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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To want a wife?

191 replies

MyOtherUsernameisaPun · 10/06/2018 21:56

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

OP posts:
ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 00:22

Well good for them, but I assume they left when they felt the penalties of "surviving" as a single were outweighed by the penalties of "putting up" as half of a couple.

Some people aren't there yet, but still feel frustrated and are looking for compassion / strategies. Is that all right, or do we have to thrust ourselves into financial strife and disruption for our children before we get any empathy?

ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 00:23

That was to @Zibbidoo

ZibbidooZibbidooZibbidoo · 11/06/2018 00:27

Some people aren't there yet, but still feel frustrated and are looking for compassion / strategies.

Which is what the “stop doing it” posts are. Strategies. It’s the obvious fucking solution. And doesn’t involve breaking up your family and leaving your children mother or fatherless for half the week. Seriously, it’s not difficult to tell your MIL to text her son and ignore any further attempts to make your repsonsible for his arrangements. It’s not difficult to let him sort his own clothes and deal with the consequences of forgetting to wash his jumper. Stop parenting grown ass men!!

coolwalking · 11/06/2018 00:35

I have a wife (I'm female) and we equally share the domestic chores. We have our preferences and strengths but it works and there is no nagging about mess or washing etc. Some men (not all) just can't see that they are meant to be equals and housework is no longer exclusively a womans job. But I agree with PP - you don't need a wife, just a husband that is a partner in all aspects of family life.

themightycrayon · 11/06/2018 00:40

My husband has been diagnosed with an attention deficit disorder too, but he's unloading the dishwasher and making dinner as I speak. He's recognized that it isn't an excuse, it's an obstacle to overcome and he's got to put the work in if he wants to be my partner. He's recognized that he often forgets things that are important to me, so he started a spreadsheet to help him remember.

Every marriage takes work, from both parties.

coolwalking · 11/06/2018 00:42

Sorry posted too soon - the petrol thing is just lazy and selfish. Please don't put up with this anymore. There is no reason why he has to behave like this. It can be stopped.

ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 00:42

No, it doesn't seem difficult, does it?

Do you suppose the OP just hasn't thought of this "fucking obvious" and brilliant solution? Or could there possibly be other factors involved?

foxpox · 11/06/2018 01:01

themightycrayon - do you have to remind him to use the spreadsheet? Or does tin genuinely work and he updates it, manages it and doesn't forget about it? Nothing like that ever sticks for us.
My dh is a man transformed on the medication he has but it's such a short acting transformation.
I am not suggesting it's an excuse but it's a reason. One o do struggle to understand at times. I wouldn't judge anyone for what they put up with or don't put up with. I might not fully understand and don't know how I would be in the same situation. Home life is far to complex and nuanced to be able to clearly explain and understand from one poster to another.

PyongyangKipperbang · 11/06/2018 01:04

I have just started a job that DH pushed me to take (I wanted it, but had a major confidence wobble and he talked me through it). I took it and then said "We need to talk through the practical suff, like when I am starting at 6pm and you are doing dinner and making the kids lunches".

Was quite entertaining to see the look of utter panic on his face when he realised that a higher family income meant him actually pulling his domestic weight. :o

ZibbidooZibbidooZibbidoo · 11/06/2018 01:05

Or could there possibly be other factors involved?

Well, it’s true, there are plenty that actually enjoy the the martyr role.

Candyflip · 11/06/2018 01:07

pyong that is not funny, that is terribly sad. Has he never done anything in the house? Why do you put up with that?

PyongyangKipperbang · 11/06/2018 01:13

Candy I didn put it very well. He does. Laundry, dishwasher, cleaning, school run. It's just that cooking is not his thing and I like the wind down of cooking (wtih an audio book playing) after a long day. While I am waiting for things to cook, I make the sandwiches for the next day. So for several years, making dinner or lunches have not been on his radar.

He will do it, he wont moan but seeing the sunrise of realisation on his face when he copped on was genuinely funny. Probably as funny as it was for him when I realised that his new job a couple of years ago, meant I had to do the school run....Wink

ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 01:23

Well, it’s true, there are plenty that actually enjoy the the martyr role.

