To be curious about roles in your house...

[KM99]

After another post today re: men being involved in buying clothes for their DCs, I wondered how the typical child raising and house chores are managed in your house?

We are pretty evenly split. DH does take turns with laundry, tidying, house work type things and I often look after the car,do the garden etc. It's really important to us DS doesn't see certain "jobs" being assigned to gender.

To be fair I can have higher standards than DH with cleanliness, but he is a big tidying up person.

We've always been 50/50 on all childxare except when I was BF.

I honestly get abit annoyed at my friends who complain their DH's do nothing but then keep enabling them. I also found some of the comments on here about certain things not being "men's jobs" quite frustrating. How do we expect our kids to treat each other equally if we don't demonstrate it?

Forgot to add - DH tends to do all the "big" jobs eg drilling, wallpaper stripping, painting, garden related stuff. I am rubbish and have no interest. I do more of the planning/organising, I buy all of DS' clothes (I enjoy this immensely whereas DH isn't that interested and likes what I choose anyway), sort applications for nursery etc, the majority of doctor/dentist appointments.

Both work long hours. Dc aren’t his but he childcare is probably split 60/40 (him doing more). Housework the same but me doing more. He does the cars and majority of diy. Not ‘because he’s a man’ but because he enjoys it. He does most of the cooking because I can’t cook and again he enjoys it (I do it because I have to).
Bugger, I’ve just realised that I don’t actually do that much

Two women here too, I work full time dp works part time so she does the after school care, cooking (because she’s an amazing cook) and general housework. I do the bills, diy, sort out events and presents for birthdays and Christmas etc, i help out with housework when I’m around. It works out well for us.

I work f/t from home and the bloke looks after the kids. He does all the child care during the week, all the cooking and all the cleaning. I do the washing.

At 4pm on Friday I take over and cook fri/sat/sun for all of us. I usually clean up too but he will do bath time. We divide the child care evenly.

We’ve never really talked about it or agreed anything but it works well for us. Of course I still do bits and pieces during the week (hair/homework/bedtime/maybe a walk when I get time/dishwasher) but it’s all very much when I choose to. There’s no expectation And default is he does it

That’s bollocks actually. We’ve talked about it in detail and agreed it from the start! At least in relation to the week days. We jus never agreed weekends. That’s come naturally

With DH working away all week, the lion's share of the housework falls to me. That said, DS (aged 12) has been doing his own laundry since he was 8, and is tasked with various chores if he wants to earn extra pocket money, things like emptying the compost, taking the bins out, emptying the ash bucket, etc.

At weekends, there is more of an even split. DH feels like I end up with the short end of the stick a lot of the time, and I'm disabled so it hasore of a potential impact, so he is actually pretty good at picking up some tasks when he's home and allowing me a break. It helps that we use an app to set family tasks where we all earn points: I get points for what I do in the same way as DS earns points for more pocket money, but this also means there is a master list of what is likely to need doing any given day/week.

DH does his own laundry when he's home, and picks up some of the things I'm physically unable to do, so in some ways I end up more responsible for planning and he ends up with the execution so the things that need to happen can, depending on how unwell I am. And while I probably shoulder more of the mental load, 20 years together have taught me that we each have our strengths and that there are simply some things I do naturally that are simply not on his radar, despite his parents actually modeling a fairly even split over the years. I have an elephantine memory and ASD, and this is just what works for us. I certainly don't feel that there is anything uneven, beyond that which is obvious thanks to him working away. He'd pick up the slack if the situation was reversed.

We both work full time with 2 Dc’s. One has additional needs so we tend to do bedtimes together. We do tend to have specific “jobs”. I do the laundry (he folds it all wrong 😂). He puts the bins out & walks the dog. We switch out for pretty much everything else & both cook, clean, tidy, look after the dc’s. I tend to buy more clothes for them because I enjoy it. He will pick up buying any sports gear they need. If one of us is poorly the other will pick up the slack. I think we’re pretty balanced overall

We keep it 'equal' by having proper meetings, every couple of weeks about how house management and childcare is going. It's a kind of 'how are we both doing?' in terms of work/relaxation/stress and then planning stuff that needs to be done. He works full time. Me part time, (a recent thing) but I'm also studying.

It might seem a bit unromantic, but it really works. I think it helps if you've both got a genuine commitment to making sure you're both doing your fair share.

The big issue for us, was not that my DP was trying to get out of housework, but that I've been a parent longer than him and had more practice and tended to pick up more of the 'invisible' work - appointments, general ongoing tidying, etc than him. It's pretty much evenly balanced now :-)

I do the day to day cleaning and tidying up, DP does a deep clean at the weekends and changes rooms around when needed.
I paint most rooms, DP paints the bigger more important ones because I'm terribly messy at it.
DP used to do most of the school runs when the boys were at school but I do them now with DD as his work hours have changed.
I buy all the clothes for everyone in the house as I enjoy it and DP hates it. Plus it takes him forever to find things whereas I know exactly where each person gets their clothes mainly from.
I do the food shop, DP does the day to day shop for milk, fresh food.
I order the takeaway, he collects it, I put it on plates, he cleans up after.
We take turns putting DD to bed/bathing her.
He does most of the washing, I do most of the cooking.
He does the bins, mops the floors, power hoses the outside of the house, I do the bathroom and toilet.
He deals with vomit when the kids are sick, I deal with the other end.

