to feel that DH should not expect me to do everything.

[generallyadogsbody]

Basically, I am irritated because I do all the 'chores' around the house. These include cleaning, doing the dishwasher, washing clothes, all the cooking and large majority of the childcare including any night time wake ups, I also sort out packed lunches/ drop offs with cm when i am at work. I work 1 day per week plus do about 1 day's worth from home. DH works full time. His contribution is mainly in terms of keeping paperwork in order, and doing all the personal admin, plus he helps out with the children when he is here (obv he is also the main breadwinner).

This morning I was getting the kids' breakfast (had already got them up and dressed), when DH wandered downstairs looking for a shirt for work. I told him I hadn't washed any. He looked and sounded all hard done by and I'm afraid I flipped and got a bit shouty because he has been at home ALL weekend. I had, as it happened, been doing lots of washing all weekend (changed the beds and did kids clothes) and could easily have stuck a couple of shirts in if he'd just TOLD me he needed them. Or, heaven forbid, he could have WASHED some himself. So basically, AIBU to have had a bit of a rant this morning? I feel a bit mean now....

YANBU. At all. You aren't his mother or psychic. And they are HIS KIDS TOO.

Things like shirt-washing need to be under control within the domestic sphere - shirt-washing (and ironing) is a regular chore. If you are fundamentally in charge of organising how regular domestic chores get done in your family, you are a bit unreasonable not to ensure that your DH has no clean, work-ready shirts in his wardrobe on a Monday morning.

You might, however, want to re-engineer your domestic arrangements and get your DH to do the shirt-washing. He needs to know this.

YANBU he needs to pull his weight with some of the household chores. I hope he comes home with some flowers and a sheepish attitude this evening.

This is why I don't wash my DH's clothes (I'm a SAHM). If he came to me looking for a shirt I would feel like his mother and lose all respect for him. His clothes are his business, he sorts them himself.

You shouldn't have to do everything, but that said if you always do the laundry then he's probably not going to wash his own shirts. In our house, I do clothes washing, DH does dish washing. I wouldn't want him putting a load on (that makes me sound really controlling) as we have limited drying facilities and I've got into a routine to keep the laundry mountain under control. I would however expect him to tell me if he's running out of things, as my responsibility ends at the point I put his clean dry clothes on his side of the bed, I am not responsible for going through his wardrobe checking stock levels

Yanbu! Unless dp tells me he needs work stuff doing or does it himself then he doesn't get to complain if there arent any done. His work tshirts are really dark and have to be washed with other dark stuff like jeans etc so unless i have got a full load of darks they do sometimes get forgotten about. Imo it's up to him to make sure he has whatever needs for work.

You could try looking at it another way.
In a typical week,how many hours do you both have free for me time.
Is it roughly equal.

It is then up to you both how you divide up the chores and kids stuff and paperwork and work in the other hours.

I'm sorry, I don't get the whole 'I'm not washing his things' arguement. It's all washing FFS, just shove it in the machine and get on with it! Don't get me wrong, I would love my DH to do that for me, have been feeling particulary hard done by this morning looking at the mess in the kitchen from his w/end of cooking, but come on! Just chuck a couple of his shirts in for crying out loud! It would take longer to sort out the washing into seperate piles than it would to just do it!

How young are your children?

In this house if its not in the wash basket it doesnt get washed. I am not psychic.

Also, we each iron our own clothes (we hardly iron anything except work uniform). I am on mat leave at the moment and have picked up a few more chores / doing chores more regularly, but I still expect dh to clear up after himself or do a job if he is in and sees it needs doing.

It shouldn't have been a surprise to either of you that he would need a clean, ironed shirt for Monday morning. Monday morning is a stupid time to have that revelation.

In an ideal world he would put dirty shirts in the laundry basket to be washed in an appropriate load as you work through the washing mountain pile/ironing, but would possess enough shirts - say two or three weeks' worth - that he wouldn't run out if a suitable cycle didn't come round quickly enough.

DH drives me nuts by refusing to own more than one pair of work trousers, so that they have to be washed and ironed over the weekend regardless of what else I've got to do. So I am about to sneakily buy some more cheap work trousers to break the stupid cycle. I have given up trying to get him to help with laundry because putting dirty things in the laundry basket was such a big step for him, and such a big help to me, that I pick my battles.