Of course, when a man can't be bothered thinking far ahead enough to leave petrol for his wife the next day, or constantly foot-drags on housework because he "doesn't realise it needs doing" it's because she's a martyr. Hmm

PyongyangKipperbang · 11/06/2018 01:32

Re; Being a martyr

As a kid in the 70's it seemed to be a competition about which wife had the shittiest husband. Women with a full time job generally won, although my mother got bonus points for having to give up her FT job to go PT because my father gave so few shits about us kids when he was in charge that one of us got seriously injured.

In public there was eye rolling and "oh what can you do?!" but in private there was either blazing rows or lots of tears.

CristalTipps · 11/06/2018 01:37

These posts do my head in every time. Just stop mothering your husbands. I bet they manage to function like responsible adults in the workplace. They don't do it at home because they know they can get away with it.

Tell his family you no longer double up as his PA.

Buy him a 50p card WhyohWhy

Spend that extra time and energy on yourselves and on your dc's (but not on turning your ds's into the next generation that expect to be mothered throughout their entire lives.) FFS.

ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 01:50

These posts do my head in every time. Just stop mothering your husbands. I bet they manage to function like responsible adults in the workplace. They don't do it at home because they know they can get away with it.

Yes and the reason they get away with it is because they're not the one who suffers if they don't pull their weight. At work there's an immediate penalty... they lose their job. At home, they probably won't lose their wife because the wife probably has SO much more to lose from a divorce than an employer has to lose by sacking a lazy employee.

If the OP's husband doesn't pull his weight, and the OP "stops mothering him", she and the kids end up with unwashed clothes/living in a dirty house. Their children don't get birthday presents from their PIL because her OH couldn't be bothered engaging in the conversation (guessing it's something like this). OP is late for work because she has to stop unexpectedly to fill an empty car. OP and the kids end up with no dinner or her OH spends money they don't have on takeaways because he can't be bothered to cook.

It's death by a thousand paper cuts and the OP may well reach a point where she's able to a) give up hope that her partner will finally see the light or b) leave without a giant disruption to her children's well-being and financial distress, but in the meantime I imagine the solution she can handle is to do her best by them and suck it up in the hope that maybe her husband will see the light, while looking for just a little sympathy from others.

OP, I get it. I'm sorry so many others want to pile something else on you for you to feel frustrated and exhausted about.

FeckinCrunchiesInTheCar · 11/06/2018 02:46

No he's not lovely, OP.
If he was, he wouldn't be such a thoughtless git.

Stop doing his shit for him and leave him stew in his own mess.
He sounds like a complete twat.

Monty27 · 11/06/2018 03:10

When are you going to stop being subservient because you are a woman
Hmm

ShamelesslyPlacemarking · 11/06/2018 03:18

When are you going to stop being subservient because you are a woman

What part of the OP's post indicates she is subservient? Hmm

Rattyzilla · 11/06/2018 03:23

My husband and I split because of this and I got a wife Grin

Life is sooooooo much easier now!

penguingirl · 11/06/2018 03:24

Wow. My dp is pretty useless around the house, but a lot of the things that annoyed me are 'my issue' such as him not clearing up as he goes along when he cooks, not folding clothes how I like them done, not wiping down surfaces when he does the washing up. I'm very anal and he has low standards/doesn't have a logical brain. None of this makes either of us bad people. So we figured out how to compromise, he now pays a higher proportion of the bills and takes me for a posh meal on payday, I do most of the household stuff. It works really well for us. I've had chronic pain for the last few months and he has really stepped up, sure things haven't been done exactly as I would do them but they've been done, and I've still been getting taken out for some amazing dinners Grin

likelyLilac · 11/06/2018 03:33

I couldn't live in a situation like yours.
I had a calleague who when around women would suddenly become limp, as in he would just slouch down and moan and let people around him do things because he "didn't know how" or he "tried very hard". Funnily enough when he was single he didn't starve to death or walk around naked or always give rubbish gifts. Seems he could cook, clean clothes and buy presents and all the various other things that all his girl friends were told he was "just useless at".

likelyLilac · 11/06/2018 03:34

of course there are people who just genuinly cant do these things and maybe your husband is one of them op

FollowYourOwnNorthStar · 11/06/2018 03:40

The Australian journalist Annabelle Crane write a book on something similar. I’ve always thought the title was excellent:

Wife Drought: why women need wives and men need lives

FollowYourOwnNorthStar · 11/06/2018 03:41

**Annabelle Crabbe.

Sorry, autocorrect on phone