To be stressed out about DH and his portion of the "mental load"

OP, why are you only responding to the posters who are accepting your "quirky scientist" excuse and not the ones who know that it's bullshit and he's like this because he knows that you'll sort stuff out if he doesn't.

IMO this is the best post on this thread.

I was married to someone like this (I worked FT and earned more money than he did) and I tried reasoning, explaining, shouting and crying. Nothing improved.

So I thought "sod this for a game of soldiers" and "downed tools" I let his shirts go un-ironed, his socks/pants fester on the bedroom floor. I even moved out into another bedroom because I couldn't stand 'the smell of his stinking socks and skid-marked pants.

I cooked and shopped for myself, and when he asked what was for tea I said "whatever you'd like to cook for us".

Eventually he had an affair, and I divorced him. I hope she's enjoying being a sexual house-keeper !

Sadly there are always females who will accommodate these type of men 🙄

and in these cases what ends up happening is after bedtime I spend all the time until I go to bed folding and putting away laundry, prepping his lunch box, tidying up etc.

Why can’t he do this, though?

I think he (not you) needs to make a weekly ‘to do’ list, broken down by day, and stick it somewhere prominent like the fridge. Then he needs to check it every day, at the same time. It should be tied to something that he has to do, like brushing his teeth (so stick it on the bathroom cabinet) or making a coffee (stick it on the required cupboard). And then he does that day’s tasks. Every day. No excuses.

Hmm. Sometimes it's less stressful if I do it all. I like having control over everything because I know it'll get done. If I rely on him for stuff I get more frustrated. Doesn't make it right, but it's less of a hassle in many ways.

As a result I don't work many hours and let him bring the money in.

My advise would be for you (and us) to not solutionise this for him. If he has end to end responsibility for few and so minor / trivial / mundane tasks and he can’t even manage them what is his way forward to be an equal partner in your relationship…. Or perhaps he doesn’t see himself as your equal partner in which case it’s a different conversation.

I'd create a task list / rota for him, or with him. Print off, laminate and stick in a prominent place he'll see multiple times a day.

I have ADHD. I could be a bit scatty when it came to doing household tasks/being on time for things/getting on top of laundry etc.

Then I became a single mum to five school-aged kids. And I KNEW that if I didn't shape up I ran the risk of losing my kids. There was simply no question of people smiling and saying 'oh, she's so absent minded' if my kids were continually late for school with no lunchboxes in filthy uniforms. It would have been Social Services. So I shaped up. I wrote lists, I set alarms, I stayed up late to catch up with things that needed doing. There was nobody to catch me and everything to lose.

It is perfectly possible even with ADHD, to remember things, to do things in order and to keep up with stuff. It's just that a lot of men (particularly but not uniquely) know that someone else (usually but not uniquely a woman) will pick up the slack

I don't agree with this idea that people are incapable of becoming more organised as adults. Before I had kids I regularly left dishes in the sink instead of the dishwasher, turned up late constantly to the extend you'd have assumed I was time blind, left my washing for 10 days, etc - then I had two kids, realised this didn't work anymore and adjusted my lifestyle so I constantly tidy up around myself, wash clothes regularly (mostly theirs) and the flat is probably tidier now than beforehand / I'm definitely much more on time than beforehand. You need to get him to get onboard with improving his contribution - its like a muscle, the more you exercise it the more it becomes instinctive.

He needs to tackle these tasks like he would at work and you need to leave him to it.

If there isn't time in the morning to empty the dishwasher, he should do it at night.

He needs to sort the rubbish out at the weekend so it is ready to go or go to the tip.

He needs to clear the tissues off the nightstand and put them in the bin immediately he wakes up and goes to the bathroom. That is rank.

Yep!

Sounds like executive function issues which can be viewed as lazy. Look at ADHD books and resource for ideas. He needs routines. Don’t let him get away with stuff. He needs to step up.

Mine is shit at most (not all) mental load stuff due to ADHD.

