To want a wife?

[MyOtherUsernameisaPun]

I love my DH. I really do. But just now and then I wish I was married to someone who did for me half of the emotional labour I do for him. All the work that's just seen as woman's work, so that men don't feel they have to reciprocate?

Some emotional Labour I wish my spouse would do:

Replying to texts on HIS family whatsapp so that my MIL and FIL dont start texting me separately asking for responses to things they've asked him

Meal planning so that it's not always me having to come up with ideas and so that he can't then wriggle out of cooking because he 'doesn't know' how to cook what I planned

Thinking about what clothes we are both going to need for specific events in the immediate future that he knows about and washing those clothes instead of random clothes

Realising what housework needs done without having to be told every time

Filling the car with petrol before bringing it home instead of steering into the drive on fumes and leaving it to me to panic about not having enough to get to the station the next morning when I'm usually in a rush

I feel like a massive nag so I'm writing here instead of having a go at him! Please make me feel better by sharing with me the things you wish your partner would do for you without needing specific instructions

Reply “i don’t know let me check with DP” then put a message on the group what’s app “hi DP, can you please answer MIL? She needs to make plans”

Er no! She replies “no idea, you’d need to check with DH” end of her involvement!

Read the book how not to hate your husband after having kids. It's spot on

My DS has a female DP who is just like this but somehow manages to cope for weeks at a time when away for work.

Tell his DPs you don't know and to text him again with their question. Repeat as necessary.

Tell him you haven't time to sort out clothes for him as well as yourself, so he'll have to do his own from now on. Then leave him to it.

Negotiate with him which household tasks will be his responsibility so then you don't need to think about those.

WTA? Do you think wives are supposed to be housemaids?

Stop enabling him. I used to be like you thinking I was being a "good" wife for helping and organising and basically mothering my stbexh. Every time I read a post like this I cringe with embarrassment for my pathetic younger self and am glad I'm single. Never again will I enable a grown man to be a spoilt manchild.

LannieDuck
I see. Put that way, it really shows up how much those (mostly) men aren't trying at all.

Ps. My DS is SAHD and his DP has a very stressful career but I still think she takes the piss a bit.

Why do you put up with this though?I think my DH was pretty rubbish when we first got together, (he was brought up by his grandparents who did absolutely everything for him) but I wasn’t about to take over jobs that he should/could be doing. I agree that you are being a martyr. If it doesn’t work for you why do it? He does sound like a shit husband tbh. (Cue the OP telling everyone just how amazing he really is...)

I’d like a wife too, OP. I love my DH, but he’s not a good partner in domestic matters.

He thinks he’s trying - but he’s too used to being enabled, so that small amounts of effort feel like big deals.

On the other hand, positive praise in the manner of dog training is way more effective than me ignoring his efforts so even if it infuriates me sometimes I have to make an effort to remember to praise the little stuff. Urgh.

His mother is Queen Enabler and so he’d been thoroughly undertrained in many tasks and I inadvertently enabled him when it didn’t matter pre-parenthood (& I didn’t even notice I was doing it). Double urgh.

I must have a wife then. I mean she's built like a brick shithouse and has a penis but knows how to do all of that and more.

It's a thoughtless dickhead problem, not a man problem.

YANBU OP. I am in the same boat as you. Other posters claiming your are a ‘martyr’ or ‘enabling’ are perhaps a younger generation or grew up in far more enlightened households than I did!

In response to your question. I sometimes feel I would gladly trade in my DH for a ‘wife’. who would:
Cook a meal more frequently than once a quarter;
Offer to make me a cup of tea,
Ask ‘What can I do to help you, do we can enjoy the rest of the weekend together?’ Say ‘yes, I made the kids finish their homework’.
Iron, anything, ever.
Buy birthday cards and party presents.

the list goes on....

I never understand these threads.

You don’t need a wife. You need an equal partner, a husband who makes your life easier not harder.

By making a little joke of it you’re not doing yourself any favours.

Like mrsterry I have a tall beardy man next to me who is more than capable of looking after himself, the household, the DC and me every now and then... I couldn’t respect him if he was a useless, lazy wanker who couldn’t decide what to wear, fill up the car or manage his own relationships and if I couldn’t respect him I couldn’t find him attractive or love him.

I despair.

I thought this was 2018 and that we'd come further than this. Even my dad, who's in his late 80s, does all those things and always has done.
Dh, mid-50s, does 50% of household stuff including 95% of food shopping and meal prep, and took pretty much half of childcare responsibilities back in the day. He's probably been guilty of the petrol thing once or twice, but not just because he's a bloke, but more that he wasn't thinking straight at the time.

