Does anyone have a marriage where the mental loa is truly equally shared?

My dh is a good man.
I stress tested him pre kids and selected him with a good father /husband mindset

Having read MN i deludedly believed that we'd be 50/50 because i am smart, i have good boundaries i am not a pushover etc.

we are not 50/50

Mn really made me feel like i was doing something wrong my boundaries were shit, i was at fault because i did it when he forgot or cba, because i didnt "make him" or didnt phrase it the right way ...whatever

I had standards, i provlem solved, i sat down and we agreed who would do what
i cried screamed yelled threatened divorce at one point

Its just not 50/50 its like 70/30, 65/35 on a good day

Amongst my niace MC friends with "good husbands and dads" he is probably better than most if not all.

As a mother you are the primary. You are the "expert" you do more.
maybe it changed or gets better but i have a toddler and baby and it is NOT 50/50 for anyone i know

Just saying this so you dont end up in unhappy knots for over a year like i did.
Im actually much happy now i have just accepted he is trying but i just do more and earn more...

To answer your question - now yes, at the beginning no. I did everything out of a kind of guilt when working very part time hours with three preschool children and it took years to reverse the habit. I'd say that we share the mental load now they're teenagers and I work full time outside the house - I'm simply not physically at home from 7am to 5pm (although I do take a child with me to drop off at the train station 😜 and usually pick him up and/ or a different child up from sports on the way home) and DH works mostly from home.

I wouldn't crochet a toy dog for a new baby or wrote notes from the tooth fairy either (and I am the mother of three children).

I think there's a difference between mental load and sweet frilly stuff tbh.

The crochet dog is the frilly unnecessary elf on the shelf type stuff. Nothing wrong with it and it's very cute and lovely but its as much for the adults as the children, probably more for the adults in all honesty.

Mental load is remembering to put a coin under the pillow perhaps, but writing a note is sweet frills as much for the parent as the child. A bit Instagram really.

Mental load is much more banal, daily grunt work:

do the children have the right clothes clean and everything they need for school/ activities tomorrow?

Have we paid for the activities and the bills and is there petrol in the car, is it taxed and insured and MOTed, is the windscreen washer refilled and do the tires have enough tread? Do any kids capable of taking the bus alone have bus fare/ bus pass with them and a charged mobile with money on the payg if relevant?

Have we thoroughly thought through how to keep the children safe online/ with mobiles and are we monitoring daily if they're still young or taught them various strategies if we choose to let them out and about but not to have a mobile yet?

Do we as a complete family have everything, from hygiene and medical supplies to clean clothing in the right size appropriate to weather and activities to pack to take on holiday next week?

How will child 2 get to football at the same time child 3 has to be at judo and child 1 has a birthday party to be at, all in different places? Has child 1 got a present and do children 2 and 3 have clean kit? What are the logistics of everyone eating a healthy meal, ideally together and at the table, around work, school, football, judo and the birthday party, have we got ingredients for a fairly healthy meal everyone will eat and who will have time to cook it and when?

Has everyone done their homework if relevant and learnt for tests, done reading/ coursework or whatever according to age?

I do think it changes with babies.

you carry the child, and are initially primarily responsible. This means you’re at home with them, learning their needs and routines.

dad then defers to you as “the expert”, or subconsciously or not assigns the baby role to you as the female. It becomes “women naturally are better with babies”, rather than “I’m better with the baby because I’ve spent 24 hours a day with them for the last year, I’ve learned what they need”.

then you’re on mat leave. You pick up more of the household chores as you are “off work” and “at home all day”. Even if it’s just so you can spend more time when he does get home from work relaxing rather than washing up and doing laundry.

6m later when you go back to work bay related stuff is your job, and now the majority of the housework is too. He’s used to going to work, maybe doing baby bedtime and putting the bins out, that’s it.

