If you WFH should you do more housework than your DP who doesn't WFH?

[AnxiousAnniee]

My view is this: you both live in the house and therefore it is a shared responsibility. Whether you work from home or not, whether you work 60 hours a week or 6, it is both people's responsibility.

I work from home 3 days a week and my partner doesn't WFH ever. I naturally do more housework just because I'm home I can do some washing and wash the pots on my lunch or do a hoover etc. However I still expect some jobs to be done by him. It has always been agreed that he is in charge of kitchen duties so cooking, washing the pots, cleaning the kitchen. I do everything else.

His mum messaged me today saying she's worried about how tired he is and could I start doing the cooking to help him out so that he can have a rest when he gets in? I'm gobsmacked and fuming a bit, but also don't know if I'm being unreasonable. If I took on the cooking as well I would basically be doing absolutely everything. I do get that I sit at my desk all day but I'm still working. My partner has a manual labour job so granted it is more tiring and strenuous but I still hold the belief that he owns this house too and should do his share. Or is my attitude wrong here and seeing as he works long hours am I being unfair? He leaves for work at 5am and gets home anywhere between 5 and 7 so they are long days. I would just kind of resent the fact that we both work yet all of the housework is left to me. I hate cooking and I'm bad at it, he loves it and is a brilliant cook which is why we have always had this arrangement and have always been happy with it. He has never complained about cooking but his mums comment has made me feel a bit bad

Yeah actually I do think YABU - he works longs days in a Manual job with a commute - I mix WFH with a commute and 100% on the days I WFH I am considerably less tired....

Ah ok, I didn't see that in the update.

I think the split outlined in the OP sounds reasonable, i.e. including kitchen clean up

I would ignore MIL and ask DH if he is happy to continue as you are atm. I understand his work is more tiring but it's not fair for you to do everything especially as he likes cooking but you don't.

I do think that you have to count commute as part of work hours when comparing. The OP says he is out at 5am and back between 5pm-7pm that is 60-70hr week compared to her 40hr week.

I do think that she should do the first 20hrs of housework/week and then they split the remainder if things are to be equal.

Absolutely not. It's still work.

I'd be telling MIL to keep out of my marriage.

It sounds like a fair-ish split to me and my initial reaction would probably be quite rude if my MIL said that! If he enjoys cooking, it may well be recharging his batteries after a day's work anyway, rather than making him more tired anyway (especially as he's not necessarily even washing the pots ...).

Housework aside, do you think he is tired and struggling? That might make me slightly less grumpy about MiL butting in (even if I do NOT agree that you should be taking on the cooking too).

Everyone should have the same amount of hobby and chill times

So if someone is working much longer hours and commuting I would expect them to do much less in the home

Yes the person who WFH absolutely should do more.

Thats one of the pros of WFH surely, that you can stick a wash on or put the hoover around during the day.

My working day consists of getting up, showered, dressed, doing my make up and hair.
Then I have an hours commute, an 8.5hour day and then an hours commute home.
I then have to do all the cooking, cleaning etc after work.

When I was WFH during covid I was able to do all of my chores by 1pm easily without it affecting my work as I didn’t have the commute and could do something on my lunch break.
So once I’d finished work I was done and could relax or do a hobby.

As you are WFH you should be doing more housework and cooking on those days.
I would say the same if it was your DH who WFH and there have been numerous threads about the same situation but the sexes reversed.

However, that doesn’t mean he gets to do nothing.
On the days you’re both in the office and weekends it needs to be 50/50.

I would be really angry if I found out that he was going to his mum moaning about how he’s doing too much etc and asked her to speak to you.

I would hope that he’s just simply been mentioning that he feels tired recently and she’s taken it upon herself to think he’s doing too much and rang you off her own back.

I’d be very annoyed at her still and tell her that if he has a problem then he can talk to you himself considering he’s a grown adult.

A chat about redistribution doesn't mean OP falls on her sword and offers to wipe his bum in-between cooking his meals and polishing his toe nails tho.

They could agree that he batch cooks, op reheats her three shorter days / his longer days but he absolutely has to clean the kitchen those nights. So he walks on at 7, eats an hour earlier than normal so has time to do the washing up.
If he's coming in at 7, sitting down at say 8 for dinner, washing up at circa 9 will feel less attractive and will reduce the couple time they have. He can empty the bins and sort the recycling as part of kitchen duties.

The goal should be equal leisure time.

You say you work 40 hours a week plus 3 days of commute and he does 50 plus 5.

If your housework/admin is 10-12 hours, then it probably does make sense you do the lion's share, unless there's more to it - like he's a bit of a workaholic or is doing extra hours to fund a hobby etc.

