to Sometimes get fed up being the pivotal person in my house?

[ChaosTrulyReigns]

Had a bit of a melt - down today, for many reasons.

I know that there really is no escape, but I seem to be the one who:

reminds,
decides,
repeats,
Is asked what/where/wgen/who/how,
and so on.

Does anyone else get fed up with nothing seeming to happen unless they provides the encouragement or urging or reminding or deciding to get it done?

Ah, I don't put up with incompetent men. My husband was taught nothing by his 1950s mother. A combination of years away at uni and a year living with me has sorted him out. We have divided up most of the chores according to what we prefer to do/not do and we take all the responsibility for it eg I don't ask him to clean the bathroom, he needs to think about doing it himself. He couldn't even iron a shirt before. Now he will stock the fridge, cook, wipe and dust etc without being told. He is in charge of bringing me breakfast in bed on the weekends and I make him a packed lunch 3 days a week. We look after each other basically.

If a man hasn't been properly taught how to maintain a household by his own parents (unfortunately very often still the case), I think they should be given lessons and a time frame to bring himself up to speed. That's the only leeway I'll allow.

I don't have kids yet, but my husband already knows that if we ever do, he will be doing the bulk of childcare at the start as he needs to learn the skills (I have been looking after babies from an early age, so I'm trained up). In case I die, I need to know my kids will be properly looked after by their father. More likely, if I fall ill with the flu, he needs to know exactly what slack to pick up.

I don't consider myself lucky, I think my situation is pretty normal in 2014 with two busy adult professionals working together and sharing a life.

I believe this thread is pretty representative of most of my friends and myself in terms of split of chores and childcare.

An extreme example : One friends DH refuses to use his holiday time to cover childcare and uses his bonus to buy new cars, whilst hers goes on family holidays. Thankfully he now seems able to do bedtime, which was a problem for him for a number of years. Meet him and he seems like a lovely bloke, but I couldn't be married to him.

Or another one, I love SIL to bits but am dreading going away on holiday and sharing a property with them again which we are due to do soon. Why? Well her adult DH and grown up adult sons do nothing to clean up after themselves and preparing meals, setting the table and clearing up is viewed as women's work although not stated as such. I was in tears with DH as I didn't want to cause a ruction within their family dynamics, but being female myself felt I was ending up doing a lot more of the work than I should do, because I didn't want SIL to have to do it all. To be fair to DH he picked up his share and I think chivied along my adult nephews a bit.

In my own case DH is lovely and kind and nice and certainly talks a good game about equality. He also works longer hours than me so it's natural that I should have a greater share of the housework and child rearing - he does more of the paperwork. However it is me who is always the one asking about homework, making sure it happens, making sure the gerbils don't die of starvation and making family plans.

DH and I were totally equal when we met, at that time we both earned good salaries and had a cleaner in twice a week so there was very little to do so it was totally equal. A combination of our family earnings going down due to working p/t ( through personal choice as I like to spend time with DS before we go down that particular thorny road), much more needing done as bigger house, DS at school and doing activities and finally a precedent being set when I was off on maternity leave, means that I now do the lions share of it and probably a little bit more than is fair, even when the part time aspect of my job is taken into account.

I don't believe it's because I'm stupid or I married the wrong man. I believe it's down to the above set of circumstances and also a bit of unconscious ingrained thinking that deep down, this is the way things are.

Threads like this are helpful as they force you to challenge your own assumptions - I got DH to make dinner a couple of times last week as a result and made sure I was out doing the car MOT on Sunday so he got DS ready for rugby and made him his lunch as a result. Managing to keep any gains are relentless as the default position is now so ingrained, but worth it in the long term for our marital happiness.

I suspect that in the instance I quoted he may have sn in some form.

sam we tried taking turns, he still forgets. And it is genuine forget too, he doesn't do it on purpose and I flat out refuse to pay delievery. should be in with cost of food, imo.

*rookie, see dh will be the first to start cooking, tidying the house, he will (and has and will again next month) use/d his holiday leave to have time while I am on a course. I wouldn't expect any different in that respect.

laura who mentioned money??

You see, I am a bit sceptical about this 'always' forgets. If this is something you do regularly it is odd to say the least that he 'always' forgets.

My guess is he doesn't forget. But as there are no sanctions for his behaviour - you always get the take away - there is no incentive to change. This may be a passive aggressive way of expressing his displeasure at 'rules' he considers too pernickety - if you can afford takeaways you can afford a charge for them to be delivered. And isn't that the whole point? Convenience and lack of bother etc.

If it bugs you then I think you either refuse to go when it's his turn or he pays the delivery charge.

But don't analyse it in terms of he genuinely 'forgets' because, absent neurological damage I am afraid that is nonsense.

If he has the text reminders or note reminders, does he always forget then too?

Rather, ask yourself, does he 'forget' regular commitments at work or with his friends? If he doesn't then he clearly has a working brain - he just chooses not to use it on occasion.

Only you can know if it's worthwhile having to set up a text message alert system in order to 'remind' him.

Frankly that would exasperate me beyond endurance.

Anchories, you took me to task for 'projection' in not wanting people to go down the same path as me, you said every relationship is different.

That is true BUT in my lengthy experience as a family lawyer I think it is worth pointing out that the way relationships disintegrate are remarkably similar - basically, lack of communication, simmering resentments never tackled, contempt and stonewalling.

So what might be 'trivial' behaviour in context of a few incidents, takes on a very different aspect after many years.

I suspect that you are right as regards some relationships following the same patterns.

I think I would like to see you use the word "some" more often than you do

I am afraid I have never experienced a relationship breakdown - and I have detailed knowledge of 100s - that didn't display at least one of the factors I outline. So 'some' is not my experience here.