It’s a natural slide and it is very difficult to get out of when you go back to work. Then you add the workplace- you’ve now got a baby so you aren’t expected to be as committed, his work are well you’ve had the baby for a year and not needed accommodation, why do you need time off/to come in late? And why can’t your wife do it. After all, women are naturally better with babies…

so you pick up the slack, career falters, possibly go pt/sahm- which means you pick up more housework and childcare…

it’s a combination of things, and it actually takes quite a bit of confidence and stubbornness go against the flow.

In my marriage I take the bigger share of the mental load, organising most things for the children, I also do more of the housework. He works more hours and does every single morning with the children, work days and weekends. He does more than 50% of the parenting when he is home. It is by no means equal, but feels very fair to me. We both have our own time and respect each other.

I have friends who have divorced over the resentment about things not being completely equal. This just doesn’t make sense to me. Divide tasks, sure, do the things which play to your strengths. Try to not set yourself up to fail with expectations aligned with what you perceive as what you/he ‘should’ do. When kids come into the mix it gets way, way harder to manage this sort of thing.

Your example of crocheting doesn’t make a lot of sense. Generic gifts are great, and not everyone appreciates home made things. Are there other examples of what you mean?

It was all on me until about 2020 and then my career became more intense and DH took the pressure off. He’s truly amazing.

Today alone he has remembered stuff like DC asthma reviews, repeat prescriptions for DC, forwarded me DCs school new ofsted report to read, has added stuff to the fridge planner / list for next weeks shop and booked parents evening. Oh and booked DCs birthday party.

I love him to bits but marriage is difficult. We’ve worked v hard to get to this stage and we’ve had a few blips along the way. But I believe if anything, he carries more mental load now!

And the mental load in our house is shared.
He does all our bills, cars, holidays, insurance.
I do kids, school, birthdays, doctors and dentist, shopping for clothes and shoes and food, decorating.
Household chores and running kids taxi service is fairly even split. I do more as I work part time.

This.
it’s absolutely possible.

The example you’ve given is not a good one to support what you’re trying to say. So he didn’t come up with a fabulously unique gift for a baby he’s never met that doesn’t belong to him?? So?
Is that the extent of his ‘thoughtlessness’? Cos buying kids present, running baths and organising meals out spontaneously sounds fairly thoughtful to me?
Not sharing the mental load means that one of you does ALL the planning, cooking, presents, holidays, appointments etc etc…
Buying a slightly boring gift for a baby doesn’t really come into it.

I am very happy in my marriage, DH respects me and does probably more than 50% of housework stuff (when he's here). He's the kind of husband that I could ask him to do anything and he'd do it. But I absolutely shoulder more of the mental load tbh. I blame myself, we've been together since a young age and I loved our life entwining and probably went too far, plus he works away a lot so naturally things do tend to fall to me. Add to that I am a complete control freak and do tend to enjoy hoarding it. The only time it's an issue in our relationship is if I feel it's not appreciated, which happens from time to time.

I've definitely learned from some mistakes that I will be trying to help my children learn from! But DH and I have a really open dialogue and I know if I really did need to offload something I could.

This. I always remember the tooth fairy and enjoy doing it. It doesn’t annoy me that DH lets me be the one who remembers that. If I wasn’t around I know he’d do it.

im really crap at remembering to move money around and pay bills etc. I also haven’t taxed the car in years. I’d have to do those things if DH wasn’t around.

what would really scupper us is if we ran around duplicating half the tasks whilst both simultaneously forgetting the other half of what needs to be done.

we do sort of fit into stereotypically male and female jobs but we are both ok with that so it works.

as a society yes we should be looking at men and women being valued equally but that doesn’t mean one size fits all.

are YOU happy with the split of labour? If so don’t worry so much about it. Just ride the tide…. 😂

My DH is wonderful and certainly does more than his fair share of the housework (he is retired, I'm not) but he doesn't really understand what the mental load is. Some things he is extremely good at, practical things like arranging insurance or arranging a new internet provider, but the less practical things seem to be completely off his radar.
I thought when he was retired he would take over the online supermarket shopping and meal planning, arrange holidays/weekends away, organise Christmas etc., but no. I do the online shopping, or it just wouldn't get done at all. Meal planning is very hit and miss as he does most of the cooking. I arrange any holidays/weekends away and I organise Christmas. I do draw the line at present-buying for his family though. He does his, and I do mine.