If you can afford it, a robot hoover (even the cheaper Amazon knockoffs) is amazing for daily runarounds for pet hair, and would save at least one job!

Regardless of how long his day is, if he lived alone he would still have to cook and eat at the end of the working day as well as doing all the other housework on top of that. I’d tell your MIL if she’s so concerned about him she’s welcome to come and cook dinner for you both every night as you don’t have the capacity, cooking skills or desire to do so.

Im kind of torn on this one tbh! My ds works over 50 hours a week in a strenuous job and also does all the cooking, shopping and a lot of housework. His dp is a stay at home mother who actually does very little apart from look after their dc! While I would absolutely never interfere or impose my views on their division of labour I must say that it is extremely hard to see my son absolutely exhausted after a hard day at work then walk in and carry on working in the home. He often looks exhausted and stressed but if this is how they choose to be what can i do? 🤷‍♀️

I would wash up if he cooked though. Nothing worse than cooking a family meal after a days work and then having to go back in the kitchen straight after to clean up.

I like the idea of batch cooking I actually don't know why we haven't already thought of that. I will talk to him tonight about that thanks for the suggestions

Yabu

Weekends we split chores equally but during the week I do way more. I wfh for 37 hours & my DP works anywhere between 50 and 60 hours and also has to travel for work, so no way would I expect things to be equally split between us then! This also means in reality I do 99% of cooking weekdays, not my idea of fun but we are a team!

The mum asking is pathetic. But I’m not sure it works to have him do all the cooking if he’s not back til 7 sometimes? I WFH and yes I do more because I’m not waiting til DH gets home at 7, for him to then cook. I see cooking or housework as replacement for DH commute. We split evenly at the weekend.

If I was the WFH one in this relationship I’d put tea on, just because my day was shorter, on the days I WFH. It might not be a gourmet feast if my cooking wasn’t up to much but I wouldn’t begrudge boiling a pan of pasta or sticking a jacket spud in the oven.

Speak to DH, say his mum’s text. He’ll either roll his eyes and tell you to ignore her or he’ll say it’s an issue and you can work it out among yourselves.

So he's getting up to leave for 5am? So when is he needing to go to sleep? If he cooks and cleans up afterwards does he have any down time at the end of the day at all?
It sounds rough - but I hate cooking and in those circumstances would be doing something as basic as possible,and catching up on everything else at weekends.

Obviously it's none of his mum's business.

But in answer to your thread title, yes I think someone wfh should do more. They have more time as there's no commute. I work in the office 2 days a week, and from home the rest of the time, and DH wfh full time. On days I'm in the office, he's responsible for things like unloading the dishwasher, tidying away breakfast, maybe hanging out some laundry or doing a bit of hoovering on his lunch break/before work. When we're both home, we share that.

Lol at he enjoys cooking but doesn't enjoy any other tasks

Does anyone love cleaning toilets or litter trays? But they still have to be done!

Your mil needs to butt out.

If cooking is ALL your h does, then he should carry on cooking. He's bloody lucky you don't mind doing everything else.

Batch cooking would be sensible, though.

You’re wrong. If the sexes were reversed and the female were out of the house for work for 60-70hrs per week and the male were WFH for 40hrs/week I would have the same view. In fact, my DH and I lived almost this. I had a job where I had 12hr shifts, five days a week (60hrs) and he WFH for 35hrs a week.

He did all the housework. We would do DIY projects together on the weekends. But all the regular cooking, cleaning, garden, laundry that was all on my DH. I wasn’t messy. I put my dirty clothes in the hamper. I took my dirty dishes to the sink. I cleaned up any spills I made. I sorted my mail so it didn’t pile up. I didn’t leave my things scattered about the house- always put them away.

When I had to leave the house at 4:45am I had to be lights out going to sleep at 9pm.

This is very timely, as have just had a similar discussion with my DH. He works out of the home in a senior professional role, quite a lot of travelling, long hours, earns significant more than me. However, I still work 4 days a week in a professional role, fairly well paid, but WFH 99% of the time. We seem to have slipped into a situation where I do the vast majority of the house work, plus all the, (I hate the phrase but), 'life admin', kids related admin etc etc.
To my mind, as you've said OP, I don't mind picking up a bit more, I'm at home, it's easy for me to put on a wash, tidy round, prep the evening meal etc. But I don't expect to do that all the time, plus everything else, plus work!

Have you told him that his mum has messaged you? The only acceptable reaction from him should be mortification!

When working from home you should tidy up your own lunch things etc like you would do in the office.

I do also put washing on and hang them out, but my DH wouldn’t “expect” this.