I havent got time right now, but I will explain better later what I meant by "some".

I quote some of your words, and write why you need to qualify some of your words a bit more.
There are exceptions to most things you know!

"You don't have to. I don't any more. No one has to".
Um. Unfortuneately, I have read very sad posts on mumsnet, where for various reasons, mainly because a very disabled person has literally no one else to rely on, they do feel utterly stuck, And probably are.
Again, an exception. But there are quite a few exceptional people on mumsnet.

From my experience both personal and professional I would say 0.01%

Admittedly, you did post this.
I would definitely say it is more than this, speaking both from real life and posts occasionally on the relationships board.

If abled bodied neuro typical adults cannot be relied upon to fulfil simple tasks like renew their car insurance or remember their mother's birthday then something is very, very wrong with both people in that partnership - both with the lazy cockwomble and his enabler.

You need the word "probably" in that one. "Then something is probably wrong". There can be other reasons such as memory problems, upcoming as yet undetected health problems, even depression.

If you used the words "most" and "some" more often, I dont think that many people would disagree with you!

I just took those examples from 3 of your posts.

There can be other reasons such as memory problems, upcoming as yet undetected health problems, even depression.

these memory problems affecting household tasks (1) don't effect women and (2) don't appear to effect the same men outside of the house.

anchories - you appear to be searching very hard for a non sexist explanation for wifework.

why?

They may affect women, I didnt say that they didnt did I.

And as regards point 2. It may affect them outside the house too. It certainly would do in the examples I posted.

I have noticed on mumsnet, that a very few posters, [and I include YouAre and sometimes Spero in that], have been making virtually total sweeping generalisations as to why men dont share chores adequately.
That is the bit in essence that I am objecting to.

YouAre. Not everything comes down to the sexes.

Not everything comes down to the sexes.

correct but I don't know what planet you are on to think that the unequal division of work within the house does not relate to the sexes.

sam we tried taking turns, he still forgets. And it is genuine forget too, he doesn't do it on purpose and I flat out refuse to pay delievery. should be in with cost of food, imo

Oh well, not much you can do about it then. I don't mind paying a couple of quid for delivery myself. But does he have learning problems? - it's pretty easy to think "I'm driving, don't drink". And are you both at home when he cracks the booze open?

*You see, I am a bit sceptical about this 'always' forgets. If this is something you do regularly it is odd to say the least that he 'always' forgets ...

But don't analyse it in terms of he genuinely 'forgets' because, absent neurological damage I am afraid that is nonsense.*

In the absence of actual mental impairment ... I agree. It's utterly bizarre.

*There can be other reasons such as memory problems, upcoming as yet undetected health problems, even depression.

these memory problems affecting household tasks (1) don't effect women and (2) don't appear to effect the same men outside of the house.*

Depression can certainly cause memory problems, both in men and women.

Anchories - I accept I should avoid hyperbole if I don't want to alienate people from my otherwise sensible arguments.

But I think you are being unfair on this thread.

You say some of us make sweeping generalisations about 'men'. That isn't true. We make criticisms of a particular subset of men. Of course not all men are like that or the human race would have died out long ago.

I don't accept your insistence on 'probably' as a qualifier for a relationship that is 'wrong' when one partner will not carry any weight in the relationship at home. In the (unlikely) event this inability relates to some physical or mental illness, it still requires addressing. A partnership can only struggle on for so long on such unequal footing before something breaks. If a man can't wipe up liquid from a floor because he is so depressed he can't remember how, this puts his children at risk so his partner absolutely must do what she can to see he gets the help he needs.

But I have in my lifetime seen very, very few examples of men who behaved in this way due to physical or mental impairment and I do agree it is odd that you seem so keen to promote this as a reason.

I agree with you that sometimes 'choices' can be very limited and very unpleasant if one also has to cope with poverty or disability - but nevertheless they remain choices.

I am VERY uneasy with what appears to be the message that women should just put up and shut up, even when their choices are limited. I think we should be encouraging women to recognise their own power to make choices, not simply put up with some awful, lazy, controlling man because of the slim change he might be 'depressed'.

Update from me:

I've stopped enabling DP so much. I'm making a conscious effort to not answer the same questions over and over again...sometimes I pretend I haven't heard, sometimes I'll say "Think for yourself."

He's aware I'm doing this, so we'll see what the results are.

Blimey...Milk-on-TilesGate has really stuck in everyone's mind....just seen Spero's post up there.

DP's mum taught him bog all. He doesn't even realise that he needs to put the right clothes in the right drawers! Last week he was getting the kids dressed and couldn't find a particular top for DD. He'd put it in DS' drawer and it took him a few mins to search through several drawers until he found it.
I said: "Just think of those minutes you wasted...minutes when you could have been doing something important and appreciated instead."

It stuck in my mind because it was such a perfect example of what we are talking about and there is no way any one can make a credible argument that 'o he just forgot how to wipe it up!' or 'you should have taught him how to wipe it up on your exciting journey as husband and wife together!'

Good for you for making some changes, I hope they have a good result!

I'm really interested to see how you get on, I hope it is a positive result for both of you!

Minou I am very interested to hear how things go with your new approach.

I often sense a simmering resentment that's behind my DP's lack of domestic capabilities. I feel as though his mother's sitting in the corner of the room with her arms folded saying 'Are you going to let her get away with that?'.

I ignore that as well. Often I say, do you want me to do that then? I can do it if you really want me to, - then he usually grumbles and just gets on with it. When he has to actually ask me, to verbalise it, he can't - deep down he knows it's futile and petty.

It's like a cat and mouse game sometimes.