AIBU to ask DH to cook/prepare a meal one day a week?

[BubblinTrouble]

I am currently on maternity leave and at the moment doing all of the cooking and cleaning whilst looking after DD. This is fine for now as I appreciate I am at home and when DD is napping I can get bits done. At the moment I will be prepping 2 different meals - DD and I will eat the same thing but DH will want something else. It’s frustrating and I won’t lie I feel resentful that he’ll swan in and have lunch prepped for him. Probably me being unreasonable - so let me know if I am on this one.

I’ve asked DH if he can take responsibility for one meal at the weekend. He says he won’t cook and doesn’t want to. I’ve said he can get a takeaway twice a month as we’re trying to be healthy and money wise. But he won’t do this either. His mum was a SAHM and his sister and SILs are too. I don’t know if this has impacted his outlook.

He’s pretty hands on with everything else… he cleans dishes, makes bottles, feeds the cats, loads washing from time to time, put clothes away. Most of the time I have to tell him to do some thing and he’ll do it. It’s just cooking he won’t do at all. AIBU to ask him to take over one lunch at the weekend?? It would be nice to have a meal prepped for me once that’s all.

@TempName01 we have 2 cooked meals a day at the moment - and DP has a cooked item with his breakfast so although it's not cooking 3 full meals a day it's a bit of a faff

I wouldn't live with another adult who wasn't at least able to get their own breakfast and lunch.
That is just ridiculous.
As I've said before, I am neither a keen nor confident cook (in terms of the 'main meal') but I realise we all have to eat, so just crack on with it all my life. If someone isn't prepared to even cook one meal each week (and take responsibility for, it isn't just the standing in the kitchen) then they are a poor choice of partner.

[quote girlmom21]@TempName01 we have 2 cooked meals a day at the moment - and DP has a cooked item with his breakfast so although it's not cooking 3 full meals a day it's a bit of a faff [/quote]
I think I’m picturing full meals when people are talking about cooking. Whereas I guess toast, porridge, egg butty, soup, omelette are all cooked . My DH would never expect me to make that stuff for him, it’s only if I’m actually cooking a meal such as lasagne, shepherds pie that I would be cooking ‘for him’. He WFH and I am SAHM.

I know - it absolutely adds up!! It’s like bloody Groundhog Day.

We usually do oven pizza with salads etc on a Friday (glamorous I know 😂) and wait to eat till after kids are in bed ad we usually all eat together. I definitely don’t think that is too much to ask. Surely your dh can bung a pizza in the oven at the very least!!!!

Is this serious?
He wants to eat - let him cook it, order it or go hungry. Sorted.

@ScaredOfDinosaurs

Easy solution, stop making separate meals for him. Honestly, that's not a good use of your time. Just say no!

M and S or Waitrose are his friends! Send him to get a few of their x for £y meals.

This is utterly ridiculous. What kind of grown man can't even feed himself? Did he go straight from his mummy's house to yours and literally never have to cook for himself?

You need to stop asking him, and TELL him he has a choice going forward. He can either eat what you're already cooking, or he can cook for himself. It's as simple as that.

@SylvanasWindrunner

He had to do housework and cooking before baby presumably, so why does he get to stop now? Why has his life become easier with a new baby? That shouldn't be how it works.

That is such a pertinent line. When you put it like that it makes no sense at all!!

What was the result @BubblinTrouble ? Did he step up?

This is my worst nightmare, dh cooking. While he can cook basic stuff like meat and vegetables I absolutely despise them (except roast beef).

For years I use to tell mine eat what you're given, tough shit if you don't like it. Then dh work hours changed meaning he was home more for dinner time so would cook. His favourite meals are bacon and cabbage and pork chops and boiled potatoes 🤮🤮🤮🤢🤢🤢🤮🤮🤮🤢🤢🤢 Dear god I was now on the other side of "Eat what you're given". Dh would joke it wasn't a restaurant, what I use to say, but fuck me, I'd never order this anywhere, not even if I was starving.

I then realised that what I had been serving up to everyone was just like me been handed these gross foods. So Seperate meals it is. It doesn't work for everyone and it's despised on here, but I'd rather eat something I like and it's only fair that the same goes for the others. Tbh I'm here most days so cooking is second nature to me, sometimes the meals are completely different, sometimes the base is the same, just with different additions.

There's 7 of us here, there are some similar likes, there are Allergies, there is sensory issues, there's food that actually make one of mine vomit. They all like their veg boiled 🤮I like roasted. I suggest on nights dh is cooking that we get take away, maybe you could do that.

You've got to find what works for you all and it sounds like this isn't working for you. So he needs to sit with you and work out a fair way. Just because you're on Mat leave doesn't mean you're on holiday or the designated chef!

I do most of the cooking at home but DH dits and does all meals with 13m DD at the weekend and evenings when he gets home as I hate feeding her at the moment (throwing food phase, very gross and messy). However he would cook if I asked He also gets up in the night with her now she doesn't need breastfeeding and is going through another regression. I clean the downstairs floor on my half day off when she's at nursery as I feel that's fair. You have to have a balance.

I agree you DH needs to cook one meal a week, on a fixed night - not just a "I'll call this my cooking night as we're out, having takeaway or eating leftovers". Something that you switch off from and just sit down to eat (as he does).

And for his meal, if he really objects to your meals, he could bulk cook on his night, freeze portions and after a few weeks he'd have a variety of "his" meals to reheat.

Also, him cooking on a regular basis is normalising this for your family. Your child(ren) see what the dynamic is, and having Mum be the short order cook isn't a healthy role model for them.

We set a rule that when the kids turned 13 they had to cook a family meal every week, now while that might seem a long way off, my DH has always had "his cooking night", so when the kids had to start it was a fait accompli, normal family routine. Only wish I'd had 6 kids to cover the whole week 😂