remind him to defrost the frozen meat for said meals? Yes he would come up with his own meal ideas if I didn’t send him any, but it would either be the same thing week on week, or end up complicated where the DC won’t eat what he’s made us so they end up having fish fingers or nuggets every other day. And he’d end up having to buy extra meat last minute on the day because he hasn’t defrosted anything in time.

He does get up early with the DC every day that he’s not gone to the office or the gym at the crack of dawn, and I’ve recently delegated DC1’s repeat prescriptions to him which has been a slight load off. I suppose he sorts out the majority of the utilities, but there’s not much to sort out? And you get reminders in the post so hardly a “mental” load.