Why do (so many) women put up with this shit?

Why do (so many) women put up with this shit?

I wish I knew. It’s so depressing isn’t it?

I must have a wife then! And why THE FUCK are you picking his clothes for specific events? Good grief.

How could anyone be attracted to an adult that can’t dress themselves. Bleugh!!

On the clothes thing, I do know someone who insisted her now XH wore something that coordinated with her outfit. If he was up and dressed first she’d send him back to change so they looked “right” together. Don’t see them much anymore but I wouldn’t have been surprised if eventually he stopped bothering to have an opinion on his own clothes.

I genuinely despair
Honestly, I do think some women just like having another child to mother. How you fuck then god only knows.
“Here sweety, I got your outfit for tomorrow’s big day ready”

I take it that he managed to do all this stuff before he met you, so why not let him get on with it?

You've made me realise with your post OP why I didn't respect my manchild of a husband. They moan at you if you haven't washed their work uniform/can't find their keys/can't find any clean socks/have lost a shoe/forgot their mums birthday/can't remember what shift they are working next and expect you to know etc etc and then they want you to give them sex whenever they want it. No thanks.

You're enabling him - stop it.

'Trying' FFS!

I can’t understand why so many capable intelligent women put up with frankly inadequate men. “He tries” If my DH tried and was still unable to reply to a WhatsApp message or sort out his clothes, I’d be seriously concerned.

Why do (so many) women put up with this shit?

Go on, use your imagination.

Because leaving is complex and you will be significantly more financially penalised than he will be and your children's financial well-being and lives will be disrupted and you'll spend much less time with your own children, so you make do for their sake.

Because doing it yourself is easier than dealing with the moaning and accusations of nagging when you point out that the house doesn't dust itself/you always clean while you cook while he leaves every pan in the house on the side/that putting dirty laundry in the machine and turning it on is not 'doing half the job' of laundry. There are only so many times you can hear "Well I'm doing my best and I'm sorry if that's not good enough for you" before you give up and do it yourself.

Because if you entrust him to do things, your kids are going to get a shitty last-minute card and badly-organised party/the plumber will never get called and the toilet will continue to have a running drip that he doesn't care about because he doesn't notice, and you don't wish to penalise others or create long-term problems to make a point.

Because leaving a "good man" because of 1000 small frustrating things instead of one big indiscretion still makes you the unreasonable one.

And yet, many survive having left such a “man” (using the word loosely)

Amen Shamelessly
There are only so many times you can hear "Well I'm doing my best and I'm sorry if that's not good enough for you" before you give up and do it yourself.

I fully endorse that all people should be responsible partners. Having a male partner who does everything 50-50 to the best of his ability is awesome, I expect, and of course in no way makes that bloke "A Wife". Clearly that's not the OP's point!

Idk - on MN there are bloody LOADS of people with perfect 50-50 relationships. In real life, I know way more people with the split I live with - more of the mental load on the female partner, with less praise for effort, frankly. It's a pretty commonly recognised phenomenon. Yet if you post on MN to say your life partner is less than ideal in a domestic scenario you can get castigated for "putting up with it". Another stick to be beaten with!

I think the clothes point the OP was making was not choosing her DH's outfit for him, but if e.g. a specific shirt/thermal vest/dry-clean only trousers were required, "wife" might consider it 3 days before the event, and "husband" might be frantically washing and drying a single item the night before... not that this has ever happened in our house.

OP - as I explained to my delightful DC at length this weekend, "nagging" is actually "reminding someone for the Xth time that if they do not do X, Y will occur". And that I am happy for Y to occur, if they no longer wish to be reminded about X. Furthermore that there is no opportunity for "nagging" to occur if the first suggestion is put into action. So up to them, basically.

Op, your dh description is very much like mine. In fact I've taken offence on your behalf for the posts suggesting you enable him! That's not fair is it? It's not that simple really. I have a slightly different situation but same results...my dh has adult adhd. It's not a rare disorder, but hugely undiagnosed. I call it arsehole disorder. It affects his working memory and thus organisational skills and almost every other useful skill an adult should have. The result is a total arsehole. He is almost functionally useless in the minutiae of life. I've seen his life without any input and it is disastrous. It makes him difficult to live with but obviously he is more than those things. We have been together almost 20 years.
I am not saying your dh has the same thing, but there's got to be something going on. Any average adult can do things like pick clothes in advance of needing them. Unless there's something going on somewhere! Me and my dh slowly worked out his problem and he was referred and diagnosed. Your dh and you need to try and work out what is going on in your set up.