The way we manage it is to not fight it, play to our strengths and ensure it is included in the division of labour. I also require that if I'm in charge of something due to the ADHD, he does exactly what he's told, and generally immediately because we both know he will otherwise forget.

Not a chance in hell I'd be tolerating stuff like the tissues though. Mine is quite big on respect for my role. Life is also a bit easier in that sometimes a big cleaning task will become the hyperfocus, so he does that quicker than I would whereas I'm more day to day.

This is so true. I have severe ADHD and have spent my entire adult life building habits to try and stay on top of things. It’s not easy but I feel so ashamed when our house turns into a tip or I miss a bill and I find the chaos upsetting.

There are so many strategies your husband could try but he’s chooses not to. How much of that is a conscious choice vs socialisation, I don’t know, but it’s a choice. He’s not incompetent or he’s not have the job he does.

Man alert.

I think you gotta lower the standards, men care less about some of these things such a cleaning tasks because they are programmed to be better at other things. Sometime you gotta go with the flow, planning less, doing less, isn't always a bad thing.

I'm guessing he never lived alone otherwise he would know how to run a house!

Funny that it seems often assumed that women automatically know how to do this-& bring up kids!

Yes you’re right.

This would be my natural personality (quirky scientist or “nutty professor” type, even though I’m not a scientist) and I have to work very hard not to be, both at home and work.

I’ve forced myself to be very organised at home, as otherwise it would all fall apart. It was very hard when I was married as we both had a tendency to want to be the “star” personality who was slightly above day to day mundanity. Long story short, I made the effort to do what was needed, he didn’t.

Its the same at work, I’ve had to work very hard not to be just the “ideas person” but to get into the detail of things, be organised and make things happen (not just suggest things). I’ve noticed that as you get more senior people are more accommodating of “scattiness” but I still make the effort.

It’s very annoying when people - either a partner or colleagues - sit back in the role of “nutty professor”

Edit- just to be clear, I’m not talking about actual scientists or professors, my job is not in those fields. I’m just talking about the stereotype. People of course accommodate it much more in men than women.

My husband is similar and what has worked for us is the opposite of what others have suggested - he does the time-sensitive tasks that can't be forgotten or ignored, because that way he can't forget or ignore them.

In our case, that means he is responsible for all the food shopping and all cooking. It's a big enough job that it relieves a lot of mental load on me, if he has to go to the shop at an inconvenient time because he's forgotten to go, well he has to suck that up and go.

Then I do the stuff that's less time sensitive or less frequent, and then it still gets done.

Classic weaponised incompetence.

Hotels create detailed lists for their employees to check and tick off. Get him to create the list (eg on x night empty bins in xyz rooms, place new liner in bins, take rubbish outside, put bin on road, bring bin in)

you shouldn’t need to do the list, he is capable, but check that he has not missed anything off.

Also, the things you describe aren't really mental load to me. Mental load is making sure everyone is in the right place at the right time, appointments don't get missed, and bills get paid. Putting in a fresh bin liner is not mental load.

works in an industry at a very high level where this is quite typical - think in the lines of quirky scientists that everyone accepts are very absent minded and engulfed in their own world.

This is a really untrue stereotype. Most of the very high-powered scientists I know (professors who discover important stuff like vaccines etc) are scarily business-like and organised.

Does he behave like this at work?

YANBU.

Can you pick something he's supposed to do, but doesn't, that will make him uncomfortable, but won't have too much of an effect on you. And just leave it.

Let him fail.

Alternatively, "forget" to do something that's on your list.

I voted YABU. I think I pick up the slack for dh in similar ways but he equally picks up the slack for me as well in other areas, like making packed lunches, walking the dog and getting homework done. Is everything really as one sided as you think?

If he isn’t going to step up, can you farm out some of it? Cleaner, send ironing to a service once a fortnight, maybe use a co-parenting app (designed for separated parents, but equally useful for engaging a second parent over matters like booking and attending parents evenings, doing school pick ups etc so that it takes up less headspace)?

Make a list of all (if any) tasks he DOES manage to remember.

Next to those tasks, write down who benefits most from them.