I've been a single mum for a few years, and got together with a new partner a year ago. He ended up moving in during lockdown - not very planned, but as a better alternative than not seeing each other.
My work got busier during lockdown but I had no childcare - and it's not going to get better for the next couple of weeks, until our new routine kicks off properly. My partner makes fantastic dinners and usually spends (by his estimate) about an hour in the kitchen each evening, tidying and cooking and washing up. He gets so dejected that the kitchen gets messy again each evening and the work needs to done over and over again. Obviously, this didn't happen in quite the same way when he lived alone and went to work and left an empty tidy house behind him!
I really do sympathise with him. I hate that houses get messy and housework is a never-ending hamster wheel.
But on days when I'm working through the day, taking breaks to meet my daughter's needs and then working right into the evening I just don't have the time to catch up on everything. I used to do housework in the evenings after my little girl was in bed, but now I usually spend that time with my partner which is obviously a good thing, I guess? And in any case, it would feel a bit odd working a 10-12 hour day then tidying the house...
I do housework sometimes - some days are 5 hours trying to get on top of the mess, other times it's the bare minimum because I'm snowed under with work. I also have a million other housework tasks beyond the kitchen that he doesn't seem to see and wouldn't consider helping with. Laundry, gardening, mowing the lawn, all the toys that my little mess monster strews everywhere, getting stains out of the wretched laundry which seems to take about an hour each time I do it... Shopping and putting it away... Tidying and decluttering a really overwhelming house (and when it's done my daughter can undo it in a couple of minutes the first time I turn my back, and there's no time to stop her because while she's busy emptying a box I can work...).
I think I'd need to work part-time to keep the house to the standard my partner expects. I'd like to work a bit part-time, but if he's living in the house I'd like it to be equal. I suspect that I need to tell him something like: 'When I'm not snowed under, I'll commit to doing more housework but you will need to do more too... And it might take longer than 1 hour each day for each of us if we want it tidy all the time... And on days when work is intense, it will take priority because it's an essential and the mess can wait.'
So, Mumsnetters, am I being unreasonable to expect him to put up with a messy house, when my life gets intensely busy? Or to share in the work it takes to keep it tidy?