Even so, in terms of “thoughtful” gifts for new parents, some may think that is, some (like me) who are tired, hungry, sleep deprived, running on empty, house a mess, self care at an all time low, would probably have gone “great, that can go in the cupboard for a year, now lets find something to eat”.

Thoughtful to new parents is often the things that others would typically think of as an easy or thoughtless gift. A food voucher, a meal, some snacks, some nappies or baby vests, a face mask etc would be just what a new parent really needs, and arguably a more thoughtful present although in another situation may be seen as a lazy gift!

We have designated areas of mental load each. I think maybe more of it falls to me but its give and take.

DP does all things holidays - arranging, researching, booking, flights, insurance, car hire. Also he arranges services / MOTs on the cars. He buys food if I send him a list. He cooks dinner Monday nights and is always happy to be given veg to peel / potatoes to mash etc on other nights. He is the point of contact for DD's hobby. He unloads and reloads dishwasher when he's around. He's meant to put the bins out but often forgets (this does piss me off sometimes). He is out of the house early for work but comes home mid afternoon so is helpful then.

He flatly acknowledges that he hates cleaning (as do I) so we pay for a cleaner once a fortnight.

I am in charge of washing / drying. I do the online food shops and the vast majority of the cooking and thinking of what to cook. I do some cleaning in between when the cleaner comes and tidy before they come. I sort the recycling. I deal with most of the day to day routines of school pick ups / drop offs as its only a short walk away and I work from home. I practice reading with DD. I go to all the birthday parties because I like seeing the other Mums. I do all DD's hair washing / combing. I sort the cat out.

We pretty much share the gardening.

We have a night maybe every three weeks where we go through the diaries and check we have everything in for school / work / social stuff etc.

I feel like I am the one that remembers the important stuff, but he's good at being a supporting role to me and I feel like he helps run the ship.

There’s necessary mental load - someone needs to do laundry, plan holidays, life admin etc., but there’s also stuff that’s optional, and handmade gifts are definitely optional!

@Mrsttcno1

it was crochet, not cross stitch. So the finished article would be more like a soft toy, which eventually the baby might like to play with (especially if it is a replica of the family dog which might be less tolerant of being carried around by the ears).

I think you maybe need to relax a bit , OP, and try to value your DP for what he does do, rather than what he doesn’t (if you both sat crocheting toy dogs, it might be a bit internecine). Of course, if what you are saying is he doesn’t do enough, or you don’t like what / how he contributes, that’s a poor look out for the long term

Signed : someone who has lived for many years with a man who hasn’t a clue where we keep the spare olive oil, or when we need to buy some more , but has cowed the electricity people into giving us a very good tariff.

You’ve had some good responses already, the only thing I’d add is that there’s more than one way of being thoughtful, and what you see as thoughtful and what someone else receives as thoughtful are not necessarily the same.

Like I’m sure you feel you were thoughtful with a cross stitched dog as a gift for a baby. But as someone who had a baby 6 months ago, my newborn wouldn’t have had a clue what it was and I’d have no use for it, but an Uber Eats voucher, a bag of snacks, or a meal ready for me to heat up because a friend knew I wouldn’t have the time or energy to cook with a newborn was my favourite and most thoughtful gift. A thoughtful gift is one chosen with the recipients interests & needs in mind, for parents of a newborn that is far more likely to be a pack of nappies, a food/snack delivery or even a little pamper basket for a new mum than it is to be a cross stitched photo of a dog. You may have saw your gift as thoughtful, and you may think a bag with some nappies/crisps/face mask in or a lasagne ready to heat up as not thoughtful, but I can guess which the new parents would have preferred and would have found more thoughtful.