So pretty much give and take. We just muck in and do what needs done and will do things for the other person if we know they hate doing it (I hate clearing out the boys bedroom, DP hates putting clothes away so we do what the other hates) but where the kids are concerned we just do what needs done or split them between us if we are both home.

I work from home part time (more a hobby as income not needed) and DH works full time in demanding role, he can work up to 60hrs per week.

I do all the school runs, church meetings and things. I do all their homework/ school letters/school costumes for things / non uniform etc.

I cook 90% of the time and he washes up.

DH does any DIY round the house.

I do all the laundry and most of the housework. He hoovers. I deal with all finances and weekly shopping. I also do all the present shopping and cards for peoples birthdays. I love organisation and spending money so this works well!

We split doing the gardening. when we can be arsed with it

DH deals with all car things like insurances / cleaning etc

I arrange all childrens out of school clubs and sort uniforms etc and it mostly falls to DH to take them if hes around (80% of the time) as he likes spending time with them and watching them do things.

I do all household pet things like taking the dog to the vets and arranging everyones (his included) eye tests, drs, dentists etc.

We get household stuff done between us. DH does bed sheets and towels on his day off as he works 1 day less than Me.
Cooking and cleaning is fairly equal although he has more enthusiasm than I do!

I tend to deal with school based admin, clothes, activities, play dates, Xmas presents . He tends to deal with house admin, bills, car service. It all seems to work out and no one has expressed any resentment!

We were very traditional and I would do housework and dp would take the bins out or diy.
Then my sister died ( over 20 years ago)
And her husband was saying, he hadn't cooked or didn't even know what size feet the children had ect.
From that day on we both did everything equally.
Even now 25 years later, first in cooks and the other loads dishwasher ect

Thanks to everyone for sharing. It's really interesting to hear all the different set ups. We don't always get the balance right, but we muddle along. I work long hours but am based mainly at home so on the odd quiet week I might do more. OH has a less stressful job so does more school pick ups, bath time and he can spend his lunch doing house admin online.

I’m on maternity leave with 8 month old baby, partner works. He does the vast majority of the cooking, keeps the kitchen clean, cleans the bathroom and takes the bins out. I do rest of the cleaning/tidying, washing, food shopping (mostly online), manage the finances, life admin and baby-related stuff like buying clothes. When he’s home we share the childcare 50/50, obviously I do it all during the day when he’s not here!
I feel like we have a good balance and play to our strengths- he’s a great cook and enjoys it whereas I like budgets and lists and organising.

I work 22 hours and DH works about 45 hours.

I do all the shopping, meal planning, cooking evening meals, most cleaning, buying clothes for the kids, all finances, life admin (appointments, nursery arrangements etc) and all pick ups and drop offs but that's because of the hours we work - he leaves the house before 7am whereas I'm technically office hours but usually finish mid afternoon.

DH does the bins, feeds the cats and gives them their various medications , makes packed lunches for both of us, does all the garden stuff, sorts my car (oil, tyre pressure etc not because I can't but I just don't remember), cleans up the kitchen each evening and empties the dishwasher in the evening.

We share laundry and getting the DCs to bed and bathed and at the weekends he usually does their breakfast and often their lunch. Usually every Saturday and Sunday he takes the DCs downstairs and leaves me to have some time to myself for a couple of hours. I sometimes feel bad for this but he also has a secondary job/hobby that takes a couple of evenings so I figure we're fairly even.

So I guess pretty gendered in some respects but it works for me, I don't want to do the bins or cut the grass etc, and I'm not going to if I don't have to just to make a point . I think I have it pretty good though I find the life admin side a bit wearing sometimes. Not sure I could give up control of it though.

I can’t be bothered to ‘calculate’ who does what but in general terms my DH probably does a lot more, he certainly works much longer hours than I do and has always done a lot more with our DS in terms of out of school activities. He does all the gardening, maintenance, organising DIY, most of the finance stuff. I do shop & cook, do most of the laundry & ironing but I have loads more ‘free time’ than my DH does. But he seems happy enough & genuinely loves spending time with DS.

I really don’t understand why so many women put up with useless DHs, and even go on to have than one child with them when they know they are so unhelpful around the home .

I'm on maternity leave at the moment so a bit different but normally I work PT and DH works FT and we work it like this:

I do the washing and sorting of clothes (DH does the ironing though as I bloody hate it), shopping, meal planning, schools runs when I'm off work, cleaning bathroom, hoovering and general tidying, cleaning out the fish tank,

DH does gardening (well, mows the lawn, neither of us are green fingered), washing up/dishwasher and cleaning the kitchen, bins and recycling, ironing. He did feed and clean the rabbit before she died last month

We share responsibility for childcare and cooking.

