to hate it when women suggest their menflok are like an extra child?

[ChaosTrulyReigns]

If he doesn't step up to the plate, get them to improve and stop enabling the behaviuor.

It's not rocket surgery.

[Kiwiinkits]

Not so easy to dismiss your wife telling you your selfishness has diminished your sexual appeal and that she interprets your behaviour as neglect, disrespect and not loving her as much as she deserves.

This.

This is one thing that does work. You not helping makes you sexually unappealing to me. Help run our house, and I'll want to shag you a lot more.

[DropYourSword]

I hate the idea of using sex as a weapon.

[Kiwiinkits]

It's not a weapon, it's a bribe.

[Kiwiinkits]

And it's factually accurate. Who does want to shag someone who's not contributing their share around the house?

[Morloth]

How is it using sex as a weapon to not want to have sex with someone you don't respect?

Sex isn't something I give my husband. I am not doing him a favour.

I want to have sex with him and he me, so we do.

If I don't want to then I won't.

And I wouldn't want to with someone who thought so little of me.

Yuck.

[justwondering72]

Hmmm

I have ploughed through all 11 pages of this thread and one thing that seems to be clear is that people repeat the patterns that they grow up with - they turn into their parents regarding the sharing of house hold / family stuff. This worries me. Dh is no manchild - at one point on the past I was writing full time while he did supply work and he took over the ttl running of the house in its entirety, cooking, cleaning, ironing, you name it. But since having children I have been a SAHM while he now works a very full on job, with long days and many evenings of prep and making (yep he's a teacher). So if I was to expect him to take on xyz household stuff that would be on top of the long hours he does in his payoff work. That's not fair, is it? The fairest soot in our household atm is for him to work outside the home and for me to do all the house stuff. But I am now really worried about the message this is giving to our two sons, aged 5 and 2-are they going to grow up having absorbed the message that only mummies do housework? What can I do, within our current situation, to mitigate that?

[curlew]

We've had times like that in our family. The important thing to do is to talk about it. Talk about shared work, and what it takes to make a household run- earning money, cooking, whatever.

And, crucially even if he doesn't have time/energy for much substantive housework, he should always do stuff like setting and clearing the table, unless that's the kid's job. And cook a meal at the weekend, and clear up properly. It should be taken for granted that everyone wipes out the bath, takes dirty dishes to the kitchen, puts rubbish in the bin, tidies up after themselves, puts dirty washing in the laundry basket, makes a cup of tea for everyone who wants one without leaving a mess, changing the loo roll- all the little day to day things that mean there is actually much less housework to do anyway. Everybody benefits, everybody contributes.

[yellowballoons]

In my experience, if the children are brought up doing housework and cooking, they automatically carry it on into adulthood, unless a girlfriend or partner comes along who wants to do it all mainly herself. Then a man will happily let them.

[Morloth]

justwondering it doesn't actually matter who does what as long as there is a fair division of labour.

We have had periods where DH was a student while I was working full time, times where I was a SAHM when DH was working long hours. Obviously whoever was home more did more home stuff.

The point isn't who is cleaning, the point is that the load for keeping the family running is shared equally and each job is appreciated and respected.

In my example of our day, we both got started at about the same time and both hit our 'leisure' time at around the same time.

[Jan49]

My ex's family seem to have definite ideas about what boys and girls should learn to do, and my ex grew up not doing any household chores. But the weird thing is, his dad does all the hoovering and laundry and always has done, whilst his mum does all the cooking. So his parents seem to have a fairly equitable division of chores and not just down gender lines, but didn't pass this on to their dc.

[Gretagumbo]

Re: sex as a weapon statement. Also disagree with this. My ex's continued failure to contribute to the household financially, emotionally, physically or any other ally made me angry, sad and less attracted to him. I felt like a doormat, my self esteem was eroded. Sex was not used as a weapon, I simply did not want to have it with a person who thought it ok to be a passenger whilst their partner took the slack.

[Leavenheath]

Exactly.

One of the women I most admire in life told her lazybones husband that it wasn't that she'd gone off sex, she'd gone off sex with him because she just didn't find manchildren attractive. She told him she was buggered if she'd put up with not having a sex life long-term and that if he didn't shape up, she'd leave him.

Pfft to 'using sex as a weapon'. If a woman not unreasonably finds herself unable to feel attraction for a lazy, sexist man, damned right she shouldn't have sex. But leaving a man like this and then finding someone who she does wants sex with and who will pull his weight is an option I wish more women would take.

[Gretagumbo]

I've taken that option. I hope to have a fabulous sex life in the future :)

[ILoveDolly]

I love the fact that you presume it's possible to change them. I have lived with dh for over 12 years now. As I am a SAHM I take on a fair amount of the drudgery and as far as parenting goes, he is great for fun days out, nappy changes etc. BUT so far in my campaign to not enable his domestic laziness I have failed! I do not do his laundry, unless he specufically asks. Upshot is he has not worn an uncreased shirt for years. His study looks like molemans lair. His shoes dont shine. If I didn't regularly rescue important household documents before they reach the lair we would never be able to reinsure the cars, find unpaid bills etcI know the women at his work think I am a poor housewife luckily I have rhino hide.....

[DropYourSword]

I think I've been a little misunderstood regarding my "sex as a weapon" comment so I just want to clarify something.

I totally understand and appreciate that if your partner isn't pulling his weight and being a supportive member of your relationship then it affects how much you may be physically attracted to them and you may be less inclined to want to have sex with them / find them sexually attractive.

What I do find horrible is the idea of saying to someone something along the lines of "I won't have sex with you unless you wash the dishes" or " I'll have sex with you once you take the bins out". That's what I meant about using sex as a weapon / bribe.

And that's my opinion. Which I'm entitled to. And everyone else is entitled to agree or disagree.

[Fraxinus]

Just wondering 72

You could make sure your boys don't take you for granted by getting them involved in household jobs. Discuss it with your oh, and agree a way for him to show or share with the boys what he does do in the household, enthusiastically.

Man children grow up with a sense of entitlement. They think they can chill out in the evening. They think even discussing the running of the household is work, and that they can just leave it for someone else to decide.

It is not who they see doing the housework, of itself which teaches boys to be man children. It is the attitude with which work is done.