Petty ironing issue with DH...

[Jng1]

We have a cleaner who comes for 4 hours on a Monday. She spends the last hour ironing.
She wasn't here last week (Bank Holiday) so although I have done some ironing of essentials there is still a larger than usual pile.

I went to add some things to the basket this morning and found that DH has been through it and put all his clothes at the top, so that all his stuff will get ironed first, and if she runs out of time, it will be mine and the DCs stuff which isn't ironed (and presumably I will have to do later).
It's not even like it's just his work shirts - it's also scraggy T shirts and pyjama bottoms (which I wouldn't normally iron anyway!).

I am just so with him - seems so selfish!

My husband iron's his own shirts, but he does look sexy in a shirt and I love unbuttoning them...

irons!

Yes - he has moments of being a selfish prick and it's beginning to worry me more these days that he also doesn't seem to understand the issue when I point out that his behaviour is unacceptable.

Can't you ask her to iron at the beginning of her shift until it's done, then use the rest of the time to clean? Just this once. That way, the ironing will be caught up with and she can spend longer cleaning next week.

Imo this thread is not about ironing and all the people suggesting solutions for the ironing have missed the point. It is about the fact that the husband thinks his stuff is more important than the rest of the family and is sneaking around to ensure his things are done first. It reveals the sort of person he is. "I'm alright jack" was the expression my dm used to use.

There are many solutions but the fact that the husband chose to have all his things ironed first definitely shows him up as selfish OP. Your other posts don't make him sound any better either.

Anyway I'm glad you turned things around and I will be interested to see how it all turns out.

MoonGeek - thank you - yes, I think you're right, that is precisely what this is about.
When you've lived with someone for a long time sometimes you become blind to elements of their behaviour. It's only after sometimes reading other threads on MN that I realise that DH is being a selfish idiot, or I am being a mug or something.

Am just wondering how I raise it with him later without appearing overly aggressive and ending in an argument!

Well the pyjama bottoms and crappy t-shorts scream, 'my wants are more important than other people's needs', don't they?

Sorry, but that's bullshit of the highest order. Since when was buying a service an issue? Your argument could apply to all manner of things:

• hairdressing
• dressmaking/tailoring
• nails & beauty services
• personal stylist

Nothing wrong with having a pride in your appearance, and indeed many jobs do require a degree of smartness. If someone wants to hang out in creased clothes then that's their choice, but it's not mine.

***

Nope. I can't do my own hair or tailor a suit, so I'm quite happy to pay others to do it and, crucially, to pay them well for this service. Expecting someone else to do things you can do perfectly easily yourself, or to pay them next to nothing for doing it, defines entitlement. Judging those who can't afford to have others do the ironing for them, or whose ironing isn't up to scratch, is snobbishness.

'Nothing wrong with having pride in your appearance', is fine but ironing isn't the sine qua non of good appearance and, as lots of people have said above, you don't need to iron to avoid creased clothes.
What's more, if I'm paying for a service I don't care how 'smart' the service provider looks. Many jobs that oblige you to look 'smart' don't actually require a smart appearance for them to be done well - it's just branding, put in place to make something of poor value look appealing. There's a reason why estate agents, flight attendants and politicians look the way they do, you know?

I'm a commercial photographer, I spend my life shooting flawlessly skinned teenagers (dressed to look in their 30's), caked in makeup and false nails, styled to within an inch of their lives. (Don't even mention Photoshop). Anyone who thinks they require these services on a regular basis to look good is a mug. Real beauty and smartness shine from within and no amount of ironing can give it to you.

Whoa.. SnotGobbler99 (nice name, btw, ) when did this thread become about judging people who can't afford to pay someone to iron their clothes?
Expecting someone else to do things you can do perfectly easily yourself, or to pay them next to nothing for doing it, defines entitlement.
I agree people should be paid a working wage, but er... the rest of this doesn't make sense...
I can perfectly easily cook a meal, so am I entitled if I go out for an occasional meal in a restaurant?
I CAN mow the lawn, so am I entitled if I'd prefer to pay a local man do it? ( he enjoys gardening and has made his hobby his job after taking early retirement)

FWIW I think appearance still matters a lot in many industries and particularly client-facing office environments. A reasonably smart appearance is still associated in many people's minds with personal organisation and a degree of professionalism. If someone can't get their shit together enough to look half decent in the morning then it makes you wonder what their attitude to their work will be like. (And yes, I know there are jobs where people can just turn up in T shirt /jeans and being scruffy is considered a virtue, but those aren't the ones I'm talking about...)

I would be so pissed off if my dh did this.

I would sit him down and explain how I felt when he did this. (My DH used to not bother sorting out my clothes when taking things out of the tumble dryer but I would sort and fold his and put them away. I made the point that I felt that he treated me as a flatmate and felt he didn't respect my things when he dumped them in a pile on the bed. He is much better now).

If he keeps doing it, I would reiterate how you feel about it.

It's rude and selfish.

I used to feel uncomfortable with the idea of employing a cleaner or someone to iron etc. Until DH made the very valid point that this type of work is mostly done by people who either haven't got qualifications for whatever reason, or need flexibility round children, need a bit of extra income over another job etc (am generalising, usual caveats of doesn't apply to all etc). Plenty of us are cash rich, time poor and prefer to spend our time with our families, not mopping and dusting. If I can afford to use some of my income to allow someone else to earn their own income, how exactly is the entitled? Surely it is just part of the economy. I am not forcing someone into doing my ironing.
Maybe it depends where you live, but round here cleaners are like gold dust and get paid well over minimum wage.

"Someone might see him"

Are you married to a 14 year old?

Oh, I wouldn't care if it ended up in an argument-because it would be his selfish behaviour in the first place that led to the argument-not you calling him out on it!

TBH something like this wouldn't bother me but I don't iron so it's a moot point anyway. The closest anything I own gets to being ironed is a quick once over with a set of hair straighteners if they're particularly crumpled!

I can see your DH's logic of wanting to make sure his work stuff is being prioritised - just like I always prioritise washing my work and DDs school stuff over our other clothes - but putting all his stuff on top just for the sake of it is unreasonable.

But rather than having it being a big row about his selfishness, why not make it about making it easier for your cleaner? From the way you describe it your cleaner just works through the pile and irons whatever is there, in the order it is piled up in. Perhaps you could give her a bit of autonomy to prioritise/group things? So if she sees five shirts spread through the pile she can pull them all out and iron them all in one go. Or, tell her to feel free to leave anything like "scraggy t-shirts and pyjama bottoms" to one side and only do them if she has time? Or, before she comes, go through the pile and weed out anything that definitely doesn't need ironing and sort what's left into priority status - so DH's work things, your work things, DCs school stuff, the outfit you want to wear to that party on Wednesday, DCs school play costume then general tshirts/jeans etc at the bottom?

For example, when my mum irons, she sorts the washing as she gets it out of the dryer/off the line so that all the "like" items are together, so that when she irons she can whizz through all the shirts in one go, then trousers then t-shirts etc. My mum also loves to iron but even she has stuff she doesn't iron - PJs, underwear, bedding, tea towels etc - so if she finds some in the pile it just gets folded up and put to one side, but your cleaner might not feel like she can pick and choose what to iron and just works through it.

Tell him, without being angry, that you need to talk about respect for each other. Then start with this issue.