I think that you’re unfair to judge your h on present buying. While the crocheted dog sounds amazing, it’s not something that the average person is going to be able to replicate in skill or idea.

I did most of the mental load when it came to raising my kids but my ex excelled in some areas - for example he was the first to jump to clean up vomit and diarrhea whatever time at night even though he couldn’t choose a thoughtful gift to save his life. He was to do all the driving around taking them places while I didn’t mind keeping on top of the school stuff.

Some food for thought
What’s he like when you are ill?
What’s he like when you have to prioritise something/someone else over him ?
Is his work a big part of his life ? I’ve read some stories where the man works 6/7 days a week. Would he be willing to change jobs or rearrange his working life if he’s in one of those jobs that dominate his life ? If he’s a workaholic now, chances are he sees himself as working long hours after kids too.

My partner is very good at lots of things but he is not a good planner so I think this can cause me to take some of the load. I’ve stopped doing as much now - he will do it eventually it’s just a bit of a rush. He was like this when we didn’t live together. He gets to it eventually just not as fast as I would. He would write a letter to the tooth fairy but leave it until 10 mins before he went to bed. I would do it when the child fell asleep. Doesn’t mean he wouldn’t do it, but if I am always jumping in to do it faster then he gets fed up it doesn’t make him do things faster, it just makes it look like I think I do things better than him. You made something lovely but not everyone has the skill to do this so I don’t think it’s a shit standard. It won’t be equal if you look down on him and think you are superior to him

I think things are pretty equal in my marriage...I am more likely to think of thoughtful gifts for people but DH is good at other stuff I hate (e.g. shopping around for good deals on broadband).

He is just as likely to read and respond to a school email as I am (eg. consent for school trips, pay £5 for charity etc)

I do not, I carried everything for the children - clothing, doctors, clubs etc. he doesn't even know where they are half the time.

However, he does do all the house admin - I haven't paid a bill for 15 years - and lots of other things I can't do. So although I might have a pang at the idea of him buying a gift for his nephews (I don't, they don't get anything from us) I know that we balance out in other ways.

Or at least that's what I tell myself.

I think my DH actually does a larger part, overall to be honest.

Yes, I do, but it's a second marriage, and I have less tolerance for carrying someone else's mental load than I used to! DH's side of the family are his responsibility, its up to him to buy the birthday presents, send Christmas cards, remember anniversaries, arrange visits, etc for that wing of the family, and I look after the relatives on my side of the family. I'm not going to lie, sometimes he doesn't remember birthdays quite on time, and the gift he buys them can be a bit generic, but as @Cookiecrumblepie says, I'm not going to impose my standards on him! This was conscious decision after getting thoroughly fed up of being the one spinning all the plates in my previous marriage- I'd actually argue it was one of the straws that finally broke the camel's back. In my current marriage everything else is split fairly evenly, and if I ever feel things are becoming a bit uneven I'll tell him and he does take it on board. However, I'm very aware that DH is wired very differently to my ex, and he genuinely wants things to be split equitably; so I'd argue its partly setting expectations, and partly the temperament of your partner.

My brother and two brother in laws, but all were always very organised and quick to do whatever needed to be done.

If it helps with a bit of perspective OP, we got a beautiful personalised gift from my brother and sister in law for our baby. I am 100% sure that it was her idea, not his. It doesn't make it any less special, but also we'd have been equally delighted if my brother himself had picked up a packet of sleepsuits from Asda on the way over.

My point being that you don't need to go the extra mile for things like that unless you want to, and if it's something you want to do then it's not fair to be annoyed that it didn't occur to your DH.

No, my DH probably does more.

Sounds like your partner had some ideas for the baby gift but you thought they weren't as good as your idea. Why not just let him crack on with whatever he wanted to get?