We both do equal (or thereabouts) washing (I spin it & he puts it to dry) and childcare and everything that goes with that (he drops them off, I pick them up and we both do things like bedtime, meal prep, looking after them etc). When they were babies he did his share of nightfeeding and nappy changes etc because the dc were formula fed.
He does quite a lot of the cooking because I hate it though I can't always get out of it. Whoever cooks, the other washes up.
I seem to do most of the hoovering, tidying and emptying of bins though.

I do all of the school pick ups and drops offs, and 99% of the ferrying dc to their activities (dh works a lot more hours than me). He does 99% of the cooking because he enjoys it and I don't! Everything else is done by whoever is free to do it when it needs doing. I do more mom-fri and we do an equal amount at weekends.

We both work 4 days a week (DH 28 hours, me 38 hours). DH does nursery drop off and pick up. We take turns each at bathing and putting DS to bed, while the other washes the dishes, walks dog, does washing, preps lunch for the next day. We both get everything needing done before sitting down (usually at 9pm). At the weekend we share out the cleaning etc. I do batch cooking at the weekend. DH preps dinner every evening while I play with DS. I do most admin, but DH will do other necessary tasks.

Before dp broke his leg, he did (I'm ashamed to admit) probably 90% of the household chores. I work is a more intense role and being home a lot more money and that is how I justified this.

When he was in hospital, the house went to shit, and he was only gone a week. I realised how much he does and made the desicion to change.

I currently do everything as he has a non weight bearing cast so physically can't do much. But when he is back on his feet, we will split more 50/50.

Except the cat litter, that is truly a man job (if that man decided to get the cats in the first place )

DH works 10 hours a day, never waking later than 5am. I'm currently on ML, before being on ML I only worked two days per week due to cc being so expensive, I do most of the cleaning, I do laundry, cook and clean (most days dh will help clean up after dinner) and then we both bath dc & when it's time we both put dc to bed together. I also do grocery shopping. This all works for us, dh doesn't expect anything and if I'm having an off day he is always so helpful.

Although I must admit, I do want DS Atleast to see more from dad doing chores as he gets older so he doesn't assume it's all a woman's job!!!

We're pretty even. DH does most of the hoovering and more of the laundry than me. I do the garden, though he'll help if I ask (which is fair - I was the one that wanted the garden). He does most of the cat related work like cleaning the litter trays and emptys the bins more than me, though I usually put the bins out on bin day. I do more cooking (I like eating more than he does!). Most of the admin falls to me, and I do the DIY, but he'll help if I tell him what to do.

YY people moaning about their husbands not helping but also enabling them annoys me too.

I know you can't always tell before you have DC/you don't think about it in quite the same way though. I think I'm lucky in some respects that I lived with a right arsehole the first time so after that I wasn't going to put up with someone who didn't pull their weight or expected me to fill some weird "woman" role. And already had DC before I even got together with DH let alone married him, so I knew what I was looking for.

Anyway

DH tends to clean the kitchen/do dishwasher every day. I do it occasionally when I remember/think about it.

I tend to do the clothes washing, all of it unless I'm ill/really behind, then DH might put a load or a few through. This comes from an ancient agreement when we didn't have a dishwasher and the washing machine was in the cellar. I swapped laundry for dishes, because I despise washing up.

He will run around and stick the robot hoover on. I rarely hoover, but I use the normal one when I do because I CBA to wait for the robot one to finish and go and put it back on charge (we have a cheap one which can only find the charging station from one room)

Sometimes I clean bathrooms during the week.

On Sundays we all clean the house together - DH tends to do living room/kitchen/hall, I do bathrooms/bedroom, DS1 does his room, might do a bit of living room/bathroom if he is doing extra for some reason.

When we do the weekly shop we take down rubbish bags. I write the shopping list/do the shop online for pick up, go into the shop and pay. DH drives (I can't), looks after DS2 in the car, packs it all into the car and puts it away when we get home.

Cooking is probably 50/50 now - it used to be skewed towards me but DH wanted to learn how to cook.

DH does the heavy lifting of reminding DS1 to do his jobs/homework/teeth etc, I get up with him in the morning and make his lunch for school and tend to have emotional chats etc with him.

I buy DC clothes because I like to. Though SIL often sends clothes parcels, and DH encourages this because it saves money.

I feed baby except for one bottle DH does. We do nappies about 50/50 as he's on paternity leave still. I do bedtimes, but if he won't sleep DH takes him. We give each other free rein on naps etc.

I do most paperwork because supposedly I'm better at German I still use google most of the time.

I seem to do all of the playdate/party/etc organising.

But I work PT and DH works FT.

We both work 4 days - toddler ds in nursery the other 3.

I am disabled, so do life admin, order food shopping online etc. I also do laundry and most stuff for ds
DH cooks from my meal plans and is in charge of the kitchen and the dogs (inc walking them, although when possible we will all go).
He does ds bathtime
He is also in charge of property maintenance, bins, the cars and the garden.

We have a cleaner.

Looking at that, I do quite well although DH is appreciative of the "mental load" I bear as he knows he doesn't really think about anything - I just make sure stuff gets sorted and he keeps on top of his jobs.

It has taken 12 years, a disability, and pnd to get to this point. But now, he gets it and is a great partner