Doing all the washing is easier than doing nearly all the washing. And work/school clothes will always need a weekend wash, so plan one.

If the agreement is that he goes out to work, and you run the house, and would normally have sorted out shirts for him, then he is not being unreasonable to expect to find a clean shirt on a monday morning.

I normally say to my husband on a Sunday morning "have you got everything you need for work tomorrow?" and he will check. All our dirty washing goes into one laundry basket, so if it is in there, it will get washed.

YANBU at all, any adult should be able to notice when they take their last clean shirt out of the cupboard, and do something about it. Even if that is just saying, hey DW, this is my last clean shirt, could you throw some dirty ones in the wash please?

YAB a bit U to have a rant, because you took ownership of the problem by doing that, IYSWIM. This sounds really bad, but I use the tactics from 'How to talk so kids will listen' in this type of situation; where you don't offer solutions or apologies, but gentle questioning to point the other person in the direction of how they might solve the problem or do things differently next time.

Sounds like you do an awful lot domestically, and he does very little. Does he not even load the dishwasher after dinner, for example?

i iron shirts on a sunday so would know by then if enough shirts had been washed (only shirts and school stuff gets ironed so takes about 1 hour a week). I do all the clothes washing so like to make sure everything that needs washing each week gets done e.g. gym stuff for me and dh, work stuff for dh and school stuff for the kids. He does put his dirty stuff in the laundry basket so if the stuff he needs is in there it will get washed

Ha. That reminded me of my own dh, he went into his wardrobe one morning, scratched his head looking puzzled and asked where his shirts were! They had been washed but still in the ironing basket as I'd been ill for 2 days and hadn't bothered with any ironing. I told him the washing fairies must have had a day off!

It's not your responsibility to check he has what he needs washed, he's a grown man! YANBU.

TBH you need to step back and let your dh do a lot more for himself, if you keep doing things for him all the time he will never learn to do these things himself.

Thing is you have done these things for him and he has got used to it - so you are partly to blame.

Communicate and keep comunicting - he needs to know what goes on in his own home - he aint a lodger

I never know where DH is with his shirts, as sometimes he wears them more than once, sometimes not. It's not too hard to just shout 'I'm sticking a load on, can you bring down anything you want washing that's not in the basket', is it? He does his own ironing, unless I haven't got much on (I work freelance at home 2 days a week), in which case I do them for him. Same with shopping, when I'm going to the supermarket I ask him what he needs (he eats cereal & milk, I don't, for example, and we have different spreads). He doesn't expect these things to happen by magic, but these are 'my' tasks. If he (and you, for that matter) pulls his weight as a partner it's no biggie. DH is going to start decorating the spare room soon, we'll decide together what we want but there's no bloody way I'm wielding a brush, I loathe decorating. He'll get all his shirts ironed that week!

Um. How can you do washing and ignore your dh's washing? That sounds petty. What's more important, clean bedclothes for kids or clean shirts for dh?? Normally I woudl say that he should put on a wash himself but if you had done several, then why ignore his stuff?

Sounds like this is a symptom of the whole 'feeling you do everything and feeling unappreciated' thing and you need to sit down with your h and chat to him - perhaps see if you can divide household chores up so you each know what you are responsible for??

OP, if your DH does all the admin then don't underestimate the time involved. I oversaw this chore for about a week and soon handed it back to DH. It takes an age and is super-boring.

As for shirts. Well, I loath doing them. The dry cleaners washes and irons them for a very reasonable price.

It's not too hard to just shout 'I'm sticking a load on, can you bring down anything you want washing that's not in the basket', is it?

It's also not too hard to ask for shirts to be washed/do them yourself/put them in the laundry basket either.

What exactly does household admin involve that it takes up so much time? I keep all of our documents in order and pay all the bills....it doesn't take up much time at all.

Well if you're usually the one who sorts out the laundry then he WNBU to expect clean shirts.

On the other hand YANBU to think he could contribute a bit more to household chores but this is something you need to sit down and discuss. If you don't feel your current system is fair then talk to him about it.

cuntflap it just used to take me hours.

But them I am poor with pieces of paper etc and DH and I are both self employed so...