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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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

266 replies

ChaosTrulyReigns · 25/08/2013 22:25

Angry

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

It's not rocket surgery.

OP posts:
Trills · 26/08/2013 21:07

Nearly all household tasks are easy enough that anyone could do them if they just tried. Being "good" at them is largely down to practise.

Unless they have special needs, obvs.

reelingintheyears · 26/08/2013 21:07

I will Chaos, then i'll bite them in half with my super sharp teeth. Wink

littlemog · 26/08/2013 21:15

curlew your post has pretty much just said all that needed to be said. In awe. Grin

ChaosTrulyReigns · 26/08/2013 21:21

Cheers, rity. Smile

I shall be more circumspcet in future.

OP posts:
Littleen · 26/08/2013 21:45

It appears OP has never tried to "improve" a man who was not taught to pull his weight in a household. IT'S IMPOSSIFU**INGBLE! I once waited 6 months for my ex to clear up the broken beerbottle (glass and beer) in the freezer. He didn't do it until we were moving out and selling the fridge. They just don't change!

Gretagumbo · 26/08/2013 22:01

Mmm I left a man child for being naff at helping. I was caught between hating my own voice for sounding like a martyr and hearing my nagging, I hated that too. Is there a man train manual? I heard that the only time you can change them is when they are wearing nappies :)

AgentZigzag · 26/08/2013 22:16

'housework is not difficult. Cooking is not difficult. Looking after children is not difficult.'

As you say, the tasks in themselves (apart from children, jury's out on that one) aren't hard to master, but the tedious repetition of them is.

I'm sure that's not an exclusively male problem, there are plenty of women who dodge it because the slack is being picked up by someone else.

morethanpotatoprints · 26/08/2013 22:41

Trills

Thank you for adding sn in your statement, can we also have incapable for illness including mh as well please.
For years I have been duped a bit lazy by many people, including family. I work so hard at housework and achieve nothing, in fact its sometimes worse than when I started. I am unable to create order and have piles of stuff everywhere. My life where this and household management are concerned are chaotic. My friends and family have tried to help me and are very supportive, but I just can't do it.
My dh and the dc are really good and without them, I shudder to think the mess I would be in. I am dyslexic and dyspraxic, that's all, but it can make this stuff difficult. So some women are a bit crap too.

Leavenheath · 26/08/2013 23:20

I can't get my head around how many posters blame their MILs while their lazy (or absent) FILs seem to have escaped any disapproval. You do realise that history's going to repeat itself and even if you do half of what your MILs do, your sons and daughters will learn that women always do more domestic work than men? And your DILs will probably be on a thread in a few years time blaming YOU and not yours- or their- lazy husbands?

If a man does fuck all, it's partially his fault if his son does the same but honestly, when that son becomes an adult, it's no-one's fault but HIS if he does fuck all. Not yours. Not his Mum's.

I don't see many women in their twenties or early thirties blaming their dads for them having an inability to put a dustbin out when they left home. Or many young husbands blaming their FILs for their wives' inability to change a fuse. This is because women tend to realise that these are tasks every adult needs to do- and because men refuse to blame other men for women's incompetence when it exists.

Men who don't know and wont learn how to perform everyday life skills are selfish, lazy partners and dreadful parental role models. It's trivialising it to say it's a stark choice between putting up with it or leaving them because it's not just that women get exhausted with the responsibility for it all, it's the sheer resentment it causes, plus a dawning realisation that it's not incompetence, it's neglect and ultimately, a lack of respect that's crept into the marriage.

Putting this under the umbrella of housework is a trivial euphemism. Disrespect and a lack of care and feeling is a more accurate title.

Morloth · 26/08/2013 23:52

There can be an advantage to being a gamer.

If the end goal is a Saturday night where the house is clean, the kids have had a great day and are tucked up in bed. Then there can be a good 6 hours available for a run.

We are both very goal oriented. We both want the house nice, the kids happy and everything trundling along.

It isn't hard to see that that can be achieved a lot more efficiently by 2 adults working towards that (and the kids being trained to do their bit as they go as much as possible).

I have Mondays 'off', I do no housework and just have DS2 to care for as DS1 is at school. DH tends to have Sundays 'off' he does no housework but will often take one of the boys out for a bit of one on one time. Now our boys are not babies anymore 'childcare' is a bit different and involves actually enjoying them.

End result 4 happy people, all doing a bit and everyone having plenty of leisure time, as opposed to 1 person doing it all and being resentful of the other 3.

blueshoes · 26/08/2013 23:54

Rather than trying to change or 'enable' men children, we should just not breed with them so they don't have a chance to pass on their crap genes.

Bonsoir · 27/08/2013 07:25

It is not genes but upbringing ( or rather its failure) that causes immaturity.

Of course, breeding with immature men is going to be hard work.

yellowballoons · 27/08/2013 07:58

curlew and littlemog.
Are you both with partners?

curlew · 27/08/2013 08:35

Yes. Why?

yellowballoons · 27/08/2013 08:43

Wondering whether he does everything you want him to do?

curlew · 27/08/2013 10:24

I don't want him to do anything. Things need doing. We like to eat nice food, wear clean clothes and live in a reasonably clean and tidy house. We like the lawn to be mown, the dog walked, the car maintained, and the bills paid. We like to have social lives and give our friends and family presents at birthday and Christmas.

There are 4 of us in this family. We all do the things that need doing as they arise.

Biscuitsareme · 27/08/2013 11:14

Agree with Curlew. There are 4 in our family, but the DC are too young to do much beyond tidying up some of their toys.
OH and I split the chores. We're both crap at cleaning so the house is usually a bit messy, but it's perfectly liveable. And we both have leisure time. I do get resentful at times for doing more; he does get resentful at times for doing more.

Not perfect, but it's ok.
It's about both behaving like adults really, and having self-respect. I'd lose my self-respect if I expected someone else to clean up after me.

yellowballoons · 27/08/2013 11:15

That doesnt actually answer the question at all.

So I am sort of assuming that you are in a Mrs
Bucket type household.

yellowballoons · 27/08/2013 11:16

My response was to curlew.

aquashiv · 27/08/2013 11:22

Massive generalisation Op. Not just women that do it. There is an element of doing what we are good at/want to do in most of us. Some get sucked into the trap.

ChaosTrulyReigns · 27/08/2013 11:27

I thought my OP was quite specific? I hate it "when" someone does something? Confused

Generalisation would be "all" women sat it.

OP posts:
ChaosTrulyReigns · 27/08/2013 11:27

Say.

OP posts:
ChaosTrulyReigns · 27/08/2013 11:29

Anyway, I've already admitted it was one of less wise threads. Wink

OP posts:
ChaosTrulyReigns · 27/08/2013 11:29

Y less wise...

OP posts:
ChaosTrulyReigns · 27/08/2013 11:29

My

OP posts:
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